My Science School

It’s not Al Gore. It’s not DiCaprio. It’s a teenager that’s undeniably the face of the environment chapter in the book of impactful stories from the decade. Swede Greta Thunberg’s story begins on August 20, 2018, when the 15-year-old skips school to protest outside parliament for more action against climate change, with just a placard in hand. Within a week, she is joined by students, teachers, parents, and has the attention of the media. Soon enough, she marks Fridays for climate protest, and suggests students everywhere take up the “Fridays of Future” campaign by staging walkouts at their own schools. How she made an entire world hear her out is history. When a few world leaders undermined her concerns, determination and impact, she came up with witty updates on her social media pages, showing them – and us – that she’s more than just a concerned teenager asking irresponsible adults “How Dare You?”

 

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The U.S. suffered three hurricanes – Hurricane Harvey, Irma and Maria in just two months, August and September 2017. It would also turn out to be among the five costliest-ever to hit the country. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that together they cost the country USD 265 billion. The storms brought widespread death and destruction to Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Since the hurricanes killed hundreds of people and brought misery and hardship to millions of people and brought misery and hardship to millions of Americans, the World Meteorological Organization decided to retire the names of these hurricanes.

NOAA said the dollar amounts are "the estimated total costs of these events — that is, the costs in terms of dollars that would not have been incurred had the event not taken place. Insured and uninsured losses are included in damage estimates." 

In all, 2017's hurricanes caused more than a quarter-trillion dollars in insured and uninsured losses, the National Hurricane Center reported. 

 

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On June 1, 2017 the U.S. President Donald Trump announced his decision to pull out of the Paris Agreement that his predecessor had signed. The agreement had come into force on November 4, 2016. Trump claimed it “gives undue advantage to India and China at the cost of the United States’ interests”, and that it “is less about the climate and more about other countries gaining a financial advantage over the U.S.”. He also insisted that the accord would have negative impacts on job growth, manufacturing and industries. His speech suggested that he was open to negotiations to “make a deal that’s fair”.

To date there are only two other countries that have not yet signed on to the Paris Agreement: Syria and Nicaragua. Syria, which remains in the throes of a destructive civil war, noted that it was not in a position to sign such agreements because of ongoing sanctions from Western countries. The government of Nicaragua, however, refused to sign on for different reasons. Nicaragua believes that the Paris Agreement does not go far enough to reduce emissions, arguing that wealthy countries such as the United States should have been forced to make deeper commitments.

 

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In October 2016, a vast stretch of ocean off Antarctica received international protection to become the world’s largest marine reserve. Over 15 lakh sq.km of water in Ross Sea is protected, thanks to the decision of the international body that oversees the waters around Antarctica- the Commission for the Conversation of Antarctica Marine Living Resources, comprising 24 countries. The nutrient-rich waters of the region are the most productive in the Antarctic, and the protection will guard everything from krills to penguins and whales. Unfortunately, only two years later, Russia, Norway and China would stop global efforts to turn a huge tract of pristine Antarctic Ocean into the world’s biggest sanctuary of about 1.8 million sq.km.

 

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Due to higher-than-normal water temperatures in 2015 and 2016, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef suffered its worst-ever coral bleaching event on record. According to a November report by researchers at ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies in James Cook University, about 67% coral had died in the worst-hit northern part. However, those in the southern part were in good health, while the central part of the Reef witnessed a six % die-off, the report said. Since coral bleaching (or die-off) usually occurred as a result of continuous warm water temperatures, scientists were concerned about the recovery of the corals.



The Great Barrier Reef is made by trillions of tiny invertebrate creatures known as coral polyps, which have built it over the past 600,000 years. The polyps, which excrete calcium carbonate to make reefs, are extraordinarily sensitive to changes in water temperature. When it rises by two to three degrees Celsius above normal levels many species of coral are forced to expel the multicoloured algae that live within its tissues, an effect known as “bleaching”.  The white coral skeletons that remain can regenerate if temperatures fall and water quality conditions are good. But in many instances entire reef systems can be destroyed if water temperatures remain elevated for several months. 

 

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June 2015 was a terrible month to be a human. Anew study in the journal “Scientists confirmed what only the discerning had perhaps expected all along – that the sixth global mass extinction was happening and humanity’s existence was being threatened. The researches had used conservative estimates to prove that “species are disappearing faster than at any time since the dinosaurs’ demise”. We are wiping species off our planet at a rate at least 100 times faster than historical levels. They called for swift action to conserve threatened species, populations and habits, and also cautioned that the window of opportunity was closing really fast.

The impacts of a still-avoidable sixth mass extinction would likely be so massive they’d be best described as science fiction. It would be catastrophic, widespread and, of course, irreversible. In the past, it has taken life ten to thirty million years to recover after such an extinction, 40 to 120 times as long as modern-looking humans have been telling tales by firelight. Moreover, Williams and his team argue that future changes driven by humanity may go so far as to create not just a new epoch in geologic history – such as the widely-touted Anthropocene – but a fundamental reshaping of Earth on par with the rise of microbes or the later shift from microbes to multicellular organisms.

 

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Also known as Paris Climate Accord, this historic and landmark climate pact was forged in Paris in December 2015, under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (an international environmental treaty). Nearly all the countries of the world adopted it. Considered the world’s first comprehensive climate agreement, it focuses primarily on bringing down increasing global temperatures by at least two degrees Celsius over pre-industrial times; reducing the amount of global emissions; and strengthening the abilities of countries to deal with climate change. With the signing of the Agreement, the then U.S. President Obama is believed to have hoped for “a world that is safer and more secure, more prosperous, and more free”. However, his successor would soon pull the rug out from under the world’s feet.

 

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December 2014 turned out to be a horrific end to the year for Sundarbans, the largest contiguous tidal mangrove forest in the world. On the morning of December 9, a tanker carrying furnace oil and a cargo vessel collided in Sundarban’s Shela river, the former sinking and spilling over 3.5 lakh litres of oil into a region popular for its rich biodiversity, including the endangered Irrawaddy dolphin, the Ganges river dolphin and the royal Bengal tiger. Within days, the impact of the toxic oil spill was visible – oil-coated marine creatures (dead or barley surviving) and sharp drop in the diversity of phytoplanktons and zooplanktons, among other signs. Thus, however, would not be the last disaster this region would witness – a ship with fertilizer and two vessels with coal would all sink in the next few years because of shipping bans being withdrawn as quickly as they are imposed.

 

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In November 2014, the U.S. and China (President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping) unveiled a deal to reduce their greenhouse gas output, with China agreeing to cap emissions for the first time and the U.S. committing to deep reductions by 2025. China, the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, agreed to cap its output by 2030 or earlier, if possible. The agreement was seen as being a significant boost to international efforts to reach a global deal on reducing emissions beyond 2020, at a U.N. meeting in Paris the following year.

Administration officials acknowledged that Mr. Obama could face opposition to his plans from a Republican-controlled Congress. While the agreement with China needs no congressional ratification, lawmakers could try to roll back Mr. Obama’s initiatives, undermining the United States’ ability to meet the new reduction targets.

 

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In the last two to three decades, hill-State Uttarakhand in the Himalayan region has seen several natural disasters. However, in June 2013, the disaster-prone area witnessed one of its worst natural disasters in the form of torrential rains and resultant flashfloods, claiming the lives of thousands of people and animals while not-so-quietly altering its landscape. The flashfloods also wiped out settlements and decimated livelihoods. The National Institute of Disaster Management, in one of its first reports in 2015 blamed “climatic conditions combined with haphazard human intervention” for the disaster. Environmentalists point out that adequate steps haven’t been taken to prevent or handle such disasters, including the recurrent Brahmaputra floods that have decimated several regions, especially Assam, over many years now.

 

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REDD+, elaborately known as “Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks” in developing countries, is a programme under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Though the talks began in 2005, the key aspects of this programme were finished by 2013. It is an important part of global steps to control climate change, and seeks to encourage developing countries to contribute to climate change mitigation efforts by “reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) by showing, halting and reversing forest loss and degradation; and increasing removal of GHSs from the earth’s atmosphere through the conservation management and expansion of forests”.

It creates a financial value for the carbon stored in forests by offering incentives for developing countries to reduce emissions from forested lands and invest in low-carbon paths to sustainable development. Developing countries would receive results-based payments for results-based actions. REDD+ goes beyond simply deforestation and forest degradation and includes the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks.

 

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An Arctic record was broken on August 26, 2012 and it was not good news. According to the U.S.-based National Snow and Ice Data Centre, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Norwegian, Danish and other government monitoring organisation that was the day the Arctic sea ice hit its lowest extent ever recorded since the beginning of the satellite record in 1979 – satellites showed it had shrunk to 4.1 million sq.km. The record it broke was 4.3 million sq.km. set in 2007. The heat and the subsequent melting have continued over the years, and 2019 was in line for the second lowest Arctic sea ice extent record.

If the Arctic begins to experience entirely ice-free summers, scientists say, the planet will warm even more, as the dark ocean water absorbs large amounts of solar heating that used to be deflected by the cover of ice. The new findings were published as climate negotiators in Poland are trying to reach a global consensus on how to address climate change.

 

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On June 13, 2012 Australia’s then Environment Minister Tony Burke announced that the country would establish the world’s largest network of marine reserves. About one-third of the island-nation’s waters, running to over three million sq.km of reef and marine life around the country’s border will be covered, he said. While creating 60 reserves and also protecting the Coral Sea, the plan will also restrict fishing and oil and gas exploration, in a major step towards safeguarding the environment.

Highly protected areas such as the Coral Sea off Australia's north-eastern coast and the adjoining World Heritage-listed Great Barrier Reef will also be protected from oil and gas exploration. Both areas, which cover a total 1.3m sq km, have shallow reefs that support tropical ecosystems with sharks, coral, sponges and many fish species.

The numbers of marine reserves off the Australian coast will be increased from 27 to 60.

 

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The earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan on March 11, 2011, turned out to be more than just a natural disaster. It caused a nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Fukushima prefecture, north of Japan. Several reactors at the plant were damaged, raising concerns over radiation leaks. The government set up a 30-km no-fly zone around the facility, and 20 km around the plant were evacuated. Later, the evacuation area was further increased when a spike in levels of radiation was evident in local food and water supplies. Several thousand residents left their homes even as radiation levels remained high months later. About nine years after the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl occurred, the site is cleared of immediate danger, but it still has a lot of clearing up to do.

 

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Established a year earlier under the National Green Tribunal Act 2010, the National Green Tribunal began functioning in July 2011. This specialized body is “equipped with the necessary expertise to handle environmental disputes involving multi-disciplinary issues’ and is guided by principles of natural justice. It has aimed at disposing of causes related to forest, environment, biodiversity, air and water. While the principal bench function s from New Delhi, the zonal benches function from Bhopal, Pune, Kolkata and Chennai. The setting up of the tribunal was seen a huge step towards realizing environmental democracy. Hundreds of appeals/petitions are heard and judgments delivered every year. For instance, over 500 judgments were delivered by the tribunal in 2016, in cases relating to pollution, conservation, industry operations, thermal power plants, mining operations, and environmental compensation, among others.

 

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