A Note on Climate Justice

If you haven’t heard of climate justice, you may be wondering what justice has to do with climate change? We are all hurt by climate change and the slow death of our planet caused by our own mismanagement so what exactly is climate justice? The use of the word justice suggests that there is someone responsible for the wrong being done. There are actors that are doing wrong to another and there is a need for a balancing of the scales. This idea makes some uncomfortable because there is a suggestion of culpability and an opportunity for accountability. Let’s take a look. 

When we look at the impact of climate change and what areas of the world are suffering the most from the extreme conditions of global warming, we often see that some of the areas most impacted are contributing the least to emission. On a smaller, but no less important, scale, within the same countries there is a large disparity between the impact of climate disasters on those who are middle and upper class, and those with lower incomes or no incomes at all. For example, when hurricanes or tornadoes hit, those who can afford insured homes will bounce back faster than those who lack coverage or are moving from shelter to shelter. For this reason, climate justice speaks to a situation that goes beyond saving our world from burning up in the next decade or so. It speaks to the disparities in disaster resources, medical care, and more. It includes the question of, how do we protect those who are already the most vulnerable in our communities from environmental issues we’ve all contributed to. 

Some try to view climate change as an issue in isolation as they believe considering the larger picture may cloud the urgency of the current climate crisis. However, this does tend to suggest that the equally urgent situation of those who are currently without clean water, medical care, shelter and adequate food, does not deserve the same urgency. It ignores the fact that millions are currently dying right now often because those who are responsible for the highest levels of global warming emissions are also responsible for stripping their homelands of all their valuable resources, leaving the surrounding communities with nothing. 

Many would say that the interwoven nature of these issues requires an equally integrated solution as attempting to solve global warming in isolation will ultimately be less of a true solution, and more of a stop-gap measure. It’s been suggested that when a culture is built on squeezing the most out of the many while the few prosper while simultaneously never investing back into the foundation that made them great, you have an unsustainable cycle that will ultimately break down. Climate change then discusses exactly how we should tackle the problem of climate change from its core to the current crisis, including protecting the most vulnerable communities around the world. What do you think is the most necessary change to balance the scales between high emission countries or the wealthy and the most vulnerable countries and communities? Comment below!

Resources:

This is just how unfair climate change is

https://www.carbonbrief.org/experts-why-does-climate-justice-matter

Set to have 15 disaster a day by 2030 article

Remember the Bees?

Fig. 1: This is a bee. Hopefully future generations will get to see one in person.

We’ve talked before a bit about bees when we discussed neonicotinoids and adulterated honey but let’s take a moment to talk specifically about what we are doing to bees. Over the last few decades, the global bee population has dropped by about 30%. In the last five years we’ve heard of beekeepers losing more than half their hives to mites and pesticides year over year. We now spend hundreds of millions of dollars transporting bees around the country throughout the year to pollinate our crops. During this rotation, some keeps are losing as much asd 75% of their colonies. Millions and millions of bees at a time when the bee population is at its lowest. There are already places where we have begun manually pollinating in place of the bees but that is not feasible for the world’s crops. 

We are dumping millions into robotic bees and tiny drones, pollination guns and mechanical pollinators but what if we just tackled the core issue of this problem. Namely, the toxins we are spraying on our food!! We’ve talked about Monsanto before but they are not the only company that insists on spraying their crops with chemicals and pesticides that destroy local bee populations. They are simply one of the largest. Bees travel within a 1-2 miles radius of their home. Sometimes they can travel as far as five miles but they mostly make their home near a consistent food supply. When a beekeeper is located near to a big ag grower and they spray their plants with pesticides, the bees will still try to pollinate those plants. They will not die immediately but will bring the pesticide back to their colony. Scientists have tested the impact of neonicotinoids and found that it negatively impacts the bees that survive by affecting their mating, fertility, ability to navigate home and more even when diluted 8 million times. 

Pesticides, limited, clean food sources and mites are the main reasons we are looking towards a future that might be without bees. This is such a simple solution when you consider the consequences of doing nothing. The below video gives a picture of the international situation. Please take a look! We need to act now as the U.S. is the main producer for a number of the world’s agricultural crops. Is a world without bees really the future you want?

How you can help save the bees.

Pretty and Self-sufficient: The Flowerbed Improved

As springtime rolls in, you might be ready to spruce up the yard, drag out the lawnmower and maybe plant some flowers to brighten the season. While pretty, even a flower garden can do more than just look pretty. There are a number of edible plants that you can add to the rotation that will spice up your favorite springtime dishes as well. 

Looking for ground cover? Mint is delicious muddled into a refreshing beverage or incorporated into a savory dish. The plant itself makes excellent ground cover and it’s pretty low maintenance even if you don’t have the greenest of green thumbs. Be careful, though. Mint will take up a mile if you give it an inch so it doesn’t really play well with others. Oregano and marjoram are resilient herbs that will spread on their own and are common kitchen staples. Sorrel, also edible, provides excellent cover for plants that might be closer to the ground. While you might be familiar with rosemary as the bush-like plant that can grow into a monster-sized shrub, there’s also a trailing or creeping version that will spread out and cover quite a bit of ground while staying pretty low.

Looking for plants to form an edible hedge instead? We’ve already mentioned rosemary. This very tasty herb can get quite large so make sure you give it some room to spread. Many of our favorite berries can serve as a great privacy hedge and some provide us with fresh berries in season as well! Blueberries, blackberries, and elderberries can all be cultivated into a fruit-bearing barrier. Cherry plums and damsons can also serve as a hedge with rewards.

Maybe you are just looking for some pretty plants with bonus features. Lavender sports tiny, purple flowers that will brighten any landscape. Red Orach is a vibrant purple-leafed plant that can serve as an excellent accent plant but is also a part of the spinach family. Amaranth is a pretty plant with a number of options for snacking. The leaves can be used in salad and cooked as well. The flowers are dramatic, large bunches coming in pinks, purples, red and gold. If you want to feed the local hummingbird population naturally, honeysuckles are also a very pretty choice. The plant itself might not be as flashy as the others, but it attracted a wide variety of showing guests.

Farmers’ markets and established local nurseries are a great place to learn about which plants will do the best in your growing zone. You are also more likely to find someone who can talk to you with some experience about which plants will grow well together. We are experiencing strains on our food supply and our climate stability is breaking down. Growing some food of your own with the same resources you might spend on annual flowers is an excellent small change to increase your personal self-sufficiency. It’s also fun! Share your favorite plants to grow below!

Resources: 

Gardening Know How 

Shrubs - Edible Landscaping 

Edible Hedge Plants That Serve as Both Privacy and Food 

Pathways for the Future

Today we are featuring another very cool innovation that has actually been around for several years but it is getting a little more press right now! You are probably pretty familiar with the concept of renewable energy but let’s do a quick review. Renewable energy is any source of energy that is sustainable and doesn’t run out. For example, we don’t run out of sunlight and (for now) it is a bottomless resource that we can utilize. Other examples of renewable energy are wind energy, hydro energy, tidal energy, and geothermal energy. If you’ve ever driven across the US, you’ve probably come across wind farms. These farms harness air movement to generate clean energy. This energy is then used to supplement the grid, reducing the power obtained from fossil fuels.

      It’s a similar pattern with the other sources of clean energy, with an environmental constant providing energy simply through its existence and technological utilization. Alternatively, the type of energy currently being talked about is not from an environmental constant but something we, as human beings, create by living. A human-generated kinetic energy. Kinetic energy is  often thought of as the energy of movement. If you’ve ever seen one of those lines of wired balls where you lift and drop one on one side and when it swings down and hits the group, the ball on the other side swings up, you’ve seen the impact, no pun intended, of kinetic energy. Well, one company called Pavegen, has decided to utilize this type of energy to power the common amenities of common areas. Specifically, Pavegen has harnessed the kinetic energy produced by footsteps to power things like stadium phone chargers, street lights, and supplemental energy for shopping spaces. These triangular panels take the energy produced from being stepped on and transfer it into usable electricity.

Not only is this a very cool idea, but the utilization of these pads have been used to push for more general behavioral changes. For example, one shopping center wanted to push both the use of the Pavegen walkway and the use of their in store app. They incentivized the use of the walkway by connecting it to their store app and rewarding users with bonuses at retailers within the mall. Now, not only are shoppers incentivized to download the mall’s app but they were also rewarded for use of the Pavegen’s walkway. Little integrations like this one allow people to benefit from sustainable activities and ultimately assist in training overall better behaviors for our environment! A true win-win!

Asbestos: Finally Gone for Good

You may have been under the impression that asbestos was completely phased out of use in the US but today’s proposal by the EPA would suggest otherwise. The EPA has proposed a rule that will finally outlaw the use of asbestos for any purpose in the US in products like chlorine bleach, brake pads and more. Asbestos still kills around 107,000 people globally with around 15,000 of that number hailing from the US of A. Mesothelioma is a cancer caused by asbestos and the survival rate is around 40%. The average life expectancy after diagnosis is less than 3 years.

Previous to this move, the US has accepted that some percentage of the population will just have to deal with an increased risk due to their specialized jobs. These professions include:

• Asbestos miners

• Electricians

• Plumbers

• Pipefitters

• Insulators

• Shipyard workers

• Demolition Workers

• Brake Mechanics

• Selected Military personnel

• Home remodelers

The risk for Mesothelioma is increased if you have a parent who has had mesothelioma. Additionally, if you live with someone with increased risk, you can also be dangerously exposed. Asbestos fibers adhere to clothing and skin. It’s possible to reduce this risk by changing your clothes and showering before going home but over time, even smaller, more indirect exposures are enough to put family members at risk for illnesses like mesothelioma.

Now, the EPA is raising the bar to exclude ALL forms of asbestos, including chrysotile asbestos. This is a big step forward in protecting Americans in specialized roles from exposure as well. These are preventable deaths and it is good to see the EPA taking this stand.

Resources:

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/05/epa-moves-ban-asbestos-00022900

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/epa-rule-finally-ban-asbestos-carcinogen-83887317

Water: Let's Stop and Think Before We Run Out!

As we recognize another annual World Water Day, let’s take a moment to highlight some of the truths of our current Water Crisis. We’ve talked about the disparity in the water supply, contrasting the availability of water in most places within the US with places where clean water is scarce. We know that without water, our life expectancy and quality of life drops dramatically. In addition to this current reality for billions of people globally, it is important to note that climate change is setting us all up to experience this lack first hand. Not only should we be working to see that those currently without get their needs met in the near future, but we need to realize that without immediate action we are all facing a dire water supply problem. Namely, the danger of running out. 

The earth is covered with a bit of water but most of it, over 96% of it in fact, is salt water.  Of the remaining 3-4%, 90% of THAT is frozen, stored up in the world’s glaciers and ice caps. The remainder, some small 0.3% of the earth’s total water, is our unevenly distributed usable resource. 

If the glaciers are melting, doesn’t that mean that we are freeing up more of that fresh water to be used? Well, temporarily, perhaps, but there are several major problems with that.  First, it doesn’t take much to understand that the melted water from the glaciers will raise the world's water level, endangering communities that live along the coasts as they flood and are eventually eroded away. Millions of people live along the coast and this will not only destroy their homes, but displace them to other places, causing a sort of migration and a period of strain as resources will need to be redistributed accordingly around the world. Additionally, a lot of our agricultural heavy hitters like California will lose considerable acreage for food production. The rising water levels will reshape the world’s coastlines and the acreage lost will be significant. 

The domino effect of this loss of land is far reaching but there is another more direct result that affects many more than those living along the coast. Glaciers, besides being made of water, serve as a sort of fridge for the water that precipitates as snow during the colder months. During the summer, that snow melts and flows through most of the world’s major rivers and supplies a large portion of seasonal fresh water. If not for this phenomenon, the only water supplied to us would be that from precipitation. Also, due to climate change, we’ve seen a significant uptick in droughts so this issue is eating away at the usable water supply from both ends. If the glaciers melt away completely, something scientists say will happen by 2100 if we continue in our current trend, we will be wholly reliant on precipitation which is also experiencing detrimental changes. Dry weeks, months or even years could be in our future without the benefit of glacial runoff. Sometimes, in the US, it’s easier to forget that clean water is not unlimited. We go to the sink and clear water we could drink (though with PFAS contamination it wouldn't be advisable) comes out. A lot of us can shower everyday if we want and using clean water for yards and plants doesn’t even phase us. This issue though is one that will have serious consequences within our lifetime and may see our children without water for their more basic needs. We need to start realizing that water is a finite resource and without changing our usage practices, we will, essentially, run out!

Cows and Climate Change

Now that we’ve talked a little bit about why a 2 degree increase is so significant, let’s look at how we got here and what changes we could make to dial back the speed of global warming. You may have heard at this point that the burning of fossil fuels is impacting and accelerating the rate at which the earth is warming. C02 lingers in the atmosphere building up for years and years and the result is that bubble of greenhouse gases, trapping heat against the earth. Methane is also one of those gases and is thought to be almost 30 times as potent when it comes to the impacts of global warming than CO2. One of the biggest differences, however, is that Methane does not linger in the atmosphere nearly as long. It stays in up there just over a decade versus hundreds of years like CO2.

So, while we produce a large amount of methane from burning fossil fuels and industrialism, cows, goats and other livestock contribute over a third of the human caused methane production in the world. Take a look at this video to learn more.

As you can see, even though methane from cows is in the atmosphere for a much shorter period of time, because of its potency, alleviating this source of methane will still have a significant impact on our forecast of the future. This is probably our best opportunity to quickly reduce the level of methane we are releasing into the atmosphere. So what can you do?

Voting with your actions, your wallet and your vote are going to be the best ways to support mitigating the damage we’ve already done! Next time, let’s look at what will happen and is already happening if we don’t push for intensive change today!

Climate Crisis: What's 2 Degrees?

When we look at the state of our current climate crisis, we might ask ourselves, how did we get here? Why does it seem like we are watching all of these global catastrophes but instead of putting on the brakes, we are running straight into more? What’s all this talk about keeping the amount of global warming down under 1.5 degrees from here on out? We’ve already increased the earth's temperature with our industrialism and agricultural practices. What’s the big deal about these seemingly tiny temperature changes? 

Most of us are somewhat familiar with the concept of air pollution contributing to general atmospheric pollution which creates what we’ve labeled the greenhouse effect. This means that when heat builds up in the atmosphere, it isn’t able to disperse but is trapped near enough to the earth’s surface to raise the overall temperature. 

WARNING: MATH INCOMING! The temperature of the earth has risen about .14 degree Fahrenheit per decade since about 1880 but in the last 40 years, that amount per decade has more than doubled. You might think, well, what’s a few degrees? A little under 2 degrees Fahrenheit doesn’t seem like such a big deal. However, let’s consider for a second what kind of energy expenditure we are really talking about. For scale, let's think about your heating bill. If it's cold outside and you have a 3 bedroom, 2 bath home, all one level, 1500sq ft, in say, Tennessee, let’s estimate that your heating bill is $100/month (67,500 BTUs). Raising the temperature of your home (all other factors staying the same) two degrees will increase your bill a little bit but not a crazy amount for that space. Perhaps, 5% or 6% more money and the associated heat expenditure to raise the temperature in the whole house 2 degrees higher is minimal. Now your bill is $106. This isn’t really about the money but it may help illustrate the real point which is that in this space you are pumping in more heat to raise the temperature of the whole space. 

Now, you got a new job and bought a new house that has 5 bedrooms, 6 baths and is about 6,000 sq. ft. Now, it takes about $400 per month to heat your house. To raise the temp two degrees now, it would take $24 per month and the amount of heat needed to raise that temperature and fill that space is 4x as high. Now…imagine that you upgraded again but now your house is the size of a football field (57,600 sq. ft.). Now it costs $3,840/month to heat the house and $230.4 to increase the heat by 2 degrees.  You add a second story, and a third. In fact, you add stories to this house until you reach space. Roughly 27,500 stories to be exact. $105,600,000 is what it costs to heat your new house (ignoring the reality of environmental facts like it getting colder as you go up, etc.) for one month. A two degree increase will now cost $6,336,000. What if your house covered the entire earth which, fyi, would take more than 100 billion football fields? This is an imperfect analogy as there are a million little factors that impact actual atmospheric conditions and the energy required to raise earth temp 2 degrees. However, you can see how if we were talking about an atmosphere-sized house, the cost to heat it ($1.056e+19) and the cost to raise the temp two degrees($6.336e+17) would be…astronomical. More significant than the cost itself is the amount of heat it would be paying for. Roughly that equal to 125,340,652 atomic bombs. 

Now, consider this. Not only have we already trapped the necessary amount of extra heat in our atmosphere to increase the earth's temp 2 degrees but we are well on our way to doing it again in half the time. The livability of earth depends on our specific temperature among other things. If it raises again in this way, it’s estimated that roughly 20% of our wildlife and plant life will lose at least half of their habitat. Half! How many of those animals will die off because their survival is balanced on a tightrope already due to other factors? How many animals in the food chain depend on the ones that won’t survive?? Suddenly, 2 percent is a much, much bigger issue. Next time we will talk more about what is driving that temperature up and what we can do to actually impact the speed of that increase!   

6 Pressing Questions About Beef and Climate Change, Answered | World Resources Institute

Climate Change: Global Temperature | NOAA Climate.gov. 

Effects | Facts – Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet.

Our planet is warming. Here's what's at stake if we don't act now. | Stories | WWF 

Plastic on Plastic for Lunch

We’ve all seen the pictures of plastic waste floating in our oceans. We know that this has a tremendously detrimental impact on aquatic life. It even damages the structure and landscape of the ocean itself. From human waste bioproducts to industrial runoff to general garbage, we pollute one of this earth’s greatest resources with little to no restraint. The ocean is so large, our garbage can’t really make that much of a difference, right? Wrong. What happens when you throw garbage and excrement in the same place that you get your food, year after year? You get sick. Though the heavy metal and PFAS contamination are both consequences of this process, today we are taking a look at micro- and nanoplastics. 

Microplastics range in size from about 0.1 μm to 5 mm particles. Particles with a diameter less than 0.1 μm are considered nanoplastics. When trash accumulates in the ocean, it is broken down by abrasion and friction, wildlife and the combination of wind, sea and sand.  Of the 380+ million tons of plastic waste produced every year, less than 10% of it is recycled and at least 10% of it will end up in the ocean. Though some of it will end up washing back up onto land, some of this trash will break down and will contaminate the ecosystem it was introduced into. Fish, mussels, and other aquatic creatures will absorb or eat some of these plastics and this will introduce a wide and varying range of chemical and physical contaminants. Some of these particulates become so small that, to the human eye, it may seem as if they’ve dissolved into the salty brine of the sea. 

Now, we get about 60 billion kgs (which is something like 66 million tons) of food from the sea every year. We also use about 270 million metric tons of salt each year and while not all salt comes from the sea, a solid percentage of it does and this all poses an obvious issue. About 90 percent of sea salt has been found to contain some level of nanoplastics and we eat both! It’s very likely we use our microplastic salt on our microplastic-filled seafood! Though the hope is that we will all care about the environment enough to want to cut back on plastic pollution for the sake of reduction itself, the idea that the trash you discard without care may very well make its way back into your diet should give you pause. Recently, nearly 200 countries signed a global plastics treaty to reduce global plastic waste. This is the first global treaty of its kind and it is our hope that this will be a real step in the direction of creating a cleaner, sustainable future. One where at minimum we are no longer eating plastic. 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/03/210310132335.htm

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/acs.est.9b04535/suppl_file/es9b04535_si_001.pdf 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-46417-z.pdf 

https://particleandfibretoxicology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12989-020-00358-y

Antimony: Carcinogenic Khol

Antimony, often mistaken for lead, was thought to be a common ingredient in Khol eyeliner back in the time of Egypt’s prime. It’s still used in some traditional eyeliner in the Middle East today and has even made its way into modern cosmetics as well. Antimony is a shiny, silvery element with 5 valence electrons and the ability to increase the strength of lead creating a much more durable alloy. It’s insoluble in water, stable in air and it is not ductile or malleable in its pure form. It’s alloys have a wide range of uses, however, from castings and metal bearings to plastics, textiles and even paper. 

Though useful, Antimony is also quite toxic. The most dangerous exposure is to those that work with it in the industrial field. If it’s inhaled it can cause respiratory issues like chronic bronchitis, emphysema, pleural adhesions and more. It’s also noted to increase blood pressure and cause gastrointestinal disorders. Studies suggest that it could also cause liver and kidney damage. It is additionally a known carcinogen! Though the FDA and CDC have dragged their feet on this classification for years, many states have gone ahead and listed it among their known carcinogens as we know it has a strong tie to lung cancer and other types of cancer related to the respiratory system.

A big environmental issue currently on the rise is the natural resource contamination due to the mining of antimony. The development of better methods for it’s isolation and removal are being highlighted as mining releases antimony into the soil where it eventually leaches into the groundwater. Currently, we’ve seen the impact of antimony when it’s inhaled regularly in it’s industrial use but imagine what harm it could do if consumed unknowingly by the greater population. This risk is one that researchers are currently trying to assess while developing safer ways to use this material.

As a consumer, it’s important to know if the products you are buying contain Antimony. It’s been known to show up in clothing, school supplies for kids and even baby prams. As we have learned before, toxic chemicals are often most detrimental to the very young so being away of the materials you pick up and expose you family too is more important now than ever.

Resources:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0045653521007219

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0045653521007219

https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2016-09/documents/antimony-compounds.pdf