humans destroying the earth essay

How we’re harming the planet—and ourselves

Human-caused changes in the global environment, such as deforestation and air pollution , are increasingly threatening our own health and well-being, according to Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s Samuel Myers .

In an interview on the NPR radio show “Living on Earth” that aired the week of November 27, 2020, Myers—principal research scientist, planetary health, at Harvard Chan School, and director of Harvard University’s Planetary Health Alliance —discussed how our own disruptions to the planet’s natural systems are increasing the risk both of infectious diseases , such as COVID-19 , and non-infectious diseases .

“Nine million excess deaths a year are attributable to pollution,” Myers told host Steve Curwood in a wide-ranging conversation. “Those deaths are noncommunicable diseases—they’re heart disease, stroke, respiratory disease, cancer.”

The unintended consequences of human activity on human health is a recurrent theme in the 2020 book “Planetary Health: Protecting Nature to Protect Ourselves,” which Myers co-edited. Myers’ own research has shown that by mid-century rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could lead to a depletion of iron, zinc, protein, and other essential nutrients in agricultural crops. That loss could translate into nutritional deficiencies in more than 150 million people worldwide. “Who would have thought if we were sitting around 20 years ago having a beer that, you know, adding carbon dioxide would make our food less nutritious,” Myers told Curwood. “And yet it potentially affects hundreds of millions of people.”

Myers also discussed the less visible impacts of planetary changes on mental health . While the emotional effects of catastrophic events such as hurricanes or fires on victims has been well-documented, Myers said we are just starting to understand the wider but more subtle effects of “eco-anxiety or ecological grief” brought on, for example, by the destruction of two-thirds of the planet’s animal population in the past 50 years.

“The first step is to acknowledge that almost every single person in this country is experiencing some form of ecologically associated threat,” Myers said. New movements such as the global climate strike organized by Greta Thunberg or Extinction Rebellion, he said, offer new hope in translating that acknowledgment into collective action. “To take action is not only necessary,” said Myers. “It’s also therapeutic.”

Listen to the “Living on Earth” interview: Planetary Health

Human Impact on Environment Essay

Ecological problem is one of the most important issues nowadays. Human activities have a negative impact on the environment. Humanity currently faces problems with air, water, and lands pollution, unreasonable agricultural systems, deforestation, and others. As a result, the number of available natural resources is decreasing. Another negative consequence of human activities is the process of global warming and global climate changes. These changes affect the whole Earth and might result in adverse consequences for people and wild nature (“The Consequences of Climate Change”). Therefore, it is obvious that the situation should be improved.

Probably, everybody asks oneself what he or she personally could do to improve the ecological situation. After all, the main source of pollution is the industry sector. However, we all belong to humanity and make our small impact on the environment. And we all could make the situation slightly better. Our daily habits have both positive and negative long-term consequences for the world we live in. It is important to understand to plan our life and our activities.

As far as my family and I are concerned, we performed several steps to reduce the negative impact on the environment. First of all, we all try to save clean water. We always remember to turn off our taps. We do not keep the water running when we brush teeth or wash something. Saving clean water is very important for the environment. The problem of clean water availability, probably, is one of the most pressing. No living creature can survive without clean water. Fewer sources we use, more of them remain for the future generation.

Another important action we perform to improve the situation with water is avoiding water pollution. Our family refused to use cleaning detergents with phosphates as it is known that these substances are harmful to human health. Moreover, it is difficult to eliminate these compounds from water. Therefore, phosphates in the water get to nature and poison living organisms. Thus, it is better to use detergents without phosphates. It helps to keep the healthy and to reduce water pollution.

Except for water pollution, there are a lot of other problems that need to be solved. One of them is waste deposits. These deposits occupy a large area. Different wastes need different (however, always significant) times to decompose. Besides, while decomposing, a lot of harmful compounds appear. These compounds poison the land and can get to the water. In the last decades, a lot of programs of waste separation appeared. People are asked to separate the waste: to combine plastic with plastic, organic with organic, and paper with paper. Different wastes are treated in different ways, which allows cutting pollution. For example, plastic can be remolded and used again, while it requires hundreds of years for its degradation in nature. Moreover, during this process, a lot of harmful products release (Law and Thompson 144). Thus, it is better to separate plastic material and recycle it. It would be even better not to use plastic at all, and when it is possible, try to use biopolymers instead.

It is important to understand that small steps are better than nothing. If we want to improve the ecological situation, we should start with ourselves, analyze our daily activities, and make improvements where it is possible. Carrying about our environment is our responsibility as citizens. Finally, the small effects of such actions might summarize positive global changes.

Works Cited

“The Consequences of Climate Change.” NASA . 2017, Web.

Law, Kara Lavender, and Richard C. Thompson. “Microplastics in the Seas.” Science, vol. 345, no. 6193, 2014, pp. 144-145.

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IvyPanda. (2021, May 24). Human Impact on Environment. https://ivypanda.com/essays/human-impact-on-environment/

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Gender and Illness in Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper"
The Effect of Inhibitors and Temperature on Enzyme Reactions
Adenosine Triphosphate, Energy and Phosphorylation
Environment and Human Attitude Towards It
"Heat" Environmental Documentary by PBS
Episode 2 of "Strange Days on Planet Earth" Series
"The Great Climate Experiment" by Ken Caldeira
Human Interaction with the Earth

Human Impacts on the Environment

Humans impact the physical environment in many ways: overpopulation, pollution, burning fossil fuels, and deforestation. Changes like these have triggered climate change, soil erosion, poor air quality, and undrinkable water. These negative impacts can affect human behavior and can prompt mass migrations or battles over clean water.

Help your students understand the impact humans have on the physical environment with these classroom resources.

Earth Science, Geology, Geography, Physical Geography

Ideas for Action
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Why Join the MAHB?
Current Associates
Current Nodes
What is the MAHB?
Who is the MAHB?
Acknowledgments

Could humans really destroy all life on Earth?

| June 30, 2021 | Leave a Comment

Dead albatross. Opphaver: Fotograf 90212004 Rettighetshaver: NTB Kilde: https://scanpix.no/spWebApp/preview/editorial/-9m24ROwkHI

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Publication Info: BBC Global News

Date of Publication: May 21

Year of Publication: 2021

Publication City: London, UK

Publisher: BBC Future

Author(s): Santhosh Mathew

The seemingly insatiable human tendency to consume is changing our planet and the life on it, but can we change our behavior?

Among the many global catastrophic risks known to humans, some are entertained in the media more than the others. Asteroid impacts, supervolcano eruptions, and climate change have all received the Hollywood treatment. And each of these has taken a devastating toll on our planet’s life in the past. Yet, unknown to many people, a new global threat capable of destroying life itself is brewing in the shadows of our everyday lives. It’s driven by the immense human desire for material consumption. And paradoxically it is a consequence of human life itself.

Read the full article here .

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Humans Are Speeding Extinction and Altering the Natural World at an ‘Unprecedented’ Pace

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By Brad Plumer

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WASHINGTON — Humans are transforming Earth’s natural landscapes so dramatically that as many as one million plant and animal species are now at risk of extinction, posing a dire threat to ecosystems that people all over the world depend on for their survival, a sweeping new United Nations assessment has concluded.

The 1,500-page report, compiled by hundreds of international experts and based on thousands of scientific studies, is the most exhaustive look yet at the decline in biodiversity across the globe and the dangers that creates for human civilization. A summary of its findings , which was approved by representatives from the United States and 131 other countries, was released Monday in Paris. The full report is set to be published this year.

Its conclusions are stark. In most major land habitats, from the savannas of Africa to the rain forests of South America, the average abundance of native plant and animal life has fallen by 20 percent or more, mainly over the past century. With the human population passing 7 billion, activities like farming, logging, poaching, fishing and mining are altering the natural world at a rate “unprecedented in human history.”

At the same time, a new threat has emerged: Global warming has become a major driver of wildlife decline , the assessment found, by shifting or shrinking the local climates that many mammals, birds , insects, fish and plants evolved to survive in. When combined with the other ways humans are damaging the environment, climate change is now pushing a growing number of species, such as the Bengal tiger , closer to extinction.

As a result, biodiversity loss is projected to accelerate through 2050, particularly in the tropics, unless countries drastically step up their conservation efforts.

The report is not the first to paint a grim portrait of Earth’s ecosystems. But it goes further by detailing how closely human well-being is intertwined with the fate of other species.

“For a long time, people just thought of biodiversity as saving nature for its own sake,” said Robert Watson, chair of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, which conducted the assessment at the request of national governments. “But this report makes clear the links between biodiversity and nature and things like food security and clean water in both rich and poor countries.”

A previous report by the group had estimated that, in the Americas, nature provides some $24 trillion of non-monetized benefits to humans each year. The Amazon rain forest absorbs immense quantities of carbon dioxide and helps slow the pace of global warming. Wetlands purify drinking water. Coral reefs sustain tourism and fisheries in the Caribbean. Exotic tropical plants form the basis of a variety of medicines.

But as these natural landscapes wither and become less biologically rich, the services they can provide to humans have been dwindling.

Humans are producing more food than ever, but land degradation is already harming agricultural productivity on 23 percent of the planet’s land area, the new report said. The decline of wild bees and other insects that help pollinate fruits and vegetables is putting up to $577 billion in annual crop production at risk. The loss of mangrove forests and coral reefs along coasts could expose up to 300 million people to increased risk of flooding.

The authors note that the devastation of nature has become so severe that piecemeal efforts to protect individual species or to set up wildlife refuges will no longer be sufficient. Instead, they call for “transformative changes” that include curbing wasteful consumption, slimming down agriculture’s environmental footprint and cracking down on illegal logging and fishing.

“It’s no longer enough to focus just on environmental policy,” said Sandra M. Díaz, a lead author of the study and an ecologist at the National University of Córdoba in Argentina. “We need to build biodiversity considerations into trade and infrastructure decisions, the way that health or human rights are built into every aspect of social and economic decision-making.”

Scientists have cataloged only a fraction of living creatures, some 1.3 million; the report estimates there may be as many as 8 million plant and animal species on the planet, most of them insects. Since 1500, at least 680 species have blinked out of existence, including the Pinta giant tortoise of the Galápagos Islands and the Guam flying fox.

Though outside experts cautioned it could be difficult to make precise forecasts, the report warns of a looming extinction crisis, with extinction rates currently tens to hundreds of times higher than they have been in the past 10 million years.

“Human actions threaten more species with global extinction now than ever before,” the report concludes, estimating that “around 1 million species already face extinction, many within decades, unless action is taken.”

Unless nations step up their efforts to protect what natural habitats are left, they could witness the disappearance of 40 percent of amphibian species, one-third of marine mammals and one-third of reef-forming corals. More than 500,000 land species, the report said, do not have enough natural habitat left to ensure their long-term survival.

Over the past 50 years, global biodiversity loss has primarily been driven by activities like the clearing of forests for farmland, the expansion of roads and cities, logging, hunting, overfishing, water pollution and the transport of invasive species around the globe.

In Indonesia, the replacement of rain forest with palm oil plantations has ravaged the habitat of critically endangered orangutans and Sumatran tigers. In Mozambique, ivory poachers helped kill off nearly 7,000 elephants between 2009 and 2011 alone. In Argentina and Chile, the introduction of the North American beaver in the 1940s has devastated native trees (though it has also helped other species thrive, including the Magellanic woodpecker).

All told, three-quarters of the world’s land area has been significantly altered by people, the report found, and 85 percent of the world’s wetlands have vanished since the 18th century.

And with humans continuing to burn fossil fuels for energy, global warming is expected to compound the damage . Roughly 5 percent of species worldwide are threatened with climate-related extinction if global average temperatures rise 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, the report concluded. (The world has already warmed 1 degree.)

“If climate change were the only problem we were facing, a lot of species could probably move and adapt,” Richard Pearson, an ecologist at the University College of London, said. “But when populations are already small and losing genetic diversity, when natural landscapes are already fragmented, when plants and animals can’t move to find newly suitable habitats, then we have a real threat on our hands.”

The dwindling number of species will not just make the world a less colorful or wondrous place, the report noted. It also poses risks to people.

Today, humans are relying on significantly fewer varieties of plants and animals to produce food. Of the 6,190 domesticated mammal breeds used in agriculture, more than 559 have gone extinct and 1,000 more are threatened. That means the food system is becoming less resilient against pests and diseases. And it could become harder in the future to breed new, hardier crops and livestock to cope with the extreme heat and drought that climate change will bring.

“Most of nature’s contributions are not fully replaceable,” the report said. Biodiversity loss “can permanently reduce future options, such as wild species that might be domesticated as new crops and be used for genetic improvement.”

The report does contain glimmers of hope. When governments have acted forcefully to protect threatened species, such as the Arabian oryx or the Seychelles magpie robin, they have managed to fend off extinction in many cases. And nations have protected more than 15 percent of the world’s land and 7 percent of its oceans by setting up nature reserves and wilderness areas.

Still, only a fraction of the most important areas for biodiversity have been protected, and many nature reserves poorly enforce prohibitions against poaching, logging or illegal fishing. Climate change could also undermine existing wildlife refuges by shifting the geographic ranges of species that currently live within them.

So, in addition to advocating the expansion of protected areas, the authors outline a vast array of changes aimed at limiting the drivers of biodiversity loss.

Farmers and ranchers would have to adopt new techniques to grow more food on less land . Consumers in wealthy countries would have to waste less food and become more efficient in their use of natural resources. Governments around the world would have to strengthen and enforce environmental laws, cracking down on illegal logging and fishing and reducing the flow of heavy metals and untreated wastewater into the environment.

The authors also note that efforts to limit global warming will be critical, although they caution that the development of biofuels to reduce emissions could end up harming biodiversity by further destroying forests.

None of this will be easy, especially since many developing countries face pressure to exploit their natural resources as they try to lift themselves out of poverty.

But, by detailing the benefits that nature can provide to people, and by trying to quantify what is lost when biodiversity plummets, the scientists behind the assessment are hoping to help governments strike a more careful balance between economic development and conservation.

“You can’t just tell leaders in Africa that there can’t be any development and that we should turn the whole continent into a national park,” said Emma Archer, who led the group’s earlier assessment of biodiversity in Africa . “But we can show that there are trade-offs, that if you don’t take into account the value that nature provides, then ultimately human well-being will be compromised.”

In the next two years, diplomats from around the world will gather for several meetings under the Convention on Biological Diversity, a global treaty, to discuss how they can step up their efforts at conservation . Yet even in the new report’s most optimistic scenario, through 2050 the world’s nations would only slow the decline of biodiversity — not stop it.

“At this point,” said Jake Rice, a fisheries scientist who led an earlier report on biodiversity in the Americas, “our options are all about damage control.”

For more news on climate and the environment, follow @NYTClimate on Twitter .

Brad Plumer is a climate reporter specializing in policy and technology efforts to cut carbon dioxide emissions. At The Times, he has also covered international climate talks and the changing energy landscape in the United States. More about Brad Plumer

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Humans: the real threat to life on Earth

E arth is home to millions of species. Just one dominates it. Us. Our cleverness, our inventiveness and our activities have modified almost every part of our planet. In fact, we are having a profound impact on it. Indeed, our cleverness, our inventiveness and our activities are now the drivers of every global problem we face. And every one of these problems is accelerating as we continue to grow towards a global population of 10 billion. In fact, I believe we can rightly call the situation we're in right now an emergency – an unprecedented planetary emergency.

We humans emerged as a species about 200,000 years ago. In geological time, that is really incredibly recent. Just 10,000 years ago, there were one million of us. By 1800, just over 200 years ago, there were 1 billion of us. By 1960, 50 years ago, there were 3 billion of us. There are now over 7 billion of us. By 2050, your children, or your children's children, will be living on a planet with at least 9 billion other people. Some time towards the end of this century, there will be at least 10 billion of us. Possibly more.

We got to where we are now through a number of civilisation- and society-shaping "events", most notably the agricultural revolution, the scientific revolution, the industrial revolution and – in the West – the public-health revolution. By 1980, there were 4 billion of us on the planet. Just 10 years later, in 1990, there were 5 billion of us. By this point initial signs of the consequences of our growth were starting to show. Not the least of these was on water. Our demand for water – not just the water we drank but the water we needed for food production and to make all the stuff we were consuming – was going through the roof. But something was starting to happen to water.

Back in 1984, journalists reported from Ethiopia about a famine of biblical proportions caused by widespread drought. Unusual drought, and unusual flooding, was increasing everywhere: Australia, Asia, the US, Europe. Water, a vital resource we had thought of as abundant, was now suddenly something that had the potential to be scarce.

By 2000 there were 6 billion of us. It was becoming clear to the world's scientific community that the accumulation of CO 2 , methane and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere – as a result of increasing agriculture, land use and the production, processing and transportation of everything we were consuming – was changing the climate. And that, as a result, we had a serious problem on our hands; 1998 had been the warmest year on record. The 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 1998.

We hear the term "climate" every day, so it is worth thinking about what we actually mean by it. Obviously, "climate" is not the same as weather. The climate is one of the Earth's fundamental life support systems, one that determines whether or not we humans are able to live on this planet. It is generated by four components: the atmosphere (the air we breathe); the hydrosphere (the planet's water); the cryosphere (the ice sheets and glaciers); the biosphere (the planet's plants and animals). By now, our activities had started to modify every one of these components.

Our emissions of CO 2 modify our atmosphere. Our increasing water use had started to modify our hydrosphere. Rising atmospheric and sea-surface temperature had started to modify the cryosphere, most notably in the unexpected shrinking of the Arctic and Greenland ice sheets. Our increasing use of land, for agriculture, cities, roads, mining – as well as all the pollution we were creating – had started to modify our biosphere. Or, to put it another way: we had started to change our climate.

There are now more than 7 billion of us on Earth. As our numbers continue to grow, we continue to increase our need for far more water, far more food, far more land, far more transport and far more energy. As a result, we are accelerating the rate at which we're changing our climate. In fact, our activities are not only completely interconnected with but now also interact with, the complex system we live on: Earth. It is important to understand how all this is connected.

Let's take one important , yet little known, aspect of increasing water use: "hidden water". Hidden water is water used to produce things we consume but typically do not think of as containing water. Such things include chicken, beef, cotton, cars, chocolate and mobile phones. For example: it takes around 3,000 litres of water to produce a burger. In 2012 around five billion burgers were consumed in the UK alone. That's 15 trillion litres of water – on burgers. Just in the UK. Something like 14 billion burgers were consumed in the United States in 2012. That's around 42 trillion litres of water. To produce burgers in the US. In one year. It takes around 9,000 litres of water to produce a chicken. In the UK alone we consumed around one billion chickens in 2012. It takes around 27,000 litres of water to produce one kilogram of chocolate. That's roughly 2,700 litres of water per bar of chocolate. This should surely be something to think about while you're curled up on the sofa eating it in your pyjamas.

But I have bad news about pyjamas. Because I'm afraid your cotton pyjamas take 9,000 litres of water to produce. And it takes 100 litres of water to produce a cup of coffee. And that's before any water has actually been added to your coffee. We probably drank about 20 billion cups of coffee last year in the UK. And – irony of ironies – it takes something like four litres of water to produce a one-litre plastic bottle of water. Last year, in the UK alone, we bought, drank and threw away nine billion plastic water bottles. That is 36 billion litres of water, used completely unnecessarily. Water wasted to produce bottles – for water. And it takes around 72,000 litres of water to produce one of the 'chips' that typically powers your laptop, Sat Nav, phone, iPad and your car. There were over two billion such chips produced in 2012. That is at least 145 trillion litres of water. On semiconductor chips. In short, we're consuming water, like food, at a rate that is completely unsustainable.

Demand for land for food is going to double – at least – by 2050, and triple – at least – by the end of this century. This means that pressure to clear many of the world's remaining tropical rainforests for human use is going to intensify every decade, because this is predominantly the only available land that is left for expanding agriculture at scale. Unless Siberia thaws out before we finish deforestation. By 2050, 1bn hectares of land is likely to be cleared to meet rising food demands from a growing population. This is an area greater than the US. And accompanying this will be three gigatons per year extra CO 2 emissions.If Siberia does thaw out before we finish our deforestation, it would result in a vast amount of new land being available for agriculture, as well as opening up a very rich source of minerals, metals, oil and gas. In the process this would almost certainly completely change global geopolitics. Siberia thawing would turn Russia into a remarkable economic and political force this century because of its newly uncovered mineral, agricultural and energy resources. It would also inevitably be accompanied by vast stores of methane – currently sealed under the Siberian permafrost tundra – being released, greatly accelerating our climate problem even further.

Amazon rainforest cleared for cattle pasture

Meanwhile, another 3 billion people are going to need somewhere to live. By 2050, 70% of us are going to be living in cities. This century will see the rapid expansion of cities, as well as the emergence of entirely new cities that do not yet exist. It's worth mentioning that of the 19 Brazilian cities that have doubled in population in the past decade, 10 are in the Amazon. All this is going to use yet more land.

We currently have no known means of being able to feed 10 billion of us at our current rate of consumption and with our current agricultural system. Indeed, simply to feed ourselves in the next 40 years, we will need to produce more food than the entire agricultural output of the past 10,000 years combined. Yet food productivity is set to decline, possibly very sharply, over the coming decades due to: climate change; soil degradation and desertification – both of which are increasing rapidly in many parts of the world; and water stress. By the end of this century, large parts of the planet will not have any usable water.

At the same time, the global shipping and airline sectors are projected to continue to expand rapidly every year, transporting more of us, and more of the stuff we want to consume, around the planet year on year. That is going to cause enormous problems for us in terms of more CO 2 emissions, more black carbon, and more pollution from mining and processing to make all this stuff.

But think about this. In transporting us and our stuff all over the planet, we are also creating a highly efficient network for the global spread of potentially catastrophic diseases. There was a global pandemic just 95 years ago – the Spanish flu pandemic, which is now estimated to have killed up to 100 million people. And that's before one of our more questionable innovations – the budget airline – was invented. The combination of millions of people travelling around the world every day, plus millions more people living in extremely close proximity to pigs and poultry – often in the same room, making a new virus jumping the species barrier more likely – means we are increasing, significantly, the probability of a new global pandemic. So no wonder then that epidemiologists increasingly agree that a new global pandemic is now a matter of "when" not "if".

We are going to have to triple – at least – energy production by the end of this century to meet expected demand. To meet that demand, we will need to build, roughly speaking, something like: 1,800 of the world's largest dams, or 23,000 nuclear power stations, 14m wind turbines, 36bn solar panels, or just keep going with predominantly oil, coal and gas – and build the 36,000 new power stations that means we will need.Our existing oil, coal and gas reserves alone are worth trillions of dollars. Are governments and the world's major oil, coal and gas companies – some of the most influential corporations on Earth – really going to decide to leave the money in the ground, as demand for energy increases relentlessly? I doubt it.

Meanwhile the emerging climate problem is on an entirely different scale. The problem is that we may well be heading towards a number of critical "tipping points" in the global climate system. There is a politically agreed global target – driven by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – to limit the global average temperature rise to 2C. The rationale for this target is that a rise above 2C carries a significant risk of catastrophic climate change that would almost certainly lead to irreversible planetary "tipping points", caused by events such as the melting of the Greenland ice shelf, the release of frozen methane deposits from Arctic tundra, or dieback of the Amazon. In fact, the first two are happening now – at below the 2C threshold.

As for the third, we're not waiting for climate change to do this: we're doing it right now through deforestation. And recent research shows that we look certain to be heading for a larger rise in global average temperatures than 2C – a far larger rise. It is now very likely that we are looking at a future global average rise of 4C – and we can't rule out a rise of 6C. This will be absolutely catastrophic. It will lead to runaway climate change, capable of tipping the planet into an entirely different state, rapidly. Earth will become a hellhole. In the decades along the way, we will witness unprecedented extremes in weather, fires, floods, heatwaves, loss of crops and forests, water stress and catastrophic sea-level rises. Large parts of Africa will become permanent disaster areas. The Amazon could be turned into savannah or even desert. And the entire agricultural system will be faced with an unprecedented threat.

More "fortunate" countries, such as the UK, the US and most of Europe, may well look like something approaching militarised countries, with heavily defended border controls designed to prevent millions of people from entering, people who are on the move because their own country is no longer habitable, or has insufficient water or food, or is experiencing conflict over increasingly scarce resources. These people will be "climate migrants". The term "climate migrants" is one we will increasingly have to get used to. Indeed, anyone who thinks that the emerging global state of affairs does not have great potential for civil and international conflict is deluding themselves. It is no coincidence that almost every scientific conference that I go to about climate change now has a new type of attendee: the military.

Every which way you look at it, a planet of 10 billion looks like a nightmare. What, then, are our options?

The only solution left to us is to change our behaviour, radically and globally, on every level. In short, we urgently need to consume less. A lot less. Radically less. And we need to conserve more. A lot more. To accomplish such a radical change in behaviour would also need radical government action. But as far as this kind of change is concerned, politicians are currently part of the problem, not part of the solution, because the decisions that need to be taken to implement significant behaviour change inevitably make politicians very unpopular – as they are all too aware.

So what politicians have opted for instead is failed diplomacy. For example: The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, whose job it has been for 20 years to ensure the stabilisation of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere: Failed. The UN Convention to Combat Desertification, whose job it's been for 20 years to stop land degrading and becoming desert: Failed. The Convention on Biological Diversity, whose job it's been for 20 years to reduce the rate of biodiversity loss: Failed. Those are only three examples of failed global initiatives. The list is a depressingly long one. And the way governments justify this level of inaction is by exploiting public opinion and scientific uncertainty. It used to be a case of, "We need to wait for science to prove climate change is happening". This is now beyond doubt. So now it's, "We need to wait for scientists to be able to tell us what the impact will be and the costs". And, "We need to wait for public opinion to get behind action". But climate models will never be free from uncertainties. And as for public opinion, politicians feel remarkably free to ignore it when it suits them – wars, bankers' bonuses and healthcare reforms, to give just three examples.

What politicians and governments say about their commitment to tackling climate change is completely different from what they are doing about it.

What about business? In 2008 a group of highly respected economists and scientists led by Pavan Sukhdev , then a senior Deutsche Bank economist, conducted an authoritative economic analysis of the value of biodiversity. Their conclusion? The cost of the business activities of the world's 3,000 largest corporations in loss or damage to nature and the environment now stands at $2.2tn per year. And rising. These costs will have to be paid for in the future. By your children and your grandchildren. To quote Sukhdev: "The rules of business urgently need to be changed, so corporations compete on the basis of innovation, resource conservation and satisfaction of multiple stakeholder demands, rather than on the basis of who is most effective in influencing government regulation, avoiding taxes and obtaining subsidies for harmful activities to maximise the return for shareholders." Do I think that will happen? No. What about us?

I confess I used to find it amusing, but I am now sick of reading in the weekend papers about some celebrity saying, "I gave up my 4×4 and now I've bought a Prius. Aren't I doing my bit for the environment?" They are not doing their bit for the environment. But it's not their fault. The fact is that they – we – are not being well informed. And that's part of the problem. We're not getting the information we need. The scale and the nature of the problem is simply not being communicated to us. And when we are advised to do something, it barely makes a dent in the problem. Here are some of the changes we've been asked to make recently, by celebrities who like to pronounce on this sort of thing, and by governments, who should know better than to give out this kind of nonsense as 'solutions': Switch off your mobile phone charger; wee in the shower (my favourite); buy an electric car (no, don't); use two sheets of loo roll rather than three. All of these are token gestures that miss the fundamental fact that the scale and nature of the problems we face are immense, unprecedented and possibly unsolvable.

The behavioural changes that are required of us are so fundamental that no one wants to make them. What are they? We need to consume less. A lot less. Less food, less energy, less stuff. Fewer cars, electric cars, cotton T-shirts, laptops, mobile phone upgrades. Far fewer.And here it is worth pointing out that "we" refers to the people who live in the west and the north of the globe. There are currently almost 3 billion people in the world who urgently need to consume more: more water, more food, more energy. Saying "Don't have children" is utterly ridiculous. It contradicts every genetically coded piece of information we contain, and one of the most important (and fun) impulses we have. That said, the worst thing we can continue to do – globally – is have children at the current rate. If the current global rate of reproduction continues, by the end of this century there will not be 10 billion of us. According to the United Nations, Zambia's population is projected to increase by 941% by the end of this century. The population of Nigeria is projected to grow by 349% – to 730 million people.

Afghanistan by 242%.

Democratic Republic of Congo 213%.

Gambia by 242%.

Guatemala by 369%.

Iraq by 344%.

Kenya by 284%.

Liberia by 300%.

Malawi by 741%.

Mali by 408%.

Niger by 766%.

Somalia by 663%.

Uganda by 396%.

Yemen by 299%.

Even the United States' population is projected to grow by 54% by 2100, from 315 million in 2012 to 478 million. I do just want to point out that if the current global rate of reproduction continues, by the end of this century there will not be 10 billion of us – there will be 28 billion of us.

Where does this leave us? Let's look at it like this. If we discovered tomorrow that there was an asteroid on a collision course with Earth and – because physics is a fairly simple science – we were able to calculate that it was going to hit Earth on 3 June 2072, and we knew that its impact was going to wipe out 70% of all life on Earth, governments worldwide would marshal the entire planet into unprecedented action. Every scientist, engineer, university and business would be enlisted: half to find a way of stopping it, the other half to find a way for our species to survive and rebuild if the first option proved unsuccessful. We are in almost precisely that situation now, except that there isn't a specific date and there isn't an asteroid. The problem is us. Why are we not doing more about the situation we're in – given the scale of the problem and the urgency needed – I simply cannot understand. We're spending €8bn at Cern to discover evidence of a particle called the Higgs boson, which may or may not eventually explain mass and provide a partial thumbs-up for the standard model of particle physics. And Cern's physicists are keen to tell us it is the biggest, most important experiment on Earth. It isn't. The biggest and most important experiment on Earth is the one we're all conducting, right now, on Earth itself. Only an idiot would deny that there is a limit to how many people our Earth can support. The question is, is it seven billion (our current population), 10 billion or 28 billion? I think we've already gone past it. Well past it.

Science is essentially organised scepticism. I spend my life trying to prove my work wrong or look for alternative explanations for my results. It's called the Popperian condition of falsifiability. I hope I'm wrong. But the science points to my not being wrong. We can rightly call the situation we're in an unprecedented emergency. We urgently need to do – and I mean actually do – something radical to avert a global catastrophe. But I don't think we will. I think we're fucked. I asked one of the most rational, brightest scientists I know – a scientist working in this area, a young scientist, a scientist in my lab – if there was just one thing he had to do about the situation we face, what would it be? His reply? "Teach my son how to use a gun."

This is an edited extract from Ten Billion, by Stephen Emmott (Penguin, £6.99)

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Humans Destroying Ecosystems: How to Measure Our Impact on the Environment

Human activities like industrialized animal farming are causing the destruction of ecosystems worldwide, including as many as 1 million plant and animal species.

Explainer • Climate • Environment

Words by Z. Zane McNeill

The United Nations reported that 1 million plant and animal species were threatened with extinction in 2019, with many just decades away from a tipping point. The same report also found that three-quarters of land-based environments and two-thirds of marine-based environments have been detrimentally altered by human activities.

In order to reduce habitat loss and slow extinction rates, we have to understand how human activities threaten and endanger ecosystems.

Can Human Activities Destroy Ecosystems?

Humans impact the environment in a variety of damaging ways. Extracting natural resources, polluting air and waterways and razing wild landscapes are some of the most damaging examples industrial destruction. These activities can destroy some or all of an entire ecosystem, wiping out the plants and animals that call these ecosystems home.

As the climate crisis continues to raise temperatures worldwide, experts say continued human encroachment on wildlife threatens the biodiversity that is the hallmark of wild ecosystems.

There are currently 77 animals listed as “extinct in the wild” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), an organization that publishes a “ red list ” of species on the brink of extinction. The IUCN also reports that over 41,000 species are threatened, though not on the brink of extinction, accounting for 28 percent of the total of all species assessed by researchers.

How Many Ecosystems Have Humans Destroyed?

Scientists have found that less than 3 percent of the earth’s total land can be considered to still have ecological integrity , a framework used for measuring restoration and mitigation efforts to manage and preserve ecosystems.

Humans are overusing the earth’s biologically productive land — including cropland, fisheries and forests — by at least 56 percent, which destroys the ability of these lands to provide important ecosystem services like storing carbon emissions or protecting wildlife. At least 75 percent of the earth’s ice-free land has also been significantly altered . The oceans are increasingly polluted as well, and the earth has lost over 90 percent of wetlands since 1700, according to reporting from the Guardian.

Between 2009 and 2018, he U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP) found the world lost about 11,700 square kilometers of coral — which is equivalent to 14 percent of the global total — while more than 30 percent of the world’s reefs have been affected by rising temperatures. Coral reefs are extremely important natural resources — home to about 25 percent of the ocean’s fish and a wide range of other species.

What Are the Ecosystems Destroyed by Humans?

According to a 2020 study published in One Earth, humans significantly altered ecosystems across an area the size of Mexico, as 58 percent of the earth’s land ecosystems experienced moderate or intense pressure from human activity. The authors also found that out of the earth’s 14 biomes and 795 ecoregions, 46 ecoregions spanning across 10 biomes have been highly affected by human-caused destruction, leading to severe ecosystem and biodiversity loss.

The Living Planet Index found a 68 percent decrease between 1970 and 2016 in population sizes of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish, particularly severe in the tropical subregions of the Americas, where wildlife populations have decreased by 94 percent. Over 3 million species that live in the Amazon rainforest are now threatened by human-caused ecosystem collapse.

The oceans are also under threat. UNEP and other experts have projected that by 2050 there will be a 70-90 percent worldwide decrease in live coral reefs because of climate change, and that coral reefs may even become extinct within our lifetimes. Over one-third of marine mammals and one-third of sharks, shark relatives and reef-forming coral are now threatened with extinction .

How Do Humans Destroy Ecosystems?

One of the greatest threats to the earth’s ecosystems is the food on our plates. Humans destroy nature, accelerate climate change and endanger biodiversity — as a result of a more highly industrialized livestock-based food system.

One U.N. report found that more than one-third of the world’s land surface and nearly 75 percent of freshwater resources are devoted to producing food to feed a rapidly growing population . The report also found that in 2015, 33 percent of marine fish were being harvested at unsustainable levels. In a paper published in Science in 2006 , scientists found that marine ecosystems were experiencing unprecedented population loss because of overfishing, estimating that marine biodiversity would eventing collapse by 2050 if humans continue along the same unsustainable trajectory.

In addition to the detrimental effects of overfishing, livestock production is to blame for biodiversity loss. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) found that 26 percent of the planet’s ice-free land is used for livestock grazing, with 33 percent of cropland used for livestock feed production, together threatening to decimate the earth’s biodiversity rates.

Livestock production is one of the biggest drivers of climate change — animal agriculture alone is responsible for at least 16.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Animal agriculture is also a well-known source of air and water pollution, threatening local ecosystems by overloading waterways with fertilizer, manure and pesticides.

One of the world’s largest beef producers is the country of Brazil — cattle farming there is causing as much as 80 percent of Brazil’s deforestation. Brazilian cattle ranching accounts for the release of 392 million tons of carbon into the atmosphere every year, which is equivalent to 17 percent of the country’s total emissions. This figure does not include land use change, which would add even more to this figure.

If global meat consumption continues to grow — and it’s already more than doubled since 1990 — human activities like cattle ranching will continue to destroy the earth’s most vital ecosystems, including the Amazon rainforest.

Hunting and Fishing

Hunting and fishing are two human activities that also destroys wild ecosystems. Whenever humans remove animals from their ecosystems — whether for food or sport — it harms ecosystems in direct and indirect ways.

For example, research shows that overhunting can kill forest trees because of the reduction of mammals that eat seeds — posing a risk to the wider ecological dynamics of tropical forests.

In addition, overhunting can decrease species diversity , altering interactions between different types of animals and other creatures, disrupting migration and hibernation patterns and damaging natural food chains, leading to uneven population growth across species — all of which creates a negative impact on ecosystems.

Similarly, fishing can damage seabed ecosystems in unintended ways. A common practice in the commercial fishing industry is trawling , which drags up plants and coral or leads to bycatch, in which marine species such as dolphins, whales, sea turtles and sharks are caught unintentionally and discarded. Trawling stirs up the water in a way that increases sediment and blocks sunlight, creating ocean dead zones .

Introduced Species

Invasive species are a major threat to ecosystems that threaten habitat loss and endanger biodiversity. Some species are introduced by humans to an area deliberately, including for pest control and pet imports. These deliberate introductions can have a detrimental effect on local ecosystems. For example, because pet pythons released in the Everglades have few natural predators there, their introduction has decimated local species. Invasive pythons have caused raccoon and opossum populations to plummet by 99 percent, effectively obliterating the populations of marsh rabbits and foxes in some areas.

Other species are introduced unintentionally through transportation or trade. For example, zebra mussels attach themselves to boats, which enables them to spread easily through bodies of water. The effects of these zebra mussels are akin to an “ aquatic pandemic ,” increasing the chances of algal blooms that kill native species.

Land Use Change

Land use change is the human-led process of transforming natural landscapes, whether by direct or indirect action. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has found that land use change for agriculture can lead to significant habitat and biodiversity loss, as well as land and water degradation .

Converting wild landscapes to farmland or for other human uses has caused most of the world’s deforestation and desertification . Deforestation is the purposeful clearing of forested land, either through clear-cutting or selective logging to obtain wood for fuel, as well as for manufacturing, grazing and to grow crops like corn and soy for farmed animal feed. It can lead to biodiversity loss by disrupting the habitats of local species, one of the main causes of extinction. In 2021, 9.3 million acres of trees in the tropics were lost due to rising populations, agriculture and energy demands. Deforestation in the Amazon has forced animals out of their natural ranges as existing habitats are clear-cut, removing their sources of shelter, food and water. It also causes soil erosion and adds to climate change pollution by destroying natural carbon reserves like forests.

Soil erosion and land degradation can cause congested and polluted waterways, increased flooding, and loss of arable land through a process known as desertification. Desertification is a consequence of land degradation, often caused by overgrazing, leading to the deterioration of habitats as the land transforms into desert-like conditions. The U.N. has found that arable land loss is 30 to 35 times higher than the historical rate, and that over 12 million hectares of land is lost each year to desertification.

Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into a habitat with adverse consequences. Pollutants include everything from car exhaust and the burning of coal to sewage or pesticides, all of which negatively impact land, water and air.

Land pollution can be caused by agriculture, mining, landfills, construction, nuclear waste, urbanization and industry. Land pollution can also poison groundwater through a process called leaching.

The Environmental Protection Agency has discovered that over 20 percent of lakes and 30 percent of streams in the U.S. are polluted by sources like animal waste from industrialized animal agriculture, storm water, waste water, fossil fuels and fertilizers. Pollution from dairy farming , for example, causes water pollution, with pollution from animal waste and fertilizer making its way to oceans and causing one of the largest dead zones ever recorded in the Gulf of Mexico.

While most air pollution comes from energy use and production , researchers have concluded that fine particle air pollution from industrialized agriculture leads to over 17,000 deaths in the U.S. per year, the bulk of which comes from animal agriculture.

Resource Exploitation

Research has shown that humans are depleting natural resources at almost double the rate at which they can regenerate. By 2050, humans will need 2.5 earths to meet our resource usage demands. The most exploited resources include sand, water, fossil fuels, palm oil, trees and soil. The overuse of these resources — caused by poor farming practices, overpopulation, logging and overconsumption — can create water shortages, oil and mineral depletion, forest cover loss and species extinction.

The expansion of agriculture — mostly for beef production — has been a primary driver of forest loss and degradation. On-farm food waste also has negative impacts, as the water, fuel and fertilizer resources used to produce, pack and transport the food ultimately go to waste too.

How Can We Reduce the Impact of Human Activity on the Environment?

The U.N. has urged the international community pursue sustainable development to mitigate the impacts of climate change. Unfortunately, the United States is not on track to meet U.N. sustainable development goals, despite President Biden rejoining the Paris Agreement in 2021.

The U.N.’s 2022 Sustainable Development Goals Report recommends that countries implement the following changes in order to reduce human-caused damages to the earth and its ecosystems:

Protect and restore the world’s wetlands, which are used as breeding grounds for 40 percent of the world’s plant and animal species
Reduce food waste
Move away from reliance on natural resources
Increase climate finance that invests in actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
Fight ocean acidification
Reduce the flow of litter, waste and runoff into waterways
Increase protected areas of the oceans
Improve regulations and increase the monitoring and surveillance of overfishing
Reduce the felling of forests, mainly caused by agricultural expansion
Fight species extinction by moving away from unsustainable agricultural methods, logging and over-harvesting of wild species
Increase protections identified as key for global biodiversity

In a special Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report on land , climate scientists also recommended that people reduce their meat consumption.

What You Can Do

The increase in industrialized animal farming across the globe is the primary driver of biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation. In 2021, research supported by the U.N. Environment Programme predicted that devastating biodiversity loss will continue unless our food system undergoes radical change, like shifting to plant-rich diets.

Research has shown again and again that plant-based foods are better for the environment and result in lower greenhouse gas emissions than meat and dairy. A study published in PNAS in 2022 also reinforced the importance of an environmentally sustainable food system with less reliance on these foods.

Reducing your consumption of meat and reducing food waste are two of the most important individual climate actions you can take. You can also vote for politicians that demonstrate a commitment to crafting public policy to protect ecosystems.

Independent Journalism Needs You

Zane is an activist-scholar, co-editor of Queer and Trans Voices: Achieving Liberation Through Consistent Anti-Oppression, and the founder of Roots DEI Consulting and Policy.

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Environment

Destruction of nature is as big a threat to humanity as climate change.

By Michael Le Page

Farming and housing occupies large amounts of land globally

Steve Proehl/Getty

We are destroying nature at an unprecedented rate, threatening the survival of a million species – and our own future, too. But it’s not too late to save them and us, says a major new report.

“The evidence is incontestable. Our destruction of biodiversity and ecosystem services has reached levels that threaten our well-being at least as much as human-induced climate change.”

With these words chair Robert Watson launched a meeting in Paris to agree the final text of a major UN report on the state of nature around the world – the biggest and most thorough assessment to date, put together by 150 scientists from 50 countries.

The report, released today, is mostly grim reading. We humans have already significantly altered three-quarters of all land and two-thirds of the oceans. More than a third of land and three-quarters of freshwater resources are devoted to crops or livestock.

Around 700 vertebrates have gone extinct in the past few centuries. Forty per cent of amphibians and a third of coral species, sharks and marine mammals look set to follow.

Less room for wildlife

Preventing this is vital to save ourselves, the report says. “Ecosystems, species, wild populations, local varieties and breeds of domesticated plants and animals are shrinking, deteriorating or vanishing,” says one of the the report’s authors, Josef Settele. “This loss is a direct result of human activity and constitutes a direct threat to human well-being in all regions of the world.”

The main reason is simple. Our expanding farms and cities are leaving less room for wildlife. The other major causes are the direct exploitation of wildlife such as hunting, climate change, pollution and the spread of invasive species. Climate change is set to become ever more destructive.

Bioenergy threat

But the challenge is immense. All countries except the US have ratified the 1992 UN Convention of Biodiversity and are supposed to be conserving biodiversity and promoting its sustainable use.

Despite this, more than 80 per cent of the agreed international targets for 2020 will not be met, says the report. In fact, as of 2016, half the signatory countries hadn’t yet drawn up plans on how to meet the targets .

The problem isn’t just our focus on economic growth regardless of the impact on the natural world. Current plans for reducing carbon dioxide emissions to net-zero to limit climate change rely heavily on bioenergy, which requires a lot of land. This will accelerate species loss as well as threatening food and water security, says the report.

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Why We're Destroying the Earth

The ways we unconsciously hurt the environment..

By Robert Gifford published March 1, 2000 - last reviewed on June 9, 2016

In November 2000, nearly 80,000 people flocked to Seattle, Washington, to protest the disregard of the World Trade Organization (WTO) for environmental concerns. Impassioned demonstrators from San Diego to France inundated the streets of downtown Seattle for days, railing against the toll that free trade often exacts on endangered wildlife.

Unfortunately, the protestors' admirable pilgrimage to save the environment actually hurt it more than they knew. Consider how many well-intentioned individuals who normally would have stayed home flew across the country, sapping tons of energy and releasing vast amounts of carbon dioxide into the air. According to the U.K.'s Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, aircraft emissions of carbon dioxide could triple over the next 50 years, highly exacerbating global warming. This is just one of the ways we destroy the environment even as we're trying to protect it--a tragic irony that is one of the major themes of environmental psychology .

Many people, based perhaps on well-publicized disasters like the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, believe that environmental problems are most often caused--and best solved--by government or big business. Most environmental damage, however, begins not with government or large companies, but with the cumulative actions of individuals. If there is a solution to this global crisis, it is to understand--and remedy--the decision-making of individual consumers of energy before nature pays the price.

For decades, environmental psychologists have struggled to understand the way we treat our surroundings, which ultimately harms our own well-being, since environmental assault can wreak havoc on our health, even leading to illnesses such as cancer. Over 100 studies conducted in the last two decades have examined the ways individuals influence the environment--from deciding to have another child to turning on the air conditioner--and why they make such decisions. We know that some people do refrain from overusing nonrenewable resources, from forests and fish to less tangible resources such as clean air and physical space. Environmental psychologists are now examining the mind-set of such individuals, hoping eventually to encourage others to consider our resources in the same way.

More and more people are environmentally aware these days--curbside recycling, insulated homes and Woodsy Owl's slogan "Give a hoot, don't pollute" are now ingrained in our cultural consciousness. You might think that awareness would lead to environmentally friendly behavior, but it does not: Well-educated, middle-class North Americans, the people most likely to have high environmental awareness, use far more energy than Third World residents--and other North Americans too.

Why the discrepancy between words and deeds? So far, scientists have identified at least 30 different personal, social or structural influences that affect whether a given person uses natural resources wisely or takes more than their share. There are four overriding ways that people, mostly unconsciously, hurt the environment every day:

o Energy use. Perhaps our biggest priority is to curb our heavy use of fossil fuel energy sources, like oil. Burning these fuels produces greenhouse gases and ground-level pollutants, leading to global warming, a planetary danger no longer questioned by experts. A 1998 study in the journal Bioscience showed that 40% of deaths worldwide are caused by pollution and other environmental factors. Furthermore, energy use is growing: Dutch researcher Linda Steg, Ph.D., reports that in the Netherlands, a region typical of developed nations, consumers now use 25% more energy than they did just 14 years ago.

o Convenience. Taking a plane is several times less fuel-efficient even than driving, but we often choose to fly to save time. In a typical recent year, U.S. commercial airliners carried 60 million passengers 158 billion miles, using 21 billion gallons of jet fuel in the process. Similarly, cars afford us speed and comfort compared to cycling or walking. But a Dutch study found that about 20% of car trips are for journeys of less than one mile. Is this truly necessary?

o Overpopulation. In a classic 1968 article, biologist Garrett Hardin, Ph.D., theorized that environmental destruction stemmed from the fact that there are just too many mouths to feed, even with great agricultural improvements. The Population Reference Bureau reports that the 20th century began with 1.6 billion people on the planet and likely ended with 6 billion. This is the end result of every parent's personal decision to have a child, whether they realize it or not.

o Ignorance. Robyn Dawes, Ph.D., a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, blames "limited processing": People simply don't place their daily behaviors in an environmental context; their decisions are literally thoughtless. Some progress has been made since Dawes' initial research (witness the growth of recycling), but how many people consider the environment when they flip a light switch or use an electric toothbrush?

Many people take whatever they can, believing that natural resources are inexhaustible. A review of 59 studies by Donald Hine, Ph.D., and myself revealed that individuals use resources more wisely when the group sharing the resource is small in number, communicates well and is informed that goods are limited. Unfortunately, groups that share real-world resources are usually large, often communicate poorly and don't realize the resource crisis they face. In a 1994 study that simulated ocean fishing in groups of up to 200 in size, I found that participants would cut back their fishing when they learned that the fish stocks were depleting. But the cutbacks they made were too little to save the fish population over the long run. People were destroying a resource just as they believed they were helping it, not unlike those who flew to protest the WTO or who travel to far-off national parks to revel in nature.

To reverse this ill-fated trend, you can construct your life to make conservation easy. For example, the next time you move, place environmental considerations near the top of your list by relocating as close as possible to work or school. Then you won't drive as much, and won't have to ride a bike or walk too far, either. Residing in a slightly smaller home would consume less energy for heating or cooling without forcing you to sacrifice much comfort. Do you need to fly as much as you do? Perhaps there are undiscovered vacation spots close to home. And instead of flying to your next business meeting simply because your company will pay for it, try carpooling or taking a train, or telecommuting via phone, fax or the Internet.

Adopting these measures would significantly reduce pollution and global warming and its ill-effects on our well-being. Celebrate Earth Day by making a few of these changes. The world depends on it.

A CENTURY OF DISASTER

1900 Industrial Revolution

London factories emit acid pollution, leading to mass fatalities and grime still evident today.

1944 Hiroshima and Nagasaki

1961-71 Agent Orange released in Vietnam

1976 Seveso

A Hoffman-LaRoche pharmaceutical plant in Milan has a reactor explosion, emitting dioxin into the air. The next year, birth defects are up by over 40%.

1978 Love Canal

A small town near Niagara Falls becomes a ghost town after industrial sludge from a leaking dump renders the area toxic. People are only now moving back, and scientists are still assessing the damage.

1978 Amoco Cadiz oil spill

Brittany's coast is covered with 200,000 tons of pollution.

1979 Three Mile Island explosion

1981 Antarctica Scientists first discover a gaping hole in the ozone layer over this continent.

1984 Bhopal

An Indian factory releases 30 tons of a pesticide, killing over 3500 people and injuring tens of thousands.

1986 Chernobyl

1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill

1991 Gulf War

The "conflict" causes the largest oil spill in history, among other assaults.

1991 Chelyabinsk

The Russian nuclear plant is found to be the most polluted spot on Earth.

1999 Japanese radiation leak

Humans destroyed forests for thousands of years – we can become the first generation that achieves a world in which forests expand

Why has humanity destroyed such vast forests and how can we bring this to an end.

For thousands of years humans have destroyed forests. At the end of the last great ice age, an estimated 57% of the world’s habitable land was forested. 1 Since then, people in all regions of the world have burned and cut down forests. The chart shows this. The forested land area declined from 6 to 4 billion hectares. That means our ancestors destroyed one-third of the former forests – a forest area twice the size of the US was lost.

There are two big reasons why humans have destroyed forests and continue to do so – the need for land and the need for wood:

We need wood for many purposes: as construction material for houses or ships, to turn it into paper, and – most importantly – as a source of energy. Burning wood is a major source of energy where there are trees but no modern energy sources available. Still today about half of extracted wood globally is used to produce energy, mostly for cooking and heating in poor households that lack alternatives. 2
By far, the most important driver of the destruction of forests is agriculture. Humanity cuts down forests primarily to make space for fields to grow crops and pastures to raise livestock. We also cut down forests to make space for settlements or mining, but these are small in comparison to farming.

The land use for farming did not only come at the expense of the world’s forests, but also led to the huge decline of the world’s other wild spaces, the shrub- and grasslands. The chart shows this too.

In many countries forests continue to be destroyed. The series of charts shows this. In all of these countries the forest cover today is lower than three decades ago. 3

Most of the forests that are destroyed today are in the tropics, some of the most biodiverse regions on our planet. Why is this happening?

The following chart shows what is driving the ongoing destruction of the world’s largest tropical forest: the Amazon. The expansion of agricultural land to raise cattle is the most important driver, by far. 4

I wish this was more widely understood. Land use for agriculture is the main threat to the world's biodiversity. 5

Most of the destruction of tropical forests is due to consumers in the region, but about 12% of the deforestation in the tropics is driven by demand from high-income countries. Beef-eaters around the world are contributing to the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. 6

This huge impact of meat consumption on deforestation is also visible in the first chart that showed the history over the last 10 millennia – 31% of the world’s habitable land is now grazing land for livestock. This is an extremely large part of the world; taken together it is as large as all of the Americas , from Alaska in the North down to Tierra del Fuego in the South.

Meat consumption is such a large driver of deforestation because it is a very inefficient way to produce food. The land use of meat production is much higher than plant-based foods. Reducing meat consumption is therefore a way to increase the agricultural output per land area. A shift away from the land-intensive production of meat, especially beef, would be a major way to make progress and end deforestation. One possible way to get there is to make clear how large the environmental impact of meat production is. Another – complementing – way is to produce meat substitutes that people prefer over beef.

The end of deforestation?

After thousands of years of deforestation is there any hope that it could be different?

In fact there are many countries that brought their history of deforestation to an end. Several even turned it around so that forests there are now expanding.

This reversal, from deforestation to reforestation, is called a Forest Transition . The chart shows the data for some of the countries that have achieved this. 7

As mentioned before, while it is the case that several countries have achieved this transition, it is also the case that consumers in these countries contribute to deforestation elsewhere.

Crucial for these turnarounds was technological progress that reduced the demand for fuelwood and agricultural land.

The demand for wood as a source of energy decreased when modern energy sources became available – initially fossil fuels, and more recently renewables and nuclear power.
The need for more and more agricultural land decreased when existing farmland was used more efficiently – when an increase in food production was achieved by a higher output per area of land .The increased productivity of the land thanks to modern agriculture allowed more and more countries to spare the forests that would otherwise be converted into agricultural land. Innovative modern crops, fertilizers, pesticides and irrigation make this increase of crop yields possible .

These two technological changes can be complemented by effective policies and regulations. Zero-deforestation policies restrict deforestation and programs like REDD+ of the FAO compensate poorer countries and farmers to make forest protection economically more attractive than deforestation. 8

Can we achieve a Global Forest Transition in our lifetime?

If we want to protect our planet’s forests the world as a whole would need to achieve what many countries have achieved already, the turnaround from deforestation to reforestation – a global forest transition.

Countries around the world have made the end of deforestation their explicit goal: At COP26 in Glasgow, countries with about 85% of the world’s forests pledged to end deforestation by 2030.

The last chart shows where the world is in this effort.

The brown part of the chart shows the history of the temperate forests. These forests as a whole have achieved the transition: deforestation was high in the past, then peaked in the first half of the 20th century, and from the 1990s onwards temperate forests have expanded in size. Temperate forests are growing back.

The challenge is now to achieve the same in tropical forests, which are shown in green. We are making progress in this direction: the rate of deforestation in the tropics was highest in the 1980s. Since then, the rate of deforestation has declined by a factor of three.

If we can further decrease the demand for fuelwood and agricultural land it seems possible to bring deforestation in the tropics to an end.

If we achieve the global forest transition in our lifetimes it would be a major success for the protection of the world’s biodiversity. Additionally it would bring greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation to an end, and expanding, rather than shrinking, forests would instead suck more carbon out of the atmosphere.

We can become the first generation that achieves a world in which forests expand

How can we bring deforestation to an end? There is no single answer, but, as we have seen, a few big changes can bring this big goal into reach.

More productive agriculture that allows more production on a smaller land area, a shift away from meat, effective conservation policies, and a shift to modern energy sources: by bringing all of these factors together we could get there. Not only would we save existing forests from being cut down, we might also free up space for forests to grow back.

In our lifetime we have the unprecedented opportunity to bring our long history of deforestation to an end. For the first time in millennia we could achieve a world in which forests expand.

57% of the world’s habitable land was forested and habitable land accounts for 71% of the world’s land surface. This means (0.57*0.71=0.4047) that 40% of the total land surface was forested.For more information on the data see see Hannah Ritchie’s Our World in Data article The world has lost one-third of its forest, but an end of deforestation is possible .

Today about half of all wood extracted from forests globally is used to produce energy, mostly for cooking and heating. See: FAO (2017) – The Charcoal Transition . In FAO – Wood Energy - Basic Knowledge the authors write “The annual removal of wood worldwide was estimated at about 3.7 billion m3, of which 1.87 billion m3 was used as fuel. On the African continent the reliance on wood as fuel is the single most important driver of forest degradation. See: FAO and UNEP. 2020. The State of the World’s Forests 2020. Forests, biodiversity and people. Rome. https://doi.org/10.4060/ca8642en The same report also reports that an estimated 880 million people worldwide are collecting fuelwood or producing charcoal with it. In addition to the destruction of the natural environment, the reliance on fuelwood also contributes between 2 and 7% of global greenhouse gas emissions. According to the 2017 FAO publication The Charcoal Transition the use of firewood and charcoal contributes between 1-2.4 gigatons of CO2-equivalent greenhouse gases annually, which is 2-7% of global anthropogenic emissions.

Here is the interactive version of this chart in which you can download the data, compare these countries with other countries, and in which you find information on the data sources.

The land use of different beef production systems varies. A big reason why beef drives so much deforestation in Brazil in particular is that Brazil has very low-density cattle-ranching (very few cows per unit of land).

On this point see the following studies:

Feltran-Barbieri, R., & Féres, J. G. (2021) – Degraded pastures in Brazil: improving livestock production and forest restoration . Royal Society Open Science, 8(7), 201854.

The authors find that “the Brazilian cattle sector has performed far below its biophysical potential. The observed average productivity is 89 kg ha−1 yr−1. However, biocapacity exceeds 172 kg ha−1 yr−1. Despite significant regional heterogeneity in technology adoption and production specialization, extensive and inefficient production systems are unfortunately common in the country.”

Schmidinger, K., & Stehfest, E. (2012) – Including CO2 implications of land occupation in LCAs—method and example for livestock products . The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 17(8), 962-972.

One key finding of this study that is relevant here is that “The highest CO2 implications of land occupation are calculated for beef and lamb, with beef production in Brazil having a missed potential carbon sink more than twice as high as the other GHG emissions.”

Also see Cederberg, C., Persson, U. M., Neovius, K., Molander, S., & Clift, R. (2011) – Including carbon emissions from deforestation in the carbon footprint of Brazilian beef .

One reason that explains part of the poor performance of beef production in Brazil is that in other cattle agricultural systems – such as in Europe – there are more mixed-dairy herds than in Brazil. So that the environmental impacts per nutritional value of beef production are shared between beef and dairy in these systems. In Brazil, more cattle are exclusively used for beef which means a higher footprint per kilogram of beef.

Finally also see the text on carbon opportunity costs by my colleague Hannah Ritchie. The first chart there makes this point well.

Williams, David R., Michael Clark, Graeme M. Buchanan, G. Francesco Ficetola, Carlo Rondinini, and David Tilman (2021) – ‘Proactive Conservation to Prevent Habitat Losses to Agricultural Expansion’. Nature Sustainability 4, no. 4 (April 2021): 314–22. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-020-00656-5 .

Also see Hannah Ritchie’s ‘Our World in Data’-essay on this research , with interactive visualizations of the data.

Most beef produced by Brazil is consumed by people in Brazil. At the time of writing the latest data was for 2018 when about 80% was consumed domestically: Exports of beef in 2018 were about 2.1 million tonnes; production of beef was about 10.2 million tonnes.

The data on Annual CO₂ emissions from deforestation in Brazil by product is also useful to see in this context.

For an evaluation of such policies (via an RCT) see Jayachandran, Seema, Joost de Laat, Eric F. Lambin, Charlotte Y. Stanton, Robin Audy, and Nancy E. Thomas (2017) – ‘ Cash for Carbon: A Randomized Trial of Payments for Ecosystem Services to Reduce Deforestation’ . Science 357, no. 6348 (21 July 2017): 267–73. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aan0568

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How do humans affect biodiversity?

Humanity impacts the planet's biodiversity in multiple ways, both deliberate and accidental. The biggest threat to biodiversity to date has been the way humans have reshaped natural habitats to make way for farmland, or to obtain natural resources, but as climate change worsens it will have a growing impact on ecosystems.

The main direct cause of biodiversity loss is land use change (primarily for large-scale food production) which drives an estimated 30% of biodiversity decline globally. Second is overexploitation (overfishing, overhunting and overharvesting) for things like food, medicines and timber which drives around 20%. Climate change is the third most significant direct driver of biodiversity loss, which together with pollution accounts for 14%. Invasive alien species account for 11%.

Some models predict that climate change will become the primary cause of biodiversity decline in the coming decades. The impact of all the main drivers of biodiversity loss is accelerating and, as a consequence, so is the pace of biodiversity decline.

Growing demand for natural resources due to the increasing human population, more rapidly increasing per capita consumption and changing consumption patterns has meant that ever more natural habitat is being used for agriculture, mining, industrial infrastructure and urban areas.

Key areas of human activity causing biodiversity loss include:

Deforestation. Tropical rainforests are particularly rich in biodiversity and are being destroyed
Habitat loss through pervasive, incremental encroachment such as that caused by urban sprawl
Pollution such as that associated with widespread pesticide use and overuse of fertiliser which are 6 and 12 times greater than they were before 1961 respectively
It is estimated that half of the species at risk are threatened by agriculture
Water use in some of the largest water catchments in the world where dams and irrigation reduce water flows
Hunting and the over-exploitation of species such as in wild capture fisheries but also for wildlife trade
Spread of invasive species and diseases through trade and travel
Climate change, as warming and changing rainfall patterns alters species ranges and the underlying water and chemical cycles which define current ecosystems
Pollution from plastic waste although its long-term effects on biodiversity are far from clear

For more on this issue visit: Amazonia’s future: Eden or degraded landscapes? | Royal Society ; Preserving global biodiversity requires rapid agricultural improvements | Royal Society ; and Past and future decline and extinction of species | Royal Society

Climate change and biodiversity

Human activities are changing the climate. Science can help us understand what we are doing to habitats and the climate, but also find solutions.

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A scientist picks through a handful of dark wet soil.

Humans have been altering nature for thousands of years – to shape a sustainable future, it’s important to understand that deep history

Executive Director, Museum of Natural and Cultural History, University of Oregon

Disclosure statement

Todd Braje does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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In July 2024, all eyes will turn to Paris for the Summer Olympic Games. Spectators from around the globe will converge on the City of Light to watch athletes compete and to soak in the culture, romance and history of one of the world’s most recognizable cities.

But an iconic Paris landmark, the Notre Dame cathedral, will still be under renovation after a devastating fire that ignited in the cathedral and burned for 12 hours on April 14, 2019. When the last embers were extinguished, most of Notre Dame’s wood and metal roof was destroyed, and its majestic spire had vanished, consumed by flames.

Notre Dame is nearly 1,000 years old and has been damaged and repaired many times. Its last major renovation was in the mid-1800s . The massive beams that framed the structure were fashioned from European oak trees harvested 300 to 400 years ago.

Today, these trees are common throughout north-central Europe, but few are tall enough to replace Notre Dame’s roof lattice and spire, thanks to centuries of deforestation. Planners had to search nationwide for enough suitably large oaks for the restoration.

As an archaeologist, I study long-term human interactions with nature . In my new book, “ Understanding Imperiled Earth: How Archaeology and Human History Inform a Sustainable Future ,” I describe how addressing modern environmental crises requires an understanding of deep history – not just written human records, but also ancient connections between humans and the natural world.

Many people assume that the devastating impacts humans have wrought on our planet came about with the industrial era , which began in the mid-1700s. But people have been transforming conditions on Earth for millennia. Looking backward can inform our journey forward.

From deforestation to reforestation

To see how this works, let’s consider the shortage of tall trees for Notre Dame from a wider perspective. Deforestation in Europe dates back at least 10,000 years to a time when early farmers swept across the continent, felling forests and creating agricultural and pastoral lands to form the landscapes of today .

Based on archaeological evidence, pollen-based modeling and written records, scientists have determined that forest cover across northern, central and western Europe reached its highest density about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago, followed by a gradual decline over the intervening millennia. By AD 1700, people were farming on 250 million acres (100 million hectares) of agricultural fields, most of which had been created by clearing native European forests.

Millions of acres of timber became fuel for domestic hearths, and then for furnaces and boilers during the Industrial Revolution. This process was so transformative that renowned British geographer H. C. Darby, writing in 1954, called it “probably the most important single factor that has changed the European landscape .”

Most of these forests were lost long before scientists could study them, but historical detective work can fill in the missing information. By identifying charred plant remains from ancient fire pits and analyzing pollen from lake and soil cores, archaeologists can map where ancient forests once flourished, determine which species were represented and reconstruct what forests looked like.

Today, European nations are working to restore forests across the continent in order to slow climate change and species loss. With historical information about past forests, modern scientists can make better choices about which tree species to plant, select the best locations and project how the trees may respond to future climate change.

Understanding what’s possible

In the past 50 years, the rate and scale of human impacts on Earth have intensified. In what scholars have dubbed “ the Great Acceleration ,” human activities such as clearing forests, converting lands for farming and development, overharvesting wildlife and fisheries, and warming the atmosphere through widespread use of fossil fuels have altered conditions for life.

For people born during this era of dizzying change, it can be hard to picture life on Earth before humans remade it. Scientists have pointed out the danger of so-called “ shifting baselines ” – the widespread tendency to assume that the current depleted state of nature is how things have always been. Knowing how ecosystems used to look and function, and how human actions have changed them, makes the scale of conservation tasks more clear.

History offers insights into how the world once looked, long before globalization and industrial activities reshaped the planet. Discarded animal bones, charcoal fragments, broken stone tools and other flotsam and jetsam of the ancient past provide clues about the sizes and abundances of animal species, the location and composition of native forests and landscapes, and fluctuating atmospheric conditions. They also indicate how humans, plants and animals responded to these changes.

Informing a resilient future

The past can help modern societies confront today’s environmental challenges in innumerable ways. Understanding how takes careful historical detective work and scientific creativity. Here are a few examples:

Tracing where Indigenous fisherfolk collected black abalone for over 10,000 years can guide restoration efforts for this endangered species . Numerous examples of effective Indigenous strategies are emerging from recent archaeological and anthropological research, showcasing innovative land management, sustainable agriculture and community resilience practices that have been honed over centuries .

Understanding the history of deforestation and land conversion patterns can help health experts anticipate future pandemics . Many infectious diseases move from wildlife to humans, and human activities such as deforestation and urbanization are increasingly bringing humans and wildlife into closer contact . This heightens the risk of zoonotic disease transmission.

Museum collections can help scientists document and understand species declines and build effective strategies to fight the loss of global biodiversity. For example, museum collections of preserved amphibians have allowed scientists to track the spread of the deadly chytrid fungus, aiding in the development of targeted conservation strategies to protect vulnerable frog species.

Taxidermied passenger pigeon in a museum display

Humans can slow and, perhaps, reverse the ecological harms that they have caused, but Earth will never return to some past pristine state.

Nonetheless, I believe that history can help humans save Earth’s remaining wild, natural places that, along with cultural icons like Notre Dame, tell the stories of who we are. The goal is not to go backward, but to create a more resilient, sustainable and biodiverse planet.

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Save Earth Essay

Essay on Save Earth

Each living being on Earth knows the importance of Earth in our lives. Without Earth, we cannot even imagine living. Have you ever thought how we would walk if there is no Earth, there will be no water to drink, there will not be animals living here, and of course, no cultivation, so no food to eat. This means to say that the life of humans, as well as other living beings, cannot be imagined without Earth.

Life is possible on the planet Earth and its related resources. Can you imagine a life on the Earth if resources are not available here. And, the answer comes not at all. The resources like air, sunlight, water, creatures, minerals, and vegetation are integral parts of the Earth. But with the increasing level of pollution, these resources are getting affected and either humans are destroying or depleting recklessly. If we have not taken a calculative step to save the Earth, it is going to be difficult to establish a sustainable future on the earth. Let’s understand why is it so crucial to save the Earth from these things:

WhyiIs Saving The Earth Necessary?

In order to save the earth, we must understand that resources that are provided by earth are limited. However, the majority of us are unaware of this fact and we are not judiciously utilizing the resources. In order to safeguard the existence of humans, we need to protect the earth and take care of it. All living beings are dependent on the earth for their survival and so we should use the gist of nature in a thoughtful way. The increase in pollution and damage caused by humans are affecting the earth so rapidly that it is threatening our survival.

Saving earth is not merely the need of the hour but much more. The extent of degradation caused by humans is becoming irreparable. This is one of the reasons why all the resources are getting highly polluted. The change in climate is also one of the examples that are caused due to severe pollution. Moreover, animals, birds are getting extinct and the worlds around us are slowly approaching the end. Nothing could be scarier than this. Therefore, saving the earth is the primary need and we should make conscious decisions to make the earth a better and sustainable place to live in.

It is and has been our responsibility to protect the planet that we live in but rather we become selfish and do such things that create more pollution in our environment. As the most evolved species of the environment, we should understand that our planet is the only planet that supports life. So when the earth will be in peril, we will not have the option to move to another planet for our safety.

Hence, it is important to make the most use of what we have right now in a sustainable manner. Our approach will not only save the earth but our lives as well. Moreover, our future generation will be bestowed with a healthy environment to live in.

Ten Simple Things to Save the Earth

Live by the mantra- Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

Keep our surroundings clean

Plant more trees

Conserve water and water bodies

Educate people about the significance of conserving nature

Shop wisely

Cycle more and drive fewer cars on the road

Use LED lights

Don’t discharge industrial effluents in the river or other water bodies

Choose sustainability in every step of life

Therefore, by making small changes in our lifestyle we can make a huge difference. By restoring ecological balance, we can save the earth from getting dreadfully polluted and uninhabitable.

FAQs on Save Earth Essay

Why is Earth an important planet?

We all know the importance of Earth in our lives as it is the planet where we all live. This is one of the crucial planets in our system. Here, other species also live along with human beings. In order to write an effective essay on Earth, we can mention the importance of Earth in our lives. Ask questions about how life will be if there is no Earth. Will there be a life or not? This way, you can get the correct answers to write interesting things about Earth.

How can we make efforts to save our beautiful planet Earth?

There are a number of ways with which it is possible for us to save Earth. The first thing is to conserve water. Always remember even the little things are going to create a difference. The second thing is to embrace compositing as it itself is a real difference. The third thing is that we all should be car-canaware, we try to use public transport as much as possible. And, the most crucial is to take part in plantations. Remember that each step counts and each step is going to make a difference then why this difference is not from you!

What are the concerning factors about Earth?

We all are aware of the fact due to the persistent torture of humans on the Earth, there are a few matters of concern that need to adressed immediately. We rotation of the Earth has slowed down gradually, so we all need to come in its rescue collectively. There is a single satellite on the Earth planet that has to be taken care of. The Earth is the densest planet on the Earth where factors like global warming have to be tackled. These all are the alarming situations that have to be resolved with collective efforts.

Is it true that Vedantu provides free access to essays on Earth?

Yes, you have heard it right that Vedantu provides the study material for free for students of all the grades. And, it is not only due to a free platform that Vedantu earned fame but these are the top quality parameters that made them come first in the list of the students as well as parents. Adding to this, our team guides the students to polish their skills as well as assists them to stay well-prepared for the final examination.

How climate change is raising the risks of another pandemic

Evidence is mounting that human disruptions to natural ecosystems are raising risks of disease spread, according to a new study.

As humans degrade Earth’s environment, we have created a world in which diseases may be increasingly apt to fester and multiply.

Infection-spreading creatures such as mosquitoes and ticks are thriving on a planet warmed by a blanket of fossil fuel emissions. When pollution, hunting or development push rare organisms to extinction, parasites proliferate because they have evolved to target the most abundant species.

And then there are the harms caused when humans introduce nonnative plants and animals or chemicals such as herbicides and fungicides to fragile ecosystems. That exacerbates losses in biodiversity that leave surviving populations more vulnerable to illness, according to research published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

Researchers said the study is the first to look at the ways such a variety of environmental problems can compound disease risks. It combined hundreds of studies and thousands of observations of all kinds of creatures — humans and other mammals, fish, reptiles, amphibians, worms and arthropods — and all kinds of pathogens, such as viruses, bacteria and fungi.

The analysis reinforced the findings of many of those inquiries: that a hotter world of ravaged ecosystems is one that is more hospitable to many parasites, and less so to humans and other life.

The connection appeared with all types of infections and their hosts, suggesting that as the planet continues to warm and humans continue to disrupt nature, increases in disease spread “will be consistent and widespread,” said Jason Rohr, a professor of biological sciences at the University of Notre Dame and one of the study’s authors. The link was just as clear with humans as it was with wildlife and plants, he added.

“That is despite all the efforts we’re making to control and prevent diseases,” Rohr said.

And if diseases become more rampant in the animal world, that could mean the likelihood of “spillover” events exposing humans to new pathogens — the likely origin of covid-19 , and a feared outcome of the ongoing spread of H5N1 bird flu — also will increase, the study suggests.

“It could mean that by modifying the environment, we increase the risks of future pandemics, ” Rohr said.

As grim as the findings appear, they underscore that actions to protect the planet can also serve to improve health, researchers said.

“This adds to a very long list of reasons we should be rapidly moving away from fossil fuels and trying to mitigate the impacts of climate change,” said Felicia Keesing, a professor at Bard College who was not involved in the study but whose research focuses on biodiversity and disease risks.

The study used observations of disease outcomes involving a wide variety of parasites infecting a spectrum of hosts around the world. The observations also included information about a range of human influences on the environment: biodiversity changes, chemical pollution, climate change, habitat loss or change, and introduction of nonnative species.

Biodiversity has a natural gradient across the planet, with the greatest numbers of species found closest to the equator and at moderate elevations. The researchers gauged the effect of human-caused biodiversity loss on diseases by comparing the observations of infections around the world to average disease prevalence at varying levels of biodiversity across that natural gradient. In nature, reductions in biodiversity are associated with reductions in disease.

But when humans cause losses in biodiversity, diseases increase. The researchers found that levels of disease and mortality in environments affected by human-caused biodiversity losses were nearly nine times worse than disease outcomes expected under Earth’s natural biodiversity gradient. Rohr said that is probably because the loss of rarer creatures means pathogens have an easier time finding the more abundant species they have evolved to use as hosts.

The researchers also found that climate change and the introduction of nonnative species have significant links to worsened disease spread, though not as strong as the effect of biodiversity losses.

The analysis found one variable of human influence that actually decreased disease risks: habitat losses. Rohr said the researchers believe that is largely a function of urbanization: Cities tend to have better sanitation and health infrastructure, and they are simply home to fewer natural organisms, he said.

Skylar Hopkins, an assistant professor at North Carolina State University who was not involved in the research, cautioned against applying the findings too broadly. Analyses such as this one are composed of a selection of completed studies but cannot represent a truly random sample of pathogens and infections, she said. Not all parasites are “bad,” she added, and one also cannot assume that repairing lost biodiversity will undo an increase in disease.

The research published Wednesday builds on past findings that link disease spread with specific global changes.

For example, it is known that extreme heat and precipitation tied to human-caused climate change have allowed malaria cases to rise , and could drive them to surge even more dramatically in the decades ahead . Biodiversity losses are known to contribute to spillover of diseases such as covid-19, HIV/AIDS, Ebola and severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS.

But the researchers wrote that more needs to be learned about how humans’ many influences on the environment might be building upon each other.

“For example, climate change and chemical pollution can cause habitat loss and change, which in turn can cause biodiversity loss and facilitate species introductions,” the researchers wrote. New studies will need to examine whether those factors, in combination, serve to add, subtract or even multiply risks of disease spread.

11 important ways that humans impact the Earth’s environment

Find out how people are changing the environment, from acid rain to cutting down too many trees, and what the results of our actions are..

Donovan Alexander

11 important ways that humans impact the Earth’s environment

zeljkosamtrac/iStock

We, as humans, have become dependent on luxuries such as cars, houses, and even our cell phones.
Things like overconsumption, overfishing, and deforestation are dramatically impacting our world.
But what does our love for manufactured metallic and plastic goods do to the environment ?

The environment is a complicated web of ecosystems that depend on each other, and people significantly impact its health and well-being. While we rely on the environment for survival and well-being, our actions often have unintended and harmful consequences.

From pollution and deforestation to climate change and habitat destruction, our environmental impact is widespread and significant. Here we’ll explore how humans affect the environment, the consequences of our actions, and how we can mitigate our impact and protect the planet for future generations.

1. Overpopulation could be impacting the environment

Diy13/iStock

Survival used to mean repopulating. That, however, is quickly becoming true for the opposite as we reach the maximum carrying capacity that our planet can sustain, so some experts claim. Overpopulation has become an epidemic since mortality rates have decreased, medicine has improved, and industrial farming methods were introduced, thus keeping humans alive for much longer and increasing the total population.

The effects of overpopulation are thought to be severe, with one of the most powerful being the degradation of the environment . Humans require lots of space, whether for farmland or industries, which also takes up tons of space. An increased population results in more clear-cutting , resulting in severely damaged ecosystems . Without enough trees to filter the air, CO₂ levels increase, potentially damaging every single organism on Earth.

Another issue is our dependency on coal and fossil fuels for energy; the larger the population, the more fossil fuels will be used. Using fossil fuels (such as oil and coal) results in copious amounts of carbon dioxide in the air- threatening the extinction of thousands of species , which adds to the effect that forest depletion already has.

Humanity continuously requires more space, which devastates ecosystems and increases CO₂ levels, further devastating the delicate environment . Although processed materials are necessary to power the cities, the previous assessment tells us that the planet can only sustain so much damage until it begins to damage us . However, many other experts point to the fact that human population levels are not really a concern , with others claiming we need more people!

2. Pollution has a direct impact on the environment

zeljkosantrac/iStock

Pollution is everywhere. From the trash thrown out on the freeway to the millions of metric tons of pollution pumped into the atmosphere yearly, it’s obvious pollution and waste is inescapable.

Pollution is so bad that, to date, 2.4 billion people do not have access to clean water sources. Humanity continuously pollutes indispensable resources like air, water, and soil, which require millions of years to replenish.

Air is arguably the most polluted, with the US producing 147 million metric tons of air pollution each year alone. In 1950, smog was so bad in LA that the ground-level ozone (atmospheric gas that is great in the atmosphere, not so much on the ground) surpassed 500 parts per billion volume (ppbv)- well above the National Ambient Air Quality Standard of 75 ppbv (6.6 times more to be precise).

People thought they were under foreign attack as the smog burned their eyes and left an odor of bleach. That is when the devastating effect of aerosols was discovered. While air quality in the US has slightly improved, the rate in developing countries continues to plummet as smog continuously blocks out the sun in a dense shroud of pollution. This is just one of the issues we have to tackle shortly.

3. Global Warming is blamed on humans

Global warming is arguably the most significant cause of impact on the environment . The most prominent causes emanate from CO₂ levels from respiration to more detrimental reasons like burning fossil fuels and deforestation.

At any rate, humans are consistently increasing CO₂ levels globally- every year . The highest level of CO₂ in recorded history before 1950 was about 300 parts per million . However, current measurements of CO₂ levels have exceeded 400 PPM, abolishing every record dating back 400,000 years.

The increase in CO₂ emissions has contributed to the planet’s average temperature increasing by almost a whole degree.

As the temperature increases, arctic land ice and glaciers melt, which causes the ocean levels to rise at a rate of 3.42mm per year, allowing more water to absorb more heat, which melts more ice, creating a positive feedback loop that will cause the oceans to rise 1-4 feet by 2100.

So what’s the big deal?

4. Humans could be impacting climate change

Sepp/iStock

Climate change is closely connected to the historical development of industry and technology. As global temperatures increase, Earth’s weather patterns will drastically change. While some areas will experience longer growing seasons, others will become barren wastelands as water will deplete in vast areas, turning once floral regions into deserts.

The increase will impact weather patterns, promising more intense hurricanes in both size and frequency and intensifying and prolonging droughts and heat waves. But air pollution does not just affect the environment .

The evidence is mounting that poor air quality, and rising temperatures are ruining delicate ecosystems, even leading to increased asthma and cancer rates in humans.

5. Genetic modification could be a ticking time bomb

simarik/iStock

Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have significantly contributed to humans’ survival and prosperity. GMOs are selected bred crops or crops with DNA directly implanted into them to give an advantage to the crop, whether to sustain colder temperatures, require less water, or yield more product.

But GMOs are not always intentional. For years humans have used glyphosate , a herbicide designed to eliminate weeds – the biggest threat to any plant. However, just as humans have a learning immune system, certain weeds have developed a resistance to 22 of 25 known herbicides, with 249 species of weeds completely resistant, according to the latest scientific report.

“ Super weeds ” threaten farming lands by choking outcrops. One of the only solutions is to till the land, turning over the soil to kill the weeds and give an early advantage to the planted crops.

The disadvantage of tilling is that it causes the soil to dry faster and kills off good bacteria, making its fertile lifespan significantly shorter. To replenish the depleted soil, fertilizer is used, which introduces a whole new set of problems to the environment and can be disastrous for local agriculture in the long run.

6. Ocean acidification needs to be avoided at all costs

Ocean acidification is caused when CO₂ dissolves into the ocean, bonding with seawater and creating carbonic acid. The acid reduces the pH levels in the water, essentially changing the Ocean acidity by 30% in the last 200 years, according to analysis – a level that the ocean has not been at in over 20 million years .

The acidity depletes the calcium concentrations, making it difficult for crustaceans to build their shell, leaving them vulnerable without their armor. Between the global temperature rise of one degree and ocean acidification, scientists say a quarter of all coral reefs are considered damaged beyond repair, with two-thirds under serious threat. The death of coral reefs is a serious concern.

Coral reefs are home to 25% of aquatic life, many of which are responsible for the ocean’s natural filtration and the production of necessary nutrients vital for life under the sea. However, acidification is not the only watery threat, as other human activities are causing severe changes. Things like plastic pollution and overfishing are wreaking havoc on our oceans.

7. Water pollution is not good either

There are 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic debris in the ocean . Not only is garbage introduced into the oceans, but also the excessive amounts of fertilizer that finds its way into the sea through rains, floods, and winds or are dumped in excess right into the largest producer of the oxygen we have.

Fertilizer contains nitrogen, an element essential for the growth of plants- but that does not limit it to what it was intended for. Phytoplankton and algae thrive off of nitrogen, causing excessive growth in what is known as “ red tides” or “brown tides ” in areas with high concentrations of nitrogen. Brown tide is caused by the rapid growth of billions of algae, which deplete water bodies of oxygen and cause the poison to accumulate in all life that consumes it, including fish and birds. But water pollution does not end there.

Millions of tons of garbage are dumped yearly into the ocean. Since the trash mainly consists of plastics, it is largely indissoluble. The waste accumulates in large vortexes across the sea.

Marine life, including loggerhead sea turtles, are tricked into thinking they are eating food when it is only a floating plastic bag or other poisonous plastic that will cause starvation or suffocation to any unfortunate animal that mistakenly ingests it.

8. Overfishing is severe for the environment

Pollution is the number one threat to all aquatic life and is the leading cause of reduced biodiversity. This is sad, given that water and water life forms are some of our most critical natural resources. But as mentioned above, overfishing is also damaging our oceans.

Fishing is not inherently bad for our ocean. But when not properly regulated, it can harm our oceans and people. O verfished stocks globally have tripled in half a century , and today, one-third of the world’s assessed fisheries are pushed beyond their biological limits, says the WWF. Even more so, billions of people rely on fish for protein.

9. Deforestation is very damaging to the environment

luoman/iStock

With an exponential expansion in human beings, more food, materials, and shelter are being manufactured at astonishing rates, mostly stemming from forestry.

Forests are cleared to make way for new humans, which in turn, causes more humans; you can see the problem. According to international data, an estimated 18 million acres of trees are clear-cut each year to make way for new development and wood products- just under half of all the trees on the planet since the industrial revolution began.

With trees being one of the largest producers of oxygen, that is not good for humans- especially not for the animals that call the forest home.

With millions of species living in forests, deforestation is a significant threat to their survival and an extensive conservation issue. It also increases greenhouse gases within the atmosphere, leading to further global warming. Such human activities need to stop if we wish to survive. Even more so, recent studies have attributed deforestation to increased wildfires in areas like the Amazon. Wildfires are equally destructed, even more so, displacing both people and entire species.

10. Acid rain is avoidable

When humans burn coal, sulfur dioxide , and nitrogen oxides are released into the atmosphere, where they rise and accumulate in the clouds until the clouds become saturated and rain acid, causing havoc on the ground beneath.

When the rain falls, it accumulates in water bodies which is especially harmful to lakes and small bodies of water. The ground surrounding the water soaks up the acid, depleting the soil of essential nutrients. Trees that absorb the acid accumulate toxins that damage leaves and slowly kill large forest areas.

Acid rain has also been known to eliminate entire fish species, causing a snowball effect of damage to the ecosystem that relies on diverse organisms to sustain the environment .

11. Ozone depletion is one impact we may have reversed

nito100/iStock

The ozone layer is renowned for absorbing harmful UV rays that would otherwise be detrimental to the health of all walks of life. Without an ozone layer, walking outside would be unbearable.

Ozone comprises three bonded oxygens that float up to the stratosphere, absorbing a substantial amount of UV radiation and protecting all life below. However, “ozone-depleting substances” (or ODS), primarily made up of chlorine and bromine, find their way up to the stratosphere, where they strip the O3 of oxygen, destroying its capabilities of absorbing UV light.

The human impact is devastating for plants susceptible to UV light, including wheat and barley , two indispensable crops to humans.

Although most chemicals that deplete the ozone layer have been banned, the substances that have already been released can take upwards of 80 years to reach the upper atmosphere so it will be some time before our protective boundary will be fully functional again. Until then, slap on that sunscreen and be safe out there.

What can be done in the future?

We must support the earth we live on, but the world will live on no matter what. Human impacts the natural habitat in so many ways, and we need to be aware of our environmental input.

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ABOUT THE EDITOR

Donovan Alexander <p><span>After 5 years in the start-up world collaborating with companies like Google and &Scaron;koda Auto, the award-winning marketer Donovan Alexander restarted his career. He has combined his passion for artificial intelligence, fashion, design, and technology to begin a new journey as an aspiring multidisciplinary designer and technology writer. Throughout his career, he has authored over 300 articles, worked on 34 advertising campaigns for international brands, and curated 4 major art projects. Donovan is fascinated with how emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and 3D printing are changing the way we design and engineer our everyday products. With a creative studio based in the heart of Europe, Donovan loves sharing the stories of the people and organizations engineering change around the world.</span></p>

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How are humans destroying the Earth?

Destruction of earth by humans: ecosystem loss is caused by changes in land and sea usage, exploitation, climate change, pollution, and the introduction of invasive species. the dumping of trash into the water has a direct impact on the environment. since the industrial revolution, humans have been pumping massive amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. as a result, worldwide average temperatures have increased. these temperature variations can lead an ecosystem to become unbalanced and unstable, resulting in many species dying out and going extinct. however, there are a slew of other forces at work, ranging from unregulated industrial standards to poaching and unlawful hunting..

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The huge solar storm is keeping power grid and satellite operators on edge

Geoff Brumfiel

Willem Marx

NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory captured this image of solar flares early Saturday afternoon. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says there have been measurable effects and impacts from the geomagnetic storm. Solar Dynamics Observatory hide caption

Planet Earth is getting rocked by the biggest solar storm in decades – and the potential effects have those people in charge of power grids, communications systems and satellites on edge.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says there have been measurable effects and impacts from the geomagnetic storm that has been visible as aurora across vast swathes of the Northern Hemisphere. So far though, NOAA has seen no reports of major damage.

The Picture Show

Photos: see the northern lights from rare, solar storm.

There has been some degradation and loss to communication systems that rely on high-frequency radio waves, NOAA told NPR, as well as some preliminary indications of irregularities in power systems.

"Simply put, the power grid operators have been busy since yesterday working to keep proper, regulated current flowing without disruption," said Shawn Dahl, service coordinator for the Boulder, Co.-based Space Weather Prediction Center at NOAA.

NOAA Issues First Severe Geomagnetic Storm Watch Since 2005

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"Satellite operators are also busy monitoring spacecraft health due to the S1-S2 storm taking place along with the severe-extreme geomagnetic storm that continues even now," Dahl added, saying some GPS systems have struggled to lock locations and offered incorrect positions.

NOAA's GOES-16 satellite captured a flare erupting occurred around 2 p.m. EDT on May 9, 2024.

As NOAA had warned late Friday, the Earth has been experiencing a G5, or "Extreme," geomagnetic storm . It's the first G5 storm to hit the planet since 2003, when a similar event temporarily knocked out power in part of Sweden and damaged electrical transformers in South Africa.

The NOAA center predicted that this current storm could induce auroras visible as far south as Northern California and Alabama.

Extreme (G5) geomagnetic conditions have been observed! pic.twitter.com/qLsC8GbWus — NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center (@NWSSWPC) May 10, 2024

Around the world on social media, posters put up photos of bright auroras visible in Russia , Scandinavia , the United Kingdom and continental Europe . Some reported seeing the aurora as far south as Mallorca, Spain .

The source of the solar storm is a cluster of sunspots on the sun's surface that is 17 times the diameter of the Earth. The spots are filled with tangled magnetic fields that can act as slingshots, throwing huge quantities of charged particles towards our planet. These events, known as coronal mass ejections, become more common during the peak of the Sun's 11-year solar cycle.

A powerful solar storm is bringing northern lights to unusual places

Usually, they miss the Earth, but this time, NOAA says several have headed directly toward our planet, and the agency predicted that several waves of flares will continue to slam into the Earth over the next few days.

While the storm has proven to be large, predicting the effects from such incidents can be difficult, Dahl said.

Shocking problems

The most disruptive solar storm ever recorded came in 1859. Known as the "Carrington Event," it generated shimmering auroras that were visible as far south as Mexico and Hawaii. It also fried telegraph systems throughout Europe and North America.

Stronger activity on the sun could bring more displays of the northern lights in 2024

While this geomagnetic storm will not be as strong, the world has grown more reliant on electronics and electrical systems. Depending on the orientation of the storm's magnetic field, it could induce unexpected electrical currents in long-distance power lines — those currents could cause safety systems to flip, triggering temporary power outages in some areas.

my cat just experienced the aurora borealis, one of the world's most radiant natural phenomena... and she doesn't care pic.twitter.com/Ee74FpWHFm — PJ (@kickthepj) May 10, 2024

The storm is also likely to disrupt the ionosphere, a section of Earth's atmosphere filled with charged particles. Some long-distance radio transmissions use the ionosphere to "bounce" signals around the globe, and those signals will likely be disrupted. The particles may also refract and otherwise scramble signals from the global positioning system, according to Rob Steenburgh, a space scientist with NOAA. Those effects can linger for a few days after the storm.

Like Dahl, Steenburgh said it's unclear just how bad the disruptions will be. While we are more dependent than ever on GPS, there are also more satellites in orbit. Moreover, the anomalies from the storm are constantly shifting through the ionosphere like ripples in a pool. "Outages, with any luck, should not be prolonged," Steenburgh said.

What Causes The Northern Lights? Scientists Finally Know For Sure

The radiation from the storm could have other undesirable effects. At high altitudes, it could damage satellites, while at low altitudes, it's likely to increase atmospheric drag, causing some satellites to sink toward the Earth.

The changes to orbits wreak havoc, warns Tuija Pulkkinen, chair of the department of climate and space sciences at the University of Michigan. Since the last solar maximum, companies such as SpaceX have launched thousands of satellites into low Earth orbit. Those satellites will now see their orbits unexpectedly changed.

"There's a lot of companies that haven't seen these kind of space weather effects before," she says.

The International Space Station lies within Earth's magnetosphere, so its astronauts should be mostly protected, Steenburgh says.

In a statement, NASA said that astronauts would not take additional measures to protect themselves. "NASA completed a thorough analysis of recent space weather activity and determined it posed no risk to the crew aboard the International Space Station and no additional precautionary measures are needed," the agency said late Friday.

People visit St Mary's lighthouse in Whitley Bay to see the aurora borealis on Friday in Whitley Bay, England. Ian Forsyth/Getty Images hide caption

People visit St Mary's lighthouse in Whitley Bay to see the aurora borealis on Friday in Whitley Bay, England.

While this storm will undoubtedly keep satellite operators and utilities busy over the next few days, individuals don't really need to do much to get ready.

"As far as what the general public should be doing, hopefully they're not having to do anything," Dahl said. "Weather permitting, they may be visible again tonight." He advised that the largest problem could be a brief blackout, so keeping some flashlights and a radio handy might prove helpful.

I took these photos near Ranfurly in Central Otago, New Zealand. Anyone can use them please spread far and wide. :-) https://t.co/NUWpLiqY2S — Dr Andrew Dickson reform/ACC (@AndrewDickson13) May 10, 2024

And don't forget to go outside and look up, adds Steenburgh. This event's aurora is visible much further south than usual.

A faint aurora can be detected by a modern cell phone camera, he adds, so even if you can't see it with your eyes, try taking a photo of the sky.

The aurora "is really the gift from space weather," he says.

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solar flares
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Strong geomagnetic storm reaches Earth, continues through weekend

NOAA space weather forecasters have observed at least seven coronal mass ejections (CMEs) from the sun, with impacts expected to arrive on Earth as early as midday Friday, May 10, and persist through Sunday, May 12, 2024.

NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) has issued a Geomagnetic Storm Warning for Friday, May 10. Additional solar eruptions could cause geomagnetic storm conditions to persist through the weekend.

The First of Several CMEs reached Earth on Friday, May 10 at 12:37 pm EDT. The CME was very strong and SWPC quickly issued a series of geomagnetic storm warnings. SWPC observed G4 conditions at 1:39 pm EDT (G3 at 1:08 pm EDT).
This storm is ongoing and SWPC will continue to monitor the situation and provide additional warnings as necessary.

This is an unusual and potentially historic event. Clinton Wallace , Director, NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center

CMEs are explosions of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun’s corona. They cause geomagnetic storms when they are directed at Earth. Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth’s surface , potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations. SWPC has notified the operators of these systems so they can take protective action.

Geomagnetic storms can also trigger spectacular displays of aurora on Earth . A severe geomagnetic storm includes the potential for aurora to be seen as far south as Alabama and Northern California.

Related Features //

Watch CBS News

A severe geomagnetic storm has hit Earth. Here's what could happen.

By Allie Weintraub

Updated on: May 10, 2024 / 8:35 PM EDT / CBS News

A severe geomagnetic storm that hit Earth has the potential to knock out power and electronics this weekend, but it could also bring a spectacular light show from the aurora borealis as far south as Alabama and Northern California.

After days of heightened solar activity, NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center issued Thursday its first watch for a G4 storm — the second-strongest rating on a scale from G1 to G5 — in nearly 20 years. It then upgraded it to a G5 on Friday.

The prediction center reported in a social media post that "extreme (G5) geomagnetic conditions" were "observed" for the first time since October 2003. Friday's G5 conditions were first observed at 6:54 p.m. Eastern Time and could continue through the weekend, the agency said.

The G5 storm in 2003 caused power outages in Sweden and damaged transformers in South Africa, according to prediction center.

"Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth's surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations," the NOAA said in an earlier statement. "[The Space Weather Prediction Center] has notified the operators of these systems so they can take protective action."

Risks to the power grid

A G5 geomagnetic storm is considered "extreme" and has the potential to cause widespread voltage control problems to the power grid, damage transformers, and even cause complete blackouts. According to the NOAA , in a G5, "high frequency radio propagation may be impossible in many areas for one to two days, satellite navigation may be degraded for days," and "low-frequency radio navigation can be out for hours"

These types of effects on power systems were first noted in 1940 and have been reported throughout the years, with incidents including a power blackout in 1958, equipment tripping and voltage stability issues in 1972 and a nine-hour blackout in Canada in 1989, according to NOAA.

The last time there was a G5 or "extreme" geomagnetic storm was in October 2003, when it caused power outages in Sweden and damaged transformers in South Africa.

Effect on satellite and radio operations

As of Friday afternoon, NOAA had also observed a moderate solar radiation storm that could expose people in high-flying aircraft to "elevated radiation risk" and could cause infrequent issues with satellite operations.

With a G5 storm, "satellite navigation could be degraded for days," it warns.

Radio blackouts have also been detected with an R3 designation, meaning that the blackouts were "strong" on a scale from R1 (minor) to R5 (extreme). At this level, wide blackouts of high-frequency radio communication is expected, as well as loss of radio contact, for about an hour on the sunlit side of Earth, as low-frequency navigation signals decline for roughly an hour.

Expansion of northern lights

The same phenomenon that causes these disruptions is also responsible for making the aurora borealis viewable in places you normally can't see them.

"Earth's magnetic field guides the electrons such that the aurora forms two ovals approximately centered at the magnetic poles," NOAA said . "During major geomagnetic storms these ovals expand away from the poles such that aurora can be seen over most of the United States."

Vivid displays were visible over parts of Europe and the U.K. on Friday night.

"If you happen to be in an area where it's dark and cloud free and relatively unpolluted by light, you may get to see a fairly impressive aurora display," Rob Steenburgh, a space scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Weather Prediction Center, told reporters Friday. "and that's really the gift from space weather, is the aurora."

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Aurora Borealis
Northern Lights

Allie Weintraub is an editor on the growth and engagement team at CBS News. She has previously written and produced stories on a range of topics for outlets including ABC News, Inside Edition Digital and Courthouse News Service.

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Space weather forecasters issued a severe (g4) geomagnetic storm watch for the evening of friday, may 10, 2024..

If you've never heard of a solar storm or geomagnetic storm, chances are you'll learn about those really quickly this weekend. Earth is under a severe G4 watch or geomagnetic storm watch for the evening of Friday, May 10.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) — a division of the National Weather Service — was monitoring the sun following a series of solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that began Wednesday, May 8, 2024. Space weather forecasters issued a Severe (G4) geomagnetic storm watch for the evening of Friday, May 10. Additional solar eruptions could cause geomagnetic storm conditions to persist through the Mother's Day weekend.

Here's what that means and how that may affect you.

What happened? Why is there a solar storm or severe G4 watch?

According to the weather service, a large sunspot cluster has produced several moderate to strong solar flares since 5 a.m. Wednesday, May 8, 2024. At least five flares were associated with CMEs that appear to be Earth-directed. SWPC forecasters are monitoring NOAA and NASA’s space assets for the onset of a geomagnetic storm.

What is a solar storm? What are coronal mass ejections or CMEs?

A solar storm or geomagnetic storm is a space weather event directly involving the sun.

According to NOAA, "solar radiation storms occur when a large-scale magnetic eruption, often causing a coronal mass ejection and associated solar flare, accelerates charged particles in the solar atmosphere to very high velocities. The most important particles are protons which can get accelerated to large fractions of the speed of light. At these velocities, the protons can traverse the 150 million kilometers from the sun to the Earth in just tens of minutes or less. When they reach Earth, the fast-moving protons penetrate the magnetosphere that shields Earth from lower energy charged particles. Once inside the magnetosphere, the particles are guided down the magnetic field lines and penetrate into the atmosphere near the north and south poles."

NOAA explains coronal mass ejections as explosions of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun’s corona. Basically, solar flares are blasts of strong energy that come from the sun, and they're detected from our satellites.

CMEs cause geomagnetic storms when they are directed at Earth. Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth’s surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations.

SWPC has notified the operators of these systems so they can take protective action. Geomagnetic storms can also trigger spectacular displays of aurora on Earth. A severe geomagnetic storm includes the potential for aurora to be seen as far south as Alabama and Northern California.

Where are the coronal mass ejections or CMEs?

As of 10 a.m. Friday, May 10, the CMEs were 93 million miles away, Shawn Dahl, a space weather forecaster at NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) in Boulder, Colorado, said in a Friday morning media teleconference.

When was the last severe G4 watch from the National Weather Service?

This is a very rare event. The last time NOAA issued a severe G4 watch was in 2005.

The Space Weather Prediction Center says NOAA categorizes solar radiation storms using the NOAA Space Weather Scale on a scale from S1 to S5. The scale is based on measurements of energetic protons taken by the GOES satellite in geosynchronous orbit. A solar radiation storm can range from hours to days.

The SWPC forecasts the probability of S1 (a minor radiation storm) as part of its 3-day forecast and issues warnings for an expected S1 or higher event, such as the G4 storm predicted for Friday, May 10.

How to prepare for a solar storm?

Experts said hopefully the public will not have to do anything. The National Weather Service said people should always have a basic plan that includes having batteries, a radio, and perhaps keep a generator handy. These space weather events are very rare.

How can a solar storm cause problems to our power grid?

The Just the FAQs video above from USA TODAY explains how a solar storm can cause problems to our power grid, affecting communications, navigation, satellite and radio.

Will the G4 storm affect ATMs and cell phones?

According to the National Weather Service, experts have not seen space weather storms directly impact ATMs or cell phones. However, space weather storms can affect power grids, which would, in turn, affect ATMs and cell phone usage. The secondary impacts from that would be great, experts said Friday morning during the NOAA press conference.

There's a solar storm and severe geomagnetic storm watch in the US. Will I lose power? Will I lose internet? Will my cell phone work?

Experts on the NOAA call on Friday morning said if the solar storm reaches the G4 levels, the level of response could mean there could be some infrastructure effects, citing the power grid in North America. Space weather forecaster Shawn Dahl said, "we won't know until these CMEs arrive about 1 million miles from Earth," adding NASA satellites will help forecast the intensity. From there, the National Weather Service will begin to issue more warnings.

Dahl explained that tracking the CMEs gives experts some lead time: "Roughly, we're talking an average speed of 20 minutes to 45 minutes" to prepare.

What could be the worst situation on Earth? Could any cities in the US experience disruption in power?

Experts on the National Weather Service call on Friday morning said it was tough to say what the worst situation on Earth would be and whether cities in the U.S. could definitively experience disruption in power. Forecasters, however, have procedures in place, other organizations (such as FEMA) are being notified as a precaution, and alternate equipment is working. These organizations, they said, would know what's causing anything if the situation unfolds, and they would be able to take the proper steps to help mitigate any problems.

How do solar storms affect astronauts? Will astronauts on the International Space Station be affected?

According to NOAA, solar radiation storms cause several impacts near Earth, affecting power grids and communications. "When energetic protons collide with satellites or humans in space, they can penetrate deep into the object that they collide with and cause damage to electronic circuits or biological DNA. During the more extreme solar radiation storms, passengers and crew in high-flying aircraft at high latitudes may be exposed to radiation risk. Also, when the energetic protons collide with the atmosphere, they ionize the atoms and molecules thus creating free electrons. These electrons create a layer near the bottom of the ionosphere that can absorb High Frequency (HF) radio waves making radio communication difficult or impossible."

When’s the next rocket launch at Cape Canaveral, Florida? Mother's Day, Sunday, May 12: SpaceX Starlink

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency navigational warning includes a SpaceX Starlink mission window that will open Sunday night. As of Friday, May 10, the SpaceX Starlink launch was still scheduled. Here's more info about it and how to tune in to live coverage:

Mission: A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch a batch of Starlink internet satellites from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
Launch window: 8:11 p.m. EDT Sunday, May 12, to 12:42 a.m. EDT Monday, May 13
Location: Launch Complex 40
Trajectory: Southeast
Local sonic boom: No
Booster landing: Drone ship out on the Atlantic Ocean
Live coverage: If you want to watch live rocket launch coverage, FLORIDA TODAY's Space Team will provide updates at floridatoday.com/space , starting about 90 minutes before launch time. You can download the free app for iPhone or Android or type floridatoday.com/space into your browser.

Sangalang is a lead digital producer for USA TODAY Network-Florida. Follow her on Twitter or Instagram at @byjensangalang . Support local journalism. Consider subscribing to a Florida newspaper .

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Destruction of nature is as big a threat to humanity as climate change. We are destroying nature at an unprecedented rate, threatening the survival of a million species - and our own future, too ...
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Key areas of human activity causing biodiversity loss include: Deforestation. Tropical rainforests are particularly rich in biodiversity and are being destroyed. Habitat loss through pervasive, incremental encroachment such as that caused by urban sprawl. Pollution such as that associated with widespread pesticide use and overuse of fertiliser ...
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In my new book, "Understanding Imperiled Earth: How Archaeology and Human History Inform a Sustainable Future," I describe how addressing modern environmental crises requires an understanding ...
Human impact on the environment
Human impact on the environment (or anthropogenic environmental impact) refers to changes to biophysical environments and to ecosystems, biodiversity, and natural resources caused directly or indirectly by humans.Modifying the environment to fit the needs of society (as in the built environment) is causing severe effects including global warming, environmental degradation (such as ocean ...
Humans Are Destroying The Earth
Humans Are Destroying The Earth. Good Essays. 867 Words. 4 Pages. Open Document. How we as humans are destroying the Earth. There have been various changes taking place on the earth. Some of the changes have been positive while others have been negative. Man has been associated with various activities that have contributed to significant ...
We Are Destroying Our Planet Essay
8 Pages. Open Document. Everyday we are destroying our planet. Global warming is one of the biggest problems in humanity. Our society has to take immediate action in order to survive there is not much time left as we continue to grow with this problem at this rate. The increase of global warming is getting out of control.
Essay about Humans: How We Are Destroying the World Around Us
The shape of the land affected where humans moved. Weather was something with which to contend. Fire affected humans until they conquered it - and herein lies the core of the relationship. The earth affects humans, and humans affect it back, viewing characteristics and patterns as problems and challenges, and finding a solution.
Save Earth Essay
The increase in pollution and damage caused by humans are affecting the earth so rapidly that it is threatening our survival. Saving earth is not merely the need of the hour but much more. The extent of degradation caused by humans is becoming irreparable. This is one of the reasons why all the resources are getting highly polluted.
Humans have transformed the planet. It's making us sicker, study says
5 min. 302. As humans degrade Earth's environment, we have created a world in which diseases may be increasingly apt to fester and multiply. Infection-spreading creatures such as mosquitoes and ...
I Believe that Humans are Destroying the Earth
Well, to put it frankly, yes. Humans are indeed destroying the Earth. Antarctica is considered, by late Steve Irwin, "as a canary in a mine-shaft" for the world's health as a whole. So when Antarctica started melting faster than usual, that should have alarmed everyone around the world that their world was in trouble. It didn't.
11 important ways that humans impact the Earth's environment
Pollution is so bad that, to date, 2.4 billion people do not have access to clean water sources. Humanity continuously pollutes indispensable resources like air, water, and soil, which require ...
How are humans destroying the Earth?
Destruction of Earth By Humans: Ecosystem loss is caused by changes in land and sea usage, exploitation, climate change, pollution, and the introduction of invasive species. The dumping of trash into the water has a direct impact on the environment.
The giant solar storm is having measurable effects on Earth : NPR
The huge solar storm is keeping power grid and satellite operators on edge. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory captured this image of solar flares early Saturday afternoon. The National Oceanic and ...
Strong geomagnetic storm reaches Earth, continues through weekend
CMEs are explosions of plasma and magnetic fields from the sun's corona. They cause geomagnetic storms when they are directed at Earth. Geomagnetic storms can impact infrastructure in near-Earth orbit and on Earth's surface, potentially disrupting communications, the electric power grid, navigation, radio and satellite operations.SWPC has notified the operators of these systems so they can ...
Humans Are Destroying The Planet
Humans will destroy the earth if no one acts. Climate change is a serious problem that has been around for decades. The 21st century is special because of the technology and information available. ... In the essay "Obligation to Endure" by Rachel Carson, Carson explains that humankind has overstepped a boundary which could reconfigure the ...
A severe geomagnetic storm has hit Earth. Here's what could happen
A severe geomagnetic storm that hit Earth has the potential to knock out power and electronics this weekend, but it could also bring a spectacular light show from the aurora borealis as far south ...
Solar storm, solar flares, G4 watch, geomagnetic storms: Things to know
A solar storm or geomagnetic storm is a space weather event directly involving the sun. According to NOAA, "solar radiation storms occur when a large-scale magnetic eruption, often causing a ...