The importance of ecology is enormous for every inhabitant of our planet. Only a careful attitude to the environment will enable the entire human race to keep the Earth suitable for life, and this is extremely important in our century, when the environment suffers a real disaster from man-made impact.
Environmental problems are very acute, this is a fact, and even the uncompromising struggle of political parties and public organizations with the cruel attitude of individuals to nature does not give serious results. We can only hope that sooner or later most of the people living on our planet will change their minds and stop harming the environment on such a global scale.
Here is a list of 10 interesting facts about ecology for children: environmental problems and possible disasters.
10. Americans pollute the most
Almost 5% of the world's population lives in the United States of America. However, they use 25% of all the Earth’s resources and produce 30% of the world's garbage..
The daily release of aluminum cans by residents of the United States is so great that all of the country's aircraft could be rebuilt from them. Despite the damage to the environment, to this day, they do not reduce the production of drinks produced in such containers.
Familiar disposable baby diapers occupy at least 1% of all garbage in the United States, and they decompose over 250 years. This suggests that after one and a half to two centuries, dirty diapers can become the main cause of air pollution in the country and on the whole continent.
In America alone, about two million plastic bottles are emptied and thrown away in an hour. At the same time, a scanty part of all this volume of garbage is sent for processing. According to some reports, this is 230-270 thousand plastic bottles per day.
9. How much garbage in the oceans?
Every year, 6,000 million kilograms of garbage are thrown into the oceans.most of which consists of plastic, killing more than 1 million birds, 100,000 mammals and countless fish and birds every year. On average, out of every million tons of oil transported in the oceans, about 1 ton is spilled into the water.
After the nuclear crisis in Japan, which unfolded due to the 2011 tsunami, 11 million liters of water with extreme levels of radioactivity were thrown into the Pacific Ocean. A few days later, fish contaminated with radioactive material was discovered more than 80 km from the coast.
8. How many children die from water pollution?
Every 8 seconds, 1 child dies from causes related to the consumption of contaminated water. In India alone, experts estimate that 1,000 minors die per day from consumption, prolonged exposure, or diseases associated with water pollution.
In China, about 700 million people drink contaminated water. According to statistics, 3,400 million people worldwide die each year from diseases associated with contaminated water.
7. Air pollution in China and Bombay
The air of the city of Beijing, the capital of China, is so polluted by human activity that breathing there carries the same risks as smoking 21 cigarettes a day. The situation is even worse in Bombay (India), where breathing for 1 day is equivalent to smoking 100 cigarettes, experts say.
According to recent studies related to global air pollution, 1 in 8 deaths worldwide due to air pollution.
6. Ecological damage from cars
An average car produces more than 0.5 kilograms of waste in the form of gas in less than every 35 kilometers. It is worth noting that just 50 years ago, the average car polluted the environment about 25 times more.
By the way, in the state of Colorado (USA) on the roads there are special sensors that measure the degree of environmental pollution after each passing car. Typically, such devices are built into the curbs.
Interesting fact: only 4 liters of engine oil is enough to poison more than 4 million liters of clean drinking water. It is worth noting that this volume, although it seems impressive, is consumed by an average of only 50 motorists per calendar year.
5. What do Kassandra and modern ecologists have in common?
According to legend, the Trojan princess Cassandra was the most beautiful and smartest of the daughters of King Priam. Apollo, the god of the Sun in Greek mythology, fell in love with her, and Cassandra promised to marry him if he provided her with the gift of prophecy in order to guess the future.
As soon as Apollo gave her the agreed gift, Cassandra refused her word, and Apollo said that no one would believe in her predictions.
Thus, she announced the misfortunes that Priam, her brother Paris and the Trojan people would go through, and even wanted to stop the Trojans from introducing a wooden horse into their city that brought them destruction. But, they not only did not believe her, but also mistook her for being crazy and locked her up.
American astronomer Carl Sagan (1934-1996) in his book “Billions” (1997) compares Cassandra with current ecologists who portend the dangers of environmental degradation. Many refuse to believe in these prophecies, calling environmentalists, like Cassandra, “catastrophic”.
4. Electricity hazardous to nature
Electricity consumption alone does not pollute the environment, however, modern methods of producing this form of energy cause enormous damage to nature.
Currently, most of the electricity comes from thermal power plants and nuclear power plants that pollute the atmosphere.
While thermal power plants produce most of the global warming (greenhouse effect) and acid rain, nuclear power plants produce very polluting and very persistent radioactive waste (millions of years of toxicity) and with which it is not known what to do.
The disposal of such waste is the simplest solution, but it is very difficult to find a suitable place on Earth that will ensure the safety of this waste for at least 10,000 years and is not close to places inhabited by people or animals. In addition, it should be borne in mind that waste will have to be transported to this site, crossing populated areas.
Thus, saving energy is a matter of health, not economy: even if you can pay your electricity bills, consume an adequate amount.
3. Some types of domestic plants very effectively purify indoor air
Bill Volverton, NASA's environmental engineer, studied the problem of maintaining clean and healthy air in spacecraft in the early seventies. He began to study home plants.
Starting from the “hazardous” levels of various volatile organic compounds, Volverton discovered that some plants reduce pollution to undetectable levels within 24 hours.
The two most effective are cleomes and philodendrons, which are among the domestic plants that are easy to care for: they tolerate almost any lighting conditions; it is enough to water them 1 or 2 times a week; resistant to pests and do not have flowers that cause allergies. These plants can also help clean up indoor air pollution.
It has been proven that in many cases indoor air is polluted because various materials emit volatile organic compounds (carpets, upholstery, plastics, artificial fibers ...), not to mention chemical contaminants with cleaning products, insecticides, adhesives, paints and varnishes ...
2. Eco-friendly golf balls
Comfortable ocean liners have special golf courses. The main problem in this case is that the balls quite often fly overboard.
Therefore, one German company decided to produce special balls in the form of compressed fish food for golfers who do not care about the environment.
1. Kangaroos are not able to spoil the air
Kangaroos are unique creatures of their kind - they are not able to blow gases. Methane formed in their gastrointestinal tract is continuously processed and absorbed back.
Scientists are trying to find the gene responsible for this feature in order to supply them with livestock, and as a result reduce the amount of gas emissions into the atmosphere.