Assess the reasons why some people are concerned about the destruction of rainforest for commercial uses.
Answers
long-term climate change is caused by orbital changes (Milankovitch mechanism) over 10,000 years,
but it happens slowly and only changes climate very gradually; it seems to be responsible for ice ages,
which have a climate very different from today’s.
• Volcanic activity, on the other hand, causes climate cooling, but only for short periods of time, usually
just a few years.
• Asteroid impacts are very rare, but would cool the climate rather like a volcanic eruption; the cooling
would be much worse but still only for a few years or a decade.
• Variations in solar output (sunspots) cause both warming and cooling for several decades, like the
Little Ice Age – but only by 0.5–1.0 °C.
• Overall, orbital changes cause long-term, significant changes whereas the other causes are much
shorter in timescale.
Explanation: