Earth Wise

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a family of human-made chemicals that have been manufactured and used in a variety of industries around the globe.  PFOA and PFOS have been the most extensively produced and the most extensively studied of these chemicals.  Exposure to PFAS has been linked to a host of adverse health effects, […]

Mangrove trees are small trees that grow in coastal saline or brackish water at tropical and subtropical latitudes.  Many mangrove trees can be identified by their dense tangle of prop roots.  These roots make the trees appear as if they are standing on stilts above the water.  The tangle of roots allows mangrove trees to […]

The Gulf of Mexico has an area of low to no oxygen in the water that can kill fish and other marine life.  It is an annual event that is primarily caused by excess nutrient pollution from human activities in urban and agricultural areas throughout the Mississippi River watershed.   When these excess nutrients reach the […]

In 2019, energy consumption in the U.S. from renewable sources exceeded consumption from coal for the first time since before 1885.  This has come about from a combination of the continued decline in the amount of coal used for electricity generation as well as the continued growth in renewable energy, mostly from wind and solar. […]

Forest loss is a major contributor to climate change, and it is continuing at a rapid pace.  The tropics lost about 30 million acres of tree cover in 2019, a third of which was within humid tropical primary forests, which are especially important for biodiversity and carbon storage.  To put that loss in a human-scale […]

California has suffered from numerous large wildfires in recent years.  The two largest in the past century took place in 2017 and 2018, and just these two alone burned nearly 750,000 acres, destroyed over 1,200 structures, and killed 24 people. Apart from the fires, drought, the warming climate, and bark-beetle infestations have killed 147 million […]

Single-use plastic soda and water bottles are a real problem.  Every year, billions of them are produced – comprising nearly 300 million tons of plastic that mostly ends up in landfills or in the ocean.   This discarded plastic ends up on remote islands, in the snow atop mountains, and in trenches in the deepest parts […]

Amazon.com is a multinational conglomerate company that sells nearly $300 billion dollars a year worth of products, employs over 800,000 people, and by any measure, consumes a tremendous amount of resources.  In terms of its environmental impact, Amazon is estimated to be responsible for the emission of 50 million tons of CO2 annually, which is […]

In recent years, millions of tons of brown Sargassum seaweed have formed gigantic blooms stretching all the way across the Atlantic Ocean from West Africa to the Gulf of Mexico.  The seaweed has become a problem for shorelines in the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the east coast of Florida.  The massive increase in […]

While the COVID-19 pandemic and its shutdown of so many human activities has reduced many kinds of pollution, it has also managed to create a new source of pollution:  face masks and sanitary gloves. Divers from a French non-profit organization called Operation Clean Sea are already finding gloves, masks, and hand sanitizer bottles beneath the […]