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Consequences of Climate Change on Ecosystems & the Environment
The world around us is being impacted by climate change as we read and speak. Ecosystems and the environment are being transformed due to factors such as rising temperatures, altered sea levels, drought and flooding, along with others.
Those changes are having a detrimental effect on our water and energy supply, transportation and agriculture as well as the health and well-being of humans and our wildlife.
Specifically, drought can bring about harm to our food production, while flooding is damaging to ecosystems and infrastructure. Such changes are liable to reduce food availability and lead to a decrease in productivity where workers can achieve less.
The future is not completely bleak as we still have time to turn around some of these most evident of issues. Reducing emissions from the burning of fossil fuels is seen as vitally important. Maritime careers will alter as new technologies will spur us on to take up the challenge to meet net zero targets, particularly in the transport sector where new skills will be essential. Fulfilling these objectives will pay us back, with sustainability and the use of renewable resources, rewarding us with better health and reduced costs from looking after an ailing population.
When looked at closely, we can see that two basic needs, fresh water and an available source of nutrition are going to be adversely affected by the changing nature of where precipitation falls. Some are experiencing droughts while conversely flooding is prevalent elsewhere.
Hot weather is increasing the amount of water needed to grow crops, as plants transpire upon increases in temperatures. Snowpack is a reliable source of fresh water, but this is melting earlier, as temperatures rise, changing the patterns that agriculture was used to, forcing us to adapt our methods.
Crops may prove to be more resistant in a changing environment, but letting our guard down would be perilous. Weather extremes are causing losses and damage through reduced photosynthesis and desiccated topsoil, while flooding can completely devastate some harvests.
The human costs should not be ignored as hot weather can cause heatstroke in the fields, while extreme conditions such as hurricanes have their own agenda, getting stronger and wetter, creating particular hazards for those involved in the growing and transportation of food crops. Flooding can cause water-borne diseases to spread, while pests can carry those diseases to previously unaffected areas.
Infrastructure such as roads, bridges, tunnels, ports and the broadband internet will not go unaffected. Most of these projects will not have been designed and built with climate change in mind. Electrical grids will be put under more pressure if the demand for indoor cooling increases due to the rise in air temperatures, while heavy rains, snowfall or extreme winds all have their own potentially catastrophic consequences. The shutting down of roads, highways and businesses due to overloading of storm drains is another outcome not to be disregarded.
The education of a generation which will have to regard the above consequences is essential and will be daunting as the changes will become apparent in different degrees in different areas, but letting our guard down now will present more difficulties when confronting these issues in the future.
