Citizens Who Care

By: Samuel Desai Today, the first day of a world changing 12-day event happened. The COP 21 is an event hosted by the ICUN in Paris. At the event, 195 countries are attending, with 40,000 delegates altogether. These countries are trying to make an agreement for a world changing agreement. They hope that the agreement will help stop Climate Change.  One of the biggest things about this is China and the US negotiating too! You see, they are the biggest producers of greenhouse gasses.  Here are some of the things people have said so far: "Countries should be allowed to seek their own solutions, according to their national interest"- Xi Jinping- China  "One of the greatest threats humanity is facing"- Vladimir Putin- Russia  "Billions of people pinning their hopes on what we do in Paris"- Angela Merkel- Germany SOURCES:  http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/30/europe/france-paris-cop21-climate-change-conference/ http://www.cop21paris.org

Hawksbill Sea Turtles By Matthew Gu The hawksbill sea turtle, or eretmochelys imbricata, is a critically endangered species found in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans. Commonly used for both religious and decorative purposes, their brown-and-yellow shells are sought out by countless illegal hunters. The thing is, they prefer higher waters, leaving them easily exposed to things like pollution, coastal development, and of course the loss of feeding and nesting habitats. Along with this, their eggs are still a common food around the world, disabling their ability to reproduce more. Hawksbill sea turtles usually feed on sponges, which is part of the reason they're close to the surface. Their head ends in a sharp point. They're also omnivorous like humans, eating crustaceans, jellyfish, fish, sea urchins, and marine algae. Compared to other turtles, they're quite small-they only grow up to about 45 inches in shell length and 150 pounds. Because of their eating h

Use Clean Energy to Help the Environment   In the U.S. we use a lot of energy.  But where does it come from?  Most of our energy comes from Petroleum, Natural Gas, Coal, or Nuclear Energy  These sources are bad for the environment and release carbon into the atmosphere.  Do we want to harm our environment?  Other options like Hydroelectricity, Solar, and Wind power don't release pollution into the air.  Don't buy dirty energy!  Use clean energy instead !

Nuclear Energy Note: rated by the Samuel Energy Index. By Nathan Shan INTRODUCTION Nuclear energy is very efficient and uses fission to make electricity. It accounts for about 19.5 percent of the U.S.'s energy generation.   I think that nuclear energy could do better, because of some progress in fusion . Click the links to learn what fission and fusion are. PROS Nuclear energy is very efficient - exactly 10 times more effective than coal.  SEI 2                                                    Does not pollute the air - nuclear energy releases only water vapor, which does not contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and is harmless to humans and animals. SEI 2                                    Relatively low operating costs - nuclear plant workers don't have to do as much as coal plant workers, so it costs less. SEI 1 CONS Nuclear energy is non-renewable - uranium, its fuel, will run out some day. SEI -2                                  

A study by Yale University had determined that there are 3 trillion trees on this earth For every 5B trees planted each year 15B are cut down This makes a 10B net tree loss  each year I found an animated map by business insider This is where I found this animated map on climate change CHECK OUT THIS NEW ANIMATED MAP

Fossil Fuels (Note SEI stands for Samuel Energy Index. The higher the number, the better) By Samuel Desai INTRODUCTION Fossil Fuels account for more than half of the US energy grid. (According to the EIA in 2013, 87%, to be exact)I think this is a bad thing. As you will see fossil fuels have many downsides. Just a week ago, Obama rejected the Keystone XL pipeline. I did a post on this last week! PROS Cheap- Fossil fuels are the cheapest energy source- SEI 2 CONS POLLUTES THE AIR When fossil fuels are used as a source of energy, it releases carbon dioxide contributing to Climate Change. A while ago, Freddy made a Youtube video on Climate Change . I also did a post on Climate Change It described  what Earth would look like if ALL the ice caps melted- SEI -2 Non-renewable Fossil Fuels will run out some day- SEI-1 Want to know how many days until fossil fuels run out?  (Please note, you must scroll down to almost the bottom to view the energy  facts. CONCLUS

BONOBOS Bonobos are a species of monkey that are related to chimpanzees.they both share about 89% of their DNA with humans. They are being killed off by poaching and deforestation. Their population has been declining for 30 years. Scientists think that this will keep happening for the next 45 to 50 years. Luckily, this species is not critically endangered, but only endangered.Humans only hunt Bonobos for the meat, to trade them as bush meat, and for use in traditional medicine. This is a picture of a Bonobos:

Earlier this week, Obama announced something! He told the public that they Keystone XL pipeline will not be built. Being an environmental blog, we are all for Obama's decision. This decision comes at the time of our Energy Sources series, so we can cover more about this in our first Energy Sources post, fossil fuels. Why is this type of oil collecting worse than others? You have to clear land, and extracting the oil from the Canadian Tar Sands pollutes more than any other type of oil extraction. Environmentalists are really happy with Obama's decision! Please leave a comment!!! The other day, I met with Nathan (the owner of this blog) and Tej (the second person to blog on this blog) about the future of our blog. We have decided that each of us will do two posts for the series. The last one coming out on December 19! Then we will have a poll run from that date till January 6, my birthday. We are recruiting a tech support person, Alan Whitman, to HTML code our

Now announcing... There will be a new environment series on our blog. Starting next week I will blog about an energy source. After all the sources, I will make a poll on them!!! Thanks, greenupdates