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Last week was the hottest week of the year so far including several days that were historically hot, here in Vancouver, Canada. Record-breaking hot days are unfortunately becoming increasingly common as a result of anthropogenic global warming. At one point my air conditioner blew a fuse in my fuse box (as a result of unusually high electrical consumption) and because I have older-style glass fuses, I had to buy new ones. Of course, high power use from air conditioning is fairly mild as global warming effects go, but it was a reminder of the fact that while many still want to ignore it, global warming affects us all.
The rise of global warming is also a common topic of discussion in Canada in general and in the province of British Columbia, in particular, because British Columbia is home to some of the largest natural gas deposits in the world. For decades now, the government of British Columbia has been investing in and promoting the extraction and export of natural gas justified by the position that it will reduce global greenhouse gas emissions because the burning of natural gas produces less pollution (including greenhouse gases) than coal, which is still used around the world. But as you can imagine, not everyone is a fan of this approach, the critics of British Columbia's natural gas approach point out that natural gas itself is a very potent greenhouse and gas leaks are all but inevitable when extracting gas, and while burning it produces less carbon dioxide it still produces considerable amounts of it, finally the method used to extract it (called "fracking") itself involves polluting the ground with extraction fluids.
Let me know in the comments, what you think.
Glossary for English learners:
Historically: The simplest meaning of this word is "regarding the past" but in this context, it means surpassing old records. E.g. "historically hot" means hotter than in recorded history.
Record-breaking: Something that surpasses previous records.
Anthropogenic: Caused by humans. "Anthro" means human-related and "genic" means causing.
Effect vs Affect: As nouns: Effect means the change something will cause. Affect means how someone feels.
To effect vs to affect: As verbs: To effect means to do something or to order something to be done, often used in the context of legal contracts. To affect means to have an effect. (It's confusing and even native speakers mix up these two)
Province: An administrative region similar to a state or prefecture.
To justify: To defend something using arguments.
Potent: Effective; can do the things it is expected to do.
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