I believe the excessive and inconsiderate use of natural resources, such as fossil fuels, water, trees, and plastics, to be the most significant problem that Earth is facing today. This contributes to the increasing levels of air pollution, water pollution, soil contamination, etc. Overpopulation has impacted the environment dramatically as early as the 20th century. Not only are there scarce resources, but also people are not being conscious of their use. The majority of the population, especially those who have the most, are being selfish and careless about the harm they are causing to the Earth. According to Peter Raven, former president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science we have lost a quarter of the world’s top soil and a fifth of its agricultural land, destroyed a major proportion of our forests and other natural habitats without replacing them. We have driven the rate of biological extinction up several hundred times beyond its historical level, and are threatened with the loss of a majority of all species by the en of the 21st century. It is time that we all do something about it, or else Earth as we know it could be lost in no time.
The majority of the problems that our world faces are derived from the excessive use of natural resources. For example: the atmosphere is building up of carbon dioxide due to our inconsiderate burning of fossil fuels, this in hand causes a major damage to the ozone layer (what protects us from the sun’s harmful radiation). Making a chain of horrific reactions such as the increasing of temperatures worldwide. This contributes to the rapid melting of the poles and therefore the future dramatic increase of the sea level. In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Fourth Assessment Report predicted that by 2100, global warming would lead to a sea level rise of possibly one meter, causing major catastrophes to cities located in the coast. It is estimated that a sea level rise of just 200 mm could create 740,000 homeless people in Nigeria, Maldives, Tuvalu, and other low-lying countries are among the areas that are at the highest level of risk. The UN's environmental panel has warned that, at current rates, sea level would be high enough to make the Maldives uninhabitable by 2100. As you can see one action leads to several consecutive events that are all harmful, unfortunately this is only one part of the problem.
Another example would be the enormous amount of waste humans generate year by year. Here are some astounding facts that will give you an idea of where we stand today. The US has 5% of the world's population and 30% of the waste. US industry “admits” to 4 billion pounds of toxic pollution released per year (likely far more). Average person consumes twice as much as 50 years ago. Average American creates 4.5 lbs. garbage a day, an amount doubled from 30 years ago. For every one garbage can you put out at the curb, 70 cans were filled by all the processes
needed in order to make it. 99% of all those things we buy are not in use after 6 months. Every Sunday, more than 500,000 trees are used to produce the 88% of newspapers that are never recycled. North Americans throw away 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour. Every year some 45,000 tons of plastic waste are dumped into the world's oceans. One of the results of this is that up to one million seabirds and one hundred thousand marine mammals are killed each year. Every year we dispose of 24 million tons of leaves and grass clippings, which could be composted to conserve landfill space.
North America is the number one region of the world with the greatest ecological footprint, according to WWF’s Living Planet report. Ecological footprint refers to the “resource accounting framework for measuring human demand on the biosphere.” It is about time that we all do something. Many of us prefer to take the pessimistic road and say “I cant make a change all by myself, so what the hell.” or say “Yeah, the world is changing but it wont affect me right now.” If we keep thinking this way, we will fall into the whole faster than we predicted. Here are several ideas of how you, as an influential individual, can help th Earthhttp://www.50waystohelp.com/. If we all committed to do at least 5 to 10 of the things listed, we would dramatically decrease the dying of our planet. Some easy ways to make a change that caught my attention are: avoid to buy bottled water or re-use the bottle a couple of times, turn off the air conditioned and open your windows, turn off the lights when you are not using them, walk more or ride you bike instead of using your car, use both sides of the paper or opt for your computer, take a shorter shower, recycle, etc, etc, etc.
We can all make a change, but in order to do so, we have to believe in what we are doing. Search in your computer watch the news, this is really happening, if we don’t act fast, catastrophe will be imminent. We still have time to save endangered species, clean ecosystems, maintain normal temperatures, and overall save the planet, our home.
