MELHAM CONSTRUCTION

CORPORATION

 MECHATRONICS ENGINEERING

ALCANTARA, JOHN LAURENCE G.

PROJECT-MECHA-1

Task #3. Cite an article about the contribution of Industrial Robots in our world and give
your insights on how it negatively contributes to the greenhouse gas emissions.

The Warming Effects of the Industrial Revolution

“Until recently, humans did not significantly affect the much larger
forces of climate and atmosphere. Many scientists believe, however,
that with the dawn of the industrial age—and the burning of fossil
fuels such as coal, natural gas, and oil—humans began to
significantly add to the amounts of carbon dioxide and other
greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, enhancing the planet's natural
greenhouse effect and causing higher temperatures.”

https://www.climate-policy-watcher.org/global-temperatures/the-warming-effects-
of-the-industrial-revolution.html

Advances in robotics technology also allow us to take robots from the factory floor
and make them mobile and autonomous for brand new applications, such as in retail.
Autonomous robots have taken grocery stores by storm in 2019, with Ahold Delhaize's
introduction of Badger Technologies' robot, which is designed to improve store
operations. Equipped with numerous sensors, navigation systems and cameras, the
robot navigates store aisles alongside employees and customers to scan floors for
hazardous conditions like spills. Concurrently, the robot keeps stock on missing,
mispriced or misplaced inventory. But in the future, autonomous robots will work in all
aspects of retail, from the warehouse to delivery.

In other industries, such as agriculture, robotic drones can examine a field to find
deficiencies in crops. They can analyze the water and dryness levels while determining
the ripeness of the goods. Mobile robots and drones monitor oil and gas pipelines and
electric transmission systems performing regular inspection and looking for signs of
maintenance needs, to efficiently dispatch maintenance teams.

As the agriculture has become more industrial, it has become increasingly

dependent on fossil energy and other finite natural resources. In the United States, the
total food system currently claims about twenty-percent of all fossil energy used with
farming accounting for about one-third of the total percentage. In fact, our industrial food
system requires about ten calories of fossil energy for every calorie of food energy
produced. Supplies of fossil energy are finite, and there is a growing consensus that
fossil energy in the future will be far less plentiful and more costly.

Pollution represents negative energy, in that it destroys the usefulness of other

energy resources or requires energy to mitigate its negative impacts. Industrial
agriculture pollutes the air, water, and soil with toxic agrochemicals and livestock
manure. It is a major source of pollution, accounting for more than twenty-percent of
total greenhouse gas emissions even more than transportation. In fact, agriculture has
become the number one nonpoint source of pollution in the U.S., creating huge dead
zones. In other words, it is safe to presume now that an industrial agriculture is not
ecologically sustainable.

Furthermore, due to industrialization, humans have expelled copious amounts of

carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. This has triggered an unnatural warming that has
seen the Earth’s temperature rise dramatically over a short period of time. The average
global temperature was 12˚C during the Last Glacial Maximum. During the following
Interglacial period, the average global temperature slowly rose to 13.8˚C. Since 1880, it
has increased another 0.6˚ degrees to 14.4˚C (as of 2015). This rate of warming is ~50
times faster than the rate of warming during the previous 21,000 years.

In general, we all are the ultimate recipient of the adverse effects of climate
change, hence we are the ones who need to initiate necessary adjustment measures.
Cutting down on emission of greenhouse gases is a necessary but inadequate measure
for climate change mitigation because some of the spin off effects of climate change
cannot be ameliorated by emission reduction. The digital revolution will not immediately
lead to a more environmentally friendly and fair future. Even though its speed takes our
breath away, it is our job to shape its evolution in such a way that its consequences do
not endanger people or the ecosystem in which it belongs.

In a positive note, as future engineers, we can do something to help fight climate

change. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions can be facilitated by robotic assistance in
renewable energy generation. This includes construction and maintenance of solar
power systems, wind towers, and hydroelectric generating stations. In addition, robots
can monitor industrial sites for emissions of greenhouse gasses. Switching to
responsible robotic machinery can reduce the level of harmful emissions produced.
Moving away from “traditional” fossil-fuelled machinery to using robots charged from
renewable energy sources, such as wind and light, will help reduce these harmful
emissions.