Our planet is sick, and its life -threatening symptoms worsen, warns a new report.
The Earth was protected past multiple physical and chemical boundaries that are crucial for the preservation of peace in life. In addition to already exceeded thresholds established by scientists to increase temperature, Loss of biodiversity and chemical pollution, now we also violated the border on Ocean nascentThe milestone field is associated with gloomy consequences for marine ecosystems and human means.
“More than three quarters of land support systems are not in a safe zone,” said Johan Rockstrem, director of the Institute for Climatic Studies (PIK) in Germany. statement Declaring 2025 Assessment of planetary boundariesThe field “Humanity goes beyond the safe operational space, increasing the risk of destabilization of the planet.”
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People and many other species developed to flourish in the climate of the Golocene, a period that began about 10,000 years ago. But as society developed industrially and began to burn wide fossil fuel in the 19th century, greenhouse gases created in the atmosphere, catching heat and transforming the Earth and its climate in many respects, in addition to increasing global temperatures.
Since 2009, Pik noted and set priorities in the study Nine geophysical restrictions This makes up a kind of planetary life support system; They argue that remaining within these limits is the best hope of maintaining the climatic conditions of the Clement, to which we and most of the other inhabitants of the Earth adapted. In 2023, researchers published a study that quantitatively determined these boundaries and are established where we are in relation to them. At that time, six borders were surpassed, and many scientists were that scientists called the “growing risk zone.”
“This is similar to blood pressure,” said Katherine Richardson, a leading author of the study, a scientist from Copenhagen University in 2023. Scientific American At that time. “If your blood pressure exceeds 120 more than 80, this is not a guarantee that you will have a heart attack, but this increases the risk, and therefore we do our best to bring it down.”
Among nine borders, of course, the climate change, which is partially measured by the number of world outfits carbon dioxide In the atmosphere of the Earth. Carbon dioxide concentrations reached a record global maximum of 422.7 parts per million (PPM) last year, compared with 280 PPM to the industrial revolution and 350 PPM, which many scientists consider to be a “safe” limit (which was surpassed in 1987). The burning of fossil fuel is an indisputable culprit.
The fossil fuel also stands behind a new violation of the boundaries – the ocean absorbs some of the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, forcing the water to become more acidic. After the industrial revolution, the pH of the ocean surface fell by 0.1; This may seem insignificant, but since the PH scale is logarithmic, it reflects approximately 30 percent increase in acidity.
The ocean owing can have a deep effect on the sea ecosystems, depleting the sea water of certain carbon formations that corals and other animals that build shells should build their protective houses. At a sufficiently low pH levels, Corals and shells can even begin to dissolveThe field can destabilize entire ecosystems and devastate many commercially valuable species, such as oysters. The report of the National Administration of the Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of the United States for 2020 showed that The ocean acidification will cost the country's economy Billions of dollars.
“The movement that we see is absolutely directed in the wrong direction. The ocean is becoming increasingly sour, oxygen levels fall, and sea heat waves increase. This increases the pressure on the system that is vital for stabilizing the conditions on planet Earth, ”said the planet in the Scientific Laboratory,” said the Planetary Borders of the Peak in the “Scientific Laboratory”.
Not a very short list of other borders that we blew up is sobering. Excess phosphorus and nitrogen from widespread use of fertilizers flows into rivers and seas in order to disappear Toxic algae flowersField artificial chemicals, such as plasticIN Dichlorordifrichloretan (DDT) And “forever chemical” Perftooroalkil and polyfluroalkal substances (PFAS) destructively accumulates in food chains. Agriculture and other changes in the agricultural land use strip and reduce affordable fresh water. And as all these problems are growing, more and more biodiversity of the Earth disappear.
According to the new report, only two of the nine limits remain untouched: exhaustion of ozone and aerosols in the atmosphere. Only the first demonstrates clear progress away from the border of the planet, as a result of the success of the Montreal protocol, an international agreement, through which countries are gradually distorting chemicals that are destroyed Protective ozone layer of earthThe field emissions of aerosols decreased all over the world – I will give from efforts to reduce pollution from global delivery– But there is no one -liba unified political structure for reduction, the levels can easily retreat.
The general forecast for the health of the planet is bad, given that a number of countries, including the United States, in particular, depart from significant actions to solve environmental problems.
“We are witnesses of a widespread decline in the health of our planet. But this is not an inevitable result. The fall in the aerosol pollution and healing of the ozone layer shows that the direction of global development can be directed. Even if the diagnosis is terrible, the medicine window is still open, ”Rockstm said in a press statement. “Failure is not inevitable; Failure is a choice. The choice that should and can be avoided. ”
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