As humans around the world grow in wealth and number, our cities and farms are eating into the space and energy available for wild ecosystems. This series so far has focused on ways to be more efficient in our consumption of space and natural resources, to give more breathing room to the living things with which we share this planet. But there’s a geographic component to solving …
Our Slice of the Carbon Cycle: Down on the Farm
Looking out an airplane window, it is shocking to see how much of the Earth’s surface is farmland – all those irrigated circles and squares, stretching on to the horizon. If this land was not tilled, sowed, sprayed, guarded and harvested – if it was not teased into the tidy, geometric, human shapes we see from the plane – it could be dales …
Our Slice of the Carbon Cycle: More with Less
Cover photo credit: Wikimedia user Coyau The picture is gloomy. Humans are consuming the Earth’s resources at an unsustainable clip, and the prospect of reducing that consumption seems remote at best. While global population growth is slowing, there are still more people every day. Each person is consuming more as people around the world get richer. Global trade is reaching deep into …
Our Slice of the Carbon Cycle: A Numbers Game
Photo: Sao Paulo at night by Julio Boaro At the dawn of the modern environmentalist movement, as we awoke to the devastating downsides of modern industrial life, our first and most obvious response was to cut back. If our voracious consumption of Earth’s bounty was hurting the environment, the thinking went, then we should probably trim that consumption. That logic is still sound. Reducing the amount of …
Our Slice of the Carbon Cycle: An Approach to Being Humans on Earth
We all want to leave a livable planet for future generations. In doing so, there are many priorities to juggle – protecting natural ecosystems, preserving biodiversity, and maintaining the “ecosystem services” that keep our air, water and soil clean. At a basic level, these seemingly unrelated priorities all center on the space we take up on this planet, and how we use it. There are other major environmental …
How to Explain Climate Change to Your Own Mother: A Guide in Multiple Installments
I have been involved with science communication and education for the majority of my adulthood. The array of venues in which I have taught, subjects I have conveyed, and audiences I have engaged has been vast; each delicate combination of venue, subject, and audience throwing a delightful challenge my way. In a non-native tongue, I have explained the wonders of …