Warming up to disaster
CHANDRA SHEKHAR BALACHANDRAN
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The earth shows drastic effects caused by global warming. What can we do to ensure a better environment?
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Photo: P. V. Sivakumar
Devastation : Making way for progress.
Recent satellite images of Earth show quite drastic effects of global warming. In March 2008, the Associated Press reported: “Satellite images show the runaway disintegration of a 160-square-mile chunk in western Antarctica, which started February 28.”
Last year, NASA released an animation based on data showing that the Arctic ice is melting faster than earlier thought.
Interlinked
The melting water has to go somewhere. The IPCC (Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change) reports that sea levels are rising faster than ever before as a result of global warming.
The Guardian reported on February 2, 2007: “… a rise of between 18 cm and 58 cm in sea levels by the end of this century, a figure that could increase by as much as 20cm if the recent melting of polar ice sheets continues.”
Everyday there are reports about plant and animal species becoming extinct. Extinction is happening at a faster rate than before.
Earth’s air (atmosphere), soil (lithosphere), water (hydrosphere), and living things (biosphere) are interconnected. Whatever we do to one affects the others. This global crisis also has a local face: Rapidly increasing population means more pollution.
More motor vehicles emitting heat, noise, and carbon dioxide and other chemicals.
Indiscriminate cutting of trees to accommodate motor vehicles. Low-lying areas had tanks and lakes have been built on, and as a result there is flooding.
We pollute the soil and water by throwing plastics and electronic goods (computers, batteries, etc.), into it.
Look at the health problems we face from pollution and the stress of living in a crowded city.
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What can you do?
At school:
Form an environmental protection club with your Principal as a member. Conduct a survey (“audit”) of the environmental issues in your school. (e.g.: How much plastic is used? How expensive is this? Are there cheaper alternatives? How can your group motivate the entire school to become environmentally conscious?
Find out how you can get credit from these projects for your Geography, language, mathematics, biology, and other classes.
At home:
Conduct similar audits. Reduce or eliminate wastage. The way is to reduce, re-use, and re-cycle.
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