The world is observing Earth Day on April 22 (Tuesday) and we are facing a series of challenges in the light of declining climatic conditions and global warming.
“The heavens reek, the waters below are foul … we are in a crisis of survival.” That’s how Walter Cronkite and CBS hyped the first Earth Day, back in 1970.
Somehow we have survived since the first Earth day, but question arises how far we have succeeded in checking the worsening climate.
A recent published study in the April 6 issue of Climate Dynamics has found that the biggest threat on mankind i.e. deteriorating climatic conditions is not a result of natural temperature changes, as commonly thought, but is due to human intervention.
The investigators of the study also claimed their findings to be 99.9 percent correct.
The most alarming and undisputed message from the world’s top scientists in the latest UN climate change report was a clear sign that time is rapidly running out.
The report was prepared by a UN group – Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The failure to limit human damage to the environment in next 15 years may make it impossible to control its consequences with existing technologies, the report found. The report had described the world as changing dramatically and rapidly.
Water supplies are under threat. Heat waves and heavy rains are increasing. The ice caps and sea ice in the Arctic region are collapsing. Oceans are rising at a rate that threatens coastal communities.
Despite so many challenges waiting before us, only about a third of the American public worry “a great deal” about climate change and global warming, a Gallup Poll in March said.
If we want to save ourselves and our planet from ourselves, the answer now is ‘wake up now’.
