Human civilization has existed since approximately four thousand years ago, but We have rapidly grown in our use of science and technology since the industrial revolution in the 19th Century. The results of our use of science and technology are evident in modern human life, including computers, massive and architecturally beautiful buildings, a stable energy supply for billions of people, and countless other developments. The main improvement brought about by rapid development since the industrial revolution is in the quality of life. With the improvements brought about by developments in science and technology also came negative consequences such as plastic pollution, climate change due to high carbon emissions, and the pollution of air, water, light, and sound. These issues are occurring at an inconceivably massive scale. This article will elaborate upon specific issues further, describe solutions created by innovators, entrepreneurs, and governments and describe the importance of investing in innovative and sustainable solutions. The following paragraphs will elaborate on what issues have occurred because of the rapid progress modern humanity has accomplished. The first issue is air pollution which has resulted in incredibly destructive global warming and climate change. Scientists state the main cause of climate change is greenhouse gas emissions created from human activities, which include Carbon Dioxide, Carbon Monoxide, and Methane among other gasses. Due to these greenhouse gasses, sunlight that hits the earth’s surface does not reflect into space and is absorbed by Earth’s atmosphere. When sunlight is absorbed by Earth’s atmosphere it heats up which results in global warming and climate change. Scientists, innovators, and Entrepreneurs have devised multiple strategies to fight climate change.
These strategies include replacing vehicles that use internal combustion engines (ICE) with Electric vehicles, planting more trees globally, developing carbon capture plants, finding alternative heating solutions for countries that have cooler weather, and finding alternative methods for construction and other processes. Other issues discussed in this article are plastic pollution, water pollution, and air pollution. Air pollution is the biggest cause of climate change, but air pollution has other grave consequences beyond climate change. Similarly, plastic pollution has consequences beyond water pollution, and water pollution is not limited to plastic pollution as well. The modern uses for plastic include creating containers such as bottles, food containers, polyethylene shopping bags, etc. While some plastics are reusable, most people use plastic items once and dispose of them, and most end up in garbage dumps, rivers, and the ocean. The collection of plastic in rivers and Oceans and the organization that tries to resolve the issue is the topic of discussion regarding plastic and water pollution in this article. Other negative consequences of air pollution include deaths and severe illness of millions of individuals who live nearby sources of air pollution. Solutions to this include promoting nonpolluting industries and businesses in government and society, promoting carbon capture technologies, promoting planting trees, etc. as mentioned in the earlier paragraph. The following paragraphs will elaborate upon the businesses, organizations, and governments that are developing solutions for the issues highlighted above.
Firstly, we will discuss how the problem of plastic pollution in the ocean, and highly polluted rivers, which the organization “The Ocean Cleanup” tackles globally. This organization is a nonprofit organization, but it aims to sell products developed using the plastic collected from the great pacific garbage patch such as Sunglasses and sell these products. These products generate profits that help in furthering the cause of removing plastic from the world’s oceans, as the main sources of plastic pollution in the oceans are highly polluted rivers, they attempt to tackle this issue as well. The revenues of this organization are the donations they collect from donors and the profits generated from selling products developed in-house. The products developed using the plastic collected from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch specifically has immense potential for generating revenue according to the CEO Boyan Slat Who started the project as an eighteen-year-old. Secondly, this article will discuss the new industry of Electric Vehicles, currently led by Tesla Inc.
The main goal of Tesla Inc is to move the world towards sustainable energy with a primary focus on Electric vehicles. The issue EVs tackle from the issues listed is climate change caused by carbon emissions. While the transport sector accounts for approximately 30% of carbon emissions globally, Tesla has established itself as the company attempting to accelerate the transition of the automotive industry towards sustainable energy. Reducing 30% of carbon emissions itself is a massive undertaking for the EV industry as it is still expensive to manufacture these vehicles at scale. Tesla Inc, Ford, General Motors, other conventional automotive manufacturers, and other EV startups are all attempting to solve the problem of producing EVs on a large scale. Tesla Inc is the first company to be successful in this endeavor as seen by its large-scale manufacturing of the Model 3 and Model Y. The success in large-scale manufacturing and due to additional products and services offered by the company Tesla has managed to become the most successful vehicle company globally in terms of market capitalization. Tesla has become the company that the other EV manufacturers must defeat to dominate the industry. It is important to note that Ford, General Motors, and Rivian have made massive progress in this regard by developing competitive EVs which have great demand in terms of orders and preorders. Furthermore, some of these products have already been delivered to customers.
The next stage of the challenge for the companies is to manufacture these products at scale to meet demand. Finally, I would like to mention the following methods for creating big money opportunities. Which are as follows, carbon removal plants, media outlets that support fighting climate change and environmental sustainability, organizations that research and develop alternative means to fight climate change, and governments that create policies to fight climate change. With carbon removal plants the basic process is to filter out CO2 from the air and store it in the ground. Another alternative use for filtered CO2 is to recreate fuel from it, which can be sold and used in a process of reusing Carbon. Another money-making opportunity for individuals is to increase awareness of climate change and potential solutions. Major examples of this are the YouTube channels DW Planet 1, Cleo Abrams, and other YouTube celebrities such as MrBeast and Mark Rober built the project Team Trees to plant twenty million trees globally. These channels create a more comprehensive awareness of solutions to climate change, and the importance of understanding how to build solutions to battle against it. By creating awareness around the challenge of climate change they also create awareness for their brands, which can generate revenue. The channels mentioned above also create awareness for the organizations that build solutions for climate change.
For example, Cleo Abram in a recent video gave awareness to an organization that develops genetically engineered trees that remove more CO2 from the atmosphere. Such organizations deserve more awareness to be able to receive more monetary and public support. Governments also can also make fighting climate change a beneficial endeavor by creating a carbon tax policy or policies around carbon credit whereby companies can buy the right to pollute within a limit for a large fee. In conclusion, the problems created as a side effect of massive progress in science, and technology, and increasing quality of life, Humanity created new and more complicated problems. This article elaborates more on a few specific issues created by human activity, and new human activity that attempts to rectify the problems. The final takeaway from this article is that Humans, for much of history have, and always will innovate and show ingenuity with the goal of solving our big problems, and often make money in the process.
This article was written by Senura: LinkedIn, Instagram, Medium, Twitter