The documentary I chose to review is “Before the Flood”. This film features the famous actor, Leonardo DiCaprio, going on a journey to see how climate change is affecting different areas all over the world. Leonardo was nominated by the United Nations to be the Messenger of Peace, a position where he would be able to fly to many different countries and speak to their government officials about how climate change is affecting them.

Throughout the film, Leonardo went to many different places, including Canada, the Arctic Circle, Miami, Florida, China, India and back to Washington D.C to conclude with an interview with Barack Obama. While on this journey, he was able to first hand see how bad climate change already was in these areas. When in Canada, the film showed oil sands and how hot air is literally being pumped into the ground in order to extract the oil from the sand. In the Arctic, it was shown that in just five years over 30 feet of ice had melted. In China and India, overpopulation and poverty were such extreme issues and over 300 million people were living without power. However, he was able to expand on how China is making an effort to switch over to solar and wind power. Leonardo and the filmmaker’s agenda was not only to show the devastating affects of climate change, but also to promote to the viewers how to help prevent them.

It is so important that our generation step up and confront climate change as a real issue. The film showed that there are still so many people in the United States government that are climate change deniers, and work so that no bills get passed to put policies in place to combat this issue. A lot of these deniers are also paid out by big oil, which is an extremely corrupt issue and needs to be stopped. In the end, Leonardo spoke in front of the United Nations and reported on all of the things he had seen while traveling the world. He reported that his overall view was very negative, and it was up to each and every individual to return to their country and try to change their ways for the better of the world. it is a tough thing to ask of everyone to do, but it is so important that we band together and help the one place we all live. The Paris Climate Agreement was signed before this film came out, so Leonardo did report on how great this accomplishment was. He still posed the question, will all these countries really uphold what they agreed to?

The overall message of the film was to show that climate change is not an if; it is already happening all over the world in numerous ways. The United States is not a leading example of how to combat climate change, and he speaks out to say that we as a nation need to become more aware. This message is extremely powerful and to me does not have any bias. It is hard to be bias about helping the planet, it is a place that everyone lives and the one thing that as a species we can aim to protect.

https://archive.org/details/youtube-90CkXVF-Q8M

newsreport-13zoqg0

Title: Oceans Are Getting Louder, Posing Potential Threats to Marine Life

Citation:

Robbins, J. (2019). Oceans Are Getting Louder, Posing Potential Threats to Marine Life. [online] Nytimes.com. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/science/oceans-whales-noise-offshore-drilling.html [Accessed 28 Jan. 2019].

Link:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/science/oceans-whales-noise-offshore-drilling.html

Main Idea Bullet Points:

-Rise in offshore energy exploration is causing large amounts of traffic in ocean blasting sonar and seismic air underwater

-Blast underwater to be picked up by hydrophones to detect where oil/gas will be

-Trump administration: allowing for more offshore drilling

-Death of sea creatures can result from these seismic blasts (affect hearing, brain hemorrhaging)

-Kills zooplankton/microorganisms that are fundamental to food chain in the ocean

-Sound is 10 times more intense underwater

-Undersea life is tuned for sound and this will alter their ability to find food, expect predators, etc.

-Whale reproduction has been reduced due to the equipment being used in their native warm waters (Along North Carolina to Florida coast)

-Sounds cause stress to marine life (adrenaline and stress hormones leads to weight loss and immunosuppression)

-Social behavior of dolphins and other marine life will be negatively affected (echolocation) rips communication systems

-40-80% fewer fish obtained in Norway due to these systems being in use

Presentation:

Source of Article: New York Times

Questions (Who/What/Why/When/How):

-Who/What: major oil corporations using seismic blast technology to locate oil is damaging to marine life

-Why: using this location method helps eliminate time it takes to locate oil supplies

-When: Trump administration recently lifted ban off offshore drilling, allowing for five huge companies to file permits to begin these actions

-How: Large machines use seismic blasts of air to detect pockets of oil

Impact of finding: The impact of this report is that marine life is now at great risk due to the lift of this offshore drilling ban. Large oil corporations benefit from this as they can make a lot of money by finding pockets of oil quickly. It is extremely damaging to marine life and there are no longer precautions in the way to protect them.

Relevance to this course: This course is focused around sustainability and that is important in every ecosystem. The marine life ecosystem relies on echolocation and this strong sonar interference is extremely damaging to their way of life.

Questions raised by story: As the Trump administration continues, will there be any sort of protection acts put on marine life? What is being done to help with the dramatically dropping reproduction rate in whales?

For this blog experience, I chose to attend the SEWE festival. This is also known as the Southeastern Wildlife Expo, where all different species are shown to the public. This was very fascinating to me, as I have always marveled at how many different types of animals there are out there and how they all come from different ecosystems and locations. All the animals shown at this expo hail from the southeastern area of the United States, so it is interesting to see the similar adaptations they have. This includes being of certain color to combat heat absorption, hunting specific prey that is plentiful to the area, among other interesting facts. Among the animals shown at this event, there were also art exhibits and food events, so this expo really can appeal to all different types of people with different interests.

I really enjoyed this event because it showed off how unique different species are and how amazing they truly can be. I have been to many dog shows in the past, but they were a lot stuffier than what was going on at this expo. Dogs’ talents were truly put to light, and owners were able to show off how special their dogs are and how much training has gone into their abilities. This shows a true connection between dog and owner, which I really admire as I have two dogs and it is very difficult to train them. I have also always admired how loyal a dog can be to their owner, and that different dogs absolutely have different personalities. My one dog has a very loyal personality, always aiming to please and feeling so guilty when he misbehaves. On the other hand, my other dog feels no remorse and has no problem being bad. This expo really shows the differences between animals and how these differences are important in have a diverse system.

Relating back to this class, I think that biodiversity is a huge environmental importance and this was really highlighted at the SEWE event. There were different species of owls, snakes, and other native creatures that really shows how different each animal is from one another. Each animal is crucial to the food chain and sustaining life. Owls and snakes share the same prey of mice, but they also have variations in their diet that allows them to live in similar environments and still have a steady food supply. It is so important to maintain this level of biodiversity so that all species can live sustainably. The impact of this event is to bring light to different species in a fun, interactive way. Not all people care about the environment, but this event was great in the sense that it really included every type of person and tried to make sustainability interesting to people who might not otherwise care or be interested in it. It is hard to get everyone on the same page of supporting the environment, but small steps like this SEWE event is a gateway to gathering people in on the pro-environmental movement.