Questions tagged [environment]
Referring to the surrounding ecosystem of the planet Earth, its natural mechanisms and balances, and study of the effects of human interaction with it.
190
questions
12
votes
1
answer
814
views
Is the honey bee apocalypse real?
In 2013 Time magazine wrote
A World Without Bees: The Price We’ll Pay If We Don’t Figure Out What’s Killing the Honeybee.
In 2021 New York Post writes
Why the honey bee ‘apocalypse’ is based on a ...
- 5,623
4
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Was the 2023 Ohio train derailment the 'worst environmental disaster in US history'?
According to Impact Nottingham:
East Palestine, Ohio: Exploring The Worst Environmental Disaster in
the History of the USA
On 3rd February 2023, a freight train carrying various potentially
hazardous ...
- 10.5k
10
votes
1
answer
742
views
Would covering 10% of hydro-power reservoirs with solar panels generate as much power as fossil-fuel plants worldwide?
This article in the journal Nature, claims that:
Covering 10% of the world’s hydropower reservoirs with ‘floatovoltaics’ would install as much electrical capacity as is currently available for fossil-...
- 1,943
38
votes
1
answer
10k
views
Does flying a small GA aircraft use less fuel than driving the same distance by car?
This is a notable claim by Friedrich Merz, head of the CDU party and a member of the German parliament:
„Ich bereue nicht, dass ich zur Hochzeit von Christian Lindner geflogen bin. Um es mal auf den ...
- 1,348
9
votes
1
answer
572
views
Is the equivalent of 2000 American football fields lost every hour due to drought and desertification?
BBC states the following
Approximately 12 million hectares (46,000 sq miles) are lost around the world each year as a direct consequence of drought and desertification. That's the equivalent of 2,000 ...
- 93
47
votes
2
answers
9k
views
Was plastic from a seaplane shot down in 1944 recently found in an albatross stomach?
The environmentalist website Ocean Sentry makes the claim (citing Calgary Herald) that:
The massive clockwise North Pacific Gyre is carrying plastic that is over 50 years old. Last year, plastic ...
- 18.7k
18
votes
1
answer
1k
views
Are more than a billion umbrellas thrown away every year?
I own a Blunt umbrella. From their and other umbrella sites, there is a claim that over a billion umbrellas are thrown away every year.
Blunt claims it on their website
Finisterre claims it
Senz ...
- 1,377
14
votes
2
answers
1k
views
Does glass decompose in one million years?
Is there any authoritative reference to the claim that glass decomposes in one million years? I came across that figure multiple times (for example, 1, 2, 3). They often cite The New Hampshire ...
- 1,061
5
votes
2
answers
550
views
Does the average carbon footprint per bitcoin transaction range from 233.4 to 363.5 kg of CO2?
https://www.cell.com/joule/fulltext/S2542-4351(19)30087-X says,
According to the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index, Bitcoin’s energy use in 2018 translates to a carbon footprint of 19.0 to 29.6 ...
8
votes
1
answer
712
views
Is photosynthesis 60% efficient?
In this article it is claimed that photosynthesis efficiency could be up to 60%.
The closest process to artificial photosynthesis humans have today is photovoltaic technology, where a solar cell ...
- 742
9
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Do banana peels take 2 years to decompose?
A Google search for "banana peel decompose time" gives the result: 2 years.
This claim is repeated in several reputable sources, such as: Popular Mechanics, The Guardian, and BBC.
However, ...
- 832
10
votes
1
answer
2k
views
Do windmills in freezing climates require power so they don't seize up?
This graphic shared on Facebook, says windmills require active heating in freezing climates when not producing electricity. Its exact text reads,
Germany's millions of solar panels are blanketed in ...
- 28.3k
4
votes
2
answers
488
views
Feasibility of electric car production given current production levels of various elements and compounds
This infographic (source) shows the elements required for production of 20 million Tesla cars per year, and compares that with current production rates of those elements. Looks like this was in ...
- 619
7
votes
1
answer
855
views
Publication Bias in Climate Sensitivity Estimates
It is claimed by Rickova and Irsova, in a paper titled "Publication Bias in Measuring Climate Sensitivity" [A], that:
We present a meta-regression analysis of the relation between the ...
- 191
3
votes
1
answer
535
views
Are there currently more large fires in Africa and South America than the rest of the world?
This has been doing the rounds on Twitter:
NASA fire map shows the absolute failure of mainstream media for not expressing how devasting fires in southern Africa and South America are.
Certainly to ...
- 149
3
votes
1
answer
1k
views
Does 1 acre of hemp produce more oxygen than an equivalent amount (let alone 25x) of forestland? [closed]
I have a friend who likes to promote hemp on Facebook, and one of the posts had this "factoid":
Looks highly doubtful to me but I can't find any real supporting/disputing info.
Is there ...
- 155
20
votes
1
answer
4k
views
Does rolled sod produce 40x as much oxygen as a pine forest?
From an advertisement for turf / rolled sod by a German company:
250 m² Rollrasen produzieren etwa so viel Sauerstoff wie 10.000 m² Kiefernwald oder etwa so viel, wie eine vierköpfige Familie zum ...
- 327
7
votes
1
answer
322
views
Did British homes increase greenhouse gas emissions by 4% in 2018?
According to this report from The Times,
Greenhouse gas emissions fell in every sector — including transport, industry and energy — in 2018, but emissions from homes went up 4 per cent, government ...
- 2,608
8
votes
0
answers
573
views
Do "big-battery" electric vehicles release more CO2 than diesel equivalents over their lifetime?
Autocar report that Mazda have made a surprising claim about electric vehicles with larger batteries (i.e. 95kWh):
Mazda says it will never build a ‘big-battery’ electric car, because it believes ...
- 89
13
votes
1
answer
807
views
Have 500 million mammals, birds and reptiles died in the 2019 Australian bushfires?
Several news sites have reported that almost 500 million animals* have died in the 2019 Australian bushfires. Example: article in news.com.au (Jan 1st 2020)
Ecologists from the University of Sydney ...
- 235
104
votes
4
answers
26k
views
Does the production of a Tesla battery produce as much CO2 as driving 200,000 km?
Recently I read on Greenpeace's website, that the production of a 100 kWh battery, as in the Tesla Model S, produces as much CO2 as driving a regular car for 200,000 km.
Source: Tesla car ...
- 2,696
3
votes
5
answers
906
views
Did the 2018 drought in Europe result in 2019 worldwide grain crop not meeting demand?
An essay on T-Online.de makes the following claim:
Schon ein einziger Dürresommer in Europa 2018 führte dazu, dass die Getreideernte in diesem Jahr weltweit den Bedarf nicht mehr deckt (noch gibt ...
- 18.9k
12
votes
1
answer
3k
views
Do termites produce 10 times more CO2 than humans?
On October 21 2019 Australian Federal MP Malcolm Roberts posted an image to his Facebook feed claiming termites produce 10 times more CO2 than humans in a year. Is there a factual basis to this?
...
- 6,511
3
votes
1
answer
581
views
Is the water used in coal burning power plants "never returned to the environment"?
According to a Duke University press release titled Replacing Coal with Gas or Renewables Saves Billions of Gallons of Water:
Water consumption – the amount of water used by a power plant and ...
- 102k
10
votes
1
answer
739
views
Are a third of the proteins we consume dependent on synthetic fertilizer?
In July 1997, Vaclav Smil wrote an article in Scientific American on humankind's use of the Nitrogen Cycle (emphasis added):
Synthetic fertilizers provide about 40 percent of all the nitrogen taken ...
- 14k
5
votes
0
answers
1k
views
Did Finding Nemo encourage people to flush pet fish down the toilet?
A Smithsonian article about goldfish starts out with (emphasis added):
The 2003 Pixar film Finding Nemo popularized the misconception that all drains lead to the ocean, encouraging young fans to ...
- 14k
11
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Does having one fewer child reduce my carbon footprint as much as 71+ people going vegan?
In July 2017, ScienceMag reported on a study:
Eating no meat cuts an individual’s carbon footprint by 820 kilograms of carbon dioxide (CO2) each year [...] by choosing to have one fewer child in ...
- 521
20
votes
5
answers
3k
views
Is food becoming less nutritious because of depletion of soil minerals and nutrients?
Over and over, I have heard and read claims that the soil growing much of the planet's crops is "depleted" and thus our foods do not have sufficient minerals, vitamins, and other nutrients.
Five ...
8
votes
1
answer
2k
views
Is there more forest in the Northern Hemisphere now than 100 years ago?
In April 19, 2019, there was a public debating event called "Happiness: Capitalism vs. Marxism" featuring Canadian psychologist Jordan B. Peterson and psychoanalytical philosopher Slavoj Žižek as the ...
- 1,716
6
votes
1
answer
506
views
Has ExxonMobil sequestered over 40 percent of all captured CO2?
From ExxonMobil's website on carbon capture and storage (CCS):
With a working interest in approximately one-fifth of the world’s total carbon capture capacity, ExxonMobil is a leader in one of the ...
- 14k
27
votes
0
answers
6k
views
Is pollution the main cause of Notre Dame Cathedral's deterioration?
A 2017 Time article discussing the crumbling, wearing out, and water damage of France's Notre Dame Cathedral prior to the 2019 fire writes (emphasis added):
Notre Dame, which looms over the capital ...
- 14k
50
votes
1
answer
13k
views
Does Germany produce more waste than the US?
According to the German Environment Agency, Germany produced 411 million tons of waste in 2016. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, the US produced about 260 million US tons (236 ...
- 1,331
1
vote
0
answers
196
views
Claim that CO2 is less relevant because it is logarithmic [duplicate]
This video presents and claims that doubling the CO2 levels would only increase the global warming by 1%, whatever that means. Now it seems like the graph contains real data, so what is up with the ...
- 11
10
votes
1
answer
869
views
Is Bhutan the only carbon neutral/negative country?
Twitter moments recently had a moment about Bhutan being the only carbon neutral country in the world: Why Bhutan Is All Alone in the Carbon-Neutral Nation Club and one tweet in the Twitter moments ...
- 38.7k
1
vote
0
answers
109
views
Does crop burning in Cambodia contribute to particulate levels in Bangkok?
Bangkok is currently coping with unhealthy levels of PM2.5 particulates.
On the 26th of January, the Bangkok Post wrote an article with the following passage on a link with Cambodian crop burning:
...
- 1,222
20
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Does the Earth only have 60 years of harvests before the top soil is lost?
According to this 2014 Scientific American article by Chris Arsenault
Generating three centimeters of top soil takes 1,000 years, and if current rates of degradation continue all of the world's top ...
- 308
-4
votes
1
answer
289
views
Does carbon dioxide pollute the atmosphere? [closed]
Following the explosive growth in the use of coal for industrial processes, in which the UK from the late 1800s to the mid-1900s was memorably darkened with soot, the public became aware of "pollution"...
- 2,865
51
votes
3
answers
11k
views
Is only 4% of original forest left in the US?
The 2009 video The Story of Stuff makes several rather incredible claims. For example:
Where I live, in the United States, we have less than 4% of our original forests left.
My gut feeling tells ...
- 575
4
votes
0
answers
282
views
Do vegan diets have lower environmental impact? [duplicate]
The Guardian has a 2018 article, Avoiding meat and dairy is the single biggest way to reduce your impact on earth, which is commonly brought up by my vegan friends:
Avoiding meat and dairy products ...
- 141
18
votes
2
answers
1k
views
Do "smart meters" bring about any significant savings?
UK television stations are showing multiple commercials such as this one which make claims about making significant savings if you get a smart meter (the linked ad claims fitting a smart meter would ...
- 1,930
58
votes
4
answers
14k
views
Have we wiped out 60% of vertebrate populations since 1970?
According to The Guardian (reporting an analysis by WWF) humanity stands on the verge of an ecological catastrophe as:
Humanity has wiped out 60% of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles since 1970, ...
- 55.4k
5
votes
1
answer
375
views
Is the Taylor oil spill on the scale of Deepwater Horizon?
According to CNN, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill leaked 176.4 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. By comparison, and also according to CNN, they say
According to the [the Department ...
- 28.3k
3
votes
1
answer
387
views
Has regulated hunting never led to threatened or endangered wildlife populations?
Hunting advocates and various fish and game bureaus argue that hunting is an effective and needed means to control various species and manage wildlife. One such claim says that "hunting benefits all ...
user11643
1
vote
1
answer
448
views
Is Plant-e an actual company stating a serious premise? [closed]
This is what I read beforehand and then I reached the company page.
They state that plants produce energy. This happens when releasing stuff from the photosynthesis process, which is consumed by ...
- 659
113
votes
3
answers
26k
views
Do 10 Asian and African rivers generate 90% of plastic trash in the ocean?
I found this image shared on Facebook [Warning: image contains a bleeding turtle.] with the following text:
Your Straws Did NOT Do This
[image of turtle with foreign body in nostril]
Americans are ...
- 1,001
7
votes
1
answer
525
views
How long do disposable plastic shopping bags take to break down [closed]
Recently in Australia some major supermarkets have begun phasing out disposable shopping bags.
A lot of people are saying things like that the new reusable bags are worse than the disposable bags.
...
- 231
44
votes
1
answer
8k
views
Is "Earth Overshoot Day" a useful or reliable metric of humanity's effect on the world?
Apparently, we are rapidly approaching Earth overshoot day and that day gets earlier every year. The Guardian explains:
Humanity is devouring our planet’s resources in increasingly destructive ...
- 55.4k
24
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Are drinking straws a minor source of ocean plastic pollution?
An opinion piece in Bloomberg: Plastic Straws Aren’t the Problem claims that drinking straws are a minor source of plastic pollution in oceans:
Yet even if all those straws were suddenly washed ...
- 38.7k
10
votes
0
answers
1k
views
Do Starbucks' new lids use more plastic than the previous lids plus straws?
Have recently seen this claim circulating Facebook:
The image goes to a post by a group called UnbiasedAmerica... but it looks like the original source article is the story Starbucks Bans Plastic ...
- 210
89
votes
2
answers
38k
views
Are cars in Arizona melting in the 2018 summer heat?
Facebook just posted to my timeline this picture claiming that cars in Arizona are melting in the heat.
Is it true?
- 934