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Month: February 2020

Jeff Bezos pledges $10 billion to fight climate change

Posted on by dishanth
Jeff Bezos pledges $10 billion to fight climate change
  • Jeff Bezos said he’s giving $10 billion to fight climate change and has launched a new initiative called the Bezos Earth Fund.
  • Bezos has an estimated net worth of about $130 billion.
  • “We can save Earth,” he said in a post on Instagram. “It’s going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals.”

Jeff Bezos said on Monday that he’s giving $10 billion to fight climate change.

The Amazon CEO and richest man in the world announced in a post on Instagram that he’d start the Bezos Earth Fund. He said he expects to start giving out grants this summer.

With an estimated net worth of nearly $130 billion, his pledge accounts for about 7.7% of his wealth.

“Climate change is the biggest threat to our planet,” Bezos said. “I want to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change on this planet we all share.”

 

View this post on Instagram

Today, I’m thrilled to announce I am launching the Bezos Earth Fund.⁣⁣⁣ ⁣⁣⁣ Climate change is the biggest threat to our planet. I want to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change on this planet we all share. This global initiative will fund scientists, activists, NGOs — any effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world. We can save Earth. It’s going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals. ⁣⁣⁣ ⁣⁣⁣ I’m committing $10 billion to start and will begin issuing grants this summer. Earth is the one thing we all have in common — let’s protect it, together.⁣⁣⁣ ⁣⁣⁣ – Jeff

A post shared by Jeff Bezos (@jeffbezos) on

 

The move follows pressure from Amazon employees to push the company to do more to fight climate change. More than 350 employees signed a Medium blog in January calling for net-zero emissions by 2030, among other requests.

In September, Bezos announced Amazon’s climate pledge to get the company carbon-neutral by 2040, 100% renewable energy by 2030, and 100,000 electric delivery vehicles by 2030.

Bezos is the only American among the world’s five richest people who has not signed the Giving Pledge, in which participants promise to give away more than half of their wealth during their lifetimes or in their wills, Business Insider’s Paige Leskin wrote. His ex-wife, MacKenzie Bezos, signed the pledge in May.

His full Instagram post read:

Today, I’m thrilled to announce I am launching the Bezos Earth Fund.⁣⁣⁣
⁣⁣⁣
Climate change is the biggest threat to our planet. I want to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change on this planet we all share. This global initiative will fund scientists, activists, NGOs — any effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world. We can save Earth. It’s going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals. ⁣⁣⁣
⁣⁣⁣
I’m committing $10 billion to start and will begin issuing grants this summer. Earth is the one thing we all have in common — let’s protect it, together.⁣⁣⁣
⁣⁣⁣
—Jeff

 

 

Written by

Rebecca Harrington, Reporter, Tech Insider

This article is published in collaboration with Business Insider.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

This is the global economic cost of air pollution

Posted on by dishanth
This is the global economic cost of air pollution
  • Greenpeace research looks at the economic impact of air pollution.
  • In China, this is estimated at $900 billion a year. For the US, the figure is $600 billion.

Greenpeace Southeast Asia and the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air have released a new report about the costs of air pollution from fossil fuels, both human and economic. Burning gas, coal and oil results in three times as many deaths as road traffic accidents worldwide and it is estimated that air pollution has a $2.9 trillion economic cost, equating to 3.3 percent of the world’s GDP. In 2018, the report estimates that it was linked to 4.5 million deaths with PM2.5 pollution also responsible for 1.8 billion days of work absence, 4 million new cases of child asthma and 2 million preterm births.

It can have an impact on the economy in many forms such as higher rates of asthma, diabetes or chronic respiratory diseases leading to reduced ability to work and lower participation rates in the labor force. Children susceptible to asthma attacks also miss school days, impacting their learning while healthcare requirements can result in their guardians also taking extra time off work. According to the report, disability from chronic diseases cost the world’s economy $200 billion in 2018, with sick leave and preterm births costing $100 billion and $90 billion respectively.

The total annual cost of air pollution in China is estimated to be $900 billion each year with costs in the U.S. running to $600 billion annually. Indian cities have scored unfavorably in air pollution indexes for years and the issue costs the country $150 billion per year on average. In 2018, the cost of dirty air equated to 6.6 percent of Chinese GDP, 5.4 percent of India’s GDP and 3 percent of U.S. GDP.

 

The economic burden of air pollution.
Image: Statista

 

 

Written by

Niall McCarthy, Data Journalist, Statista

With the collaboration of Statista.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

Extreme weather could bring recession ‘like we’ve never seen before’.

Posted on by dishanth
Extreme weather could bring recession ‘like we’ve never seen before’.
  • Physical climate risk from extreme weather events remains unaccounted for in financial markets, a new paper warns.
  • But forecasting and modelling this risk is complicated, because previous climate patterns are ‘no guide to the future.’

Without better knowledge of the risk, the average energy investor can only hope that the next extreme event won’t trigger a sudden correction, according to the research.

 

“If the market doesn’t do a better job of accounting for climate change, we could have a recession – the likes of which we’ve never seen before.”

— Paul Griffin, Professor at the University of California, Davis.

 

The central message in his latest research is that there is too much “unpriced risk” in the energy market. “Unpriced risk was the main cause of the Great Recession in 2007-2008,” Griffin says.

“Right now, energy companies shoulder much of that risk. The market needs to better assess risk, and factor a risk of extreme weather into securities prices,” he says.

For example, excessive high temperatures, like those experienced in the United States and Europe last summer, can be deadly. Not only do they disrupt agriculture, harm human health, and stunt economic growth, they also can overwhelm and shut down vast parts of energy delivery, as they did in Northern California when PG&E shut down delivery during fires and weather that could trigger fire.

Extreme weather can also threaten other services such as water delivery and transportation, which in turn affects businesses, families, and entire cities and regions, sometimes permanently. All of this strains local and broader economies.

 

“Despite these obvious risks, ivestors and asser managers have been conspiciously slow to connect physical climate risk to company market valuations.”

— Paul Griffin, Professor at the University of California, Davis.

 

“Loss of property is what grabs all the headlines, but how are businesses coping? Threats to businesses could disrupt the entire economic system.”

Climate-vulnerable locations also factor into risk for energy markets. In the United States, US oil refining is located on the Gulf Coast, an area exposed to sea-level rise and intense storms. Oil refining in Benicia and Richmond, in Northern California, can be exposed to coastal flooding.

 

 

Energy companies’ transmission infrastructure is located in arid areas, increasing risk of damage, such as the destruction from recent wildfires in California. In addition, it is not clear insurance will be available to cover such risks. Add to those risks, Griffin says, “litigation, sanctions, and even loss of business from the property destroyed.

“The climate litigation risk already priced into energy stocks (after, for example, a protracted ExxonMobil court case in the 1990s) would prove insufficient.”

Extreme weather climate risk, in summary, is hard to predict.

“While proprietary climate risk models my help some firms and organizations better understand future conditions attributable to climate change, extreme weather risk is still highly problematic from a risk estimation standpoint,” he concludes in the article.

“This is because with climate change, the patterns of the past are no guide to the future, whether it be one year, five years, or 20 years out. Investors may also normalize extreme weather impacts over time, discounting their future importance.”

The paper appears in the journal Nature Energy.

 

 

Written by

Karen Nikos, Associate Director, News and Media Relations, University of California, Davis

This article is published in collaboration with Futurity.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

Time capsules: the stories that Amazon trees can tell us

Posted on by dishanth
Time capsules: the stories that Amazon trees can tell us
  • Dendrochronology (the study of tree rings) can tell us more about the life of a tree – which can help reduce climate change impacts through better land management.
  • Thicker rings tend to denote a year when conditions were good for growth, whereas thinner rings suggest a lean year of drought and competition with other trees.

Tropical forests are one of the world’s largest carbon stores and they help regulate the global climate. But they’re being erased at a terrifying rate. Deforestation claimed an area the size of Belgium in 2018. These habitats are often cleared to make way for palm oil plantations and grazing pasture for livestock. For most forests, destruction on this scale is a fairly modern phenomenon.

Tropical forest ecosystems tend to have very high biodiversity, but often in the places you’d least expect. Research has found that there is often more wildlife in areas where there is an ancient history of human activity.

So how have indigenous people in tropical forests nurtured biodiversity in tropical forests while still domesticating tree species, building cities and growing crops? New research published in Trends in Plant Science suggests that the answer may be written in the trees themselves.

Ancient time capsules

Over 50,000 years ago, people in Borneo managed tropical forest vegetation using fire. They burned the edge of advancing forests, and this targeted disturbance was enough to prevent a large number of tall tree species dominating. It allowed habitats to regenerate that were rich in wild food plants and attractive to the animals that people hunted.

Other traditional methods of forest management included opening the forest canopy by carefully selecting trees to cut down. The light that flooded to the forest floor could then encourage edible species such as wild yams to grow amid the regenerating vegetation. These practices are similar to the modern ideas of edible forests and agroforestry, which maintain relatively high biodiversity and retain soil carbon and nutrient stores. Much of this is lost upon conversion to industrial plantations or ranches.

 

Traditional forest management encouraged biodiversity, whereas modern methods erode it.
Image: Caeteno-Adrade et al./Trends in Plant Science

 

In the past, vast areas of the world’s tropical forests were managed by indigenous peoples in this way. Trees keep their own accounts of this history in their wood. It has always been thought that tropical trees have short lifespans, usually less than 400 years. But recent research shows that many tropical trees live for a very long time, and can preserve over 1,000 years of history in their timber.

You’re probably familiar with the idea that you can measure how old a tree is by counting the rings beneath its bark. One ring usually equates to one year, so dendrochronology (the study of tree rings) offers a fairly easy way to understand the life of a tree. Thicker rings tend to denote a year when conditions were good for growth – ample sunshine and water – whereas thinner rings suggest a lean year of drought and competition with other trees.

Many tropical trees don’t lay down annual rings, but in the new study dendrochronologists identified over 200 species that do. Typically wider rings reflect higher rainfall, but many trees put on a growth spurt if light intensity rises. These are called release events and can happen if trees around them are cut down, allowing more light to break through the canopy. Finding these markers helps researchers to recognise and date past episodes of forest clearance. In the Amazon, these records help scientists understand the enormous extent of pre-Columbian agriculture and forest management.

 

Researchers extract a core of wood to measure the tree’s rings and find out its age.
Image: Victor Caetano-Andrade

 

The rings also preserve evidence of changes in the climate through the different isotopes (types) of oxygen and carbon laid down in the wood. Carbon isotopes tend to reflect light availability and other factors that control photosynthesis, whereas oxygen isotopes help scientists track changes in a nearby water source and annual rainfall. Isotopic studies showed that the abandonment of Angkor Wat in the 14th century coincided with severe drought.

Forest histories can also emerge from new DNA studies. Heavily logged species go through what we call “genetic bottlenecks”, where part of the genetic material of a species is lost as many individuals die or are unable to reproduce and pass on their genes. This leads to restricted gene pools.

Researchers would expect to see the same patterns in species which were strongly affected by logging or fires started by people in the past. Genetics can also identify species that were spread by ancient people, like the Brazil nut.

Living tropical trees record within themselves a history of human activity and the forest’s response to it. The regeneration of forests after disruption by people in the past offers some hope for the future, but only if current rates of deforestation can be halted, allowing the lungs of our planet to regenerate.

 

 

Written by

Chris Hunt, Professor of Cultural Palaeoecology, Liverpool John Moores University

This article is published in collaboration with The Conversation.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

‘Undersea gardeners’ are restoring Jamaica’s lost coral reefs

Posted on by dishanth
‘Undersea gardeners’ are restoring Jamaica’s lost coral reefs
  • Jamaica lost 85% of its reefs due to a hurricane, pollution, overfishing and boat damage.
  • “Coral gardeners” are helping to restore the reefs by growing young corals in “nurseries.”
  • Sea urchins and parrotfish, which protect corals, are also making a comeback.

Jamaica’s coral reefs were once a paradise for scuba divers and a haven for marine life from parrotfish to sea snakes. But that was before a sequence of disastrous events deprived the Caribbean island of its coral.

The destruction started in 1980 when category 5 Hurricane Allen, the strongest Caribbean storm of the 20th century, hit Jamaica with winds of over 185 km/h and a 12-metre storm surge.

Just as the coral was starting to recover, in 1983 a mystery disease killed off grazing sea urchins, which kept harmful algae at bay. Pollution, overfishing and boat damage added to the destruction, and eventually 85% of Jamaica’s coral reefs were lost.

But now these “rainforests” of the oceans are starting to recover, thanks to the efforts of a group of scuba divers who are nurturing young corals in “nurseries” before planting them back on rocks to rejuvenate the reefs.

 

Young coral are grown on ropes in ‘nurseries’.
Image: Jamaica Conservation Partners

 

In the underwater nurseries, located in The White River Fish Sanctuary, one of Jamaica’s 44 Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), coral fragments are suspended from ropes to allow them to feed and grow, protected by the coral gardeners who remove predators like snails and fireworms that prey on immature coral.

When the corals are big enough, the divers use fishing line to attach them to exposed rocks in the former reef areas to secure them until the young corals have time to attach themselves permanently.

Safe havens

Corals are not the only living things making a comeback in Jamaican reefs. The areas are also being used to conserve heavily overfished species like parrotfish, which are vital to keeping coral reefs clear of invasive algae. Conservationists are calling for a total ban on catching parrotfish. Black sea urchins, which eat harmful algae, are also recovering and making the seafloor safe for corals once again.

Corals are soft-bodied animals that build a hard limestone-like carapace by converting minerals in seawater into calcium carbonate. It’s this hard outer shell that makes up a reef. Its bright colours come from friendly algae that protect the corals from damage.

But warming ocean temperatures are destroying the world’s coral reefs. Already half of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has been damaged by “coral bleaching,” a process that starts with the death of the coral’s protective algae.

Without the algal covering, corals eventually die, leaving just their white skeletons. Scientists predict rising sea temperatures will destroy 90% of the world’s coral reefs unless we take urgent action to cut global greenhouse gas emissions.

 

The stark differences between healthy and unhealthy coral
Image: US National Ocean Service

 

Rainforests of the sea

Coral reefs occupy just 0.1% of the ocean floor but are a vibrant source of aquatic biodiversity, providing a home to a quarter of all marine life – that’s more species than rainforests. But they are very slow growing, which means they can take decades to recover from damage.

Our seas absorb about a third of all the world’s CO2 emissions. This is turning them acidic, which in turn harms corals. Over the last three decades, half of the world’s coral reefs have been lost, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).

Coral reefs also provide food and livelihoods to millions of people, worth an estimated $386 billion each year. They also act as a buffer, protecting vulnerable coastlines and communities from storm damage.

Jamaica still has a long way to go on its journey to marine recovery. But the coral farmers are a great example of ordinary people taking action to protect the environment and reverse the damage being done to our planet by climate change.

 

 

Written by

Douglas Broom, Senior Writer, Formative Content

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

Carbon emissions are raising the acidity of the Pacific Ocean, leaving Dungeness crabs defenseless

Posted on by dishanth
Carbon emissions are raising the acidity of the Pacific Ocean, leaving Dungeness crabs defenseless
  • Scientists found the shells of young Dungeness crabs along the US West Coast were dissolving due to a lower pH level as the Pacific Ocean acidifies.
  • Ocean acidity was not expected to damage the crabs so quickly.

As the Pacific Ocean becomes more acidic, Dungeness crabs, which live in coastal areas, are seeing their shells eaten away, according to a new study commissioned by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

 

Image: Science Direct

 

The study authors looked at ocean acidification levels from 2016. They found that the lowered pH is dissolving the shells of young Dungeness crabs in Oregon, Washington and British Columbia. Without strong shells, the young crabs suffer damage to their sensory organs, as CNN reported.

The findings contribute to growing concerns about the viability of the Dungeness crab as atmospheric carbon dioxide, which continues to rise, is absorbed by the Pacific Ocean and increases acidification, as The Seattle Times reported.

Ocean acidity was not expected to damage Dungeness crabs so quickly. Researchers say it is a warning for the future of seafood and the health of marine life.

“If the crabs are affected already, we really need to make sure we pay much more attention to various components of the food chain before it is too late,” said study lead author Nina Bednarsek, a senior scientist with the Southern California Coastal Water Research Project, as CNN reported.

The study was published last week in the journal Science of the Total Environment.

Dungeness crabs are vital to the West Coast fishing industry — netting around $200 million annually. They are also important to tribal and recreational crabbers. The crabs have thrived in coastal waters that have recently become hotspots for ocean acidification, according to The Seattle Times.

Ocean acidification happens when the pH of ocean water drops. The primary cause is an increase in absorption of atmospheric CO2 over a long period. When CO2 is absorbed by seawater, a chain of chemical reactions is set in motion. That causes the sea water to increase its acidity as an increase in hydrogen ions tamps down carbonate ions, which would balance out the water’s pH level, as NOAA explained in a statement.

Crustaceans and corals need carbonate ions to help them build strong shells. In their absence, it becomes difficult for crabs, oysters and clams to build shells. It also stops corals from building strong skeletons and it weakens plankton, as CNN reported.

“Decreases in carbonate ions can make building and maintaining shells and other calcium carbonate structures difficult for calcifying organisms,” explains NOAA.

Previous research had shown that ocean acidification was causing harm to West Coast pteropods, small free-swimming snails that are food for Dungeness crab, according to The Seattle Times. Direct damage to Dungeness crabs was not expected for many years to come, so the findings have alarmed NOAA scientists.

“We found dissolution impacts to the crab larvae that were not expected to occur until much later in this century,” Richard Feely, study co-author and NOAA senior scientist, said as CNN reported.

The research boat that took samples in 2016 did not just find damage to the crab’s shell, but also to tiny hair-like structures crabs use to navigate their environments, which is something scientists had never seen before. Crabs without these tiny mechanoreceptors could move slowly and have trouble swimming and finding food, according to CNN.

As for shell damage, the shells showed signs of scarring and abnormal ridging, which may impair a crab’s ability to swim, stay buoyant and escape from predators. The damaged crabs were also smaller, which suggests developmental delays, as the Sustainability Times reported.

“We were really surprised to see this level of dissolution happening,” Bednarsek said, as The Seattle Times reported.

The authors say their findings mean more research is needed to make new predictions about the future of the Dungeness crab as the Pacific coastal waters continue to absorb more carbon dioxide, according to The Seattle Times.

 

 

Written by

Jordan Davidson, ,

This article is published in collaboration with EcoWatch

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

Why we need wetlands

Posted on by dishanth
Why we need wetlands

It’s called the Extinction Wing. Located in a dark corner of the Paris Museum of Natural History, it houses a haunting collection of species that have long vanished from the natural world. With biodiversity declining faster than at any time in human history, what size museum will future generations need?

We now face a sixth mass extinction, in which an estimated one million species are predicted to disappear. Does it matter? We survived the dodo’s demise and, though tragic, will the imminent extinction of the northern rhino really affect our lives?

In fact, it will. All living things on our planet depend on healthy and diverse ecosystems for air, water, and nutritious food. These same ecosystems regulate the climate and provide the raw materials and resources on which our economies – and lives – depend. The annual global value of natural services each year is estimated to be $125 trillion.

Yet, biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse are among the biggest risks to economic prosperity and global development, according to the World Economic Forum. For many, it is a matter of life or death. For all of us, it is an existential threat as far-reaching, complex, and urgent as climate change.

The world’s failure to meet almost all of its biodiversity goals highlights how we’ve underestimated that threat. Humanity wonders at the natural world but fails to value it. We pollute ecosystems, exploit their resources with abandon, and make them inhospitable. Too often, we fixate on the threatened extinction of iconic species – the polar bears and koalas whose suffering makes headlines – while ignoring the vast range of organisms we may never see, but which are essential to sustaining the habitats that support and shelter all life, including us.

The most endangered ecosystems are wetlands, including freshwater rivers, lakes, paddies, marshes and peatlands, and saltwater estuaries, mangroves, coral reefs, seagrass beds, and lagoons. We have lost 87% of our wetlands in the past 300 years, and 35% since 1970. Today, they are disappearing faster than any other ecosystem – three times faster than even forests. As they vanish, so does the life within them. More than 25% of wetland plants and animals – which comprise up to 40% of all the world’s species – are at risk of extinction, and stocks of other remaining species are declining rapidly.

The implications of this trend are sobering, given that wetlands are our most valuable ecosystem. Economically, they provide an estimated $47 trillion worth of services annually and a livelihood for about one billion people.

More fundamentally, wetlands clean and store water. At a time when one in three people worldwide lacks access to safe drinking water, and water-related conflict is on the rise, protecting these ecosystems saves lives. It also saves money: protecting a natural watershed providing clean water to New York City, for example, eliminated the need for a $10 billion water-treatment plant that would have cost $100 million per year to run.

Wetlands are also a major source of nutrition, including fish and rice – a staple food on which 3.5 billion people depend. The world’s largest mangrove restoration in Senegal shows how conserving and restoring wetlands can be a valuable strategy to tackle hunger and poverty. The restoration led to increased biodiversity; higher rice yields; and increased fish, oyster, and shrimp stocks. Along with improved food security, surplus catches continue to bring valuable income for villagers.

Wetlands are also among the planet’s most effective carbon sinks, and thus play a central role in climate regulation. That is why some countries – such as Scotland, Denmark, and others – have embarked on large-scale peatland restoration, with positive knock-on effects for wildlife.

But, despite the clear evidence, wetlands are largely sidelined in national and global policymaking. To redress this anomaly, the parties to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity will this year adopt an ambitious global roadmap to avoid mass species extinction while redefining a future where humans genuinely live in harmony with nature.

Proposed goals – including zero net loss and integrity of ecosystems by 2030 and a 20% increase in that area by 2050 – are essential. This is a critical opportunity to embed specific, measurable targets for protecting wetlands, and it must not be lost.

Commitments already exist to protect and better manage wetland biodiversity, such as the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. But mainstreaming wetlands’ compelling role in global and national solutions concerning biodiversity would provide the impetus for the transformative action needed. It would also help deliver multiple international goals on climate change and sustainable development.

Future generations should not have to wander around vast extinction museums imagining lost worlds and mourning missed opportunities. They should not have to struggle to access the vital natural services that our planet is supposed to be able to provide. Unless we take urgent action to curb the next mass extinction, that will be the future that awaits them.

 

 

Written by

Martha Rojas-Urrego, Secretary-General, The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands.

This article is published in collaboration with Project Syndicate.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

This is a smart solution to water scarcity in Africa.

Posted on by dishanth
This is a smart solution to water scarcity in Africa.
  • Solar pumps collect data to monitor underground reserves of fresh water.
  • The pumps’ sensors record real-time data such as energy usage and pump speed, which is used to calculate groundwater extraction rates and levels.
  • The technology could help tackle water scarcity and monitor water usage across the continent.

High-tech solar pumps mapping underground freshwater reservoirs across Africa are collecting data that can help prevent them running dry, according to the project’s developers.

Manufactured by British social enterprise Futurepump, the solar pumps are being used by thousands of small-scale farmers in 15 African nations, including Kenya and Uganda, as a cleaner, cheaper option to diesel and gasoline-powered ones.

The pumps’ sensors record real-time data such as energy usage and pump speed in each location, which is shared with the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) to calculate groundwater extraction rates and levels.

“We fitted remote monitoring sensors on to our pumps for our own in-house reasons – for looking at their technical performance – and we’ve collected tens of millions of data points,” said Toby Hammond, Futurepump’s managing director.

“So this project is a really exciting opportunity to do something far richer with the data. We want to make it available for the good of the sector – for those advocating solar irrigation and those working to ensure sustainable water use.”

Many of the world’s major aquifers are stressed because too much water is being taken out for household, agricultural and industrial use and not enough surface water is seeping in to replenish the underground rock formations.

 

A Kenyan farmer sets up her solar irrigation pump in Busia county, Kenya on February, 2019.
Image: Futurepump

 

While more than 90% of Africa’s agriculture is rain-fed, farmers are facing increasing rainfall variability due to climate change, say environmental experts.

To ensure food security for the continent’s 1.3 billion – and growing – population, countries need to manage their water resources more efficiently, from harvesting rainwater to maintaining aquifers, or underground water basins.

Studies by the Sri Lanka-based IWMI suggest that in many regions of Africa there is still much untapped and sustainable groundwater potential – particularly if recharge from the surface is managed.

But there is a shortage of local data to develop policies.

IWMI plans to use the data from Futurepump’s 4,000 pumps to calculate how much water is being extracted at any given time, which can help governments ensure it is used sustainably, with limits on extraction or a shift to less water-intensive crops.

“People often see solar pumps as ‘free energy’ … They feel since it’s not going to cost extra to extract more water, it can be taken,” said IWMI’s David Wiberg, who uses tech to make water use more efficient.

“But once you put in place an information system like this, farmers will be able to see that pumping extra amounts of water is not helping them or their neighbours grow extra crops.”

 

 

Written by

Nita Bhalla, Journalist, Thomson Reuters Foundation

This article is published in collaboration with This is place.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

This man ran across the USA to raise awareness of plastic pollution

Posted on by dishanth
This man ran across the USA to raise awareness of plastic pollution
  • He’s run thousands of kilometres to raise awareness of marine pollution.
  • The plastic waste on his home of Bali inspired him to take action.
  • 8 million tonnes of plastic waste end up in the sea every year.

It’s around 4,800 kilometres from New York to Los Angeles – coast-to-coast, northeast to southwest, across the mountains, plains and prairies of 13 different states. It’s a journey that would take 41 hours of non-stop driving or a flight lasting six hours.

Alternatively, you could run. Yes, run. If you can cover 32 kilometres every day it would take you approximately 160 days to complete the trip. You’d have to be crazy, right? Or maybe so determined to make a difference that you believe “no idea is crazy enough.”

Step forward Sam Bencheghib, who has just completed that feat. He ran from Battery Park in New York to Santa Monica, to raise awareness about the harm plastic pollution is inflicting on our world’s oceans. He even wore running shoes made from upcycled plastic.

 

Monument Valley, Colorado, gave Sam the opportunity to recreate a scene from the movie Forrest Gump
Image: Martin Parent/Sam Bencheghib

 

His journey ended on 1 February 2020, when he was accompanied by a group of 70 runners for his last mile before he jumped into the Pacific ocean to celebrate.

“It definitely wasn’t easy to get there but despite all the obstacles along the way, physically, mentally and emotionally, it was a life changing experience that I will carry with me for the rest of my life,” he said.

 

Time for action

His brother Gary spoke at the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting in Davos this year. Together with their sister Kelly, Sam and Gary help run the Make a Change Foundation, which fights marine plastic pollution. “There are 500 times more pieces of plastic in our ocean than there are stars in our galaxy,” Gary told the Davos audience. “The truth is that there has never been a more important time to act than now.”

 

“It’s starting to feel like I’ve been out here forever,” Sam wrote on 11 December
Image: Martin Parent/Sam Bencheghib

 

The Bencheghibs grew up on the Indonesian island of Bali. In 2017, the two brothers paddled along the heavily-polluted Citarum river in a kayak made from plastic bottles to raise awareness about the trash clogging up the waterway. At Davos, Gary was unveiling his latest initiative – Sungai Watch, an online platform that uses artificial intelligence and river barriers to detect and trap plastic and other debris. ‘Sungai’ means river in Indonesian.

Around 300 million tonnes of plastic waste is generated every year, with around eight million of those tonnes ending up the sea.

Down but not out

Sam’s journey ran into difficulties on the last stretch. With just 720 kilometres left of his mammoth journey, he damaged his Achille’s tendon. “Sometimes no matter how hard you try to do everything right, you get unlucky,” Sam wrote on the Make a Change blog. Undeterred, he picked up some hiking poles and started walking rather than running.

 

“I’ll be pushing through with these walking sticks, one step at a time, doing 24 miles a day until I finish this thing.”
Image: Martin Parent/Sam Bencheghib

 

Along the way, Sam met with residents of landlocked parts of the US to talk about his experiences dealing with coastal and river-borne plastic pollution. He visited schools and universities, conducted zero-waste workshops, and plogging events to clean up local neighbourhoods.

“I’m bringing the ocean to citizens around the US who don’t necessarily understand the problem,” Sam said in an interview last year. “A big part of it is that no matter where you live, inland or by the coasts, everyone contributes to this problem because they’re using plastic. And 80% of the plastic in the ocean comes from rivers and streams.”

 

 

Written by

Sean Fleming, Senior Writer, Formative Content

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

This is how worms could help to eat up the planet’s plastic pollution.

Posted on by dishanth
This is how worms could help to eat up the planet’s plastic pollution.
  • Research has found mealworms can eat plastic and still be nutritious as food for other animals.
  • Even those that ate Styrofoam, which contains a toxic chemical, seemed to show no adverse side-effects and the chemical didn’t build up in its body.

New findings suggest mealworms could be the solution to our big plastic problem.

They can not only consume various forms of plastic, but also Styrofoam containing a common and toxic chemical additive. And even after that meal, they can serve as protein-rich feedstock for other animals.

The study is the first to look at where chemicals in plastic end up after being broken down in a natural system—a yellow mealworm’s gut, in this case. It serves as a proof of concept for deriving value from plastic waste.

“This is definitely not what we expected to see,” says Anja Malawi Brandon, a PhD candidate in civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University and lead author of the paper in Environmental Science & Technology.

 

The process of how meal worms could help to minimize plastic waste.
Image: Environmental Science and Technology

 

“It’s amazing that mealworms can eat a chemical additive without it building up in their body over time.”

Mealworms as animal food

In earlier work, researchers revealed that mealworms, which are easy to cultivate and widely used as a food for animals ranging from chickens and snakes to fish and shrimp, can subsist on a diet of various types of plastic.

They found that microorganisms in the worms’ guts biodegrade the plastic in the process—a surprising and hopeful finding. However, concern remained about whether it was safe to use the plastic-eating mealworms as feed for other animals given the possibility that harmful chemicals in plastic additives might accumulate in the worms over time.

“This work provides an answer to many people who asked us whether it is safe to feed animals with mealworms that ate Styrofoam“, says Wei-Min Wu, a senior research engineer in the civil and environmental engineering department.

The researchers looked at Styrofoam or polystyrene, a common plastic typically used for packaging and insulation that is costly to recycle because of its low density and bulkiness.

It contains a flame retardant called hexabromocyclododecane, or HBCD, commonly added to polystyrene. The additive is one of many used to improve plastics’ manufacturing properties or decrease flammability.

Plastic, worms, shrimp

In 2015 alone, nearly 25 million metric tons of these chemicals were added to plastics, according to various studies. Some, such as HBCD, can have significant health and environmental impacts, ranging from endocrine disruption to neurotoxicity. Because of this, the European Union plans to ban HBCD, and US Environmental Protection Agency is evaluating its risk.

Mealworms in the experiment excreted about half of the polystyrene they consumed as tiny, partially degraded fragments and the other half as carbon dioxide. With it, they excreted the HBCD—about 90% within 24 hours of consumption and essentially all of it after 48 hours.

Mealworms fed a steady diet of HBCD-laden polystyrene remained as healthy as those eating a normal diet. The same was true of shrimp fed a steady diet of the HBCD-ingesting mealworms and their counterparts on a normal diet. The plastic in the mealworms’ guts likely played an important role in concentrating and removing the HBCD.

The researchers acknowledge that mealworm-excreted HBCD still poses a hazard, and that other common plastic additives may have different fates within plastic-degrading mealworms. While hopeful for mealworm-derived solutions to the world’s plastic waste crisis, they caution that lasting answers will only come in the form of biodegradable plastic replacement materials and reduced reliance on single-use products.

“This is a wake-up call,” Brandon says. “It reminds us that we need to think about what we’re adding to our plastics and how we deal with it.”

 

Written by

Rob Jordan-Stanford, ,

This article is published in collaboration with Futurity.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.