This is our last blog post for the fall semester. It feels bittersweet; I'm sad it's over but I'm happy I can take all the things I've learned and incorporate them into my life. For the final blog, I have to reflect, and choose one environmental issue, out of all the ones we have learned, that I believe is the most important. The issue I felt I had to choose is climate change. Climate change is one of the biggest issues facing out world today, and it will only get worse if nothing drastic is done. One of the main reasons I chose climate change is because it kind of intertwines a variety of different issues into one. These issues include the use of nonrenewable energy (coal, oil), overconsumption, overpopulation, industrial agricultural practices, habitat destruction, deforestation, and the list just continues. Climate change is very serious, and it can have extreme negative effects on the earth and on its inhabitants. What's worse, is that this issue is mostly human caused, meaning, we are the ones who have caused all this damage to the earth and to ourselves.
This graph from NASA's website conveys that the current carbon dioxide levels are at the highest level they have ever been.
Carbon dioxide levels have started to increase more quickly ever since the start of the industrial revolution, which proves there is a positive correlation between urban development and the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Something clearly needs to be done about climate change, but the question is what? Where do we start? Well, on a large scale, society as a whole can make a switch to renewable forms of energy: solar, wind, geothermal, biomass, etc. Lawmakers and politicians would need to make more of a push to create laws that help, rather than hurt the environment. On a smaller scale, as an individual, I can ride my bike more, use less energy, or renewable forms of energy, and I can even look into cars that can fun on bio fuel, or an electric car for my future car.
We learned so many interesting facts and concepts in this class, it's hard to narrow it down to what I found the most interesting. I really liked all the videos and documentaries we watched. Specifically, "No Impact Man," "The Story of Stuff," and the documentary, "Wasted." No impact man encouraged me to make every attempt to reduce my footprint, the story of stuff surprised me by sharing how much we consume as individuals, and wasted encouraged me to waste less food and to look into composting. I thought our guest speaker's lecture about hazardous waste was really interesting as well.
We learned so much in this class, and although a lot of made me feel sad and hopeless about our future, I was always encouraged in the end to go out and make a change. I'm really glad I was able to learn as much as I did in Wednesday night's environmental science class.
