Effects of Climate Change on Plant Growth Dylan Sharma (Year 10, Churchill)
This article will present scientific evidence for the way plants adapt to climate change and research on the ways plants develop in order to sustain themselves whilst experiencing climate change.
EFFECTS ON PLANTS Climate change is having a significant effect on the growth of plants. The number of days per year in which a plant has the right conditions to grow within the next 80 years could decrease by as much as 11% due to climate change [1]. This would highly affect food production, as well as many farmers, and low paid workers who depend on the crops for food. The main cause of this decrease would be the large increase in CO2 levels due to the increase in temperature, as the high temperatures increase the amount of water vapour which amplifies the greenhouse gases. The Earth’s average temperature has increased by 0.8 degrees in the last 200 years [4], but has only started rapidly increasing in recent times due to new technology and infrastructure which increases greenhouse gas emissions. This is due to natural combustion processes such as respiration and decomposition, and man-made processes such as burning of fossil fuels and deforestation. This leads to less photosynthesis which takes in carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to change it into oxygen, resulting in more carbon dioxide remaining in the atmosphere. Research has shown1 that if the temperature of the earth’s atmosphere increases, then the number of freezing days will also decrease. Freezing days are extremely crucial for the plant as they are normally the days in which plants don’t grow due to lack of heat. This is because a plant needs an optimum temperature in order for it’s enzymes to work; if it is too cold the enzymes won’t function well and if it is too hot the enzymes would denature, meaning the enzymes have to be at a perfect temperature in order to function well. If freezing days decrease by 7% then there will be a positive increase of growth in the plants [1]; however, too much increase in temperature would mean the water availability for the plant would also decrease. This is because there would be more energy to transfer water into water vapour, which means there would be water on the ground less consistently available. As water is one of the key reactants for photosynthesis it is extremely important for providing energy which helps the growth of the plant. Overall, the temperature increasing or decreasing is bad for plant growth due to the enzymes not working efficiently; however, too high an increase in temperature could also lead to lack of water supply due to evaporation which is greater than the effect of denaturing of the enzymes due to too high temperatures. Another effect of climate change is the effect on forests throughout the world. Temperature increase reduces plant growth, as the water supply will be minimal and the enzymes may denature, which is seen through deserts such as the Sahara where the only plants living there are cacti due to their adaptations to the decreased in water supply. Forests are an essential provider of food and habitat to thousands of species of animals. These animals depend completely on the forest for food and a home. Increased temperatures would mean that the number of stable trees would decrease substantially and many habitats will be lost resulting in a decreasing population of animals and birds essential to the food chain and our ecosystem. In order for plants to react to climate change, they have to adapt to the change in CO2 levels in the atmosphere. However, research showed some plants which are older find it harder to adapt to climate change and therefore are highly affected by the increase in temperature levels, leading to an increase in CO2 levels [1]. This is because older plants are a lot slower growing and flowering than younger plants as they respire and carry out photosynthesis1 at a slower rate. As well as this, the older plants need more water to survive and as there has been a decrease in water due to the rise in temperature the older plants struggle to adapt1. Essentially, this means the older the plant, the more difficult it is to adapt and therefore much more likely to die from climate change.
97
