(87) The Carbon Cost of Your Cocaine
Whether they smoked a joint on the couch or snorted a line in a club, some 379 million people around the world took drugs in 2020, according to the United Nations. Cocaine production is at record levels, opium has been on an upward trend for the past decade, the market for synthetic drugs is growing […]
(86) Bitcoin Mining Consumes ‘More Electricity Than Argentina’
It’s not just the value of bitcoin that has soared in the last year – so has the huge amount of energy it consumes. The cryptocurrency’s value has dipped recently after passing a high of $50,000 but the energy used to create it has continued to soar during its epic rise, climbing to the equivalent […]
(85) Heat-Reflecting Paint Keeps Things COOL Without Air Conditioners
The paint would absorb nearly no solar energy and send heat away from the building, replacing the need for air conditioning, according to the researchers. Without the building heating up, air conditioning wouldn’t have to kick on. The paint would not only send heat away from a surface, but also away from Earth into deep […]
(84) Solar Panel Waste: The Dark Side of Clean Energy
Tons of solar panels installed in the early 2000s are reaching the end of their lifecycles, posing a serious problem for the industry to contend with. Current solar panel disposal practices are far from being environmentally friendly. Solar panels have an operating lifespan of around 20 to 30 years. As society continues to adopt solar […]
(83) More Garbage Than Water Threaten Dam in Balkans
Huge islands of garbage floating on some rivers in the Balkans are causing an environmental emergency and threatening a regional hydropower plant. Plastic bottles, rusty barrels and other waste could be seen clogging the Drina River near the eastern Bosnian town of Visegrad on Tuesday. Upstream, the Drina’s tributaries in Montenegro, Serbia and Bosnia carried […]
(82) This Man Is Installing 100 Trash Barriers In Bali’s Rivers To Stop Plastic Pollution
Called Sungai Watch – from the Indonesian for river – it’s an online platform that uses GIS (Geographic Information System) mapping and artificial intelligence (AI) to see details in rivers of up to 10 centimeters. Around 90% of the marine plastic transported by rivers to the ocean originates from just 10 waterways. Indonesia is second […]
(81) Millions of ‘Old and Unsafe’ Cars Sent to Developing World Fuelling Air Pollution
Millions of used motor vehicles exported from the US, Europe and Japan to developing countries are of poor quality and are contributing significantly to air pollution, according a new UN report. About 80% of the 14m used light-duty vehicles – saloon cars, SUVs and minibuses – exported between 2015 and 2018 went to low and […]
(80) Enzyme “Cocktail” Breaks Down Plastics Six Times Faster
The scientists who re-engineered the plastic-eating enzyme PETase have now created an enzyme ‘cocktail’ which can digest plastic up to six times faster. A second enzyme, found in the same rubbish dwelling bacterium that lives on a diet of plastic bottles, has been combined with PETase to speed up the breakdown of plastic. PETase breaks […]
(79) 1 Million Plastic Bottles Bought Every Minute, That’s Nearly 20,000 Every Second
Citing figures from consumer market research company Euromonitor International, The Guardian reported that 1 million plastic bottles are bought every minute—or about 20,000 per second—around the globe. About 540 billion plastic bottles were purchased globally in 2019 but less than half gets recycled, meaning most of this waste ends up in our oceans and landfills. […]
(78) Cigarette Smoke Produces 2 Times More Air Pollution Than Diesel Car Exhaust
Environmental tobacco smoke produces fine particulate matter, which is the most dangerous element of air pollution for health. Environmental tobacco smoke is a contributor of air pollution particles. These fine particles are a risk factor for chronic lung disease which can be debilitating and sometimes fatal. They can lead to conditions such as asthma, bronchitis, […]