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Science

This glacier was featured on a postcard in 1900. A camera captured where it is today.

Whoa.

116 years ago, the Pasterze glacier in the Austria's Eastern Alps was postcard perfect:

Photo via Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons.

Snowy peaks. Windswept valleys. Ruddy-cheeked mountain children in lederhosen playing "Edelweiss" on the flugelhorn.

But a lot has changed since 1900.

Much of it has changed for the better! We've eradicated smallpox, Hitler is dead, and the song "Billie Jean" exists now.

On the downside, the Earth has gotten a lot hotter. A lot hotter.

The 15 warmest years on record have all occurred since 1998. July 2016 was the planet's hottest month — ever.

Unsurprisingly, man-made climate change has wreaked havoc on the planet's glaciers — including the Pasterze, which is Austria's largest.

Just how much havoc are we talking about? Well...

A series of stunning photos, published in August, show just how far the glacier has receded since its heyday.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

First measured in 1851, the glacier lost half of its mass between that year and 2008.

The glacier today.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

A marker placed in 1985 shows where the edge of the glacier reached just 31 years ago. You can still see the ice sheet, but just barely, way off in the distance. In between is ... a big, muddy lake.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

The view from the glacial foot marker from 1995 — 10 years later — isn't much more encouraging.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

Even in just one year, 2015, the glacier lost an astounding amount of mass — 177 feet, by some estimates.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

Ice continues to melt daily, and while the dripping makes for a good photo, it's unfortunate news for planet Earth. Glacial melting is one of the three primary causes of sea-level rise.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

According to a European Environment Agency report, the average temperature in the Alps has increased 2 degrees Celsius in the last 100 years — double the global average.

Beautiful, but ominous, fissures in the glacier.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

It's not unreasonable to assume that that's why this mountain hut has been abandoned by the flugelhorn-playing children who once probably lived in it.

Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images.

Is there anything we can do to stop climate change besides look at scary glacier photos?

Climate change is, unfortunately, still a robust debate in the United States as many of our elected officials refuse to acknowledge that we humans are the ones doing the changing. As of last year, that list included a whopping 49 senators. Calling them to gently persuade them otherwise would be helpful. Not voting for them if they don't change their minds would be even more so.

There is some tentative good news — the Paris Agreement signed in December 2015 commits 197 countries, including the U.S., to take steps to limit future global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius. While it may be too late for the Pasterze glacier, if we really commit as a world, we might be able to stop ourselves from sinking whole countries and turning Miami into a swimming pool and stuff like that.

And who knows, with a little luck, and a little more not poisoning the sky, we just might recapture a little of that Alpine magic one day.

OK, these guys are Swiss. But who's counting?

Photo by Cristo Vlahos/Wikimedia Commons.

This article originally appeared on 3.11.17

popular

What would happen if all the Earth's ice melted?

There will be serious problems on both U.S. coasts.

via Pixabay/Pexels

What would happen if all the ice melted?

Ten percent of the land area on Earth is covered with glacial ice, which includes ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica, ice caps and glaciers. Unfortunately, 750 billion tons of Earth’s ice is melting yearly due to climate change.

If climate change isn’t stopped, this will lead to disastrous consequences for the entire planet.

"As a result of this, ice around the world is melting and raising the planet's sea level. The oceans already rose 6 centimeters during the course of the 19th century. But they rose by 19 centimeters during the 20th century, over 3 times faster than they rose in the previous century,” says a video produced by Real Life Lore. “NOAA estimates that global sea level could rise by up to 2.5 meters by the year 2100. Which would have devastating consequences."

Real Life Lore has over 7 million subscribers to its videos covering geography and world populations.

The video speculates that if all the ice on Earth melted, it would raise the global sea level by an incredible 68.3 meters (224 feet).

This would have a disastrous impact on the United States.

How Will Earth Change If All the Ice Melts?

“In North America, Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, and most of San Diego and Los Angeles would be underwater. San Francisco would be an island and San Jose would be destroyed by the waves,” the video says.

There would be catastrophic damage to the East Coast as well. The ocean would expand to swallow the entire states of Florida and Delaware, almost all of Long Island, and the cities of New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington D.C. and Boston.

This video depicts a rather grim future, but the positive side of the story is that it can be avoided. Each of us has the responsibility to take whatever measures we can to revert the effects of climate change and to push for policies that stop the creation of greenhouse gasses.

Science

Kenyans got a 'special holiday' to plant trees that could significantly fight climate change

The government hopes that 100 million trees will be planted on the holiday.

via KindikiKithure/X

Kenyans plant trees on its new "special holiday."

Kenya celebrated its first “special holiday” dedicated to planting trees on Monday, November 13. The day was declared on November 6 by Kithure Kindiki, Kenya’s cabinet secretary for the Interior, who wrote, “The public across the Country shall be expected to plant trees as a patriotic contribution to the national efforts to save our Country from the devastating effects of Climate Change.”

To support the country’s efforts, the Kenyan government made 150 million seedlings available to its citizens via public nurseries and hopes that each of them will plant two trees to help reverse the effects of climate change.

The government hopes that 100 million trees will be planted on the holiday.

The holiday is part of Kenya’s Landscape and Ecosystem Restoration Programme, which aims to grow and nurture 15 billion trees by 2032. From 1990 to 2010, Kenya’s forest cover was reduced from 12% to 6%, according to UN estimates. However, conservation efforts over the past 12 years have increased to 9%.

— (@)

The UK’s King Charles, who has been a lifelong environmental advocate, praised the country's efforts at reforestation. “Having been planting trees for most of my life, I thought I was doing rather well, but your ambition for planting 15 billion trees makes me admire your efforts,” King Charles said at a state banquet.

Planting trees is one of our best tools for fighting climate change because they can absorb carbon dioxide, a major greenhouse gas, from the atmosphere. They also provide shade, reducing the need for air conditioning while releasing oxygen, which supports biodiversity.

A typical hardwood tree can absorb 48 pounds of carbon dioxide a year, which adds up to approximately a ton by the time it reaches 40. Unfortunately, humans dump about 40 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the air yearly.

The holiday was celebrated by many in the rural parts of Kenya. Dozens of people came together to plant trees near the source of Kenya's second-longest river, Athi. "I have come to plant trees here because our water levels have been diminishing. Even here at the river source, the levels are very low, trees have been cleared," local resident Stephen Chelule told the BBC.

Planted.... pic.twitter.com/XV22aHgHe2
— Ahmednasir Abdullahi SC (@ahmednasirlaw) November 13, 2023

Watu wakanairo washaanza kupanda miti as early as Now taking advantage of the morning rain..... Wee kaa hapo waiting uletewe Land kwa bed Yako. pic.twitter.com/TYzVTApuvk
— Mike Sonko (@MikeSonko) November 13, 2023

Raila Odinga plants a tree in Homa Bay in honour of National Tree Growing Day pic.twitter.com/0oThpy20Kq
— Kenyans.co.ke (@Kenyans) November 13, 2023

The Kenyan tree-planting holiday reminds people of the tremendous power they can have when they come together for a common cause. What if people in countries across the world made the same commitment?

The United States has 11 federal holidays, which are all dedicated to significant historical events and people. We also have Arbor Day, where people are encouraged to plant trees, and in 2022, the National Arbor Day Foundation says it helped plant more than 630,000 trees worldwide. Consider this: If we made Arbor Day a Federal Holiday where everyone gets the day off, and asked to plant two trees each, that would be over 660 million trees a year!

In the United States, we have Arbor Day, where people are encouraged to plant trees, and in 2022, the National Arbor Day Foundation says it helped plant more than 630,000 trees worldwide. However, what if we made Arbor Day a Federal Holiday where everyone gets the day off, and is expected to plant two trees each? That’d be over 660 million trees a year!

The United States has 11 federal holidays, which are all dedicated to significant historical events and people. But given the incredible climate crisis we face, it would be beneficial to add one more where Americans come together to do something extraordinary for the planet that has given us so much.

From Your Site Articles

climate change

Heroes

Artist creates stunning watercolor paintings that are scientific charts in disguise

Hard to unsee once you spot it.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

Artist Jill Pelto says more than you think in her paintings.

Jill Pelto's world is made up a rich blues, ochres, and a sky that looks like something out of an old mariner's chart.

But when you start to look closer, little details start to pop out. You notice a number here or there. Or a series of points marching down the top of a glacier. Or ... is that an x-axis?

Wait, are all of these charts?! This is data! Wooah!

The artwork, you see, isn't just beautiful. While each piece starts as a simple line graph of mass or temperature, Pelto — a graduate student at the University of Maine — transforms them into something more.

Pelto has spent the past years creating this astounding series of paintings, all based on scientific data.

She was first inspired by a research trip back in 2015.

Painting depicts scientist coring ice to reveal climate history.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

Since she was 16, Pelto's been going on research trips with her father, glaciologist Mauri Pelto. In 2015, she joined her father in the field to study the glaciers in Washington state's North Cascade National Park.

On the trip, Pelto saw how the glaciers, while beautiful, had also lost much of their mass. Inspired, saddened, and packing her watercolors, Pelto decided to try to use her art to communicate what she was seeing.

The mass of glaciers in the North Cascades from 1980 to 2014. Data available here.

A painting depicting a study in glacial mass.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

Since then, Pelto has continued the project, turning not just glacial mass but many other variables into brilliant works of art.

Within the deep purples and reds of a forest on fire hides a global temperatures trend.

forest fire, temperature change, global, studies

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

Global temperature data, obtained from Climate Central, becomes the backdrop to an incredible forest fire. Rising temperatures and drought conditions could increase the future risk of forest fires.

Aquamarine-colored salmon intertwine with waves made from their population numbers.

Coho salmon face declining rivers and climate change.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

Washington state has been hit by a number of droughts in the last few decades. Many rivers run low, affecting the coho salmon that spawn there.

Lifelike Arctic foxes hide amid a line graph that shows dwindling ice sheets.

arctic, foxes, science, nature, warming of poles

Arctic foxes face warming poles and climate change depicting in artist painting.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

The graph tracks the loss of Arctic sea ice from 1980 to the present. Arctic foxes are well-equipped to survive the chilly polar weather, but as the poles get warmer, larger species may invade and outcompete them.

This beautiful swaying reef exists in an increasingly acidic ocean.

coral reefs, warming seas, acidic ocean, science

Clown fish swim on a coral reef in a painting showing data of the oceans becoming more acidic.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

As more carbon dioxide is pumped into the atmosphere, the ocean is slowly becoming more acidic. Many species could be affected, including clownfish.

A tiger struggles against it's shrinking jungle habitat.

Painting showing the decline in tiger habitat area.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

This line graph is based on the decline in tiger habit area from 1970 to 2010.

Here, four different trends combine into a complex, ethereal landscape.

fossil fuel, sea levels, glacial decline, science

Artist Jill Pelto offers detailed information on climate change in artistic form.

Image from Jill Pelto, used with permission.

In this piece, called "Landscape of Change," Pelto combined data on sea levels, glacial decline, temperatures, and fossil fuel usage.

Pelto plans to continue painting once she completes her master's degree.

Science is an important tool for understanding our changing world, but even the most passionate scientist will admit it can be pretty dry at times. Getting people excited about trend lines or statistical analyses is no easy feat.

But art touches us on an emotional level. We get art. Seeing something that can combine the two disciplines, and hopefully inspire something inside us, is pretty dang cool.

You can see more of Pelto's artwork at her website.

This article originally appeared on 03.03.17

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science

Science

New study shows ozone layer has made 'significant milestone' in its recovery

Environmental progress is possible.

Photo by NOAA on Unsplash

Change is possible.

The negative effects of climate change are all around us—countless devastating heatwaves, droughts so severe in some areas that long lost ancient relics have reappeared, and in other areas, extreme storms destroy entire communities.

With all the visible decline on our planet, improvements might not be so obvious. But they do exist. All we need to do is look up.

Euro News announced on Sept. 19 that the Earth’s ozone layer, nature’s shield against UV radiation from the sun, has made significant progress against prior damage.

This is not only some much-needed relief against an onslaught of bad news for the environment, it also shows us that a better future is possible with concentrated effort.

It’s been 37 years since researcher Jonathan Shanklin first discovered a hole in the ozone layer above Antarctica. His findings instigated arguably the biggest environmental movement of the 1980s, leading to the universally ratified Montreal Protocol, which phased out human-made, ozone-depleting chemicals (aka chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, remember those?) previously found in cleaning products, certain appliances and hairspray—just imagine how much hairspray was probably being used during that time to create the signature '80s coif … yikes.

Think about the environment, dude!

Giphy

Increased UV radiation can lead to more cases of skin cancer, cataracts and impaired immune systems. It is also believed to be contributing to the increase in melanoma, the most fatal of all skin cancers. And it’s worth noting, since 1990, the risk of developing melanoma has more than doubled.

Though the potential danger of CFCs had been discovered as early as the mid-'70s, it would take a giant scare like a big gaping chasm in the sky for folks to really pay attention. But pretty soon it was a full-blown, mass hysteria sensation. One environmentalist even compared it to “AIDS from the sky” back in 1991.

Fast forward to 2022, and a new study from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shows that the overall concentration of those damaging chemicals has dropped just over 50%, back to levels not seen since before 1980.

That's visible progress.

research.noaa.gov

Of course, progress doesn’t mean perfection. Antarctica, which still experiences a large hole once a year, has seen a slower pace of reduction. But even still, chemicals have fallen 26%, the report revealed. And until it does close, the hole is being closely monitored using 3D imaging.

The Montreal Protocol has been a success in part because it forced corporations to come up with alternative solutions. Today we have plenty of brands that are environmentally conscious, but that wasn’t always the case. And lo and behold, a huge systemic shift caused a huge positive impact.

We still only have one planet to call our home and it will take a collective effort to protect it, just as it did to damage it. It can be easy to get nihilistic (or at the very least, anxious) when only the destruction is visible. That’s why it's important to acknowledge and celebrate the small victories—it helps us hold onto hope and leads to more inspired action. Because, as we can see, for good or for bad, every action counts.

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Planet

A grocery store added climate impact to its receipts and it changed how its customers shop

via Oda Product Tech/Medium

Oda's climate impact receipt.

A new program from Norway shows that when you educate people and give them the ability to make sustainable choices, many will do the right thing.

Oda, the most popular online grocer in Norway (formerly known as Kolonial.No), wanted to cut its CO2 emissions in half by 2025. To reduce its carbon footprint, the company switched from plastic bags to paper boxes and upgraded its delivery vans to electric. But those changes weren’t drastic enough to hit its goal.

The company then took a hard look at its biggest source of carbon emissions, its own products. It knew that the only way it could make a real impact would be by changing the food its customers purchase and consume.

“Our customers told us that they find it close to impossible to know what is climate-friendly. We thought it was an important challenge to solve so we started looking for easy ways to communicate emissions,” Louise Fuchs, sustainability director at Oda, said according to Yahoo News.

“We do not want to point fingers and tell our customers what to buy and what to avoid,” she added. So the company decided to create climate receipts that not only show the food's cost in kroners but CO2 emissions, too.

Oda rated the CO2 emissions of its products and grouped them into four different categories: low, medium, high and very high. Here’s an example of the carbon footprint of various foods that Oda sells.

via Oda/Medium

The graph is eye-opening because it shows the high price that we pay as a species for our reliance on eating red meat. Conversely, it shows why eating fruits and vegetables is a better choice for the planet.

According to The Guardian, meat production is responsible for 57% of all food production emissions. While only 29% comes from the cultivation of plant-based foods.

After checking out, customers now can see how their grocery shopping affects their carbon footprint.

via Oda/Medium

Oda’s new program has been a resounding success because its customers have made huge changes in their shopping habits after realizing how they affect the planet. “Our customers already bought buy more than 50 percent more fruit and veg than the average consumer and meat substitutes are growing 80 percent year-on-year since we added the carbon receipts,” Fuchs said.

“Lentil soup was one of our top ten sold recipes last year—the previous years it was nowhere near the top ten,” she added.

Oda’s simple, but effective plan to educate its customers is a great way to encourage people to make planet-positive choices. It’s also commendable because the company is clearly putting the planet before profit by prioritizing sustainability.

It looks like the idea is catching on.

“We were the first in Norway to create the climate receipt and a year after we have seen examples of other grocers following the trend. This is great news for the consumers and we hope more will follow,” Fuchs said.

There are a lot of people that want to do more to help the planet, but they're not sure how. Oda’s receipts empower the average person by giving them the information they need to make climate-friendly choices on a regular basis. Let’s hope this idea catches on in other countries so that more people are encouraged to shop and eat more sustainably.

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Ingrid Michaelson just put a terrifying and topical twist on one of her hit songs.

Last night's episode of "Full Frontal with Samantha Bee" was all about climate change, a topic that can feel both done-to-death and completely fresh at the same time.

Weather-wise, the past few months have been a doozy, featuring everything from a seemingly endless parade of destructive hurricanes and floods to devastating wildfires, all of which share a disturbing link to global warming.

But still. Deniers gonna deny.

Or, as Bee warned, "Our descendants will look back on the summer of 2017 as the time we stopped ignoring that climate change was coming and started ignoring that it had arrived."

If the seemingly endless string of natural disasters wasn't getting the message across, maybe a sweeter and kinder approach would do the trick.

Bee invited songwriter and heavenly-voiced singer Ingrid Michaelson to perform a topical twist on one of her hit songs.

Dressed as Earth, with an angry looking Sun looming overhead, Michaelson took the stage, and for one night, her earworm of a song "Be OK," became "(Earth is) Not OK."

"I am clearly not OK, not OK, not OK. Earth is clearly not OK today. I'm getting warmer every day, every day, every day," Michaelson sang as "Full Frontal" correspondents dance behind her holding paper hurricanes.

Though most of the lyrics are funny and sung over a happy melody, the subject itself is a terrifying reminder of what we've done to the planet.

"Hurricanes are here to stay ... and we're making them worse day by day," Michaelson sang in one verse, a reminder that the latest news suggests that climate change might actually be more worse than we thought. Awesome.

"But you know what part hurts the most? It feels like you don't care about me," Michaelson/Earth sings, as the lyrics take a turn for the vengeful.

Was the performance silly? Sure. Absurd? Maybe. A total downer? Absolutely. Still, there's nothing more absurd and depressing than the fact that some people still don't believe any of this is actually happening.

The upbeat tempo and Michaelson's sweet vocals at least make the dire message a little easier to swallow.

We're rapidly running out of time to make a real dent in the fight against the effects of climate change. If you're interested in what you can do to help, however small, start here.