Changing Planet Revealed In Atlas

ring writes "The United Nations Environmental Programme (Unep) has released a new atlas 'One Planet Many People: Atlas of our Changing Environment', to mark World Environment Day (WED). It compares and contrasts spectacular satellite images of the past few decades with contemporary ones." From the BBC article: "Among the transformations highlighted in the atlas are the huge growth of greenhouses in southern Spain, the rapid rise of shrimp farming in Asia and Latin America and the emergence of a giant, shadow puppet-shaped peninsula at the mouth of the Yellow River that has built up through transportation of sediment in the waters."

Comments

Re:Not enough evidence

[October_30th]

I'm more afraid of the hippies who want developing countries to starve to death and prevent their economies from developing.

I think that pretty much sums up your point. There will never be enough "good enough" evidence to convince you that that sustained, unlimited development is a pipe dream and that we must aim at zero growth at some point. After all, unlimited growth is the fundamental doctrine of the libertarian faith.

Re:Not enough evidence

[that_xmas]

Unlimited population growth has nothing to do with libertarianism.

Though a libertarian would know that population growth slows as economic freedom and prosperity grow.

A libertarian would also know that care for the environment increases as prosperity grows. And that more efficient farming and GMO plants will decrease the water and landspace needs for a population. Smaller farms providing more food than traditional farming means more land goes back to a natural state.

I'd like to see those same satellite images for the United States. There was a recent story on New Hampshire, how only 20% of New Hampshire was forest covered at the turn of the 20th century. Now it is 80% forest.

Lemna

[Espectr0]

I was curious to find that 5th picture, talking about using insects to control a green swirl of something that appeared somewhere.

I wish they could visit our lake. Last year it had a huge crop of lemna, shown here.

What you see is not a tennis court but a big piece of the lake being covered in the thing. This lake is lake maracaibo in venezuela.

Distorted Picture

[Anonymous Coward]

In North America at least, the trend has been going largely in the opposite direction. We are seeing REforestation rather than DEforestation. This is in despite of an increasing population.

It can be a little tough to find good data given all the bullshit flying around but here's a map that shows the amount of forest land in the US from 1620 onwards:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/gg96rpt/chap7.htm l

The interesting things is that we are see a dramatic resurgence of forest land here in the US. A big part of the reason, apparently, is more efficient farming practices which have allowed us to restore a lot of farmland back to forests. Here's a map showing the trends from 1982 to 1997:

http://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/LandUse/Gallery/m ap1.htm

A move to more densley packed cities is also a contributing factor to reforestation.

Article such as the one Zonk cited are a favorite of the hard left environmental movement. These 'studies' cherry pick data to paint an alarmist picture. The media usually swallow these article whole with little crtical thought. In the end, these distorted pictures don't do anything to help real environmental progress.

Re:Distorted Picture

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand, you could argue that a major reason for reforestation has been the environmental movement, which from its earliest stages was the first voice pointing out that we had better stop cutting down all our trees and start managing our resources properly.

Here in Wisconsin we actually have more forest land than we did before the arrival of European immigrants, mostly because what had been prarie was carefully maintained by the Indians, and when farmers moved in they stopped the periodic fires that sustained the prarie. (Most of our prarie was actually somewhat artificial, a product of the Indians' land management policy, you might say.)

Environmentalists point out that just because we have more forest land doesn't mean we have more wildlife habitat. The kinds of forests that we have just don't make the same kind of home for wildlife -- most are new growth, many are tree farms that are logged, and there are few unbroken tracts of forest large enough to sustain many of the species that once thrived there. So, more forests doesn't mean more biodiversity, and it may not even mean more biomass.

Even if we do have lots of healthy forest land, that doesn't necessarily mean the environment is better off. We do have a serious problem with wetlands destruction in Wisconsin, and it's affecting the health of our lakes. Madison lakes are becoming dirtier and dirtier every summer since the marshes that once cleaned the water were destroyed. Warm winters don't help either, since they leave a higher bacteria count in spring -- by the end of the summer, the bacteria are suffocating the fish.

Re:Same with you!

[micheas]

Corp Watch has an article that has a couple of interesting points about water in India and World Environment day's premire sponsor, Coke

All of the cities in India that have a Coke plant blame part of their water shortage on Coke.

Coke in India has toxins in it.

Coke's defence is, well it is a drought, and the USDA doesn't have a problem with what we are selling. They have never challenged (to the best of my research) the fact that their is lead in the soft drinks, just the fact that it is unsafe

Coke is trucking water into the villages that it has plants, as a good will gesture

Coke offered Coke as fertilizer to farmers, but it turned out to have lead in it that made the land unfit for farming.

How can we "use up" the earth's water? It all remains here doesn't it?

We don't use up the water. We contaminate it. and while extracting plutonium from water is fairly stright forward, it is very expensive due to the fact that you really do have to get essentially all of it not 99% of it.

Most farmers vote on a single issue. Water rights.

So yes we will not run out of water, but we may well wind up with far less potable water than there is demand for.

As a bit of indirectg evidence that Humans are the problem. The only place on the planet that has a healthy eco system of large mammals is in the areas of Cambodia that have so many land mines that pochers refuse to go, and large crocs only exist in the war torn regions of Africa.

The statement that there are enough resources for humans, falls apart if you asume that we are to be living in an ecosystem and not trying to manufacture everything we need.

Back to water. Have you noticed the number of public drinking fountains lately? They were everywhere thirty years ago. Now They are almost extinct. Do you pay a water bill? Have you pulled on up from twenty years ago?

Why do you think that Intel recycles 3 million gallons of water a day, and puts it on their website?

I am not someone who is anti-development. 500,000 people are going to move to California next year, and I am one of those lobbying that we should be building housing for these people, and that the new housing should be near the city centers.

Yes, many of the Indians that are objecting to Coke are Marxists, and Coke is doing a lot to sanitize thier image. But, that does not change the fact that their is a big fight over potable water, indicating the potable water is indicating that it is a limited resource.

Re:Not enough evidence

[cdrguru]

Plenty of evidence abounds for what you are talking about. Unfortunately, the Earth as a closed system can't handle the current load, much less the future.

We passed the point of fully "sustainable" around 1850 or so - every year after that we produced more waste products that can be broken down by natural processes in a year. I'm not talking about CO2 or iPods here - I'm talking about vegetable matter and human waste. Heat is another consideration as well - our current use of energy produces significant amounts of heat and not all of it is radiated into space.

To consider a "sustainable" environment and a closed system you are going to have to look at how things are going to be in several hundred years. Recycling is going to be a big deal, because the energy required to smelt ore into "new" metal isn't going to be around. Nor would any right-thinking individual let someone produce the waste products and heat from lighting up a forge. Why would you anyway, when you can just go over to the dump and pick up something ready to be "reclaimed"? Remember, that if we really want "sustainable" we better start thinking about some significant population reductions. Quickly, too.

Pollution and waste management are but one side of the equation - the other is input resources. We can spend money today on the future and building our ability to obtain resources from elsewere, or we can spend money today on reducing the population so we don't have to later. There is a third alternative - let everyone keep knocking up their Significant Other and having 14 children. Especially popular in third-world countries. We will, of course, drown in our own waste products if we don't bake from our own waste heat.

The population in 1850 was less than 100 million people. At that level we can be 100% fully "sustainable" and the natural processes on the planet will recycle all of the waste products. Waste heat won't be a problem either. We just need to decide between "open" or "closed" system and plan for the future. Should we decide on "closed", we better start reducing the population, drastically, and soon.