Jane Goodall on Conservation, Climate Change and COVID-19: 'If We Carry on With Business as Usual, We're Going to Destroy Ourselves'
10 July
Climate
Dr. Jane Goodall, the world-renowned conservationist, desperately wants the world to pay attention to what she sees as the greatest threat to humanity's existence. Craig Barritt / Getty Images for TIME
By Jeff Berardelli
While COVID-19 and protests for racial justice command the world's collective attention, ecological destruction, species extinction and climate change continue unabated. While the world's been focused on other crises, an alarming study was released warning that species extinction is now progressing so fast that the consequences of "biological annihilation" may soon be "unimaginable."
<p><a href="https://www.janegoodall.org/" target="_blank">Dr. Jane Goodall</a>, the world-renowned conservationist, desperately wants the world to pay attention to what she sees as the greatest threat to humanity's existence.</p><p>CBS News recently spoke to Goodall over a video conference call and asked her questions about the state of our planet. Her soft-spoken grace somehow helped cushion what was otherwise extremely sobering news: "I just know that if we carry on with business as usual, we're going to destroy ourselves. It would be the end of us, as well as life on Earth as we know it," warned Goodall.</p><p>What follows is a lightly edited transcript of our conversation.<br> </p>
<p><strong><em>Jeff Berardelli:</em></strong> <strong>Destruction of nature is causing some really big concerns around the world. One that comes to the forefront right now is </strong><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-environment-pandemic-infectious-diseases/" target="_blank"><strong>emergent diseases like COVID-19</strong></a><strong>. Can you describe how destruction of the environment contributes to this?</strong></p><p><strong></strong><strong><em>Dr. Jane Goodall:</em></strong> Well, the thing is, we brought this on ourselves because the scientists that have been studying these so-called zoonotic diseases that jump from an animal to a human have been predicting something like this for so long. As we chop down at stake <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-brazil-amazon-rainforest-destruction/" target="_blank">tropical rainforest</a></span>, with its rich biodiversity, we are eating away the habitats of millions of animals, and many of them are being pushed into greater contact with humans. We're driving deeper and deeper, making roads throughout the habitat, which again brings people and animals in contact with each other. People are hunting the animals and <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/wuhan-china-coronavirus-bans-eating-wild-animals-breeding-wet-markets/" target="_blank">selling the meat</a></span>, or trafficking the infants, and all of this is creating environments which are perfect for a virus or a bacteria to cross that species barrier and sometimes, like COVID-19, it becomes very contagious and we're suffering from it.</p><p>But we know if we don't stop destroying the environment and disrespecting animals — we're hunting them, killing them, eating them; killing and eating chimpanzees in Central Africa led to HIV/AIDS — there will be another one. It's inevitable.</p><p><strong>Do you fear that the next [pandemic] will be a lot worse than this one?</strong></p><p>Well, we've been lucky with this one because, although it's incredibly infectious, the percentage of people who die is relatively low. Mostly they recover and hopefully then build up some immunity. But supposing the next one is just as contagious and has a percentage of deaths like <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/ebola-virus-disease" target="_blank">Ebola</a>, for example, this would have an even more devastating effect on humanity than this one.</p>
<p><strong>I think people have a hard time connecting these, what may look like chance events, with our interactions and relationship with nature. Can you describe to people why the way that we treat the natural world is so important?</strong><br></p><p>Well, first of all, it's not just leading to zoonotic diseases, and there are many of them. The destruction of the environment is also contributing to the <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/climate-change/" target="_blank">climate crisis</a>, which tends to be put in second place because of our panic about the pandemic. We will get through the pandemic like we got through World War II, World War I, and the horrors following the World Trade towers being destroyed. But climate change is a very real existential threat to humankind and we don't have that long to slow it down. </p><p>Intensive farming, where we're destroying the land slowly with the chemical poisons, and the monocultures — which can be wiped out by a disease because there is no variation of crops being grown — is leading to habitat destruction. It's leading to the creation of more <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-lockdowns-climate-change-carbon-dioxide-emissions/" target="_blank">CO2</a></span> through fossil fuels, methane gas and other greenhouse gas [released] by digestion from the billions of domestic animals.</p><p>It's pretty grim. We need to realize we're part of the environment, that we need the natural world. We depend on it. We can't go on destroying. We've got to somehow understand that we're not separated from it, we are all intertwined. Harm nature, harm ourselves.</p><p><strong>If we continue on with business as usual, what do you fear the outcome will be?</strong></p><p>Well, if we continue with business as usual, we're going to come to the point of no return. At a certain point the ecosystems of the world will just give up and collapse and that's the end of us eventually too.</p><p>What about our children? We're still bringing children into the world — what a grim future is theirs to look forward to. It's pretty shocking but my hope is, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/earth-day-how-the-pandemic-is-changing-air-pollution-levels/" target="_blank">during this pandemic</a>, with people trapped inside, factories closed down temporarily, and people not driving, it has <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-photos-decline-air-pollution-lockdown/" target="_blank">cleared up the atmosphere</a> amazingly. The people in the big cities can look up at the night sky and sea stars are bright, not looking through a layer of pollution. So when people emerge [from the pandemic] they're not going to want to go back to the old polluted days.</p><p>Now, in some countries there's not much they can do about it. But if enough of them, a groundswell becomes bigger and bigger and bigger [and] people say: "No I don't want to go down this road. We want to find a different, green economy. We don't want to always put economic development ahead of protecting the environment. We care about the future. We care about the health of the planet. We need nature," maybe in the end the big guys will have to listen.</p>
<p><strong>I often think our economic future, which is always put at the forefront, is actually dependent upon our ecological future. Without an ecological future, there is not going to be any economic growth. Would you agree?</strong></p><p>Absolutely. I mean, it's all been said again and again, but fossil fuels are not infinite, they will come to an end, leading to a lot more destruction of the environment for sure. Forests and natural resources are not infinite and yet we're treating them as though they are, and in some places using them up more quickly than nature can replenish them.</p>We have to have a <span style="background-color: initial; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/climate-change-action-economic-benefit-study-finds/" target="_blank">different kind of economy</a></span>, we need a different way of thinking about what is success.<strong> </strong>Is it just about having more and more money, more and more stuff, being able to show off to your friends, and the wasteful society we live in? We waste <span style="background-color: initial; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/earth-day-2019-fashion-industrys-carbon-impact-is-bigger-than-airline-industrys/" target="_blank">clothes</a></span>, we waste <span style="background-color: initial; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/americans-waste-nearly-a-pound-of-food-each-per-day-study-finds/" target="_blank">food,</a></span> we waste laptops and cellphones. That pollutes the environment. So we've got to think differently, haven't we?<p><strong>So what do we do? Right now our worldview is based on GDP. You suggest that we think of it in a different way. So do you have a suggestion of how we rate our success other than GDP?</strong></p><p>I'm not an economist.<strong> </strong>I just know that if we carry on with business as usual, we're going to <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-climate-change-report-human-civilization-at-risk-extinction-by-2050-new-australian-climate/" target="_blank">destroy ourselves</a>. It would be the end of us, as well as life on Earth as we know it.</p><p>So one thing we can do, those of us in affluent societies can almost all do with a bit less. We have a very unsustainable lifestyle. You can't really blame people, they grew up into it. But if you went through World War II like I did, when you took nothing for granted, one square of chocolate for a week is what we had and everything was rationed. So, you appreciate it. We never wasted even an ounce of food; not like today. </p><p>Then, we also have to alleviate poverty. Because if you're really poor you destroy the environment, you cut down the last trees to make land to grow more food for your family, or fish the last fish. Or if you're in an urban area you buy the cheapest junk food. You don't have the luxury of asking: how is this made, did it harm the environment, did it lead to the suffering of animals like in the factory farms, is it cheap because of child slave labor? You just have to buy the cheapest in order to survive. </p><p>Then the third thing, which nobody wants to talk about, but nevertheless ... there are approximately 7.8 billion of us on the planet today and already in some places we're using up natural resources faster than nature can replenish them. In 2050 it's estimated that there will be 9.7 billion of us. What will happen? We can't just go on burying it under the carpet. </p><p>Population issues are politically sensitive so I talk about voluntary population optimization. So that's OK, it's voluntary, it is your choice. You optimize it for your financial situation. People are desperate to educate their children and they can't educate eight anymore. So they love family planning, and women can space out their children so that they can have a child and look after it.</p>
<p><strong>Let's switch gears. I don't eat animals. I have a dog. I love my dog. Let's talk about the idea that animals have feelings and that pigs are as intelligent as dogs...</strong></p><p>You know, animals are so much more intelligent than people used to think, and they have feelings and emotions and personalities, like your dog, any animal you share your life with. You know, birds now are making tools and octopus are incredibly intelligent. And when we think of all this trafficking of animals, selling them in meat markets or factory farms, when you think that each one one is an individual, can feel fear and pain, can suffer mentally as well as physically, isn't it shocking? I'm glad you don't eat them. I don't either, of course. </p><p>The shock and horror because in China and South Korea they <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/dog-meat-festival-china-underway-in-yulin-but-activists-hope-it-will-be-the-last-amid-coronavirus/" target="_blank">eat dogs</a></span> — well, the thought of eating a dog makes me feel particularly sick, but not more sick than eating a pig. They eat dogs and we don't like it, but we eat pigs, and they are as intelligent as dogs.</p><p>Isn't the point, if you must eat an animal shouldn't you treat it really well, like the Native Americans, respect the animal and give thanks that it's sacrificed itself for you?</p><p><strong>This is a bit more of a thought-provoking question: What has led us to this over-consumption in society? There is an idea that perhaps there is a Biblical basis, that we have dominion, that we're in charge, and because we're in charge we're able to do what we want. Can you give me an idea of why we are where we are, as a world right now, and what led us here? </strong></p><p>[Laughing]<strong> </strong>You think I'm going to be able to answer all these questions?</p><p><strong>I know it's a lot, but I know that you must have some thoughts on this.</strong></p><p><strong></strong>Well, first of all, I do think that religion has played a role. I was told by a Hebrew scholar the original translation of that word that you just mentioned, "dominion," is wrong. It's actually something more like "stewardship." That's very different. If God gave us stewardship that's different from saying we have dominion. So I think religion started this thinking that we're so different from all the other animals and I was taught there was a difference in kind, not degree. Thank goodness the chimpanzees are so like us biologically, as well as behaviorally, that science had to start thinking differently.</p><p>So how did we get there? It's sort of been like this all throughout human history. There were so many fewer of us back then that we could have these unsustainable lifestyles and it didn't really matter; they were sustainable. Think of how people have always exploited the natural world just because we can. And so there's been a lag between developing new technologies [which enable us to] destroy whole forests. Whereas the indigenous people might take a week to cut down the big tree, we can do it in an hour. And the moral evolution and the sense of a spiritual awareness and connection to the natural world on which we depend, that's lagged behind as well.</p>
<p><strong>So how do we repair that? How do we rediscover our connection to the rest of the natural world?</strong></p><p>As I think you know, I began a program for young people back in 1991 called <a href="https://www.rootsandshoots.org/" target="_blank">Roots and Shoots</a> because young people had lost hope in the future. I've met them all over the world. They were mostly apathetic and didn't seem to care. Or they were angry or deeply depressed and they told me they felt like that because we compromised their future and there was nothing they could do about it. And we have compromised their future. We've been stealing it for years and years. And yes, we still are still stealing it today. But when they said there was nothing they could do I thought, no, that's not right. We got this window of time. If we all get together, take action, we can start healing some of the harm, we can start slowing down climate change and we can work on educating people. </p><p>Kids are really good at educating their parents and grandparents, some of whom may be in positions to make a huge difference, like CEOs of big companies or people in government. That program is now kindergarten to university and everything in between. It's in 68 countries and growing. Every group has the message: Each one of us — and that means you as well as me — we make some impact every single day and we have the luxury of choosing the impact that we make.</p>
<p class=""><em>This story originally appeared in</em> <em><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/" target="_blank">CBS News</a>,</em> <em>and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Co-founder of WE ACT for Environmental Justice Peggy Shepard attends New Yorkers For Clean Power Campaign Launch at Solar 1 on May 2, 2016 in New York City. Roy Rochlin / Getty Images
By Jeff Berardelli
In recent weeks, our nation has been forced to come to grips with the variety of ways in which inequality harms minority communities, from the death of George Floyd at the hands of police to the disproportionate impact of COVID-19. A recent Harvard study concluded that air pollution — which is typically worse in areas with larger minority populations — is linked to higher coronavirus death rates, along with a slew of other health problems.
<p>This is just one form of environmental injustice, which Peggy Shepard has dedicated the better part of her life to combating. Shepard is the co-founder of <a href="https://www.weact.org/" target="_blank">WE ACT for Environmental Justice</a>, a New York City nonprofit organization that's been working to improve the environment of local communities since 1988. The mission of WE ACT is to "build healthy communities by ensuring that people of color and/or low income residents participate meaningfully in the creation of sound and fair environmental health and protection policies and practices."</p><p>Environmental justice has become a mainstream topic recently as awareness grows of the worsening <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/un-climate-change-report-world-meteorological-organization/" target="_blank">impacts of climate change</a> and the proposal for a <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/green-new-deal-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-introduces-2020-policy-test/" target="_blank">Green New Deal</a>. So this week CBS News asked Peggy Shepard to discuss how environmental issues disproportionately impact minority communities and what needs to be done to fix that. Here is a portion of that conversation.</p>
<p><strong><em>Jeff Berardelli: </em>Social justice is front and center in the news, but you've been fighting what your website calls "environmental racism" for decades. Can you explain the term environmental racism?</strong></p><p><em>Peggy Shepard:</em> Environmental racism is the intentional targeting of pollution in communities of color and low-income communities because they are less informed and they vote less. They have less political clout and often land is cheaper in those communities as well. As a result, industrial pollution tends to get located inside in those communities because there is more industry, government-run facilities like sewage treatment plants and bus depots. </p><p><strong>How do environmental issues fuel racial inequality?</strong></p><p>One thing we know is that environmental enforcement does not happen the way it needs to happen in communities of color and low-income communities. I work with groups in Florida that are small Southern communities surrounded by 19 waste sites. All throughout the country and in the South there aren't zoning laws, so you can have a chemical facility right next to a small community. Out in California there's no zoning so you can have a cement factory or an oil refinery right down the street from a school. When you look at the issues around the country they play out very differently. But the one commonality is that pollution is in communities of color and low-income. Environmental enforcement is very lax and those people who are most affected by that pollution are not a part of the environmental decision-making in that city, state or the nation. </p>
<p><strong>Would it be correct to say that the pollution, the flooding, and all the climate and environmental issues that are more common in these communities exacerbate the racial inequalities?</strong><br> <br>Absolutely. If you're living in a community filled with transfer stations where trucks are coming daily to dump garbage; if you're living in a community with buses up and down the street idling outside of schools; if you're living in a community where the oil refinery is emitting air pollutants that are making people sick and have horrible odors; then you're probably living in a community with low property values, with trash, where people don't feel respected. They're living in a community that's environmentally degraded. You also add to that the stress of racism and unequal schools and you have an environmental system that is making people sick and stressing people out. </p><p>You will find that some of those communities are the same ones that don't have access to open space and parks. There may be a waterfront but you'll find that half the kids don't even know because they've never had access to that. One of our projects was creating access to the incredible Hudson River in our community so the families could go there and have recreation and have aesthetics.</p>
<p><strong>This is a little deeper, but can you trace the roots of environmental inequality in the United States back to their beginnings?</strong></p><p>There are books written on this. ... Urban planning is a good example, which has planned for some of these situations that poor communities find themselves in… and we understand that that has been systemic. For instance, one of the issues that got us started was the siting of the North River sewage treatment plant, which was mandated by the Clean Water Act because it used to be if you flushed a toilet on the west side of Manhattan, it went directly into the Hudson River. So the federal government said, you've got to clean up the river, you've got to have a sewage treatment plant. Well, the best place that the engineers felt was in the [affluent] West 70s on the west side of Manhattan. But developers, seeing that that land was much more profitable and wanting to develop that land, managed to get the City Planning Commission to move it uptown to Harlem. So as a result, we have one of the largest sewage treatment plants in the city that's literally right across the street from Riverside Drive, right across from people. The emissions and the odors were making people sick. So we had to begin to hold the city accountable and that was our first real campaign.</p>
<p><strong>What are some examples of how communities of color are disproportionately impacted by environmental issues like pollution, disease and climate change?</strong></p><p>Extreme heat events right now are killing more African Americans than any other people. Air pollution creates something like 200,000 premature deaths around the country every year. I think a lot of people have been stunned to understand that air pollution has increased the risk of more severe impacts from COVID-19 for people living in polluted communities. And so the link of environmental exposure to health outcomes is a very strong link, and I think the <a href="https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/biostatistics/2020/04/linking-air-pollution-to-higher-coronavirus-death-rates/" target="_blank">Harvard study</a> that came out last month or so certainly bears that out.</p><p>A number of studies show that the primary predictor of where toxic waste sites will be sited is a community of color, and secondarily, a low-income community. You can also see that the refineries — the chemical companies — are all in communities that are low income and of color. We can look at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_Alley" target="_blank">cancer alley</a> [in Louisiana] as a prime example of that. </p><p>We can also look at many of the communities in the South, along the Gulf Coast, that are impacted by hurricanes and extreme weather events. We know those communities are going to be hit by extreme weather, yet the investment by those municipalities and states are not going into the communities that are most vulnerable. For example, New Orleans' Ninth Ward was the most impacted [by Hurricane Katrina] yet communities that are most impacted by sea level rise and hurricanes have not been invested in.</p><p>There are many of the Gulf Coast states and communities that have still not been restored from the last hurricanes. You've got black communities in Alabama and Mississippi that are still waiting for their roads to be repaved. That investment that came from the federal government did not go to the most impacted communities. </p><p><span></span>We're also seeing the issue of <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/climate-change-refugees-united-nations-rules/" target="_blank">climate migrants</a></span>. People had to leave New Orleans because their homes were gone, so they moved to other states. When many of them tried to return they found that all the public housing had been torn down and they could no longer afford the new housing that was there. This is called <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/climate-change-miami-affordable-housing-gentrification-cbsn-originals-documentary/" target="_blank">climate gentrification</a></span> in which communities are being cleared out because of climate impacts and then <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/climate-change-miami-little-haiti-gentrification-cbsn-originals-documentary/" target="_blank">more affluent people buy up the property</a></span> and rebuild the city. So you really have total civic disruption and you do not have the civil society that you once had. </p><p>I think we'll see that in Puerto Rico, as well, with so many <span style="background-color: initial;"><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/puerto-rico-exodus-after-hurricane-maria-cbsn-originals/" target="_blank">people having to leave the island</a></span> [because of Hurricane Maria] with no electricity, no services. Yet affluent people can go back, buy up those properties, and put the infrastructure investments in place that are needed to have a healthy society.</p><p>Another example is wildlife exploration in Alaska. What's the equity issue with that? Well, if you're allowing exploration in the Arctic… that's going to hurt the animals that the indigenous people depend on for food. It's going to pollute the ocean and that means it pollutes the fish that they depend on.</p>
<p><strong>That brings us to climate change. It is fast becoming the most pressing of all environmental issues worldwide. As a result, "climate justice" is a term that I hear often. What are your main concerns for the future as climate change continues to get worse?</strong></p><p>Well, the term climate justice, I think, is being used by a lot of people as a cool term. Climate justice has a very specific meaning: it is about the studies, it's about the initiatives, it's about the interventions that are needed in communities of color and low-income communities that will be the first and worst hit by climate extreme events. Even though it seems to be a newer consciousness, the environmental justice community has been working on climate issues integrated with environmental justice for many many years. It goes hand in hand. You cannot have climate justice without environmental justice. </p><p>We understand that the investment has got to go to those communities that we know are in the flood zones that will be the worst hit and don't have the resilience to come back without strong support by the government.</p><p>We need changes and reform of FEMA. We need advisory committees made up of people of color and the most affected people informing the committees about the kind of initiatives and interventions needed to become whole again when there is an extreme event. All of us need to be part of the climate solutions. We cannot just have mainstream green groups working on climate, national climate legislation, because they are not generally living in the communities that are the first and worst hit. </p><p>So when we talk about environmental racism and environmental injustice, we're also talking about being engaged in environmental decision-making. If people of color and low-income people who are most affected by the issues are never in the rooms where the decisions are being made and the solutions are being recommended, we are going to continue to have two different worlds, two different realities, like we're seeing right now today. Two different realities do not make a unified country. </p>
<p><strong>Let's talk about the Green New Deal. I think a lot of people don't understand why the Green New Deal addresses sustainable energy and at the same time addresses social programs. Can you explain how these two are interconnected and why they both need to be addressed?</strong></p><p>Climate is more than simply reducing greenhouse gases. The communication to the public has got to be for them to understand how it impacts every facet of their lives, whether it's energy security or whether it's a "<a href="https://climatejusticealliance.org/just-transition/" target="_blank">just transition</a>" from fossil fuels to a green economy. If we are not all part of those solutions, we are going to continue the divisions that we currently have. </p><p>I have heard some people say <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/climate-change" target="_blank">climate change</a> is about greenhouse gas reduction, what does equity have to do with it? Well, the solutions are going to affect our economy and our energy security. Right now 30 million households in this country are energy insecure. They cannot pay their energy bill and put food on the table, yet many of our climate initiatives may increase our energy costs. So how do we begin to distribute those costs fairly, especially when we're talking about communities of color and low income who consume less and produce less carbon emissions than more affluent communities? So, how do we begin to equalize the benefits in a new green economy? You really have to come together. </p><p>Also, there's no requirement for community involvement in what kinds of jobs will be created or what kind of businesses will receive tax incentives. That's economic development. What does economic development have to do with climate or environmental quality? Well, of course, it has everything to do with environmental quality. It can create more density, bringing in more pedestrians and more commuters, which has an environmental impact and contributes to health disparities. </p>
<p><strong>How can both the impacted communities and also society as a whole create positive change and get us off this track of environmental Injustice?</strong></p><p><strong></strong>I think we have to understand that all of our communities need to be respected. The benefits that society has given so many of the residents in our country have not gone equally to all of the residents here. We've got to understand our shared values. I think we're seeing today... we have a shared value that the police should treat everyone equally, that our community should be invested in equally, that without transformative economic development that the workers who are now in the fossil fuel industry will not have family-sustaining jobs in the new green economy.</p><p>I believe there's now a consensus that we have got to unify. The environmental community and the mainstream green groups have been coming together over the past year and a half to up climate solutions together. So you might know about the <a href="https://ajustclimate.org/" target="_blank">Equitable and Just National Climate Platform</a> that about six green groups and 12 environmental justice organizations have worked on for the past couple of years. We are now working to develop policies to implement.</p><p>We cannot continue to perpetuate the divisions that have gotten us to where we are today, which is in a crisis. We're in a COVID-19 pandemic and we're in a climate crisis and without coming together with unity, consensus and common ground, we are not going to get ourselves out of these crises. </p>
<p><em>This story originally appeared in</em> <em><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/environmental-justice-movement-climate-change-racism-peggy-shepard/#app" target="_blank">CBS News</a></em> <em>and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.</em></p>
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A woman takes a break to look outside while working from home on a laptop computer. Justin Lewis / Getty Images
By Irina Ivanova
The millions of Americans who are skipping their morning commute and working from home because of the coronavirus have drastically reduced smog over America's largest cities and otherwise benefited the environment. Yet the growing ranks of workers now plying their trade online using tools like Zoom and Slack are taking their own toll.
<p>Environmentalists note that the technological infrastructure that supports our online video watching, searching and music playing leaves a large carbon footprint of its own. By some estimates, data centers and the networks that connect them produce as much carbon pollution as the aviation industry— or about 2% of the world's total.</p><p>On one hand, the massive drop in car traffic from staying-in-place orders across the country is "a slam-dunk" environmentally, said Eric Masanet, a professor of sustainability sciences at the University of California at Santa Barbara. But the relatively lower impact of Netflix binging and many other digital activities doesn't mean we're in the clear.</p>
How Dirty Is the Cloud?
<p>Indeed, the digital domain is hardly emissions-free. Manufacturing a smartphone, tablet or computer as well as the network that supports them consumes considerable resources — everything from <a href="https://cms.cbsnews.com/hub/cmsframework/reroute/content_article/56996486-e00f-41e8-ba81-aff54844d68e#link=%7B%22assetType%22:%22article%22,%22uuid%22:%2256996486-e00f-41e8-ba81-aff54844d68e%22,%22slug%22:%22how-clean-energy-demand-could-fuel-conflict-in-congo%22,%22linkText%22:%22mining%20rare%20minerals%22,%22href%22:%22https://cms.cbsnews.com/content/article/56996486-e00f-41e8-ba81-aff54844d68e/version/us%22,%22role%22:%22content_link%22,%22target%22:%22_blank%22,%22edition%22:%22us%22%7D" target="_blank">mining rare minerals</a> to laying undersea cables for high-speed internet. And of course it takes oodles of electricity to power the whole system. Electricity in the U.S. still comes <a href="https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3#link=%7B%22role%22:%22standard%22,%22href%22:%22https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3%22,%22target%22:%22_blank%22,%22absolute%22:%22%22,%22linkText%22:%22overwhelmingly%22%7D" target="_blank">overwhelmingly</a> from generators powered by fossil fuels, not wind or solar.</p><p>"When we're using our cars, we see that we're using gas … But when you use a computer or a smartphone, it is not so obvious that it's also responsible for greenhouse gas emissions," Hugues Ferreboeuf, project director at the Shift Project, a Paris-based think tank, recently told CBS News.</p><p>The Shift Project issued an alarming <a href="https://theshiftproject.org/en/article/lean-ict-our-new-report/#link=%7B%22role%22:%22standard%22,%22href%22:%22https://theshiftproject.org/en/article/lean-ict-our-new-report/%22,%22target%22:%22%22,%22absolute%22:%22%22,%22linkText%22:%22report%22%7D" target="_blank">report</a> last year that found digital technologies' energy demand was growing at an unsustainable rate. "The only chance to keep the [global] temperature increase to 2 degrees is to divide by two the greenhouse gas emissions in the next 10 years," Ferreboeuf said. "If we want to change things, there is no alternative to us reviewing the way we use digital." </p>Big Data Gets Bigger
<p>The silver lining is that, at least for now, the energy impact of cloud computing remains relatively modest. Over the past decade, data centers — often called the "brains" of the digital world — have massively increased the amount of information they process while increasing energy use only a little. Since 2010, such data crunching has jumped more than fivefold, while energy use rose only about 6%, according to a <a href="https://datacenters.lbl.gov/sites/default/files/Masanet_et_al_Science_2020.full_.pdf#link=%7B%22role%22:%22standard%22,%22href%22:%22https://datacenters.lbl.gov/sites/default/files/Masanet_et_al_Science_2020.full_.pdf%22,%22target%22:%22_blank%22,%22absolute%22:%22%22,%22linkText%22:%22paper%22%7D" target="_blank">paper</a> published this year in Science.</p><p>"We're consuming much more data than we used to for not that much more energy," said Masanet, the paper's lead author. </p><p>Here's why: Data center operators have become much better at heating and cooling their massive buildings, essentially limiting or even eliminating a function that hogged more energy than running the servers themselves. The trend toward larger centers and better servers over the last decade, led by cloud-computing giants like Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft, has also helped lower the energy-to-data ratio.</p><p>Still, that increase in energy efficiency is unlikely to continue forever.</p><p>"The old data centers were kind of like old refrigerators when you didn't put the door on," said Arman Shehabi, a coauthor of the paper and research scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. "Now they put the doors on and it's more efficient. But once they all have doors, you're going to need something new" to keep energy use under control, he said.</p><p>Shehabi and Masanet each estimated that we can go another five years without increasing data centers' energy demands. But to keep their energy use from exploding thereafter, governments need to make policy changes — today.</p>
<p>"The industry, policymakers, data center operators, they all have to confront the wave of demand that's coming," Masanet said. </p><p>In particular, technologies including artificial intelligence, 5G, virtual reality and augmented reality are all energy-intensive, and usage is expected to surge in the years to come.</p><p>Mitigating that energy consumption goes beyond making sure that data centers use the least amount of power possible — it also requires better and wider use of renewable energy.</p><p>In Europe, where governments are aggressively trying to reduce their carbon emissions, much more electricity is carbon-free than in the U.S., noted Jacqueline Wernimont, distinguished chair in digital humanities and social engagement at Dartmouth College.</p><p>Wernimont also pointed out that data centers' environmental impact goes beyond carbon emissions. Most emit a constant low hum, creating noise pollution that affects humans and animals. When they are sited near population centers, they tend to be placed in poor neighborhoods (like power plants, landfills and other <a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__ajph.aphapublications.org_doi_abs_10.2105_AJPH.2017.304297&d=DwMFaQ&c=jGUuvAdBXp_VqQ6t0yah2g&r=04C8JZ6tqnL9s3MAkhMPOGc7_tMEMdMB2GH-BNRkP68&m=exdb3hWyL0mT6aLC0W2F3CKd3eVqZkfRgHbneXgpAfc&s=0Yx_kwZCsHVY6-EUTBMdaOzMOWThMk_YAnc6B1cdesw&e=" target="_blank">undesirable infrastructure</a>), to the detriment of the people who live there.</p>
Who Pays for Digital?
<p>So has the coronavirus lockdown in the U.S. decreased carbon emissions overall? Scientists are currently exploring that question, and it will likely be months before they can come up with a definitive answer. Yet Masanet has a strong hunch the answer is "yes" — even taking into account the rise in binge streaming.</p><p>"Of course there's more electricity use from being online more, but the savings we get from avoiding our commutes dwarf any increase in electricity," he said. "My instinct is that, yes, electricity use is going up, but the savings we get nationally from avoided travel is much greater."</p>From Your Site Articles
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5 Things to Know About Climate Change and Coronavirus With WHO Climate Lead Dr. Campbell-Lendrum
23 April
Climate
Doctor wearing highly protective suit while injecting a vaccine into the earth. Hocus-Focus / Getty Images
By Margaret Brennan and Kelsey Micklas
Wednesday marked the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, and since well before the COVID-19 outbreak, the World Health Organization has been tracing and analyzing the impact of how climate change is impacting public health.
But as the global community continues to grapple with the coronavirus pandemic, top climate officials say our attention needs to shift to climate-related issues that directly impact our health.
<p><br/></p>
<p>In an interview with "Face the Nation" moderator Margaret Brennan, Dr. Diarmid Campbell-Lendrum, Head of the Climate Change and Health Program at the World Health Organization, says presently, air pollution "is one of the severest problems that we face around the world."</p><p>Air pollution increases the risk of other illnesses like heart disease and respiratory issues, something that has had a direct impact on those suffering during the coronavirus outbreak. About one in eight deaths around the world are caused by air pollution. </p><p>Additionally, extreme weather events and increased temperature can all have negative effects on public health.</p><p>"The extreme weather events are getting more severe. So we're seeing more severe heat waves. We're seeing more severe wildfires," Dr. Campbell-Lendrum said. "So it's absolutely clear to us that climate change is making these extreme weather events worse, and it brings a whole range of severe impacts to human health."</p><p>Dr. Campbell-Lendrum noted that while climate change did not <em>cause </em>coronavirus, "if we want to reduce the chances of the next pandemic, then we have to start taking more care of the natural environment."</p>
Here Are Five Other Things to Know About How Climate Change Is Expected to Impact Public Health Worldwide:
<p>1. <strong>Air pollution kills 7 million people a year throughout the world</strong></p><p><strong></strong>About <a href="https://www.who.int/airpollution/news-and-events/how-air-pollution-is-destroying-our-health" target="_blank">9 in 10 people</a> around the world are inhaling polluted air. Air pollution is a contributing risk factor for many other illnesses such as heart disease and respiratory illness. According to the World Health Organization, a third of the deaths from strokes, lung cancer and heart disease are due to air pollution, and there is some evidence emerging out of the COVID-19 outbreak that suggests people living in areas with higher air pollution are more likely to be infected with the virus.</p><p>"We're getting the first indications that places with high levels of air pollution may also have high rates of death and disease from COVID-19," said Dr. Campbell-Lendrum. "It's not conclusive at the moment, but it's what we would expect and that's what we think we're starting to see."</p><p><strong>2. But air quality has largely improved due to the coronavirus outbreak</strong></p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzE1ODM4NS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MTA1Mzc0NX0.YQc4CznHsW49RqSsjdYCOBM-OXtH57tbE0ASQMvf9yM/img.jpg?width=980" id="b604c" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="205283223b7b06e9524c833b4f712f87" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
NASA Earth Observatory images, based on data from the European Space Agency's Copernicus satellite, show nitrogen dioxide emissions dramatically reduced over central China as the coronavirus outbreak brought cities to a standstill. NASA EARTH OBSERVATORY
<p><br></p><p>While the coronavirus has had devastating impacts around the globe, it has also led to a <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-satellite-animation-shows-pollution-clearing-over-china-and-italy/" target="_blank">decrease in air pollution</a>. In the northeastern United States, air pollution dropped by 30 percent in March, and countries like China and Italy have experienced similar decreases. </p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzE1ODM3OC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTU5NTg3Nzk5NH0.3Hxn_fheWVpC87LIfuwX_8ZTJ0jepoB7M7_Q5fM1MBw/img.jpg?width=980" id="90f87" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="544e880d09e41bfeb2caea2b721e1bc9" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
NASA Earth Observatory images, based on data from the European Space Agency's Copernicus satellite, show nitrogen dioxide emissions dramatically reduced over central China as the coronavirus outbreak brought cities to a standstill. NASA EARTH OBSERVATORY
<p>"We would never want to say this is okay, because the human cost of COVID-19 is so great," said Dr. Campabell-Lendrum. "What we do want to make clear is that we should try and hang on to some of these gains as we come out of the COVID-19 crisis."</p><p><strong>3. 70 percent of the world's infectious diseases have come from the natural environment, with many from animal-to-human contact</strong></p><p>Most infectious diseases the world has had to deal with over the last few decades have come from the natural environment. "So it's very clear that the damage that we're doing to the natural world does make it more likely that these diseases will emerge," said Dr. Campbell-Lendrum.</p><p>Evidence shows that COVID-19 was a <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/video/us-explores-theory-virus-spread-started-in-chinese-lab/" target="_blank">zoonotic </a>event that jumped from animal to humans. Many of the infectious diseases like SARS and even HIV were transmitted by animal to human contact, coming out of the natural environment. </p><p>"So when we damage the natural environment, when we overexploit it, and then when we don't monitor what's happening to infections in wildlife and infections in domestic animals and infections in humans, we're basically leaving ourselves open to these-these risks," said Dr. Campbell-Lendrum.</p>
<p><strong>4. Climate change didn't cause coronavirus -- but it can help spread future pandemics and disease</strong></p><p><strong></strong>Dr. Campbell-Lendrum explained that while climate change isn't directly correlated to the cause of coronavirus, "it's very clear that the damage that we're doing to the natural world does make it more likely that these diseases will emerge."</p><p>Warming climates and increasing variability in weather patterns across the globe make it inherently easier to transmit diseases of any origin. </p><p>In order to reduce our chances for the next pandemic, Campbell-Lendrum says we need to start taking more care of our planet. </p><p>"Overall environmental damage seems to be increasing the risks either of past epidemics of this pandemic and potentially of future pandemics as well," he said. </p><p>Campbell-Lendrum rightly noted that the COVID-19 crisis exposed our lack of preparedness for pandemics in general across the world. "In many cases we've gone in with weak health systems. In many cases we've gone in with a really high burden of environmental pollution, such as air pollution," he said.</p><p>He added, "One of the things we're saying is that we shouldn't come out of this crisis in the same direction that we went in...We should be thinking, can we get-can we hang on to some of the environmental gains that we're seeing in the COVID crisis, such as cleaner air."</p>
<p><strong>5. Adjusting our diet can be better for both you and the environment</strong></p><p><strong></strong>Last year, the United Nations released a report saying that plant based diets are better for the environment. One of the reasons is that cows produce large amounts of the greenhouse gas methane when they eat. Additionally, eating large amounts of meat regularly, particularly processed meats, is not that healthy for humans.</p><p>"We're not telling people they-they have to or they should become vegetarians," said Dr. Campbell-Lendrum. "If you want to think about whether a more sustainable diet is going to be good for your health and good for the environment, now is a really good time to do it." </p>
<p><em>This story originally appeared in</em> <em><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/" target="_blank">CBS News</a> </em><em>and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Releasing Herds of Animals Into the Arctic Could Help Fight Climate Change, Study Finds
21 April
Climate
A reindeer herd congregates in mid-winter in the Norwegian Arctic, January 27th, 2016. Scott Wallace / Getty Images
By Jeff Berardelli
Herds of horses, bison and reindeer could play a significant part in saving the world from an acceleration in global heating. That is the conclusion of a recent study showing how grazing herbivores can slow down the pace of thawing permafrost in the Arctic.
<p>The study — a computerized simulation based on real-life, on-the ground data — finds that with enough animals, 80% of all permafrost soils around the globe could be preserved through 2100.</p><p>The research was inspired by an experiment in the town of Chersky, Siberia <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/siberia-pleistocene-park-bringing-back-pieces-of-the-ice-age-to-combat-climate-change-60-minutes/" target="_blank">featured on CBS News' "60 Minutes."</a> The episode introduces viewers to an eccentric scientist named Sergey Zimov who resettled grazing animals to a piece of the Arctic tundra more than 20 years ago. </p><p>Zimov is unconventional, to say the least, even urging geneticists to work on resurrecting a version of the now-extinct woolly mammoth to aid in his quest. But through the years he and his son Nikita have observed positive impacts from adding grazing animals to the permafrost area he named Pleistocene Park, in a nod to the last Ice Age.</p>
<p>Permafrost is a thick layer of soil that remains frozen year-round. Because of the rapidly <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/climate-change" target="_blank">warming climate</a> in <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/climate-change-noaa-arctic-report-2019/" target="_blank">Arctic regions</a>, much of the permafrost is not permanently frozen anymore. Thawing permafrost releases heat-trapping greenhouse gases that have been buried in the frozen soil for tens of thousands of years, back into the atmosphere.</p><p>Scientists are concerned that this mechanism will act as a feedback loop, further warming the atmosphere, thawing more soil, releasing more greenhouse gases and warming the atmosphere even more, perpetuating a dangerous cycle.</p><p>Last year their fears were confirmed when a <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145880/permafrost-becoming-a-carbon-source-instead-of-a-sink" target="_blank">study</a> led by scientists at Woods Hole Research Center revealed that the Arctic was no longer storing as much carbon as it was emitting back into the atmosphere. </p>
<p>In winter the permafrost in Chersky, Siberia stays at about 14 degrees Fahrenheit. But the air can be much colder, dropping down to 40 below zero Fahrenheit. Typically there is a thick blanket of snowfall in winter which insulates the soil, shielding it from the frigid air above and keeping it milder.</p><p>The idea behind Zimov's on-the-ground Pleistocene Park experiment was to bring grazing animals with their stamping hooves back to the land to disperse the snow, compress the ground and chill the soil.</p><p>Turns out, it worked. The 100 resettled animals, across a one-square-kilometer area, cut the average snow cover height in half, dramatically reducing the insulating effect, exposing the soil to the overlying colder air and intensifying the freezing of permafrost.</p>
<p>In an effort to see what impact this method could have on a much larger scale, beyond the confines of Pleistocene Park, Professor Christian Beer of the University of Hamburg conducted a simulation experiment. His team used a special climate model to replicate the impact on the land surface throughout all of the Arctic permafrost soils in the Northern Hemisphere over the course of an entire year.</p><p>The results, published in the <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-60938-y" target="_blank">Nature journal Scientific Reports</a>, show that if emissions continue to rise unchecked we can expect to see a 7-degree Fahrenheit increase in permafrost temperatures, which would cause half of all permafrost to thaw by 2100.</p><p>In contrast, with animal herds repopulating the tundra, the ground would only warm by 4 degrees Fahrenheit. That would be enough to preserve 80% of the current permafrost though the end of the century.</p>
<p>"This type of natural manipulation in ecosystems that are especially relevant for the climate system has barely been researched to date, but holds tremendous potential," Beer said.</p><p>CBS News asked Beer how realistic it is to expect that the Arctic could be repopulated with enough animals to make a difference. "I am not sure," he replied, adding that more research is needed but the results are promising. "Today we have an average of 5 reindeers per square kilometer across the Arctic. With 15 [reindeer] per square kilometer we could already save 70% permafrost according to our calculations."</p><p>"It may be utopian to imaging resettling wild animal herds in all the permafrost regions of the Northern Hemisphere," Beer concedes. "But the results indicate that using fewer animals would still produce a cooling effect."</p><p>Rick Thoman, a climate specialist at the International Arctic Research Center in Alaska, agrees that snow disturbed and trampled by animal herds is a much less efficient insulator, but he has his doubts about implementing this idea. "Unless the plan is to cover millions of square kilometers with horses, bison and reindeer, how could this possibly have any significant impact? I certainly would not call it 'utopian' to destroy permafrost lands as we know them by having these animals in the distribution and numbers required." </p>
<p>Beer and his team did consider some potential side effects of this approach. For example, in summer the animals would destroy the cooling moss layer on the ground, which would contribute to warming the soil. This was taken into account in the simulations, but the cooling impact of the compressed snow effect in winter is several times greater, they found.</p><p>"If theoretically we were able to maintain a high animal density like in Zimov's Pleistocene Park, would that be good enough to save permafrost under the strongest warming scenario? Yes, it could work for 80% of the region" said Beer.</p><p>As a next step, Beer plans to collaborate with biologists in order to investigate how the animals would actually spread across the landscape.</p>
<p class=""><em>This story originally appeared in</em> <em><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/" target="_blank">CBS News</a></em> <em>and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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