Millions of young people all over the world are preparing for the Global Climate Strikes planned for September 20.
Marches, rallies, and walkouts are all on the table for students who want adults to start listening. Just in the United States, there are more than 800 events planned. These kids are calling for real action to combat climate change.
This was all started by a 16-year-old climate activist from Sweden, Greta Thunberg. She will speak at the United Nation's Emergency Climate Summit Monday, September 23.
She called for the mobilization of children around the world so leaders would listen.
ABC15 is also focusing on climate change and what it is doing to Arizona with our Climate in Crisis series.
Chief Meteorologist Amber Sullins began by speaking with the State's Climatologist, Nancy Selover, about these major impacts.
These impacts include hurricanes, the drought, and the extreme heat in the Valley. These changes getting worse each year and internationally recognized scientists believe we have less than 10 years to fix the planet.
In Arizona, we are seeing these changes rapidly taking place.
"It's real. Here we are, we did this. There's really no doubt that we did this," Selover said about the data she has seen in the past decade.
She has been tracking these changes her entire career. Things like the urban heat island that surrounds Phoenix.
"Because we're getting so much heat, we’re getting a lot more evaporation," Selover explains. "Because of that additional evaporation, we are getting drier conditions quicker. And, then that leads to more danger for fire."
Arizona residents are also a big part of this emissions cycle. People are trying to cool down from the extreme heat and that is putting more strain on the climate.
"The heat is creating more demand for electricity, so we're using more water to generate more electricity and carbon."
The Valley continues to expand as more people move to the valley and more developments are under construction. All that translates to higher and more extreme temperatures.
Selover explains the impact, "We're converting natural desert and now we're converting the last remaining irrigated agriculture. That irrigated agriculture was a huge, huge benefit in temperature because we were surrounded by all this."
When it comes to the "point of no return" Selover believes we have hit the limit.
"Oh, I would definitely say for sure because of the residence time of the CO2 in the atmosphere is well over 100 years. So, when you just say, 'stop burning fossil fuels tomorrow... and the seas will go down and the temperature will go down.' That's hogwash. It won't."
She adds there is another step we need to take.
"You need to be grabbing [Carbon dioxide] out of the atmosphere, too. You can't just say, we can stop adding it. We also need to start removing it."
