If you visit climate modeling sites on the web, you may be deluged with technical terms and numerical analyses. A better place to begin your understanding of climate modeling is to visit the National Climactic Data Center (NCDC), billed as "the world's largest active archive of weather data". What types of data does the NCDC provide? Propose two or three questions that you might like to investigate using data provided at the NCDC.

Given the rate at which new information about environmental effects is being generated, some parts of this book will be of date before it comes to press. Consult the web to find two documents on global warming that were published in the last calendar year. For each, give the title, author or source, URL, and the date last updated. Summarize the new information that you found. If this information is different from your textbook, cite the differences.

Some people believe that human activities have amplified the greenhouse effect; others do not. Find out what the skeptics have to say about the topic. At these two sites, you will find a variety of resources that take a lukewarm view of global warming.

• Skepticism: Global Warming
  
• Cato Institute (use their search engine to search for Global Warming)

*These sites were located by searching for "global warming" and "skeptics". Many search engines allow "wild cards" such as *. Thus, by typing skeptic*, you will bring up sites that include related words such as skeptics, skeptical or skepticism.

Has the greenhouse effect been amplified by human activities?
a. Find some web links to several organizations that don't believe so. Try the Global Warming Skeptics web page or that from the Greening Earth Society. Newspapers, television and radio-related web pages may contain editorials that criticize global warming as a scientific concept.
b. Is there scientific merit to the arguments of those opposing global warming? Cite specific cases.

It is no secret which countries are emitting the highest amounts of CO₂. You can access a list of the Top 20 fossil fuel CO₂ emitters right on the web. This list is provided by the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center and gives carbon dioxide emissions both per country and per capita (person) as of a year or two ago. Three sets of data are available: on a regional, national or global basis.
a. Your text book cites the United States and the Peoples' Republic of China as the leaders in total CO₂ emissions from fossil fuels. What countries rank 3rd, 4th and 5th? Whose emissions are relatively low? Access the national database to answer these questions.
b. Now look at the emissions per capita. Which countries have the highest emissions per person? Do the top five differ per capita by very much?