Members & Roles:

1) Amurao, Arcelli Sheryne Rose Y.  

Radio Broadcasting, 
Article Writing, 
Audio Editing 

2) Gonzales, Chiana Peaches Nicola A.  

Radio Broadcasting, 
Article Writing

3) Albano, Jian Carlo D.   

Radio Broadcasting, 
Article Writing

4) Marquez, John Rei M.  

Radio Broadcasting, 
Article Writing, 
Scriptwriting

The Planet's Descent to Inferno

Amidst the prickly heat of a Swedish afternoon, an 8th grader sat in front of the Swedish
Parliament. Barely 4’11’’ in height and only 16 years old, she clenched to a picket sign that says,
“School Strike for Climate Change.” Her name was Greta Thunberg. She was short in stature, a
mere ant compared to the elephant that is the government building behind her. And yet, with
eyes unfazed and a vision firmly locked, her presence seemed to tower over the building. For
hours on end, she stayed and stood her ground. There she was, sitting in utter silence, bearing a
deafeningly loud statement: We must solve the climate change crisis.

What Greta had in mind was climate change, one of the most alarming issues that plague
modern times. For the past decades, centuries even, we humans have witnessed multiple early
signs. As Greta puts it, “Our house is on fire.” Yet, none of these signs ever seemed enough to
wake people up. We may be the last ones with the power to make a change and minimize the
damages, yet ignorance and willful indifference remain rampant. We have caused great damage
to our environment already. However, this cruel destruction has never been given the attention it
truly deserves. Many people sought ways for the situation to improve, and while their efforts are
commendable, their attempts remained in vain. This large group of people with hopeful
aspirations were held back by an even larger group of people who were either stuck in denial or
too bothered to even care. But where does the problem lie here? Perhaps, it’s in the people who
know nothing. But even more likely, it’s in the people who know something, yet actively choose
to do nothing.

But enough of this game of pointing fingers and dwelling in the past. Our response
should be proactive, looking forward instead of behind. Our focus now should be on informing
people about how our actions have, and continue to, shape the course of our planet. Specifically,
by burning fossil fuels for energy consumption, cutting down the rainforest for agriculture, and
farming livestock to meet the excessive demand for meat, we add a huge amount of greenhouse
gases to the atmosphere. This, in effect, accelerates the greenhouse effect and global warming. 

However, disseminating eye-opening information like this is hindered by climate change

deniers. Some of these naysayers, to the likes of the former U.S. President Donald J. Trump,
even assert outrageous claims like “The concept of global warming was created by and for the
Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” At first glance, these claims
may appear completely random. But upon closer look, one can detect a political slant to it.  As a
politician known for constantly pursuing economic growth even at the risk of environmental
collapse, Trump has every bit to gain by spreading disinformation. Worse, although he no longer
holds the presidency, the hive mind of people who share the same beliefs still linger. They are
composed of people who refuse to acknowledge climate change either because they selfishly
benefit from their ignorance, or because they are politically motivated to do so. But regardless if
they believe that it’s real or not, the negative impacts carry on.

An effective countermeasure for this anti-intellectual mentality is to educate the public.

While being informed does not necessarily mean being motivated to act, it is at least a step in the
right direction. This information then carries more persuasive ability if it underscores the grave,
irreversible effects of climate change. Among these drastic effects, a good starting point is the
immense acid concentration in the environment. After all, the word “acid” implies a connotation
of hazard, which can evoke the sense of urgency needed in establishing the severity of the issue. 

By definition, acid concentration or acid rain includes any acid-containing substance that
falls to the ground. These acidic components are often composed of sulfuric or nitric acids that
manifest as rain, fog, snow, or acidic dust. To get to the bottom of this phenomenon, one must
look for its underlying causes. In this case, the causes of acid rain are greenhouse-emitting
sources such as vehicles, oil refineries, and electric power generators. These sources emit gases
like sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide, which would then be transported to other places by the
wind. Then, upon exposure to water, oxygen, and other chemicals, these gases turn into sulfuric
and nitric oxides, the primary components of acid rain.

Similarly, acid rain and climate change are deeply interwoven. The more one happens,
the more likely it is for the other to get worse. On top of that, these two are also connected by
their common causes: emissions and human-related activities. Considering the enormous amount
of gases released by acid rain sources such as vehicles and power plants, one could easily form a
correlation among these two. 

This correlation is supported by several real-life examples that show how acid rain, as a
major driver of pollution, can result in climate change. The first example revolves around the
excessive carbon dioxide left by coal power plants as a byproduct of acid rain. As a greenhouse
gas, carbon dioxide absorbs and radiates heat. In moderate amounts, carbon dioxide is beneficial
to the environment and is even vital for continuing life-giving processes like the carbon cycle.
But in excess amounts, it traps so much heat that the Earth’s average temperature rises at an
explosive rate, far beyond the planet’s capacity to naturally cool down. 

Second, acid rain makes bodies of water more susceptible to climate impacts. A report
published by the aquatic biologist Dana Warren and her co-authors accurately captures this point.
“Clear lakes lack healthy amounts of plankton and dissolved organic matter into the water due to
the impact of acid rain. This makes conditions more harmful for trout populations.” While their
study focused more on the fish species of trout living in lakes, similar detrimental effects have
been observed across different marine species at different bodies of water. Some studies, like the
recent research published in 2020 by Debnath and Ahammed, even suggest that the harmful
impacts of acid rain are not limited to aquatic life and could instead be extended to plant species.
They propose that acid rain negatively affects the growth, photosynthesis efficiency, and
metabolic changes of plants to a certain extent. 

Solving these issues is a herculean task that may last generations on end. But the
difficulty shouldn’t be taken as a sign to stop the efforts. On the contrary, it should be viewed as
a motivator for people to do more, not less. With each problem comes a corresponding solution,
and these solutions appear in the form of different approaches to mitigating climate change.
These approaches are what environmentalists like Justin Adams call as “natural climate
solutions” (NCS), defined as the “acts of conservation, restoration, and enhanced ways of land
management”. In one of his articles, Adams outlined different ways to minimize or avoid
greenhouse gas emissions across global agricultural lands, wetlands, grasslands, and forests. His
proposed solutions can be divided into two categories: responsive and preventative.

The responsive type of solution serves as a remedy to a pre-existing problem. It is

retroactive, which means that it is a reaction to an issue in the past. A perfect example of this is
reforestation, a process where trees are planted at places that are ecologically sustainable in order
to “reverse” the damage that forest degradation (cutting down or burning of trees) has caused. A
considerable part of this damage comes from the trapped carbon dioxide released by trees when
they are chopped or set on fire. But by widespread replanting, this carbon dioxide can be
efficiently reabsorbed by the trees, thus offsetting the excess carbon in the atmosphere. Adams
and his team argue that as much as two billion hectares of land are degraded globally. They also
estimate that the reforestation of these land areas, if executed properly, can “capture three
gigatons of carbon dioxide annually”. To put this number into perspective, that colossal amount
of carbon dioxide is the equivalent of “taking about 600 million cars off the road”.

On the other hand, the preventative kind of solution serves as a stop sign for a potential
problem. Unlike the responsive type of solution, the preventative type is proactive, focusing on a
possible issue in the future rather than on an existing issue from the past. This is exemplified by
the calls for the agricultural reform of the food sector. These calls aim to stop this sector before it
even starts to release its emissions. The reason is that the food sector, through practices that bring
about direct and indirect emissions of greenhouse gases, share an astronomical contribution in
climate change. The direct emissions come from the methane and nitrous oxide released from the
manure of animals like cows. Meanwhile, the indirect emissions come from the patches of land
converted into pastures for raising and feeding the animals we eat as meat. Fortunately, Adam
and his colleagues report an optimistic path ahead. “Twenty-three companies around the globe,
including Nestlé, McDonald’s, Tesco, and Unilever, have recently signed a commitment that
requires them to halt deforestation in Brazil’s Cerrado savanna.” They add that this decision was
influenced by “...the growing pressure...” to minimize the “...production of beef, soy, and other
materials” that play a significant role in shaping the climate.

Taking everything into account, we must firmly believe that climate change is far from
being a hoax. But simply knowing this is not enough. We must act. We must move. We must go
beyond the text written in the pages of this article. Let the thoughts from the screen bleed into the
real world! Because while nature is capable of healing itself, this healing won’t begin unless we
pave the road for it to happen. We have a moral duty to preserve the world not just for us, but for
the future generations. To save this planet from its descent to inferno, we must awaken the inner
Greta in all of us. And this all starts with you.
Bibliography:

Adams, J. (2017, November 22). Natural solutions to climate change. Retrieved February 11,
2021, from https://www.nature.org/en-us/what-we-do/our-insights/perspectives/
natural-solutions-to-climate-change/#:~:text=Some%20of%20the%20most
%20promising,gas%20emissions%20in%20landscapes%20worldwide.

Bronson W. Griscom, Justin Adams, Peter W. Ellis, Richard A. Houghton, Guy Lomax, 
 Daniela A. Miteva, William H. Schlesinger, David Shoch, Juha V. Siikamäki, Pete Smith,
Peter Woodbury, Chris Zganjar, Allen Blackman, João Campari, Richard T. Conant,
Christopher Delgado, Patricia Elias, Trisha Gopalakrishna, Marisa R. Hamsik, Mario
Herrero, Joseph Kiesecker, Emily Landis, Lars Laestadius, Sara M. Leavitt, Susan
Minnemeyer, Stephen Polasky, Peter Potapov, Francis E. Putz, Jonathan Sanderman,
Marcel Silvius, Eva Wollenberg, Joseph Fargione
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Oct 2017, 114 (44) 11645-11650;
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1710465114

Debnath B., Ahammed G.J. (2020) Effect of Acid Rain on Plant Growth and Development:
Physiological and Molecular Interventions. In: Naeem M., Ansari A., Gill S. (eds)
Contaminants in Agriculture. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-41552-
5_5

Greta Thunberg: Who is she and What does she want? (2020, February 28).
Retrieved                                      

            February 16, 2021, from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49918719

Sawtell, R. W., Sayers, M. J., Shuchman, R. A., Leshkevich, G., Brooks, C. N., & Hatt, C.
(2015). Water quality observations in the Great Lakes using an optimized satellite bio-
optical algorithm. IAGLR 58th AnnualConference on Great Lakes Research. Retrieved
from: https://digitalcommons.mtu.edu/mtri_p/103

Warren, D. (2017, October 05). Northeast lakes recovering from acid rain may give trout 

refuge from climate change. Retrieved February 11, 2021, from

https://today.oregonstate.edu/archives/2016/dec/northeast-lakes-recovering-acid-rain-
may-give-trout-refuge-climate-change