However, too much of CO2 in our air can be a bad thing. Humans are responsible for producing large amounts of CO2. Every day we use fossil fuels (such as coal, oil, or natural gas, which we find deep underground in solid, liquid, or gas forms) in our cars or power plants, or we cut down forests. All these activities combined have caused the amount of CO2 in our atmosphere to increase to levels not seen on earth in 55 million years. This increase in greenhouse gases heats the earth. The increase in temperature causes climate change, which is a change in average worldwide or regional weather patterns. Scientists project that climate change will cause a rise in sea level, more intense heat waves, extreme weather, species extinction, and other negative impacts on our world.
Luckily, there are several steps that we can take to reduce the impacts of future climate change. Scientists generally divide these helpful actions (known as "climate change mitigation") into three categories: reducing CO2 and other harmful greenhouse gas emissions (the release of these gases into the atmosphere), reducing the amount of sunlight that reaches the earth's surface, or removing CO2 from the atmosphere.

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