Read Aloud the Text Content

This audio was created by Woord's Text to Speech service by content creators from all around the world.

Text Content or SSML code:

Chapter 8 - Freshwater is a resource that is getting harder and harder to find. On a blue planet, we reside. The majority of the world is covered by water, which is also essentially what makes us exist. We use it to maintain our cleanliness, stay hydrated, and cultivate our food. Since water is the primary component of most of our bodies, it is also where life first began. Humans depend most heavily on freshwater, by far. However, it only makes up 2% of the total freshwater supply on the planet; the remainder is salt water. Additionally, just 1% of the world's freshwater is usable; the majority is buried beneath the earth or frozen in glaciers. Despite popular belief, this is not a problem. According to a study by National Geographic, only 0.007 percent of the water on Earth is required to hydrate seven billion people and cultivate crops. Between 70 and 80 percent of this is used to produce food, with only a minor portion going toward hydration. However, in the future decades, a key aspect of climate change will be water scarcity. The demand for freshwater on a global scale is predicted to outpace supply by 40% by 2030. This rising demand will primarily be met by increasing agricultural output, which could result in food shortages and further need for agriculture—yet another example of a negative feedback loop. The fact that, in the following 30 years, water demand for world food production is anticipated to rise by 50%, primarily as a result of the growing number of people, only makes the situation worse. Additionally, freshwater resources will be severely limited. Many of the major lakes in the world began to dry up in the previous century. Since the 1960s, the volume of the Aral Sea in Central Asia, formerly the fourth largest lake in the world, has decreased by 90%, while Lake Chad in Africa, which was once as huge as the Caspian Sea, has lost 95% of its volume. Additionally, the majority of the world gets its freshwater through spring melts of high-altitude snow. These snowfalls are extremely vulnerable to global warming, which runs the risk of turning snow-capped peaks into dusty hills. By 2050, the UN estimates that five billion people would have insufficient access to fresh water. Furthermore, just like with any limited resource, there will always be groups eager to engage in conflict to gain control of it. We'll examine the connection between human conflict and climate change in the following chapter. The next few decades of warfare will undoubtedly include water-driven conflicts. Chapter 9 - On a hotter, more polluted planet, human conflict grows. Climate change can harm human behavior as if the catastrophes mentioned in the previous chapters weren't already terrible enough. Human conflict is significantly influenced by climate change. Depending on the scope, it may be localized, interpersonal, or global. On a human level, a wide range of different situations have been connected to greater temperatures. Heat encourages car drivers to honk their horns longer and enhances the likelihood that a baseball pitcher will hit an opposing hitter with their toss. More seriously, hot weather increases the likelihood that police may open fire on criminals during training exercises. Violence is also significantly influenced by pollution. In a study of 9,000 US communities, researchers discovered a link between increased auto theft, assault, rape, and murder and excessive air pollution. According to a different study, the US will experience an increase of 22,000 homicides and 3.5 million assaults as a result of climate change. It is very difficult to estimate how global warming will affect larger-scale human conflicts. It would be dishonest and misleading to claim that a particular war is the direct result of heat or pollution because all hostilities are complicated, with a variety of various causes and objectives. But one thing is certain: The likelihood of war rises as the temperature rises. There are several reasons why this occurs. For instance, drought brought on by climate change reduces agricultural yields, putting pressure on food supplies and escalating competition for them. Additionally, when there are more natural disasters, there will be more refugees and forced migrants, which will cause social and political tensions. The likelihood of an armed conflict breaking out anywhere in the world rises by 10 to 20 percent for every half degree of temperature warming. Competition for limited freshwater resources may be the primary cause, or it may be indirect because of growing tensions. And this catastrophe is currently occurring, just like many of the ones we've already discussed. One study performed by Stanford academic Marshall B. Burke said that by 2030, projected temperatures on the continent would result in an additional 393,000 deaths in combat. Climate change has already raised the likelihood of violence in African countries by over 10%. Chapter 10 - Although new technologies offer us means of reducing the severity of these catastrophes, they are now unrealistic. You've probably guessed by now that nothing looks good. Unfortunately, increased suffering is unavoidable, and we frequently feel helpless in the face of it. However, we are still the creators of this terrible story, and we have the power to alter how cruelly it concludes. It's only reasonable to wonder, "What can be done to solve it," when we are gazing at such a grim future. Both good and terrible news is contained in the response to this question. We already have the technologies to improve our climate, which is good news. The bad news is that they are currently unfeasible. It is not enough to reduce our emissions if we want to go beyond our current best-case scenario of 3 degrees. Instead, we require something more forceful—something that lowers the air's amount of carbon. This strategy has two variations and is known as negative emissions. First, there is what is known as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS). To generate bioenergy, this method burns biomass, or plant waste like wheat stalks or maize cobs. Producing bioenergy alone would still release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere since biomass takes up carbon dioxide during its existence. For this reason, it is integrated with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. These entail gathering the carbon released when burning biomass and moving it to storage locations, typically underground. We can therefore actively lower the amount of carbon in the air by cultivating and burning biomass while also capturing and storing the carbon emitted. In the second negative emissions strategy, machines would be used to remove carbon from the atmosphere rather than CCS technology, which is still used. Fortunately, these tools already exist. They cost around $30,000 and have a similar level of complexity as a current automobile. One research team said that BECCS couldn't function because it would require a third of the world's agricultural land, which is untenable given the demand for food worldwide. According to a different study, BECCS may potentially result in the atmospheric addition of carbon if improperly applied. Building sizable facilities with carbon-sucking machinery are the second option, but it is extremely expensive. A hundred million machines would be required if we wanted to generate a minor carbon deficit by consuming more than we produce annually. The price tag for this would be $30 trillion, or 40% of global GDP. These two solutions will probably get more affordable and efficient over time, but we're running out of time. How much time do we have left? We are promised that our pain would only become worse as the days pass. The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming by David Wallace-Wells Book Review We underestimate how bad the situation is. A variety of climate-related catastrophes, some of which work as self-reinforcing cascades, aggravating global warming and human suffering, pose a threat to humanity's well-being. Even methods that reduce emissions are currently only a pipe dream in terms of preventing catastrophe. Even while time is running out, we still have a say in how severe the effects of climate change will be. Put political leaders under pressure to act. Although altering your spending patterns is a noble objective, putting pressure on the political establishment may be more crucial. You must take action right away to force change at the top if you want to stop climate change. To ensure that your opinions are heard, get in touch with your political officials, participate in protests, or join pressure groups actively.