Spring 2014
An area of extraordinarily high temperature stretching more than half way around the globe helped propel this past March into the record books as the fourth warmest since historical record-keeping began in 1880, according to NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
The global average temperature for March was warmer only in 2002, 2010 and 1990.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/imageo/2014/04/14/massive-sea-of-warmth/#.U01TJfldXZJ
In this article, published in the New York Times, Stephen Castle touches on the issue of the smog that beset London on Wednesday. According to Castle, “Central London had moderate levels of air pollution on Wednesday, with a score of 6 on an index on which 10 ranks “very high.”” Recall that a number of cities in China were beset by the same problems with smog earlier this year. In fact, in this article, published in The Guardian, author Adam Vaughan identifies nine cities that suffered from the same smog issues. Call to memory too that Paris came under clouds of smog earlier this year, initiating a driving ban and offering free mass transit. More on this can be found in this article published in the Los Angeles Times.
In an era where cities around the world are being beset by smog and all of the health-related implications of the pollution causing it, will this become the new norm?
In this article, published in the New York Times, author Justin Gillis touches on the recent report published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a branch of the United Nations “that periodically summarizes climate science.” The main point of the report was that the worst is yet to come. Given that climate change is a present issue, occurring everyday, the effects of it are difficult to slow down without taking the serious steps to cut back on carbon and greenhouse gas emissions.
On the front of human rights, the report “emphasized that the world’s food supply is at considerable risk – a threat that could have serious consequences for the poorest nations” (emphasis mine).
Furthermore, on the sociological and political fronts, the report “cited the risk of death or injury on a wide scale, probable damage to public health, displacement of people and potential mass migrations.”
Finally, on the economic side, “climate-change impacts are projected to slow down economic growth, make poverty reduction more difficult, further erode food security, and prolong existing and create new poverty traps, the latter particularly in urban areas and emerging hot spots of hunger.”
Climate change is not only about the earth and the resources that are exhausted through mass consumption, though these are two ends in and of themselves. Climate change has implications in the realms of economics, politics and even human rights.
The graphite used in lithium ion batteries primarily comes from China and graphite pollution is negatively impacting air and water quality. Unfortunately, lithium ion batteries are vital to many clean electric vehicles in the US, including those manufactured by Tesla.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-14/teslas-in-california-help-bring-dirty-rain-to-china.html
Here is a New York Times article on the declining moose population in Minnesota. The moose thrive in this abnormally long winter, but have the past hotter and longer summers in combination with shorter winters stressed them out? With warmer temps, the white-tailed deer population has risen which is the carrier of brain worm, which is fatal to moose. Is climate change to blame? If it is, what can we do for the Minnesota moose population. Or is this rapid recent decline similar to that of the brown bats on the East Coast…unable to be explained.
This op-ed in the NY Times explains how drought, water, California agriculture, and increasing consumption of beef in Asia are all connected.
As nearly 95% of the state of California remains in a drought, new desalination plants are being considered.
A new 50 million gallon/day plant is on track to open Carlsbad, Ca in two years, and several other communities in the state are considering similar solutions. However, the ecological impact and the high price that are still inherent to desalination are causing many towns to hold to out for cheaper sources of water.
Yesterday I came across an article in NPR’s The Salt blog which I found to be somewhat disheartening. In Why Farmers Can Prevent Global Warming Just As Well As Vegetarians, factory farming-like practices are touted as the best solution for mitigating greenhouse gas emissions from the livestock industry.
In no way am I questioning the logic behind the article’s source. As the demand for animal products rises globally, so will the already vast emissions from the livestock industry due to feeding, raising, transporting, and the creation of new grazing lands. Thus, per the findings of the study, animals should be raised in an industrial facility on grain, and the creation of new grazing land for livestock should be avoided. (It should be noted that “grain” may not mean what you think it means.) It makes sense that deforestation is not good, and that “…transitions toward more productive livestock production systems…” should be more efficient and economical, but at what cost ethically? Neither the article nor the abstract of its (pay walled) primary source explicitly mention the practices that factory farms are notorious for; however, it’s fairly easy to make that connection when their recommendations rely heavily on limiting land use and altering livestock diets. Is this really a solution that we should be suggesting to developing nations?
Through all of this, I am still having trouble understanding how the factory farming of meat can somehow be just as eco-friendly as non-consumption, and it saddens me to realize that the escalation of these farming practices are the likely outcome when compared to simple restraint.
If you haven’t heard of it before, I think NPR does a really nice job putting together their podcast, TED Radio Hour. As the title suggests, it’s a selection of related TED talks, but also mixes-in interviews with each of the featured speakers. The show translates well to an audio podcast but the video for each talk is easily accessible from the NPR website.
The episode from last week was titled, Everything is Connected, where the theme was based on “…how everything in nature is connected, and how we can restore its delicate balance.” If you only had time to listen one segment, I would suggest, What Listening To Nature Teaches Us About Changing Habitats. The segment features Bernie Krause, who has been recording the sounds of nature for over 45 years. From the NPR link:
Bernie Krause is a bioacoustician whose recordings have uncovered nature’s rich sonic tapestry — along with some unexpected results. Krause captures the fading voices of nature, studying sonic interplay between species as they attract mates, hunt prey and sound out their roles in the ecosystem. His documentation of vanishing aural habitats is a chilling reminder of shrinking biodiversity.
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