Dear Mr./Mrs. President,

I know you have a lot on your plate right now, but climate change should be at the top of that plate. At the moment, there are many issues that will affect future generations, but climate change affects whether or not those future generations will exist.

Climate change has caused some major problems. The planet has been warmed by 1.4 degrees fahrenheit since the 1800s. It doesn't seem like much, but it makes a big difference. 2015 was the hottest year worldwide (since we started record keeping in the 19th century). The warming of the earth has reduced rainfall, causing more droughts, such as the one in California, and has begun to melt much of the earth's ice in the polar regions. This is leading to higher sea levels. If we continue , not only will it be too hot to live on earth, but we'll all be under water.

Climate change is being caused by increasing carbon dioxide concentration in the earth's atmosphere creating a green house effect that is trapping the sun's warmth. Since 1750, there has been a 31% increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. 75% of this increase has come from the burning of fossil fuels.

So, what can you do to put a hold on the damaging effects of climate change? The whole idea is to reduce green house gas emissions. After all, the United States is the 2nd largest contributor of greenhouse gases with 19.2% of emissions. An important step towards reducing green house gas emissions is looking into cleaner, more efficient energies, such as wind energy or hydropower. Many of these clean energies have a lot to provide but, need help becoming bigger contributors to the world's energy, over fossil fuels. For example, the world wind generating capacity is increasing very quickly. In 1999 the world wind generating capacity had surpassed 10,000 megawatts. As president you can seize this opportunity and take the next step towards cleaner energy.

Climate change isn't going to stop. We need to take action now to to prevent it from growing to a point where we can't control it. We have the opportunity to drift away from the path towards the destruction of climate change, to a path leading to a bright future for the generations to come.

Sincerely,

David