A Perspective on the Environment
One contribution we must make to the education of our undergraduates is to provide them with a perspective on the environment that is intellectually honest and scientifically sound. Beyond doubt, the complexity and urgency of the problems associated with improving the quality of life without destroying the quality of the environment are such that only the coolest and most informed community thinking and action over an extended period of years can offer any assurance of long range environmental safety and stability. Two things about the present state of environmental affairs are clear: The first is that d e m a g o g u e w a s for example, "The battle to feed all humanity is over. In the 1970's the world will undergo famines-hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death in spite of any crash program," [Ehrlich, "The Population Bomb," 19671-and other hard-sell tactics such as overstatement, oversimplification, recitation of half-truths, cursing of existing situations without offering alternatives, or even pretending there is no problem, serve only to divert interest and energy away from potentially constructive work, and hence are counterproductive. The second is that real progress is being made and much more is possible in attacking several major environmental problems. There is no doubt that we have turned the corner on air pollution-in 82 metropolitan areas around the country there has been a decline in most air pollutants since 1968-01 that we can achieve a long term goal of good air quality. While zero population growth is still some years away, the total fertility rate (births per woman during her childbearing years) has fallen dramatically in this country since 1968, and now is about 2.08, substantially below the 2.2 level of the depression years, and far below the 2.46 level of 1968. In water pollution we are doing little more than holding our own, but with industrial activity and population growing, this in itself is encouraging. The fact that Lake Erie, once thought lost, has made substantial recovery under even minimal water quality control enforcement speaks well for our ability to deal with water pollution. The expectation i s that by 1980 we shall have turned the comer on water pollution and that secondary treatment of water from the entire sewered population and from all industrial effluents will have been achieved. -. The problems of population control and of air and water pollution are, of course, among the easier of the environmental problems to manage, a t least in the developed countries of the world. We have the know-how to minimize many of these and we need only pay the price-some personal restraint and about $145 per person per year will greatly improve our air and water quality, for example. Far more difficult to deal with are questions concerning energy supply and demand, the strain on our nonrenewable natural resources, the handling and recycling of waste materials, the control of food and drug quality, safe limits on fertilizers, pesticides, radioactivity, etc., and public and even personal health quality. Dealing with these matters will require considerably more knowledge, participation, and restraint by the average citizen than he has demonstrated up to this time.
1 editorially
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speaking
While there are a number of ways in which we could prepare our students to think intelligently and to respond responsibly in connection with environmental issues, there are a t least three basic points that should not be overlooked. The first is that there is air, water and energy in abundance-enough to take care of the needs of the present population of the earth and then some. The atmosphere has more than a million pounds of air for each person alive, and the waters of the earth have sufficient volume to provide each person with a private reservoir just under a half mile square and a half mile deep. The sun supplies energy a t about one calorie per minute on each square centimeter of the earth's surface. In a year the energy falling on the land area of the United States is several thousand times its annual energy consumption. The problem with air, of course, is in maintaining its quality, with water it is a matter of extensive purification and transportation; with energy it centers on our use of nonrenewable, air polluting fossil fuels as our principal energy source, and on the added expense, lowered efficiency and faster depletion rates of these fuels as energy demands increase and their polluting effects are minimized. However, if energy were cheap enough, clean enough and safe enough, a great many technological and social problems-including air and water quality control-would literally evaporate. Energy from nuclear fusion and solar heating-processes that could be perfected by 2000 with added support and good luck-might cost less than one percent of the cost of coal, on per calorie basis. With air, water, and energy in abundance, and given the earth's current population, temperature, and climate along with our present knowledge of and ability to manipulate nature, it would appear that we have a t least some margin of environmental safety in which to operate. A second basic point is: Even as nature has amply supplied some materials, she has supplied others in very limited amounts. These must be rationed, handled with prudence and kept in circulation. As an illustration, estimates are that the known world reserves of platinum, silver, gold, aluminum, tin, lead, tungsten, nickel, chrumium, manganese and certain other metals will be all but exhausted in less than 50 years. Even though suitable substitutes for metals-plastics and materials made from ordinary rock-will be developed, we simply cannot afford to wantonly squander and lose major fractions of the world's supply of any elementary material. This will happen unless recycling becomes a way of life for all. A third point is that up to now man has been able to do little or nothing to interfere with the grand cycles of nature-life cycles, seasonal cycles, biogeochemical cycles. However, our scientific and technological advances, when applied on the massive scales required by our desire to make money and to bring the greatest good to the greatest number, have taken us to the place where what we do in certain situations now or in the future could have a significant effect on some of these grand cycles. Before trying to play in this league, perhaps we all need a better perspective on the environment. WTL Volume 50, Number 3. March 1973 / 163
