Photo by Chokniti Khongchum: https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-holding-green-leafed-plant-2280551/
If pollution, world hunger, extreme climate change, and global warming aren’t enough to grab your attention and make you advocate passionately for the Earth, nothing will.
Why is environmental protection important? Why do people give time and attention to learning how to preserve and conserve this place they call Earth and the only place they call home? How urgent is the call to love and protect the environment?
These are the questions that people need to ask, and adults must instill them in children’s minds. The love and the passion for conserving, preserving, and protecting the only environment where people live and breathe should be taught and practiced at the earliest stage of an individual’s life.
Walter Hoge’s book Easter: McEaster Valley shares the beauty and wonder that would come off from taking care of nature and the planet. If people practice these values, not only do people get to share in nature’s natural beauty, but they would also benefit by living healthier and happier lives.
The Urgency of Environmental Care
The sudden shift in climate and weather, the extreme heat, cold, and other weather disturbances all pushed the urgent call for the need to look after nature and the environment. The frequent floods, typhoons, severe snowstorms, and heat waves are hard to ignore. Environmental advocates have been flooding the news and social media outlets with the environment’s critical status caused by global warming and climate change.
Are these two, global warming and climate change, the same?
Global Warming
Who is not feeling the impact of the weather’s extreme heat on this Earth? Across the planet, people are beginning to notice the frequency of the rising hot weather temperature. At the same, cold weather is becoming lesser in frequency and duration.
Global warming is the long-term heating of the Earth’s temperature primarily caused by human activities or fossil fuel burning. The burning of fossil fuels is linked with the growth of the human population; as the population increases, so does the need and usage of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are the coals, oils, natural gases, etc., that all contribute to and comprise what is known as the “greenhouse effect.”
The greenhouse effect is when the heat gets trapped on the Earth’s surface. This heat-trapping effect is responsible for the blanket and wave of warmth reverberating throughout the Earth’s corner. Simply put, each time carbon dioxide is emitted from engine combustion, these carbon dioxide gases blanket the Earth’s atmosphere, preventing heat from flowing naturally. So the more these gases are produced, the more the atmosphere is covered. Hence, the reason behind the extreme heat weather.
Climate Change
Climate change and global warming should not be confused because both are different. Global warming talks about the causes of environmental distress, while climate change is associated with the unusual “change” in the weather system.
Although the Earth’s climate has constantly been changing, only in the last and current decade and century has the term climate change been used persistently to reflect the gravity of Earth’s present situation. Global warming highly contributes to climate change. The heat-trapping greenhouse effect produced abnormal climate changes. Trapped heat causes land and sea temperature, increases sea levels, melting Earth’s poles and glaciers, wildfires, droughts, etc.
Time to Stand Up
Unfortunately, not many people have taken up the mantle of becoming guardians and heroes for nature and the environment. It’s all about fully maximizing the use of natural resources without talking about how to grow, maintain, or even protect them. These passive attitudes led to unprecedented pollution, leading to an environmental crisis in which people could no longer turn a blind eye.
So, why should people stand up for environmental protection?
The top reason is a domino upshot from caring for the environment: saving lives. If people pay more attention to how to preserve and care for the planet, there is a greater chance of stemming global warming’s tide of impact. There will still be climate change and global warming, but the effects will be less felt. Water and food provisions will flourish when a flood is prevented, and drought is contained. There will be fewer to no deaths from dehydration and starvation. People will be saved from the vicious impact of destructive weather disturbances such as typhoons and hurricanes. Species extinction will be prevented.
Environmental protection also instills a positive change in the people who advocates for it. The advocacy itself creates awareness and interest. It also develops an empathetic attitude in people to care for the well-being of those significantly impacted by global warming. By paying attention, learning, and discussing ways and means to help protect the Earth, peoples’ lives could improve a little more every day. And that is the reason why it is essential to teach the love for the environment.
Wandering Will 