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The human impact on biodiversity

April 28, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Biodiversity is under threat. More and more plant and animal species are disappearing and humans are to blame. Humans cause biodiversity loss through habitat destruction, invasive species, pollution, direct exploitation, and climate change, all of which are significantly influenced by human activities.

But until now, drawing broad conclusions about human impacts on biodiversity has been difficult because a clear, global overview of how human activity affects nature across all species did not exist. Most studies have focused on specific places, impacts, or time periods.

To fill these research gaps, a research team from the University of Zurich in Switzerland and the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology conducted an unprecedented synthesis study. The researchers compiled data from around 2,100 studies that compared biodiversity at almost 50,000 sites affected by humans with similar places that hadn’t been affected by humans.

The synthesis study, which was recently published in the journal Nature, found humans are having a highly detrimental impact on biodiversity worldwide. In fact, not only is the number of species declining, but the composition of species communities is also changing. On average, the number of species at impacted sites was almost 20% lower than at unaffected sites.

The study, which is one of the largest ever conducted on this topic, highlights the widespread negative impact of human activities on nature, and emphasizes the need to consider all forms of life when assessing biodiversity loss.

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The Devastating Human Impact on Biodiversity

Photo, posted November 19, 2014, courtesy of Green Mountain Girls Farm via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Transparent wood

April 25, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Plastics are pretty much everywhere in the modern world including places we want them to be and places where we don’t. Conventional plastics are not biodegradable and instead cause increasing problems wherever they end up after their useful life. As a result, there are global efforts to find environmentally friendly replacements for petroleum-based plastics.

An interesting candidate for replacing many types of plastic is transparent wood. Transparent wood is a man-made material derived from natural wood. Wood has three components: cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin. Transparent wood is created by removing the lignin and hemicellulose, leaving behind a porous, paper-like network of cellulose. It is transparent but lacks structural strength. In the past, clear materials like epoxies have been added to produce a strong, transparent material: transparent wood. But because of the epoxy – itself a form of plastic – the resultant material was non-biodegradable.

Researchers at Kennesaw State University in Georgia have developed a method for producing transparent wood that replaces epoxies with an egg white and rice extract mixture along with a curing agent called diethylenetriamine. The end product is a semi-transparent form of wood that is biodegradable.

The researchers also incorporated silver nanowires into samples of their transparent wood. This enabled the wood to conduct electricity and could be useful in wearable sensors or as coatings for solar cells. There is additional research needed to improve the properties of this transparent wood, but a plastic replacement made from natural and inexpensive materials could be quite valuable.

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Making sturdy, semi-transparent wood with cheap, natural materials

Photo, posted August 1, 2017, courtesy of NOAA Marine Debris via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Water from thin air

September 6, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The Earth’s atmosphere contains enormous amounts of water. Being able to efficiently and economically extract some of it to provide drinking water would be extremely beneficial to the billions of people across the globe who face chronic water shortages.

There are existing technologies for atmospheric water harvesting – or AWH. But there are downsides associated with size, cost, and efficiency. A new device developed by mechanical engineering researchers at the University of Utah has the potential to provide a new drinking water source in arid places.

The device is a compact, rapid-cycling, fuel-fired AWH device. It relies on adsorbent materials that draw water molecules out of non-humid air and then applies heat to release those molecules into liquid form.

Hygroscopic materials are those that have an affinity for water and soak it up at every opportunity. Such materials are used, for example, in disposable diapers. The Utah device makes use of metal organic frameworks, which have enormous amounts of surface area on the molecular scale.

The initial work on the Utah device targeted a small compact water generation unit for soldiers in the field. Instead of lugging around a large canteen filled with water, the small unit can produce water on demand. The prototype was able to produce 5 liters of water per day per kilogram of adsorbent material. Within three days in the field, the system outperforms packing water. The heat required to precipitate the liquid water was provided by a standard-issue Army camping stove.

Non-military needs are the ultimate application for the device. The researchers have applied for a patent for what they hope will be a potential solution to a persistent global problem.

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Producing water out of thin air

Photo, posted August 9, 2012, courtesy of Enid Martindale via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Storing carbon underground and abandoned wells

April 18, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Using government support in the form of subsidies and tax credits, energy companies and others are planning to capture millions of tons of industrial carbon dioxide emissions and pipe the greenhouse gas into underground storage. It is a strategy enthusiastically supported by the fossil fuel industry because it allows them to keep burning the stuff.

There are currently 69 projects being reviewed by federal and state regulators seeking to store CO2 underground. The sorts of places where carbon dioxide can be injected are geologic zones containing porous rock formations which, in no way coincidentally, are the same places where oil and gas deposits are found. As a result, these places are studded with abandoned wells that have accumulated over the past century.

In Louisiana, there are about 120,000 abandoned wells that overlie geological zones that could store carbon dioxide. Environmental watchdog groups have identified numerous abandoned wells within a few miles of proposed storage sites.

The problem is that abandoned wells leak – even ones that have been plugged – and many haven’t been. The question is how much leakage will occur and what will be the consequences of the leakage. In Texas, pumping oilfield wastewater into abandoned wells has led to geysers of toxic water, artificial saline lakes, and earthquakes.

Underground carbon dioxide sequestering on a scale large enough to really matter will have to extend to very large areas. For example, injecting 100 million tons per year could create a pressurized zone as large as 100 miles. How large a problem this might create from abandoned wells in the zone is not at all clear but cannot be ignored.

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Companies Are Poised to Inject Millions of Tons of Carbon Underground. Will It Stay Put?

Photo, posted December 3, 2023, courtesy of Jason Woodhead via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Why Was the Summer So Hot? | Earth Wise

September 4, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Many places around the world have experienced extraordinary heat waves this summer. The 31 days of high temperatures 110 degrees or more in Phoenix is a prime example but many other places suffered from extreme and relentless heat. Why did this happen?

The overarching reason is climate change, which has warmed the Earth by 2.2 degrees Fahrenheit since the preindustrial era. This change on a global level is enough to make heatwaves far more likely. For example, the concurrent heatwaves in Europe and North America were 1000 times more likely to have occurred because of climate change.

But there hasn’t been a sudden increase in global temperature that would make this summer so much hotter. Instead, what really has happened is three other factors all came into play at the same time.

The first is the 2022 eruption of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha-apai, which is an underwater volcano in the South Pacific. That eruption did not produce much in the way of planet-cooling aerosols in the atmosphere. Instead, it vaporized huge amounts of seawater, sending water vapor into the atmosphere, which helps trap heat.

The second is a change in the amount of energy radiating from the sun. That actually rises and falls a small amount every 11 years. Currently, it is in the upswing and will reach its next peak in 2025.

Finally, there is the arrival of the El Niño in the Pacific, whose balmy ocean waters radiate heat into the air.

The combination of all these factors when added to the already warming climate is a recipe for temperatures to soar to uncharted highs. We can expect more heat waves, forest fires, flash floods, and other sorts of extreme weather.

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It’s Not Just Climate Change: Three Other Factors Driving This Summer’s Extreme Heat

Photo, posted February 27, 2017, courtesy of Giuseppe Milo via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Plastic In Lakes | Earth Wise

August 28, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

We are always talking about the millions of tons of waste plastic that finds its way into the oceans and about the challenges of trying to remove it. A new multinational study has found that the concentration of plastics and microplastics in some lakes is even worse than in the so-called garbage patches in the oceans and some of these lakes are even in remote places around the world

Scientists from institutes in multiple countries collected water samples from 38 lakes and reservoirs in 23 countries across six continents. The samples were then all analyzed by the University of Milan to assess the presence of plastic particles more than a quarter millimeter in size.

The study found that two types of lakes are particularly vulnerable to plastic contamination: lakes and reservoirs in densely populated and urbanized areas and large lakes with elevated deposition areas, long water-retention times, and high levels of human influence.

Lakes found to have the highest concentration of plastic included some of the main sources of drinking water for communities and were also important to local economies. These included Lough Neagh in Northern Ireland, Lake Maggiore in Italy, and Lake Tahoe on the California/Nevada border. Not all the lakes studied contained large amounts of plastic. For example, Windermere, the largest lake in England, had very low concentrations of plastic in surface water.

This was the first global survey of the abundance and type of plastic pollution in lakes and reservoirs and the scale of freshwater plastic pollution is sobering indeed. There is widespread concern that plastic debris is having harmful effects on aquatic species and ecosystem function and clearly is not limited to marine ecosystems.

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Plastic pollution is higher in some lakes than oceans

Photo, posted May 27, 2019, courtesy of Jonathan Cook-Fisher via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Europe Is Warming Very Quickly | Earth Wise

July 13, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

According to a new report from the World Meteorological Organization, Europe is warming faster than any other inhabited continent. The result of the rising temperatures has been increasingly severe heat waves, flood, and wildfires.

The Paris Climate Agreement has set a goal of limiting warming to no more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and, if at all possible, to no more than 1.5 degrees. To date, the planet has warmed by 1.2 degrees and, with greenhouse gas emissions continuing at record levels, the temperature keeps going up.

These numbers refer to the global average. Some places have warmed more and others less. The Arctic has been warming four times quicker than the rest of the world. In terms of direct impact on large populations, Europe has already surpassed the 2-degree mark, having reached 2.3 degrees last year. In 2022, many countries in western and southwestern Europe had their warmest year on record. Weather-related economic damages totaled $2 billion, mostly as a result of storms and floods.

Europe is trying to do its part in mitigating climate change by making major gains on clean energy. Wind and solar generated 22% of Europe’s power in 2022, which is more than either natural gas or coal produced. Europe is trying to do its share, but the warming climate is a global phenomenon and will require a global effort to mitigate its effects.

The record-breaking heat stress experienced by Europeans last year cannot be considered a one-off occurrence. It is part of a pattern that will make weather extremes more frequent and more intense over time.

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The Fastest-Warming Continent, Europe Has Already Heated by More Than 2 Degrees C

Photo, posted September 26, 2011, courtesy of Ben Ramirez via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

A New Deep-Sea Reef In The Galapagos | Earth Wise

June 2, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Like in many other places around the world, ocean warming has mostly destroyed the shallow-water reefs in the Galapagos Islands. The islands are some of the most carefully protected places in the world, but they can’t escape the effects of a warming planet.

Recently, however, scientists have discovered a healthy, sprawling coral reef hidden deep under the sea in the Galapagos. More than 1,300 feet underwater, the reef extends for several miles along the ridge of a previously unknown volcano in the Galapagos Marine Preserve.

The reef is pristine and is teeming with all sorts of marine life including pink octopus, batfish, squat lobsters, and a variety of deep-sea fish, sharks, and rays.

The expedition that discovered the new reef was led by the University of Essex in the UK. Prior to this discovery, scientists thought that coral reefs were all but gone from the Galapagos. A period of ocean warming in 1982 through 1983 wiped out more than 95% of the corals in the archipelago. Only a few reefs in shallow waters remained. The newly discovered reefs are sheltered deep under the sea and would have been protected from the deadly heat.

According to the scientists from the expedition, the newly discovered reef potentially has global significance because it represents a site that can be monitored over time to see how such a pristine habitat evolves with the ongoing climate crisis. Reefs like this are clearly very old because coral reefs take a long time to grow. Finding this one means that it is likely that there are more healthy reefs across different depths that are waiting to be discovered.

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Pristine Deep-Sea Reef Discovered in the Galápagos

Photo, posted March 28, 2009, courtesy of Derek Keats via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio