After watching the video (Humans - Destroyers of the earth) I have some insights that we had to do for our homework. I wanted to add the category "energy carriers" too but it doesn't exist yet.
Corruption
Climate change, which is caused by humans, is arguably the biggest challenge we have ever faced. Huge expense is needed to prevent and respond to it. This means tempting opportunities for corruption. Corruption is defined as “the abuse of entrusted power for private gain”. Corruption and climate change share a characteristic: both are most devastating for the poor and vulnerable people as they have less access and control of resources.
Especially vulnerable to corruption are developing countries because they depend economically and culturally on natural resources which are vulnerable to climate related storms, droughts, flood and other extreme weather.
Industrial agriculture
The majority of American farmland is dominated by industrial agriculture. This is a system of chemically intensive food production, which was developed after the World War II. It includes enormous single-crop farms and animal production facilities. Industrial agriculture is an unstainable way to grow our food over the long term because of the impacts on the environment and the public health. At the core of industrial food production is monoculture, the practise of growing single crops intensively on a large scale. It relies heavily on chemicals such as fertilizers and pesticides. Fertilizers are needed because growing the same plant only in the same place year after year depletes the nutrients that the plant relies on. Much of this harvest goes to animal feeding operations where they are fed a high-calorie, grain-based diet, often supplemented with antibiotics and hormones to maximize their weight gain. Their waste is concentrated and becomes an environmental problem.
Industrial agriculture damages the soil, water and even the environment!
Reduce the demand for oil
The world relies heavily on coal, oil and natural gas for its energy. Fossil fuels are non-renewable and will eventually be gone and become too expensive. However there are renewable energy sources such as wind and solar energy that will never run out because they constantly replenish. Renewable energy is for the long term.
Kind regards,
Raffael Hofmann TZ19