In the next few decades we’ll be driving species to extinction a thousand times faster than we should be.
— Dr. Stuart Pimm, conservation ecologist, Duke University.
It is quite possible that the baby boomer generation is the most impactful generation that this planet has ever seen.
— Racing Extinction directed by Louie Psihoyos, Discovery Channel, 2015.)
Costa Rica is hoping to make a dent in the trillions of plastics polluting the oceans and the environment by becoming the first country to ban all single-use plastic products by 2021.
Some U.S. cities, states and other countries have either banned plastic bags or are working on a plan to do so, but that only touches the surface of what Costa Rica wants to do. Forks, lids, coffee stirrers, water bottles, and a multitude of other products would be prohibited under the ban. [1]
More than 2 million people were left scrambling for safe drinking water after China’s Lake Taihu exploded with algae a decade ago, and ever since then, the government has been spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year trying to solve the problem. One of the most awe-inspiring solutions involves harvesting algae from Lake Taihu before it spreads too far, and turning it into a flexible, rubbery material that is now being used to make shoes. [1]
Sometimes when I’m kneeling on the outermost rocks in my favorite cove in Big Sur, the spray hitting me in the face and the endlessly popping champagne stallions rearing up on both sides of the cliffs, I feel one with this powerful dynamic being called Earth. I understand that, though I will disappear, it has been a great privilege to have been here. The Earth will go on, regenerate, prevail. If necessary, it will shake off the “disease” of humanity, as my favorite movie hero, Agent Smith of The Matrix, called us.
In June of 2017, a group of 200 scientists and medical professionals called on the international community to ratchet up restrictions on the production and use of triclosan and triclocarban – 2 antimicrobial chemicals found in shampoos and cosmetics. They cite “extensive peer-reviewed research” which suggests the ingredients are potentially harmful. [1]
Plastic is not recycled.
One of the great myths of modern-day society is that people recycle in earnest… saving the environment. Au contraire! Check out the ocean. It’s filled with plastic. Fish and seabirds eat it by gobs and gobs. Furthermore, according to a World Economic Forum presentation, The New Plastics Economy: Rethinking the Future of Plastics, February 2016, by 2050 there will likely be more plastic than fish in the seas, unless socio-economic policies change drastically. But, where’s the leadership?
The sale of petrol and diesel cars will end in the UK in 2040, with a new tax on diesel drivers to be introduced from 2020
The post New diesel and petrol cars to be banned from UK roads by 2040 appeared first on Positive News.
Human Evolution of the Mind Is Like a Hind Teat on a Texas Bull…
Exxon Mobil’s Billings Refinery in Billings, Mont. (AP/Matthew Brown)
The world as we know it is changing– dramatically and permanently. Several common species of animals are approaching extinction, along with various plants, and the homogenization of crops could incite a global food scarcity. Day to day human activities are a contributor, but there are 100 businesses that really take the cake in carbon emission.
Lately, I've been writing a lot about how the DCCC is trying to bring on the dancing Blue Dogs again-- so, like clockwork, I'm hearing from a packing of simpering whiners about what an awful purist I am and how only Blue Dogs can win on this district or that district, ideas born out of nothing at all except the purest and most overwhelming ignorance (with some shear stupidity tossed in for good
