Our Environment – Introduction

Each year I survey the public to determine what their needs are – what they are most concerned about – and where Extension might help.  One of the primary functions of Extension is to provide local clientele with solutions to their needs – our mantra at UF IFAS Extension has been “Solutions for Your Life”.  Most years the primary concern for Sea Grant locally has been water quality.  Habitat restoration and invasive species also score high.  These are all important issues.  We want to maintain a high quality of life and addressing these concerns will help do that.  And as important as these are, and they are, if someone were to ask me about my highest concern, it would be climate change.  The issues above can be connected directly, or indirectly, to climate change.

 

 

Scientists have predicted, and witnessed, the negative impacts of climate change for several decades now.  Nonscientists have begun to notice as well.  Increased number of hurricanes, increased intensity of some of these hurricanes, excessive and extended heat waves in the summer, drought conditions in some areas of the country, flooding issues in others, and wildfires out west.  These things have all happened before but in recent decades they are becoming more common.

 

In 2024 I wrote four articles about our changing climate in response to the devasting hurricane season we had.  The reason was my concern about climate change and that we all need to pay more attention to the issue.  I wrote a total of 41 articles over the course of the year – including these four on climate.  The articles on climate were the least read articles of the group. There could be a couple of reasons for this.  It could be that most do not consider it a high priority concern – and I understand that.  Again, water quality and habitat loss are real concerns and climate maybe less so for many people.  It could be that people understand the concern about climate but what can you do?  It is too big of an issue for me to deal with and so, I will focus on what I can do something about.  It may be because the topic is so negative – and I get this also.  I taught environmental science at Pensacola State College for 15 years.  Despite there being many positive lessons in the course, many students were so depressed by the final exam they would add notes such as “I will never have children” and others similar to this.  Discussing the state of our environment can be a “downer”, and they just do not want to deal with it.  And it could be that they deny climate change is even happening.  There are many who do feel this way.  In their minds, there is no issue, nothing to discuss, nothing to read about – move on.

 

I posted my four articles and let it ride (links to them are posted below).  However, with the tragedy of the fires in Los Angeles recently, I felt it needed to be brought back up.  I watched a program about the fires and a science writer, who recently published a book about climate, made a statement to the effect that “nature is letting us know that something serious is going on… nature is letting man know that we are in this together and we need to make some changes”.  I agree.  Though the topics of water quality and habitat loss are concerning – and Extension will provide articles and programs during the year to help the community solve those problems – I also believe that the community needs to pay more attention to climate change and enact behavior changes to solve this very serious problem.

 

I have decided to post articles throughout 2025 mimicking the environmental science course I used to teach.  I am obviously going to shorten the subjects – and may write more in-depth articles about some of them down the road – but the outline will follow that of the course.  We will begin with how the planet works. This will be followed by the introduction of humans and how we have spread across the planet.  There will be articles about how we have impacted our natural resources and the climate.  And we will end with some suggested methods for solving some of the problems.  I am not expecting a lot of people to follow this – but I hope you will.  And I hope some positive change will come from it.  Let’s begin…

 

Climate articles from 2024

 

Another Look at Climate Change – Part 1 Introduction

https://blogs.ifas.ufl.edu/escambiaco/2024/06/20/another-look-at-climate-change-part-1-introduction/.

 

Another Look at Climate Change – Part 2 How Might the Earth’s Temperature and Climate Change in the Future?

https://blogs.ifas.ufl.edu/escambiaco/2024/06/25/another-look-at-climate-change-part-2-how-might-the-earths-temperature-and-climate-change-in-the-future/.

 

Another Look at Climate Change – Part 3 What are Some Possible Effects of a Warmer Atmosphere?

https://blogs.ifas.ufl.edu/escambiaco/2024/07/03/another-look-at-climate-change-part-3-what-are-some-possible-effects-of-a-warmer-atmosphere/.

 

Another Look at Climate Change – Part 4 What Can Be Done?

https://blogs.ifas.ufl.edu/escambiaco/2024/07/08/another-look-at-climate-change-part-4-what-can-be-done/.

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Posted: January 28, 2025


Category: Natural Resources
Tags: Environmental Education