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Google is marking Earth Day with time-lapse satellite images showing melting glaciers, retreating snow cover, deforestation and coral bleaching to remind its users about humanity’s impact on the climate and environment.
The 2022 Earth Day Google Dot includes four GIFs that were created using satellite imagery and photographs The Ocean AgencyThat will rotate throughout the day.
They show glacial retreat at Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, between 2012 and 2020, and glacial melting in Sermersooq Greenland between 2000 and 2020.
Other images show the effects of coral bleaching on the Great Barrier ReefBetween March 2016 and Oct 2017, near Lizard Island in Australia; and between December 1995 and 2020, deforestation of Elend’s Harz forests in Germany.
Climate counsellor Lesley Hughes, a professor of biology at Macquarie University in Sydney, said the images of coral bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef are “a very high-impact visual image” that would resonate.
“Our major natural icon, that we are stewards of, is a symbol of the impact of climate change on an extraordinarily diverse ecosystem,” Hughes said.
“Our physical and biological world is transforming before our eyes and that’s what these images are emphasising and so there’s absolutely no time to waste.”
The Great Barrier Reef was through its Sixth mass bleaching event in march with aerial surveys showing almost no reefs across a 1,200km stretch escaping the heat – the first known to have occurred during a La Niña year.
Hughes stated that the images of glacial melting would be similar to Hughes’s for others.
The vast and ancient glaciers of New Zealand are a highlight Thinning is alarming.
The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research – Niwa This is what we found between 1977 to 2014, a third of the permanent snow and ice was lost from the Southern Alps – a dramatic decline that began accelerating rapidly in the last 15 years.
Recent summers of 2017-2018 saw temperatures rise by 3C over the average in New Zealand. Some glaciers were even shrinking, and they almost disappeared.
Other Artifacts that were long hidden in the Italian Alps are now being made public as the ice melts, leading to the discovery of equipment left behind by soldiers camped out on the peaks during the first world war and a 5,300-year-old crime scene when the mummified body of Ötzi was found by hikers.
The catastrophic climate change threat is also a sign of what has been a boon to archaeologists. Forni, one of Italy’s largest valley glaciers, has retreated 800 metres within the past 30 years and 1.2 miles (2km) over the past century.
The images contrast with animations published for a positive note. Earth Day 2021, which the company said was designed to “encourage everyone to find one small act they can do to restore our Earth”.
Hughes suggested that the 2022 publication of confronting images may be an indication of a new trend. Response to the IPCC26 Report They were crucial in raising awareness.
“I think when you’re sitting in a middle-class environment and it’s a nice day and the sun’s come up or has gone down, it’s easy to become complacent about the larger forces at work in our climate system and the impacts those forces have,” Hughes said.
“So reminding people that just because it’s a nice day, climate change hasn’t gone away is really important.”
Alphabet, which runs the Google search engine claims to be carbon neutral since 2007, and plans to continue to do so. All data centres will be powered entirely by renewable energy by 2030.
The company In 2020, 15.5 terawatts of electricity was consumedIt was used to power its data centres. It also decreased its waste production by 40% to 28864 tonnes, but increased its water use.
The company has not released its 2021 numbers yet, but it claims that it has compensated its emissions by purchasing enough renewable electricity and offsets to cover its current consumption.
