As we approach Earth’s Day on Tuesday, it is tempting to believe that the world is on the verge of environmental collapse. We are constantly flooded by terrible predictions of climate catastrophe and warnings about the imminent destruction of the planet.
But this is misleading. Instead of a spiral in panic, we must take a time to appreciate the remarkable progress we have achieved to improve the environment and recognize that a key factor is prosperity.
When Earth Day was first marked 55 years ago, the world faced some gloomy environmental challenges.
The rivers were burning and the cities were drowned from Smog. Air and water pollution was rampant, especially in the industrialized west. Today, outdoor air pollution has decreased dramatically in rich countries. In the last three decades, the risk of death due to air pollution has decreased spectacularly by more than 70%, while river roads have been cleaned and reforesting nations.
Chinese example
However, in the poorest countries, the image is more complicated. That is worse as nations leave poverty, industrialization at the beginning increases pollution, before nations become rich enough to address it. But only in the developing world, progress are being made. Look at China: once notorious for his Severe pollutionIt is now Acty cleaning its air and water.
For the 7 billion people who do not live in the rich world, outdoor air pollution worsened between 1990 and around 2015. But as sulfur emissions have reached their maximum point and have begun to decrease, deaths from outdoor air pollution decreed.
More, when focusing on images of Smoggy Asian megacities, we miss the much mortal air pollution that takes place indoors for the poorest people in the world. This problem ignored the voice of energy poverty, where people are forced to trust traditional biomass (wood, cardboard and manure) for cooking and staying hot. The World Health Organization estimates that 2.1 billion people live in homes that are often more contaminated that even the sausage outside the days in Delhi or Beijing, equivalent to each person smoking two cigarette packages daily. Even today, inner air pollution Kill more than 3 million people Every year.
Look inside
However, a spectacular fact of Earth Day that almost nobody celebrates is that contamination of the inner air for the non -rich world has been reduced more than half since 1990. That means that more than 4 million lives are saved each year.
How did this progress happen? Through prosperity, which means that Fower’s poor people depend on manure and cardboard to cook and keep heat; Instead, they use much cleaner and better energy sources such as natural gas and electricity.
In fact, in many ways, the greatest pollution is poverty. When people fight to survive, environmental conerns are in the background. But as countries enriched, they can invest in cleaner technologies, regulate industries and focus on improving public health. Prosperity not only leads to better levels of living and nutrition and people become more resistant to environmental challenges, but also causes societies to improve their environment.
There is a clear connection between the income of a nation and its environmental performance. The richer a country, the better it manages its environment, as shown in Environmental Performance Index at Yale University. A society focused on economic development can not only get people out of poverty, but will also address pollution and invest in sustainable practices.
Unfortunately, Earth Day and its broader environmental movement often ignore practical solutions, instead of favoring sensation. Many of the environmental predictions that won generalized attention in the 1970s turned out to be alarmist and incorrect. They told us that we would run out of the resources, that overpopulation would lead to a global catastrophe, and that we would have to wear gas masks outside for the year 1985. None of these predictions materialized, but they or the placement setback.
Climatic deaths
We are seeing that this pattern is repeated today, partly when it comes to climate change. Yes, climate change is a real challenge, but we must keep it in perspective. It is not the existential threat that some would make us believe. In fact, during the last century, climate -related disasters deaths, such as storms, floods, droughts and forest fires rejected by a notable 98%. This is not because the environment has remained static, but because innovation and human adaptation have made us more resistant.
The reality is that we are not in the precipice of fatality. Instead of being afraid of sensationalist rhetoric to spend billions of dollars on poor weather policies, we must focus on practical and intelligent solutions that can make a real difference. In the case of climate change, this means investing in green energy innovation. When it comes to one of the world’s greatest environmental challenges, we must finish contamination of the inner air and save 3 million lives every year, mainly through preperity and access to clean, cheap and reliable energy.
While we mark Earth DayWe should go to panic, but inactivity celebrates the immense environmental progress that we have achieved and we will, as long as prosperity continues.
Bjorn Lomborg is president of Copenhagen’s consensus, visiting member of the Hoover institution of Stanford University and author of “False Alarm” and “Best Things First”.
