The Fourth Industrial Revolution could save the environment with its development of more renewable resources and energy. Synthetic biology could play a big role in re-growing populations of plants and animals that diminished due to air pollution, deforestation, etc. The use of clean energy could really help not only humans, but also our environment and wildlife.
"We now have a unique opportunity to harness the Fourth Industrial Revolution to help fix environmental issues and to redesign how we manage our shared global environment." -World Economic Forum
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/04/fix-the-environment-there-s-an-app-for-that
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During COP21, Paris began its plans for action against climate change. They have plans to change transportation energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Greenhouse gas emissions accounts for 25% of our air pollution. But we can fix that, it just takes clean energy. The U.S. has urged mobility services (car manufacturers, bus services, taxies, etc.) to convert over to cleaner emissions or completely over to electric energy. Tesla is currently the leader in clean electric mobile services. They have already sold more Model Ss in the Bay Area than all of Cadillac's sales in 2014, which was over 170,000 by the end of December.
"Spur coordinated and practical climate action across the mobility sector that can help governments achieve – and increase – their climate commitments." -World Economic Forum
https://www.weforum.org/projects/a-global-roadmap-to-clean-mobility
"Oh, it's just El Nino" is another common response to global warming. However, El Nino's warming trend is only extended over a short period of time, and global warming has continued over the past couple of years. El Nino is an irregularly occurring series of climate changes that effect the Pacific side of the equator. Global warming is all due to gas emission of water vapor, carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane. We can reduce is quicker by driving with electric vehicles, public transportation, consumption of less red meat, and decreasing the amount of standing water in the environment.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/el-nino-southern-oscillation.htm
Water is needed for so many things. It's needed for cooking, bathing, swimming, drinking, and much more. Global companies across the world are working to create efficient systems in their countries that will supply more water for food, energy, industry and manufacturing, etc. The project is called the Global Water Initiative, and it is one of the core projects of the System Initiative on Environment and Natural Resource Security. The Initiative plans to become more involved in smaller countries and solely "seeks to embed water at the center of economic growth planning thus resulting in optimized allocative decision making for policy makers and in turn a more equitable and water secure and stable environment for users that will be more conducive in attracting investment and job creation, supporting social stability and preservation of the environment." -World Economic Forum
https://www.weforum.org/projects/global-water-initiative
So maybe American isn't in first place for energy production. But who is? It's Switzerland. This so called "barren wasteland" is known for its chocolate, cheese, watches, and now, apparently, energy production.
"Despite being quite dependent on energy imports and not benefitting from high energy export revenues, Switzerland’s energy system performs well on most dimensions measured by the index and supports overall economic growth through low energy intensity, a diverse supply mix and diversity of import counterparts." -World Economic Forum and Global Energy Architecture Performance Index How many people does it take to change a lightbulb?- The question may have finally been answered.4/5/2017
"Two, if they're public servants with a gift for mobilizing countries from China to the USA."- World Economic Forum
Many countries have now switched to LED lightbulbs, some sooner than others. These LED lightbulbs have the capability to last from 20,000 to 50,000 hours, using less energy in the process. Thousands of cities already promoting LED in their stores, and playing their ads more often on radios and televisions statewide. Such a small thing that makes such a big impact... and apparently needs a lot of help installing.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/02/how-many-people-does-it-take-to-change-10-billion-lightbulbs
Although America has made changes to become more environmentally friendly, there are many countries that are doing much better then we are. Currently, many Nordic countries are dominating the top 5, with America lagging behind in 26th place.
"In order to support environmental protection along with economic growth, Denmark (in fourth place) has pledged 13.5 billion Danish krone (approximately US$1.9 billion) to its Green Growth initiative. Denmark scored 89.21 overall, ranking in the top 20 for health impacts, water and sanitation, water resources, biodiversity and habitat. However, at 128 for fish stocks, Denmark still has areas to work on." -World Economic Forum and EPI
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/05/which-are-the-worlds-most-environmentally-friendly-countries
"We are due for another Ice Age" is everyone's common response to the climate change/global warming. But it isnt true. An ice age only occurs when the earth's orbit and tilt and strong enough to cool down the temperature. But currently the ice age will not happen because the orbit and tilt are too weak. Then why is global warming and climate change happening? Global warming and climate change is being caused by all the emissions released into the air. They trap in the heat that had been reflected off the earth. The emission are called greenhouse gases. They are causing the earth atmosphere to deteriorate, allowing more of the sun's rays to reach earth. The major greenhouse gases are water vapor, carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane. These are all released from the cars we drive, anthropogenic black carbon gas (from the production of dairy and meat cows), and too much condensation from standing water (pools of water left in the open such as unused buckets, large puddles, etc.). We reduce these by using public transportation, eating less red meat, and draining any water being uncleaned or unused regulary.
Governor Jerry Brown recently signed a bill to regulate cow flatulence. This means that California will need to cut methane emissions from dairy cows and other animals by 40% by 2030. This mandated 40% reduction in methane and 50% reduction in anthropogenic black carbon gas represents a direct assault on California’s dairy industry and will hurt manufacturing by creating an arbitrary limit on natural gasses which dissipate quickly. This will ease the emissions that are being released, but it will be more costly for the agricultural economy and small businesses. But Jerry Brown's new restrictions on cow flatulence isn't bad news for everyone...perhaps there is now hope for Argentina's cow fart backpack invented by the National Institute of Agricultural Technology.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-09-19/only-california-governor-jerry-brown-signs-bill-regulate-cow-flatulence
Imagine that you're out fishing at the lake with your grandpa, and you can't wait to catch a good sized fish for the family to eat. Now imagine that all the fish in the lakes, streams, creeks, rivers, and oceans became extinct. At the rate that humans hunt and kill the sea life (including fish, octopi, and crustacean) they could become extinct by 2030. The population consumes so much seafood, that the ocean population cannot reproduce quick enough. Larger species of marine life are disappearing faster than the smaller species, allowing populations of prey to multiply faster than the populations of predator, creating an unbalanced system. This decrease in ocean populations creates an uneven and drastically low negative feedback loop. Less predator=more prey=unbalance ecosystem Report comparing past mass extinction events warns that hunting and killing of ocean’s largest species will disrupt ecosystems for millions of years... I find this to be a big problem, because it can completely ruin the food chain by reducing the amount of predators, increasing the amount of prey, which reduces the vegetation by consumption, and ruins the stability of the ocean environment, creating unhealthy water for humans and wildlife, increasing the mortality rate... This issue can throw off the whole system of marine life, just because we "wanted to catch 5 more before heading back to shore".
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/sep/14/humanity-driving-unprecedented-marine-extinction
It is the year 2016, and drones are the new "it". Drones are used for fun, military assignments, and now environmental science. A professor at Cambridge University recently began using these drones for exploration, versus their former use of satellites for images and video.
"Being able to use drones means that I can get information in much higher detail - so instead of just seeing a tree, I can see individual leaves, and on the reef I'm able to see the different corals and algae. I can quite easily see sand, stars, fish and sharks - things that you just can't see from satellites."- Karen Joyce, an environmental scientist at James Cook University in Cairns, Australia While drones are still too recent to calculate an area's climate change, they are capable of measuring temperature, and very high quality imagery, without putting the researcher or scientist at risk for any potential harm while the the field. They are readily equipped with high quality cameras, thermometers, and infrared technology, great for researching and investigations in many areas of need. In my opinion, this is very enlightening topic, because it gives us an idea of what kind of breakthroughs are happening in technology, and allows us to further explore science without disturbing it. Drones are capable of going into an area or situation, retrieving information, and returning while remaining nearly un-noticeable to the environment around it. Now we can send militants into less dangerous situations, because we were able to locate the enemy before an ambush. We can explore mangroves without the danger of being attacked by a crocodile. We can can scale and structure buildings, and so much more! Drones have been one of the newer steps forward in technology, and a great contribution to many areas of science, combat, and everyday life. Hopefully we can continue more detailed research of the Earth that we live on.
http://www.dw.com/en/how-drones-are-revolutionizing-environmental-science/a-19515857
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