Biodiversity is the natural variety found in living systems and individuals, and is

essential to the function of ecosystems and to the continuation of life on earth. The
current human-driven extinction of vast numbers of species is one of the most pressing
issues facing humankind. Yet people can be good stewards of the land and contribute to
the preservation of biodiversity.
How can I help?
• Purchase goods and services from companies that are environmentally
responsible. Although you can't always believe marketing claims for "green"
goods, a little internet research can often shed some light on the ethics of
particular companies. Where possible, look for third-party certifications and
labels. Organic, shade-grown (coffee) and fair-trade are some practices that are
more likely to preserve biodiversity. When possible, purchase goods from
responsible companies in your local area; this cuts down on the pollution
generated in long-distance transportation.
• Plant a garden of native plants around your home (see natural gardening
techniques), or at your school. In this way you can help to preserve plant species
as well as create habitat for wildlife.
• Plant heirloom crops in your garden, and practice seed saving.
* Remove invasive species from your property.
• Use natural gardening techniques as alternatives to pesticides, herbicides and
fertilizers
• Maintain valuable wildlife habitat on your property, such as large trees, wetlands
and natural shoreline.
• Consider donating part of your land to a preservation agency, or placing a
conservation covenant on your land to protect valuable natural areas from future
development.
The Land Conservancy

• Reduce automobile pollution (one of the largest sources of pollution and damage to
species and ecosystems) by driving less, carpooling, cycling, keeping your car
properly tuned and maintained and switching to a more efficient vehicle.

Threats to Biodiversity
One of the most serious threats, both locally and globally, to biodiversity is
pollution. Pollution occurs when substances are released into an environment
where they can have a harmful effect on living and non-living things. Human
activities can pollute both on a local and global scale and may affect water,
soil and air, three of our most important natural resources.

Water – with sewage, fertilisers, toxic chemicals and oil.

Soil – with pesticides, waste, herbicides and toxic chemicals (which may be
washed from the land into water)

Air – with smoke and gases such as sulphur dioxide.

Many of the substances which cause pollution are not necessarily harmful in
their proper place. Ozone, for example, is necessary in the stratosphere in
order to protect us from the sun’s harmful UV-B radiation but a lot of ozone
present at ground level pollutes the air we breathe and causes health
problems such as asthma.

Species such as the corncockle, poppy and cornflower that used to be

common in our cornfields are becoming rare as more agricultural chemicals
are used.

It is only quite recently that the global effects of pollution have been
discovered. Problems like global warming and acid rain are not as noticeable
as oil spills and sewage on beaches and they don’t sound as frightening as
nuclear accidents – but all of these, from supermarket trolleys in rivers to
gases high up in the atmosphere, have a polluting affect on our ecosystems.

Agriculture, waste and energy production are just a few of the ways in which
we pollute our planet…….

Energy and Fossil Fuels

In Britain we all use energy in the form of electricity, gas and petrol to help
us in our daily lives. Industrial processes also use large amounts of energy
and all this energy has to be produced somehow. Throughout the world, as
more countries become industrialised and more people adopt a consumer
lifestyle, our need for energy is increased.

Coal, oil, and gas are all fossil fuels. The Earth’s supply of fossil fuels is
limited, once they are used up they cannot be replaced, so they are called
non-renewable energy resources. Most of the energy used by humans comes
from non-renewable resources and mainly from fossil fuels. There are still
quite large reserves of coal in the UK but if we carry on using oil at the rate
that we do today all the world’s oil and most of its natural gas supplies could
be used up by the year 2050!

Fossil fuels release energy when they are burned, unfortunately, they also
release carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide all of which have
polluting affects on the environment. Carbon dioxide is one of the gases
which contributes most towards the greenhouse effect.
1. The heat from the sun warms the surface of the earth.

2. The earth’s heat is radiated back, away from the surface.

3. Some of the heat radiated back from the earth is reflected off the layer of
“greenhouse gases”.

4. This heat remains within the earth’s atmosphere, gradually increasing the
earth’s overall temperature.

Gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and

chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) appear naturally in the atmosphere but, as a
result of human activities (mainly the burning of fossil fuels), these gases
have accumulated. The gases than act in the same way as a pane of glass in
a greenhouse, letting the sun through to heat the earth’s surface but
trapping the heat as it is radiated back. This alters the heat balance of the
Earth and gradually global temperatures rise. This is known as global
warming. An increase of just a few degrees Celsius in global temperatures
could cause a change in climate: more frequent and stronger storms and
hurricanes, droughts and widespread flooding as the polar ice-caps start to
melt. These climate changes all threaten the world’s ecosystems.

Sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide cause a different problem. As they are
passed up into the sky these gases react with the tiny droplets of rain in
clouds, making them acidic. The rain from these clouds then falls as weak
acid which is why it is known as acid rain. The effects of acid rain are far
reaching, often the pollution is carried for thousands of miles before it falls
as rain. Acid rain can damage trees and plants directly and is also washed
into rivers and lakes, where it may kill animals and plants. It also damages
stonework and metalwork on buildings.

Fossil fuels are not the only resource we have from which we may produce
energy. Nuclear fuel is one alternative which is being increasingly used.
Nuclear power stations don’t produce nearly so much pollution in the form of
gases such as carbon dioxide or sulphur and nitrogen dioxides. The main
problem associated with nuclear power is how to safely store and dispose of
the radioactive waste that it produces. People also worry about risk of
accidents in nuclear power stations such as the one at Chernobyl in 1986.
High level radioactive waste must be stored very carefully as it will remain
radioactive for hundreds of years. Nuclear power stations have only been
developed relatively recently so many of the possible pollution problems are
still unknown.

It is not only nuclear waste that has to be stored and disposed of, all sorts of
other processes create waste products. Agriculture, industry, sewage and
individual households together produce mountains of waste – so where does
it all go?

Agriculture
Farmers add fertilisers to the soil in order to increase the nutrients available
in the soil. Fertiliser that is not absorbed into the soil or taken up by the
roots of plants is waste, and may be washed into rivers and lakes. Fertiliser,
though it may be good for the farmers’ crops, becomes pollution when it is
washed into rivers. The nutrients present in the fertiliser encourage the
growth of bacteria and algae in the water. As the bacteria increase they use
more and more oxygen from the water until there us none left for fish and
other aquatic animals and plants – so eventually they die of suffocation. This
process is called eutrophication.
Sewage
As the population of the world grows so does the amount of sewage that we
produce. It is very important that our sewage is treated before it is disposed
of into rivers and seas. If it is dumped untreated into water it will not only
cause eutrophication but it will also spread diseases and poison any people
or animals that drink it.

Treating sewage involves several complicated filtering processes and even

these have their own waste, a leftover “sludge”, which then has to be
disposed of somewhere. Some sludges are used as fertilisers on farms,
sometimes the water is removed from them and the remaining substance is
burned and sometimes the sludge is dumped out at sea. As you can imagine,
each of these methods could also end up causing pollution of some kind.

Domestic Waste
Each family in the UK throws away an average of 1 tonne of rubbish per
year! We throw away leftover food, paper, clothes, packaging and plastic
bags, toys, electrical equipment and most of the time we don’t stop to think
where all this will end up.
The most common method of dealing with domestic waste is to put it in
landfill sites. Layers of waste are tipped into the site, crushed with bulldozers
and then covered with soil to stop it blowing away, smelling bad or attracting
flies. Gradually most of the waste starts to rot, with bacteria breaking down
the biodegradable material.

Domestic waste can become dangerous when it is not properly disposed of.
Litter pollution is a growing problem.

As the rubbish rots it gives off a mixture of gases, mainly methane with
some carbon dioxide. Not only does this gas contribute to global warming
but if it builds up in nearby buildings or drains it can cause explosions, so it
must be collected by pipes and burned off safely. The rotting rubbish also
produces a rather unpleasant, poisonous liquid known as leachate which
seeps into the earth and, if it is not carefully managed, could be washed into
rivers or even groundwater that is used for drinking supplies.
An alternative to landfill is incineration (burning) of waste but this can have
polluting effects too. As waste is burned it releases toxic substances called
dioxins into the air. When the burning is complete 10-30% of the original
weight of the rubbish is still left as ash. This ash has to then be disposed of
in landfill sites.
Industry
Huge amounts of industrial waste are produced by large manufacturing
companies and much of this is disposed of in the same way as household
waste. Some industrial waste however may be toxic (harmful) and therefore
cannot be disposed of in general tips. Instead it is either buried deeply,
incinerated (burned), diluted or dumped into the sea in containers. None of
these methods are necessarily completely safe. Buried waste could be
disturbed by digging or earth movement, containers could crack and toxic
waste could leak out into the sea or soil. Burning toxic waste could lead to
polluting gases being released into the atmosphere, contributing to acid rain
and global warming. It is therefore very important that companies are
careful and responsible when making arrangements for disposal of toxic
waste.

Natural Resources and Habitat Loss

It is not only pollution that threatens the biodiversity of our planet, another
threat is the over-exploitation of natural resources. In other words we use
up too much and too quickly. As the population of humans increases,
demand for these natural resources grows. Timber is taken from forests
without giving them time to regenerate themselves, animals are hunted to
the verge of extinction and our oceans are fished without giving the fish
population time to recover their numbers.

One of the most familiar of these problems is the destruction of the

rainforests. Deforestation endangers biodiversity in several different ways:

• Directly killing species or by destroying their habitat.

• Increasing the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere (through

burning forests)

• Reducing the rate at which carbon dioxide is removed from the

atmosphere and oxygen is produced (photosynthesis)

As intensive farming has developed, trees and hedgerows have been

destroyed to create larger fields for crops, wetlands have been drained and
ponds filled in. All these changes have reduced the areas available to many
species of animal and plant.
Tourism, one of the largest industries in the world, is another growing
environmental problem. As tourists flock to find unspoilt areas, clean blue
seas, sandy beaches and historic towns; new buildings are built to
accommodate them, mangrove swamps, sand dunes and coral reefs are
destroyed to build marinas and golf courses, local lifestyles change and local
resources are stretched to their limits.

Freshwater is a valuable resource and even in Britain, where our climate is

quite cool and damp, we have been having regular problems with summer
droughts. Some of our water comes from underground (aquifers), some
from reservoirs and some is pumped out of lakes and rivers. Even when we
have long periods of time without rain we still need fresh water to drink,
wash and water crops. Industry too, uses huge amounts of fresh water – but
it is power generation that uses the most. As ground water supplies get
lower and reservoirs dry up more and more water is pumped out of our
rivers and lakes and this can have very damaging affects on our freshwater
ecosystems.

Habitats are also destroyed everywhere through building more houses,

roads, supermarkets and factories, creating more farmland an increased
mining and mineral extraction.

As the population of the world has increased, the threats to biodiversity have
become ever greater. The world’s ecosystems are being affected and now
there is a serious danger of causing permanent damage, not just to local
environments but also to the global environment.

As we continue to build, quarry, farm, mine, generate energy, trade and

dump waste we are gradually reducing the amount of land available to other
animals and plants and to future generations of human beings.

What can we do?

Sustainable Development
In 1992, just over 170 countries gathered together in Rio de Janeiro for a
meeting called “the Earth Summit” to discuss the future of our world.
Together they agreed that there was a need to work together, “ in global
partnership for sustainable development”.

Since then the phrase “sustainable development” has been used more and
more – but what exactly does it mean?

The most common definition comes from a document called the “Brundtland
Report” in 1987. It says that sustainable development is…..

“development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”

In other words we must make sure that whatever we do, as populations

expand and lifestyles change, we must keep the world in good condition so
that our children and our children’s children will have the same natural
resources that we have. Natural resources that include: fresh air, clean
freshwater, farmland, wildlife, forests, unpolluted seas and a stable climate.
A sustainable lifestyle is one that our environment can support without using
up these valuable natural resources.

In Rio, 150 countries agreed to promote “sustainable development” and they

set out some guidelines, “an action plan for the 21st century.” This action
plan was called Agenda 21 and it outlines some ways in which governments
and all members of society can start to take action to help make our
lifestyles more sustainable in the future.

We must:
 • Promote energy conservation. The less energy we use, the less we need
to produce which means non-renewable resources last longer and less
pollution is caused.
• Improve efficiency and lessen the environmental impact of present
energy production methods.
• Develop more renewable energy resources such as wind, water and solar
power.
You can help too!
• Don’t go by car if you can walk, cycle or use public transport instead!
• Turn off lights when you are not using them!
• Don’t waste hot water!
• Insulate your house!
Waste in the Future
Waste will always exist but we must find ways to lesson its impact on our
environment.

We must:

• Promote recycling, re-use and composting.

• Improve world-wide sewage treatment procedures.
• Reduce the amount of packaging and “disposable” products.
 • Encourage tougher laws and better law enforcement to prevent illegal
dumping and unsafe disposal of toxic waste.
• Encourage tougher laws and better law enforcement to prevent illegal
dumping and unsafe disposal of toxic waste.
You can help too!
• Sort out your household waste and recycle what you can!
• Make and use a compost heap!
• Re-use plastic shopping bags!
• Don’t drop litter!
• Don’t buy products with lots of packaging!
Preserving Natural Resources for the Future

All over the world whole ecosystems are threatened by direct destruction for
building, farming an industry. As they are destroyed, more and more species
become endangered and more habitats are lost forever.

We must:

• Tighten controls of trade in endangered species and products derived

from these.
 • Change farming practices to encourage biodiversity – by reducing the
use of pesticides and herbicides and leaving hedgerows, trees and
strips of uncultivated land between fields.
• Encourage sustainable forestry practises.
• Teach people about the effects of tourism and promote sustainable
tourism.
You can help too!

• Be careful what you buy when you are on holiday – many gifts such as
coral, shells and ivory will have been taken from local ecosystems!
• Do what you can to protect your local ecosystems and species. Looking
after ponds, building bird boxes and bat boxes, creating wildlife
friendly gardens all helps to preserve biodiversity!
• Don't buy hardwood products from unsustainable sources - it should be
labelled clearly!
• Report evidence of pollution to your local council or the Environment
Agency - if they don't know about it they can't stop it!
• Don't waste water - remember it is a valuable resource!