environmental suffering
The data shows the carbon emissions of the African countries compared to the more industrialized and modernized western countries. The data shows the tremendous difference of carbon dioxide emissions between the western and African countries. Although Africa holds about 14% of the world population, it only contributes 3.6% of the world carbon emissions, while the western countries holds less than one-third of the total world population, it contributes over half of the world carbon emissions. This shows that the western countries have a much larger carbon footprint compared to the developing countries in Africa although they always complain that the African countries should cut down on their carbon emissions.
The overall amount of carbon emissions is increasing annually, although a few steps have been undertaken to halt its growth, the results have not been very convincing. Some of the main reasons that contribute to the rising amount of carbon emissions are increasing population, industrialisation and the consumption of larger amounts of fossil fuels and coal to satisfy electricity needs.
The environment is suffering, the signs of it are very obvious, the increasing number of natural disasters are testament to that. There has been a constant rise in the average sea levels around the world. Lowlands around the world are under threat of being submerged by an ever rising sea level. The ice caps in the Antarctic are melting. Creaks could be observed forming in the ice caps. The air is being constantly polluted, factories and cars spew out poisonous fumes that damage our health and the environment. The changes in the climate has caused the occurrence of many natural disasters that are not supposed to happen or have increased the frequency of existing disasters. Currently, the number of minor and major earthquakes occurring are increasing yearly. This shows that all the pollution that we have done to the earth has injured it severely.
When too much pollution is done, the earth will turn barren and will not be able to support life anymore. Then the world will not have anymore land to farm on and feed itself. The world will descend into chaos and destroy itself. I believe that it may be time for everybody to band together to do something drastic about this calamity. Last year, the worldwide concert “LIVE EARTH” is organized to bring forth the message of an earth in crisis, but I feel that it ended as a failure as the people still left rubbish around after the concert and the concert used up a lot of electricity.
Personally, I believe that switching to other forms of renewable energy may be one of the best solutions available with the current state of technology. However it may still be a futile attempt if we do not stop using fossil fuels and coal, or drastically cutting the amount of carbon dioxide that we are emitting. Proper environmental education should be taught to the community so that they can be reformed to cut down on their electrical consumption. New technology could be devised to try to clean up the mess that had already been done. Since the damage is already irreversible, I believe that we could try to minimise the damage done by treating some of it. We could clear up the waste materials dumped into the oceans and bury them in proper landfills, factories can be imposed a quota to the amount of waste gas they can emit over a period of time, where the quota can be enforced strictly. Power stations could be upgraded so they have a higher efficiency, and fewer resources could be wasted. The countries with forests can stop chopping down their trees, instead they can replant the deforested areas with young saplings, which can one day grow up to rebuild the forest again.
To save the earth, it will take copious amounts of time and wealth to do so, but if everyone is willing to help by doing a little in one way or another, the efforts will be able to go a long way in saving the earth, which I firmly believe, will happen one day in the near future.
My computer got a slight glitch, currently cannot paste picture. Will do so after glitch is solved. Sorry for any inconvenience caused.
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