Burning fossil fuels causes seven million unnecessary deaths per year 1. According to the World Health Organization , 7 million people die each year as a result of air pollution. 2. There are also the deaths caused by coal mining, explosions of offshore drilling rigs. 3. Each year 39.8 billion tons of CO2 are pumped into the atmosphere. 4. There is also pollution of the ocean by spillage of crude oil from tankers. 5. We have already killed off 40% of the phytoplankton in the oceans. All fish life is dependent on phytoplankton. When all of the phytoplankton are gone, the ocean will be a desert, and there will be no fish. Some authors feel that we will reach a point soon when all phytoplankton will disappear, along with all of the fish. 6. Acidification of the ocean. It is because of the acidification that the phytoplankton are disappearing. The acidification is directly due to CO2 7. The quality of life has been degraded because of air pollution. The smog in Los Angeles and also in Beijing makes life miserable. 8. Global warming is caused by the presence of CO2 in the atmosphere. When the ice caps melt we will lose a tenth of the world land due to rising ocean levels, and this will create wars, as people fight for the remaining land. If we have runaway warming, it may cause the complete extinction of life on this earth. 9. Burning coal produces large areas of strip mining and also produces large amounts of coal ash which contains mercury, arsenic, sulfur, radon. These are leaching into the ground water and also being carried to the oceans. 10. The acidification of the oceans is also causing the coral reefs to disappear. 11. A large cruise ship uses about 467,000 gallons of fuel to make a seven day cruise, and when large ships leave port and get out onto the “ocean” they burn bunker fuel which is similar to asphalt and is very dirty. It contains sulfur , mercury, arsenic and other poisons. 12. The burning of fossil fuels should have stopped 50 years ago but since that didn't happen, it needs to be stopped this year.