A quick glance at the local or national paper will show you that there are many environmental issues today. Some of the issues you will hear about are related to population issues and how to control the population of humans on Earth. Some stories will be about the loss of ecosystems in some part of the world. Maybe you'll see something that has to do with the current administration treats environmental issues. You are going to probably be reading a lot of articles that talk about climate change. It will all seem so current.
But, if you go back a hundred years and check to see what was going on then, you'll find that many of the issues and concerns then are still the same.
In 1894, Svante Arrhenius was a Swedish scientist that called attention to the possibility of fossil fuels role in warming the Earth's atmosphere. He thought it would be a good thing when he first considered it because many of the colder climates would have a longer growing season. After about ten years of chewing on that thought, he issued another thought - that maybe it wasn't that great an idea and maybe we should be cutting back on our use of fossil fuels.We know now that fuels, such as ethanol (made from corn and other agricultural crops) can be used almost directly as vehicle fuels, but this was also known a hundred years ago. What caused petroleum to be our major fuel and our dependence upon it to drag us into global conflict? In the early 1900's, Standard Oil was in direct combat with the ethanol supporters to have petroleum declared the main automotive fuel. To make matters worse, in about 1915, they decided to add tetraethyl lead to gasoline to boost the octane. They knew that ethanol fuels had higher octane ratings, but created a competitor by adding the leaded compound to the fuel. For most of the 20th century, lead was sent into the atmosphere by vehicles and that lead settled all over the planet. The introduction of the automobile in New York in 1900 was seen as a solution to pollution. The use of horses for transportation created a daily pile of manure that weighed 2.4 million pounds from 120,000 horses. This was a public health issue and a quality of life issue. In addition, dead horses were often abandoned on the street, just like junk cars now are sometimes abandoned on the streets. In 1904, childhood lead poisoning was linked to lead in paint. In 1909, France, Belgium and Austria banned the use of lead in paints designated for the insides of buildings. It took another 70 years - and lots of lead poisonings -before the US did the same. In 1898, Andrew Carnegie made an encouraged people to find a solution for smoke pollution in Pittsburgh. By 1906, Pittsburgh had enacted smoke ordinances and in the next 5 years, the smoke level went down measurably. In 1899, the …show more content…
It took a while for that idea to catch on in the US at first. Beginning in the mid 1800s there was a movement toward conservation. This was usually spearheaded by the wealthy who saw the common people spreading over the landscape, destroying things as they went along
Hetch Hetcy Valley Controversy John Muir became very concerned with preserving many of the natural beauty spots out west. He wrote and became involved in controversies about these places. One notable one was a dam he opposed because it would flood an incredibly beautiful valley called Hetch Hetchy Valley. He argued that the water was not needed, but after the Earthquake and ensuing fire in San Francisco in 1906, he lost the cause due to political and public outcry for better equipped fire fighting facilities. Whenever public health is involved, in an environmental situation or anything else, the public health issue wins. Many texts will tell you that Rachael Carson was the founder of the environmental movement in the US. On the contrary, there was conservation and environmental movement for over a hundred years before she published her famous book, "Silent Spring." Later in the course, we'll see how she overcame a lot of tough opposition to write the book and defend her stand against the misuses of
But, if you go back a hundred years and check to see what was going on then, you'll find that many of the issues and concerns then are still the same.
In 1894, Svante Arrhenius was a Swedish scientist that called attention to the possibility of fossil fuels role in warming the Earth's atmosphere. He thought it would be a good thing when he first considered it because many of the colder climates would have a longer growing season. After about ten years of chewing on that thought, he issued another thought - that maybe it wasn't that great an idea and maybe we should be cutting back on our use of fossil fuels.We know now that fuels, such as ethanol (made from corn and other agricultural crops) can be used almost directly as vehicle fuels, but this was also known a hundred years ago. What caused petroleum to be our major fuel and our dependence upon it to drag us into global conflict? In the early 1900's, Standard Oil was in direct combat with the ethanol supporters to have petroleum declared the main automotive fuel. To make matters worse, in about 1915, they decided to add tetraethyl lead to gasoline to boost the octane. They knew that ethanol fuels had higher octane ratings, but created a competitor by adding the leaded compound to the fuel. For most of the 20th century, lead was sent into the atmosphere by vehicles and that lead settled all over the planet. The introduction of the automobile in New York in 1900 was seen as a solution to pollution. The use of horses for transportation created a daily pile of manure that weighed 2.4 million pounds from 120,000 horses. This was a public health issue and a quality of life issue. In addition, dead horses were often abandoned on the street, just like junk cars now are sometimes abandoned on the streets. In 1904, childhood lead poisoning was linked to lead in paint. In 1909, France, Belgium and Austria banned the use of lead in paints designated for the insides of buildings. It took another 70 years - and lots of lead poisonings -before the US did the same. In 1898, Andrew Carnegie made an encouraged people to find a solution for smoke pollution in Pittsburgh. By 1906, Pittsburgh had enacted smoke ordinances and in the next 5 years, the smoke level went down measurably. In 1899, the …show more content…
It took a while for that idea to catch on in the US at first. Beginning in the mid 1800s there was a movement toward conservation. This was usually spearheaded by the wealthy who saw the common people spreading over the landscape, destroying things as they went along
Hetch Hetcy Valley Controversy John Muir became very concerned with preserving many of the natural beauty spots out west. He wrote and became involved in controversies about these places. One notable one was a dam he opposed because it would flood an incredibly beautiful valley called Hetch Hetchy Valley. He argued that the water was not needed, but after the Earthquake and ensuing fire in San Francisco in 1906, he lost the cause due to political and public outcry for better equipped fire fighting facilities. Whenever public health is involved, in an environmental situation or anything else, the public health issue wins. Many texts will tell you that Rachael Carson was the founder of the environmental movement in the US. On the contrary, there was conservation and environmental movement for over a hundred years before she published her famous book, "Silent Spring." Later in the course, we'll see how she overcame a lot of tough opposition to write the book and defend her stand against the misuses of