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Task 6: One Planet Living & Cool Cities

Modern cities are developing in range ways as its obvious her with respect to the UAE’s cities. Those improvements have expressed both positive and negative growth. Nowadays, the number of population is increasing day to day, where citizen tend to use more energy that produces more CO2 and heat. Thus, the developers have searched out basic strategy that can deal with heat and CO2 throughout building Cool Cities. People now are more aware of this issue where they are trying to reduce or minimize the amount of heat and CO2 to the minimal level. In this essay I will summarize some points including the expected role from people who lives in those modern cities. Also I will point out the ways that modern cities can minimize their usage of energy that results an increasing in carbon release.

First of all, I will come across the link between modern cities and global warming. Starting with, “one notable concern is with regard to the buildings. For example, buildings in the UAE don’t have spaces so they don’t provide any shade as well as poor materials used in construction” (Younes 2). Additionally, a main factor to be taken in consider is transportation. In another words, as we all know there is a quick growth in the UAE population that directed to a sharp increase in the usage of cars. Those increases amounts of energy spending and carbon were affecting our atmosphere around us.

Well after having a look at some handouts, I found out very interesting and recommended solutions that attracted my attention on how to reduce the level of energy and carbon usage. Starting with climate control. To illustrate, Mr. Hope stated that “sorouh plans to circulate seawater underground to cool the pavement and benches and the exterior of buildings” (Hope 2). Mr. Younes stated that “using creative architecture will cut the energy consumption by 50-70 %” (Younes 3). Moreover, “they will create abundance of trees and water to prevent the heat island effects, filtered light rooftops which can reduce the impact of sun heat and utilizes natural energy such as wind energy” (Cool cities). Furthermore reducing the carbon caused by transportation.

To clarify more, cities now are encouraging citizen to use public transportations as they become more knowledge of the danger of this issue. In addition they are trying to increase the awareness of using new ways of transportations that saves energy with less carbon. “Cool city will use Monorail, Hybridcar, Light rail transit and solar ship for water transportation” (Cool cities).

In conclusion, cool cities are the best idea that works on reducing carbon emission all over the world. On the other side, there are many challenges that could face this project. “Masdar” is making a bigger plan in order to make people live in less polluted cities that result from global warming. In my opinion, I believe that those solutions are very useful to reduce the carbon emission, however UAE people and other people from the middle east might have some difficulties in changing their life style especially those countries that known as oil producing countries.


Works Cited
Cool cities. Prod. SDCJ. 4 May 2009 .
Hope, Bradley. "Cool ideas to beat the heat." The National NewsPaper [Abu Dhabi] 5 May 2008:
Salama, Vivian. "Building a green dream." The National NewsPaper [Abu Dhabi] 6 May 2008:
Stanton. "Masdar?s green dream is not for all." The National NewsPaper [Abu Dhabi] 25 Apr. 2008:

Carbon Footprint Task 5

There are various ways to measure our impact on the earth from an environmental standpoint. One of these ways is by way of our carbon footprint. In the following report, I will define what a carbon footprint is, show how a carbon footprint measured, and show how I rank in comparison to others, my country and the worlds as whole and finally I’ll make some suggestions as to how we can reduce our carbon footprints.
In this part I will define what carbon footprint is. A carbon footprint is the amount of human effeteness activities that appears on the environment. In other words, “A carbon footprint is often expressed as tons of carbon dioxide or tons of carbon emitted, usually on an annual basis” (Renewable Energy Sources 1).

There are two main ways in order to measure a carbon footprint. Firstly, is by scheming the quantity of the production released .secondly, is by creating a life cycle. The carbon footprints vary from person to another, because each human has his/her own standards and they have certain aspects that could affects their footprint on the environment around. As a result to that it is very hard to calculate and give an accurate amount about the number of the world carbon footprint according to each person energy used in their daily activities such as traveling, transportation, etc… but on the other hand it raises human awareness about how much their simple activities can affect the planet so they can think critically in order to save their planet.


I was wandering the amount of carbon footprint that I affect the planet by so I measured my carbon footprint through a website http://footprint.wwf.org.uk/ and http://www.myfootprint.org/. in includes questions on food, Travel, home and stuff in different grouping. I scored 3.07, where my classmate Abdull Alfazari scored the highest with a total of 7.145 .Then my classmate Zabir recorded a reading of 2.585 making him the second, Sultan Saoud coming in third place with a reading of 2.235, Salah came fourth with a score of 1.7and finally Jassim scored 1.475. UAE has poor reputation as far as energy use is concerned.
It is important to save our planet because even simple daily activities can affect the environment around us; I highly recommend reducing the amount of carbon footprint. This will happened if humans worked together as a one hand in saving energy, by switching off all lights and electrical machine when it’s not needed. Choose energy-efficient appliances and light bulbs. Another major point is recycling, where humans can use recycled products such as stationery, and so on. Finally, in the website http://extinct.wwf.org.uk they stated that saving water is a curial factor to decrease carbon footprint, in daily activities like cooking, washing dishes, etc… (Re-think your lifestyle 1)
In brief, this report helped me to primarily become more aware of my impact on the environment and take into consideration ways that I can also benefit the environment by becoming a responsible.

An Inconvenient truth argument

Researchers have been arguing about the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” which represents the global warming issue. Some critics’ admired this movie. This essay will outline the two sides of the argument about An Inconvenient truth film.
Number of people agreed about this movie. First of all, the main point was that Al Gore’s presenting constructs the film in a very interesting way which showed that he had a huge background on this issue. For example, he dealt with the audience as adults; moreover he added some entertainments like jokes. Furthermore he stayed away from political principles in his documentary. In the empire reviews stated that Statistic and scientists proved that the global warming is not new observable fact (O’Hara 2). They support their opinion by several excellent environmental researchers who says that Al Gore have the correct facts.
However, there are some discussions against. The first point to consider is that the reviewers believe that he is trying to be against the Republicans, where they admitted that this documentary was making fun of Bush administration and other Republicans. Another point is that Al Gore waist a very long period only for proving that the global warming is taking place. According to Scott, the film doesn’t provide the impression to be about the global warming but it is about Al Gore’s life (Scott 1)
In conclusion, the movie converse a crucial issue “global warming” even with the arguments for and against it. I recommend that we all should work as a one hand in order to protect the planet from the calamite changes.

Works Cited
O'Hara, Helen. "An Inconvenient Truth." Http://www.empireonline.com. 26 Feb. 2009 .
Scott, and Eric. "Movie Review Inconvenient Truth, An." Three Movie Buffs Review. 25 Nov. 2006. Paramount Classice. 26 Feb. 2009 .

An Inconvenient Truth: A Summary

Al Gore, the host, was the vice-president of the United State in the Clinton Administration. He first took an interest in climate change in grade school and has continued to take an interest in this subject as a politician. In this documentary, he highlights the relationship between the emission of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the corresponding temperatures over a 650,000 year period. Let’s now take a look at some of the major results of global warming according to Gores presentation.
The film prevail the causes/effects and dangerous about global warming and it suggest some actions to prevent it. It does focus on Al Gore and his travels in support of his efforts to educate people about the severity of the climate crisis and intersperses Gore's exploration of data and predictions about climate change and its potential for disaster with Gore's life story. The film reviews the scientific opinion on climate change, discusses the politics and economics of global warming. In addition, the film examines the annual temperature and CO2 levels for the past 650,000 years in Antarctic ice core samples. It's also discusses the possibility of the collapse of a major ice sheet in Greenland or in West Antarctica, either of which could raise global sea levels by approximately 20 feet. The film contains some short animated projections of what could happen to different animals more vulnerable to climate change.
To sum up, Al Gore says that although the situation regarding global warming appears dire, he does speak passionately looking forward to the future with hope. His presentation concludes with parting nuggets of practical advice as to how man can play a role in curbing climate change.