Many important aspects of global warming need to be better appreciated if this looming crisis is to ever be averted. Global Warming Reality: A Naturalist Action Plan is aimed at high school and college students. It seeks to promote widespread debate and discussion in regard to developing practical solutions to this major problem. It encourages massive global reforestation and increasing the solar reflectivity, or albedo, of the Earth's surface. Practical Insulated Soil Pad Exhibits are introduced to illustrate the upward soil heat transfer potential of any underlying capillary moisture transport that is induced. A phenomenon that is commonly known as rising damp. The test exhibit consists of a 16 by 16 foot square pad with a 6-mil thick polyethylene ground cover, a 4-inch thick layer of extruded polystyrene foam insulation, and a polypropylene tarpaulin cover that is staked to level ground. The winter reading of a single temperature sensor, underneath the center of the pad, offers to display the possible base temperature in local above grade buildings employing the inverted cave phenomenon. This then literally turns the massive storage of solar energy in the Earth's subsoil into a practical new heat source that is widely available. As a senior educator, the author believes that most people are fascinated by such scientific exhibits that can help them to see an old problem in a valuable new light. The book offers readers a well illustrated appreciation of the edge effects, minimum ground contact area, geometry, equipment integration, geological and climatic concerns that are involved.
