Blogs

Blue Carbon: An Overlooked Resource

By EarthX Stories posted 3 days ago
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When environmental conversations turn to carbon a lot of attention is paid to both atmospheric carbon in the form of greenhouse gases and terrestrial carbon such as forests. An often overlooked piece of the global carbon puzzle for both carbon sequestration and as an economic tool to be wielded in international voluntary carbon markets is oceanic carbon, also known as blue carbon. What is blue carbon? According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), blue carbon is the “the term for carbon captured by the world's ocean and coastal ecosystems.” The world’s oceans and coastal areas have a powerful effect on sequestering greenhouse ...
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EarthxOceans: Shark Conservation

By EarthX Stories posted 10 days ago
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Prowling at the top of the food chain, sharks maintain the balance of the ocean ecosystem. Without them, lesser predators would deplete herbivorous fish that modulate the abundance of plant life. Yet an estimated 100 million sharks are killed each year—almost 11,000 per hour—usually by fishermen, sometimes by governments pandering to public fear. Since the 1950s, the shark population has plunged 90 percent. “The main culprit is the same culprit for the decline in all fisheries: commercial fishing,” said Paul de Gelder, a former Australian Navy diver who became a shark advocate after surviving a shark attack. “The human hunger for seafood is pushing ...
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Sustainable Fisheries Report

By EarthX Stories posted 10 days ago
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Sylvia Earle, renowned marine biologist and oceanographer, once called oceans “the real world bank.” She cautioned that people were making many more withdrawals than deposits. On June 10, the second day of the virtual EarthxOcean conference, Lelei LeLaulu moderated a Sustainable Fisheries panel that probed the consequences of those withdrawals, and offered a sampling of reasoned responses. The chairman of the Earth Council Alliance, and an expert in global fisheries, LeLaulu described the broad outlines of current conditions. “Because of non-sustainable practices and downright voracious, vicious illegal fishing,” he said, “we’ve arrived at ...
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EarthXOcean 2020: Celebrate our Ocean Planet to Awaken Ocean Conservation

By EarthX Stories posted 10 days ago
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Whaling, climate change, habitat loss — these are only a few challenges facing our oceans. Research and preservation may seem like the only steps required to progress — but public awareness and advocacy can build the momentum needed to turn the tide. During EarthXOcean 2020’s virtual session, “Celebrating our Ocean Planet,” speakers showed the role art, education, and love of life play in renewing and preserving the ocean. A common theme amongst some visionaries who spoke was the impact they have been able to make through their art, advocacy, and ingenuity to diminish global whaling. Captain Paul Watson, founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, ...
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EarthxOceans: Reef Restoration

By EarthX Stories posted 10 days ago
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Coral reefs routinely host a quarter of the ocean’s biodiversity, and at some point more than half of fish species spend time on a reef. Those fish go on to feed hundreds of millions of people, but back at the foundation of the food chain, corals are facing mass mortality, according to presenters at the EarthxOceans Conference, and could go extinct in this century. Corals live in an intimate symbiotic relationship with microscopic algae that, like all plants, convert sunlight and carbon dioxide into sugars and oxygen. The algae feed the corals and lend them their vivid colors. As climate change warms those algae, they produce more oxygen, explained ...
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Ocean Plastic Solutions

By EarthX Stories posted 10 days ago
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Like too many other dire challenges to Earth’s natural systems, plastic pollution in the oceans is visible, immense, and defies ready solutions. Nearly 400 million metric tons of plastic are manufactured annually, according to various market analyses. As much as 13 million tons of plastic ends up in oceans , causing an estimated $13 billion in economic damage to global marine ecosystems, according to the UN Environment Program. Unless the world changes its practices and embraces new technology, quickly, the volume and weight of plastics in the ocean in 2050 could be greater than all the fish in the seas, the World Economic Forum reported in 2016. ...
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EarthXOcean 2020: Protect the Ocean’s Life Support Systems and High Seas; Preserve Life on Earth

By EarthX Stories posted 10 days ago
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The average person may imagine the high seas as rough waters, vast highways for whales and sharks that stretch across plains of rock and sediment… an empty deep blue — certainly not coral reefs, mountains, and sea beds teeming flora and fauna. But they should. This year’s EarthXOcean 2020 virtual sessions on protecting the ocean’s life support systems and high seas brought to light the little-known vitality and global significance of our international waters, the challenges they are facing, and exactly what we all can do now to preserve this ocean planet. Speakers — icons of ocean exploration and advocacy — discussed how preserving the ocean is not ...
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30% by 2030: A Plan to Protect the High Seas

By EarthX Stories posted 16 days ago
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The world’s oceans are the lifeblood of all life on planet Earth. And it is widely known the oceans are under attack across a range of environmental issues from climate change leading to warming oceans and acidification to overfishing to widespread pollution in the form of toxic spills and plastics. While all of Earth’s oceans need protecting, a major area of those waters – the high seas – are often overlooked. In fact, during the recently held EarthxOcean Conference 2020 , Peggy Kalas, director of the High Seas Alliance , said, “Sometimes we say they are the forgotten half of our planet.” What are the high seas? Kalas offered a series of facts ...
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March for Science Global Youth Forum: What Can Youth Do to Save the Planet?

By EarthX Stories posted 05-13-2020
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In the wake of a global pandemic, climate action may feel futile. Most of the world’s inhabitants are stuck inside for the foreseeable future, meaning that in-person demonstrations are impossible — at least for now. The global economy could be entering a years-long downturn, with less money for ambitious projects or plans. And the urgency for some time will be on rebuilding, not rethinking. But luckily, youth climate activists aren’t buying this. Rather than wait for life to return to ‘normal,’ they are sounding the alarm from their homes; that the pandemic is a time to reflect, persist, and engage. At the March for Science Global Youth ...
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EarthxCities 2020: Urban Resilience After the Pandemic

By EarthX Stories posted 05-13-2020
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Over the last decade, cities have increasingly been recognized as integral to resiliency. Home to a majority of the world’s population, cities are at the forefront of climate resiliency, as urban residents collectively face the brunt of environmental hazards. As jobs coalesce in urban areas, cities are at the forefront of economic resiliency, as they continue to attract talent and absorb disruptions. And with inequities persistent in both, cities are the forefront of social resiliency, where damage disproportionately posed to vulnerable populations is front and center. Then a global pandemic hit. “Talk about chronic stress and shock, to ...
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EarthxE-Capital 2020: How Can Cleantech ‘Reset’ After COVID-19?

By EarthX Stories posted 05-12-2020
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The COVID-19 pandemic is ushering in could be a years-long economic slump, spelling trouble for consumer confidence at least for some time. Startups and early-stage investments are being hit particularly hard, as unknowns linger over when projects can break ground again, or when facilities can reopen. Pilots have been put on pause, and expenses are being cut. Access to capital is under threat, too, as investors will likely be hesitant to take risks until markets stabilize, whenever that may be. But here’s the thing: cleantech has no time to slow down. “We are still going to need to get their solutions that address climate change to market,” ...
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Earthx2020 Presents EarthxLaw: What Does the Environment Look Like on the 50th Earth Day?

By EarthX Stories posted 05-08-2020
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A Look at the Past, Present and Future of Environmental Law The world we live in today is completely different than the one we lived in 50 years ago. From social norms to a more dynamic economy, we have made huge strides. Perhaps one of the largest shifts has been environmental quality. Over the course of 50 years, a lot has happened and the environmental landscape in the U.S. has transformed in ways never seen before in history. April 22nd marked the 50th anniversary of Earth Day and although we are in the midst of a global pandemic, EarthX took innovative measures to continue on. EarthX, the world’s largest environmental expo and ...
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EarthxEnergy: Renewables

By EarthX Stories posted 05-07-2020
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EarthxEnergy joined leading technology developers and policy experts in a series of online panels during EarthX2020. The conference, held in partnership with the National Geographic Society, commemorated the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. It also coincided with the global COVID-19 pandemic, which meant transforming the annual event into a virtual experience held around the world. The coronavirus was top of mind in this year’s EarthxEnergy: Renewables conference. Panelists compared the ongoing health crisis to the much broader climate crisis. They said the urgent, international cooperation countries are showing today is exactly what’s required to reduce ...
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EarthX 50th Celebration of Earth Day

By EarthX Stories posted 05-07-2020
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EarthX and The National Geographic Society Celebrate the 50 th Anniversary of Earth Day with Earthx2020 Earthx2020 Addressed Today’s Most Pressing Environmental Challenges through Virtual Conferences, Film Festival and Youth Programs from April 16-27 th . DALLAS (May 5, 2020) –In celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day, Earthx2020 convened virtually as EarthX and The National Geographic Society partnered to shine a light on the critical issues facing our planet. The world’s largest environmental event, which was expecting over 200,000 visitors in Dallas this year, instead streamed live conferences, its film festival and youth ...
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EarthX and March For Science: Island Resilience Forum

By EarthX Stories posted 05-01-2020
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EarthX Island Resilience Forum April 25th and 26th, 2020 In it its second year, the Island Resilience Forum’s shift to a virtual format at EarthX underscored the urgency of its mission in the midst of a global pandemic. Despite being separated by thousands of miles, climate change challenges and solutions resonate from islands across the Pacific Ocean to the Caribbean Sea. Leaders, researchers, poets and student activists from around the world joined Saturday over live Zoom feeds to engage in meaningful dialogue that illustrated the link between public health and climate-driven issues. Belize, Seychelles, Tonga, the Marshall Islands, Guam, Fiji, ...
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EarthxWomen: Women in the Environment Summit

By EarthX Stories posted 05-01-2020
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EarthxWomen brought together youth climate leaders, creative activists, and seasoned advocates in a series of online discussions for Earthx2020. The virtual conference, held in partnership with the National Geographic Society, commemorated the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. Yet the COVID-19 pandemic was also high on the agenda during this year’s Women in the Environment summit. Panelists drew parallels between the current health crisis and the climate change emergency, and discussed how communities and leaders can learn from the pandemic. “If the industry knows how to shift from building a car to building a ventilator, they can also shift from building ...
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EV Tech: The Next Evolution in Maritime Shipping

By EarthX Stories posted 04-18-2020
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A lot of attention is paid to electric cars, long-haul trucks and other land-based electric vehicle (EV) technology. And rightly so. Making the switch from constantly polluting combustion engines to clean, battery powered EVs for daily driver vehicles and the semi rigs moving goods and products around the country will make a dramatic impact on greenhouse gas emissions. But an often overlooked source of atmospheric pollution is ocean going cargo vessels. Globally maritime transportation accounts for around 2.5% of total greenhouse gas emissions, per the International Maritime Organization, producing 1 billion tons of CO2 yearly. Research by IDTechEx found ...
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Composting: A Cornerstone of Sustainable Living

By EarthX Stories posted 04-07-2020
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The secret is out: composting is a pretty easy hobby to pick up for those interested in sustainable living. It requires little more than the proper tools and time. And as with anything, one of the most important tools at a gardener’s disposal is knowledge! So here are a few answers to the most frequently asked questions about sustainable composting. What Goes in the Compost Pile? According to the Environmental Protection Agency , the recipe for a good compost is only three ingredients long: Browns: “dead” materials like dead leaves, cardboard, sawdust, wood chips Greens: “live” materials like vegetable and fruit waste, coffee ...
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Air Pollution Drops Due to Global Coronavirus Lockdown

By EarthX Stories posted 04-03-2020
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The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has completely altered human activity across the globe. The human toll in deaths related to coronavirus and healthcare systems strained beyond reason in cities worldwide are the worst effects by far. A secondary effect of essentially everyone on Earth being impacted in some fashion is the world’s economy has shuddered to a near halt. The economic shock stems from policies either asking or requiring people to shelter in place or self-quarantine to avoid spreading the disease with no current silver-bullet treatment or vaccine. In many cities these policies extend to closing places where people gather such as bars, restaurants, ...
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The Plastics Recycling Challenge

By EarthX Stories posted 04-02-2020
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The recycling industry radically changed in March 2018 when China stopped taking plastic waste from the U.S. And it’s not just China refusing trash from the U.S. Last summer CNN reported that over 1,600 tons of plastic trash in 83 shipping containers labeled “recyclable products” ended up in Cambodia and were immediately turned around and shipped back to the U.S. and Canada. "Cambodia is not a dustbin where foreign countries can dispose of out-of-date e-waste, and the government also opposes any import of plastic waste and lubricants to be recycled in this country," Neth Pheaktra, Secretary of State and Spokesman to the Ministry of Environment, told CNN ...
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