Water/Google Alerts

We, as a species, must use water more efficiently. The wasteful techniques employed today must soon be upgraded, or else we will face a dark future. Aquifers throughout the world are drying up and major bodies of water are receding. Most developed nations use water wastefully while other developing nations are lacking sufficient water to sustain their growing populations. I found an article about climate change in Forbes magazine through my Google alerts. This article stated that governments spent 409 billion dollars to artificially lower the price of fossil fuels. If governments would stop subsidizing fossil fuels, there may be more incentive on the consumer side to move towards renewable energy sources. This move to cleaner energy must happen soon or else fossil fuel wells will dry up and we will be left with no energy sources.

 http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/01/29/cutting-climate-change-is-simple-just-stop-subsidising-fossil-fuels/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEXQQaUeETg

This video shows how man’s negligence can have serious environmental impacts. A construction crew in Boone, NC decided to seal a newly paved parking lot right before a major rainstorm. When the rain came the sealant rain off into nearby Hodge’s creek. This killed every living organism for a substantial distance. This small creek runs to the New River which is the world’s 2^nd oldest river. If this crew had waited than the sealant could have been applied safely but instead they opted for the “easy way out” and defenseless living creatures paid the price. This story really hit home for me because I live a mere fifteen minutes away from Hodge’s creek. One of my favorite streams to fish is right next to Hodge’s, If the sludge had gone just a little farther both of the major river systems in the area (the New and Watauga) would have been affected.

A Fossil Fuel Haiku

If energy cost
equaled its carbon footprint
people would not drive.

Reducing the Global Scale of the Economy & Sustainability

In an interview with Mark Fischetti of Scientific American, Bill Mckimmon outlines his beliefs that the quickly globalizing economy must become more localized. At current consumption rates the Earth’s limited resources will be exhausted in the near future. Mr. Mckimmon blames this on global distribution of resources. Why would we produce wheat in Kansas and then ship it throughout the world? While in some areas it may be advantageous to produce a single resource and import the rest it may be more sustainable to become localized. By limiting the transportation costs of food (as well as other resources) we would become less dependent on fossil fuels. By forcing local farms to produce more food the world’s agriculture would become more efficient. Developing countries may benefit from this by becoming less dependent of developed nations. I believe that Mr. Mckimmon is right in the fact that current resource distribution methods are not sustainable. Something must be done to reduce the scale of the global economy so that when the inevitable elimination of the Earth’s natural gas resources does occur, we are ready for it.

According to Wikipedia sustainability means “the capacity to endure.” When I took Environmental Sustainability 200 we learned that sustainability was “the ability to sustain our way of life indefinitely.” It is hard to believe that something so difficult can be expressed in so few words. Sustainability is one of the greatest challenges of the modern world. The Environmental Protection Agency is working in conjunction with many other world agencies to move towards a more sustainable world. If you go to their website you will see what the EPA is doing to make our way of life more sustainable but the million dollar (or should I say priceless) question is, are we doing enough?

Climate Change

Human interactions with the environmental are changing the climate of Earth. The global average temperature is rising at an alarming rate. As many of the world’s countries industrialize larger amounts of pollutants are being released into the air. These Greenhouse Gasses (Methane, Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Monoxide, Perflurocarbons, etc…) are changing the chemical makeup of the atmosphere. The ozone layer that protects us from many of the sun’s harmful radiation is disappearing. As the global average temperature increases the global ice caps will continue to melt, resulting in sea level rise. Some nations that sit at or below sea level may not exist in 100 years. Climate change will also increase the frequency of severe drought. Many poor nations such as those in sub Saharan Africa will experience even harsher drought in years to come, which means more preventable deaths. It has only been in the last 50 to 60 years that any legislation has been passed to protect the environment.  Further actions to control and curb global climate change must be taken. If we continue to pollute and mistreat the environment in the same manner as the last 200 years than the prospects for the future will be grim.

Below is a link to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC is the leading provider of data and reports on climate change.

http://www.ipcc.ch/

Island Civilization Response

In his essay Island Civilization: A Vision for Human Occupancy of Earth in the Fourth Millennium Dr. Robert Nash proposes a theory that he believes will help solve the growing environmental crises as well as help improve the interactions between Homo Sapiens and planet Earth. Dr. Nash’s theory consists of multiple high density “cities” that house large numbers of people in a small, confined area. These miniature metropolises would be completely independent of one another, both economically and physically, mirroring the once great city states of ancient Greece. By doing this he believes that the major problems of today’s society (lack of resources, war, etc…) will be finally put to rest. Currently humans are populating Earth at an alarming rate. We as a species have grown in numbers exponentially over the last 100 years. As the finite resources of planet Earth are drained we are left with a question, “does Earth have a carrying capacity?” Recent studies show that the global average temperature of Earth is warming. We, as a species, have managed to alter the climate of our own environment. It is only recently that legislation has been passed to reduce the environmental impact of our interactions with the planet. Dr. Nash also addresses the common misconception of what is “wild.” If you go and sample a random group of people by asking them what wilderness is, you would hear similar answers describing land that is uninhabited by humans and where wild animals live. While this is not necessarily incorrect the actual meaning of wilderness is land that is not controlled. The islands of human population proposed by Dr. Nash are just one of many proposals that could help restore Earth to its wild state, completely cutting human ties to the rest of the world and once again letting the wilderness that we once controlled take over.

            Dr. Nash’s idea for island civilizations has many good components. By severing mankind’s ties with nature we would be letting the indigenous fauna of Earth once again reign supreme, freeing them of their current repressed state. The island civilizations would also help reduce global pollution. By reducing the amount of pollutants released into the atmosphere the environment of earth would eventually stabilize and life would become more sustainable. The Island State proposal also has some problems. By confining large amounts of people in a small space the likelihood of violence increases. Research shows that rats, when forced to live in a confined space, become more violent towards one another, resulting in fights and even death. The fantasy of the end of war and world peace is also virtually unattainable. When Dr. Nash compares the futuristic island super cities to the self-sufficient city states of ancient Greece he fails to mention that the Greeks often waged war amongst themselves, fighting for one city state’s supremacy over the others. While the island model eliminates want for land from the causes of these wars it is impossible to predict whether each city will remain at peace with its neighbors. Dr. Nash also lacks explaining what kind of governing body each Island would have and how the islands would be governed as a whole, a problem that remains to be unanswered today. By being completely resource independent the government may resemble that of modern Communist states where wealth is supposed to distributed evenly. Unfortunately this rarely happens due to theft and corruption of high ranking officials, which has caused most modern communist governments to fail. I believe that Dr. Nash’s proposal of Island civilizations would help restore the Earth to the wilderness it was before human habitation, but it would not be long until human greed exceeded the boundaries of these isolated capsules and the Island system would fail.