5 Things Environmentalists Have Tried To Help 'Save the Planet'
Environmentalists sometimes propose radical solutions to save the world from global warming — a disaster some say will destroy almost all life on Earth if not dealt with quickly and radically.
In honor of Earth Day on April 22, The Daily Caller News Foundation compiled a list of solutions suggested or tried, largely unsuccessfully, by environmentalists to roll back the effects of global warming.
Stop Cows from Eating Grass
Grass fed beef cattle are destroying the environment while putting off large amounts of methane just by digesting food. People need to cut back on the amount of cattle they raise and beef they eat to lessen the severe impact raising cattle is having on the environment, according to Tara Garnett of the University of Oxford’s Food Climate Research Network.
“Sadly, though it would be nice if the pro-grazers were right, they aren’t,” Garnett said in 2017, according to the New Scientist. “The truth is, we cannot eat as much meat as we like and save the planet.”
If We Can’t Stop Cows from Eating Grass, Let’s Just Stop Cows from Farting So Much
Scientists have developed “fartpacks” for cattle to wear, capturing the animals’ methane emissions before they are released out in to the environment. The backpacks capture cows’ methane through a tube inserted into the animals’ stomachs, The Daily Mail reported.
Capturing cows’ methane not only fights climate change from keeping the gas from entering the environment, but the gas can then be converted into energy. A cow emits enough gas in a day to — after being converted into usable energy — power a car for the same amount of time.
Don’t Have Kids, or at Least Have Less of Them
Having children is one of the worst things humans have done to further climate change and bring the world closer to irreparable harm, the Independent reported.
Children produce “an average of 58.6 tonnes of CO2-equivalent emissions per year,” according to Swedish researchers from Lund University.
“A U.S. family who chooses to have one fewer child would provide the same level of emissions reductions as 684 teenagers who choose to adopt comprehensive recycling for the rest of their lives,” the researchers’ 2017 study stated.
These Totally Unrealistic Yet Absolutely Necessary Climate Change Solutions from a Scientist
Peter Wadhams, head of the Polar Ocean Physics Group at the University of Cambridge, authored a book in 2017 outlining several radical steps possibly necessary to save the planet from climate change, Wired reported.
- Use giant vacuums to suck all the greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere.
- Use giant hoses to pump massive amounts of ocean water into the sky, creating clouds filled with salt crystals to reflect the sun’s heat back into space and stop it from getting trapped in Earth’s atmosphere.
- Filling the sky with other crystals, such as sulfuric acid or sulfur dioxide, to provide the same kind of cover and produce the same effect as the salt clouds.
- Launching a giant mirror into space to orbit the Earth and, again, reflect the sun’s powerful rays.
Beat Climate Change to the Punch — Set Yourself on Fire
A 60-year-old lawyer and activist committed a “protest suicide” April 14 by setting himself on fire. He was attempting to draw attention to the affects of climate change and inspire action against it.
“Most humans on the planet now breathe air made unhealthy by fossil fuels, and many die early deaths as a result — my early death by fossil fuel reflects what we are doing to ourselves,” the man wrote in a note found next to his blackened bones.
“I am David Buckel, and I just killed myself by fire as a protest suicide. I apologize to you for the mess,” he added.
A version of this article appeared on The Daily Caller News Foundation website.
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