Period 5 Group C

SCIENCE REPORT

To all concerned human beings:

For Okinawa native, Kame Ogido, seaweed and algae is major part of a low-calorie, plant-based diet that will help give her and her fellow Okinawans an average life expectancy of eighty-two years. Okinawans have the longest life expectancy in the world. Ogido is eighty-four years old, and she is in wonderful shape for living a lot longer. For Ogido, this is her life; she gardens and harvests seaweed and algae along the coasts to keep her healthy. Although, recently life under the water has faced a life-threatening problem. For some rain is a blessing, for others, an annoyance. For Ogido, it is changing her entire lifestyle.
Acid rain has become a growing problem among the environment and many important ecosystems specifically. On the opposite side of the planet, the lakes in the Adirondack region of New York, are suffering. The marine life, including, fish, algae, and phytoplankton had been nearly wiped out in some of these lakes. On a good note, recovery efforts have been successful and underwater organism population is on the rise.

Deadly Precipitation

Baseball size hail is bad, radioactive snowflakes are terrible, but there is precipitation drastically worse than the precipitation previously listed. Acid rain is known to have gruesome long lasting effects on out living and the main contributor to this problem, is ourselves. Our notorious lust for energy and our strong reliance on nonrenewable resources has introduced the presence of acid rain and its harsh effects on our lifestyle. Acid rain is created by sulfur emitting, coal-fired power plants. The great nation of the United States of America is currently the leader in the noxious emissions. There are over 600 of these power plants in America, all of which contribute to 54% of our nation’s energy. This dependence on nonrenewable energy is really hurting our nation in many of different ways. Global warming, using up all of this resource and acid rain are all long lasting effects on using this energy source. We might fulfill our appetite for energy but just when we need it the most in the near future we won’t have it and the other effects will be too much for us to handle and BOOM, the extinction of the human race. Yes, this is kind of a big deal. The immediate stop of using this energy is necessary for the survival of all humans. Just saying.

Cap and FAIL

The so called “solution” to the effects of coal burning is infamously known as “Cap and Trade”. The real truth behind this is that cap and trade does just about NOTHING for us. Cap and trade also known as – emissions trading – is a huge problem. Some guys from ENRON and some other fellows from Wall Street financers like Goldman Sachs, who gave us the subprime mortgage crisis, are the people to blame for cap and trade. How emissions trading works you ask? Well, pretty much all scientists agree we need to reduce the amount of carbon in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million if we want to avoid a climate disaster. For the U.S. that means reducing our emissions by a whopping 80% before the year 2050! Which isn’t impossible but America has troubles trying to do stuff like this. They way these genius’ want to do it is setting a cap on how much a certain nation can emit. Governments would give out emissions permits and every year there would be fewer and fewer permits till we reach our goal. That’s where the trading comes in. Some companies would start using innovative new ways to get their energy and they could “trade” their permits to other companies. It sounds great right? Yep, that’s what I thought too. Except there are this little loop holes in cap and trade that make it such a terrible investment.
First off, there is this thing known as “free permits” or also cap and giveaway. What happens is industries get these free permits so they pollute more and more. So in all actuality carbon emissions went up and the only part that did work was the polluters made lots of money. Oh I forgot to mention, all the money they make comes from our pockets!! Sounds like a great plan huh? Second, is offsetting, which is when a company supposedly removes carbon from the atmosphere which can be sold to a polluter so they have permission to emit more. The real danger with this is it’s hard to know if these companies are actually taking out carbon because if they sold these permits to a polluter but the company didn’t actually take out any carbon the polluter will just pollute more and our emissions will shoot right past our goal and the whole effort will be lost. Third is known as distraction which like we’re coming up with all these great ideas but we are really “putting the cart in front of the horse” if you’re capping what I’m emitting. If a cap and trade proposal is actually stopping us from capping carbon, it’s a very dangerous distraction. Right now, all we can do as concerned human beings is let the world know that this is a problem that needs to be fixed now. Raise our voices and stop this crisis that could lead to the end of our lives and worse the end of the human race!!!

Careful Celebration

Although all of these other topics seem very despondent there is some very good news for the fish in the Adirondack lakes. Times are getting better and the rain is becoming cleaner. These lakes went from clear to murky which is a good thing for the organisms that live in the water up in those northern lakes. That means that algae and other water plants are starting to grow in the water again. Acid rain would kill off any of the life that lived near the surface and below the water which lead to clearer waters. Now that you can’t see as far down in the water as normal it’s a good sign for the wildlife of the Adirondack region. As happy as all of this sounds there is still a lot to be done to save our planet from sheer destruction. Good thing as human beings we are smart and will eventually make the right decision. Although we shouldn’t get our hopes up and celebrate too soon I think it is necessary for a…careful celebration.