By Bineh Ndefru, Stephanie Kawecki, and Priera Panescu
The year 2020 has been an unprecedented year of change. With the drastic rise of global COVID-19 cases occurring in early 2020, our lives practically changed overnight. We are working at home more and commuting less. We are avoiding large social gatherings and instead opting for cocktail hour with friends over Zoom. We have reduced our visits to public recreational sites and have postponed our vacation plans. With so many restrictions, it becomes apparent what we can’t do, but what are we being encouraged to do, and how does that affect our environment? For example, we are being continually encouraged to protect ourselves by wearing personal protective equipment. We are using more synthetic gloves, disposable masks, and plastic bags at the grocery store. Unable to sit at restaurants, we are ordering more take out. Even if we may choose to dine at a socially-distanced setting, many restaurants have switched to serving food using disposable plates and cutlery to avoid viral contact with restaurant workers. Living in our new normal, many questions arise regarding the effects of the pandemic on the environment. Essentially, we have begun an unintended experiment which may provide insight into the possibilities of improving the state of our environment through drastic changes in policy, human behavior, and resource consumption. In this article, we take a comprehensive approach to discuss a few observed short-term, and some potentially long-term effects of the pandemic on the environment, and suggest action items that can be taken from the findings of this unintended experiment.
Short-term Changes and Their Effects on the Environment
One of the most obvious short-term environmental benefits of the pandemic is the decrease in Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHGE) occurring globally. We are working from home more and in doing so, we are also traveling less. According to the Ozone Transport Commission, car traffic nationwide has dropped by about 50% with truck traffic decreasing by about 20% since February of 2020. The combination of reduced automobile and air traffic during lockdown resulted in a 26% decrease in daily carbon dioxide emissions from each country on average, and a staggering 60% decrease of nitrogen dioxide emissions. Given the reduction of fossil fuel use during the pandemic, the International Energy Agency expects global GHGE to drop by 8% this year. Staying at home, however, causes precipitous increases in residential electricity usage and increased use of internet services for meetings and has been shown to lead to a 60% increase in streaming internet content. Powering this internet activity requires the use of millions of servers in data centers, switches, routers, all connected by over 500,000 miles of cables under the sea. Before the pandemic, powering this connectivity required huge amounts of energy and emitted CO2 equivalent to the amount used in aviation globally. Stay-at-home orders are increasing this impact and adding to the tradeoffs between more energy use at home and energy savings from travel. Ultimately, though the reduction in travel may instill new habits in some, it is likely that travel rates will return to previous levels after the pandemic is over. Thus, any net reduction in GHGE is likely a temporary environmental benefit.
Environmental processes are often interconnected, creating domino effects within other environmental systems. For example, the reduction of travel both on land and sea has resulted in a reduction of environmental noise, which benefits wildlife. We are also observing cleaner beaches with less tourism and fewer beach visitors. In addition, cleaner air means cleaner surface water. With the drastic decrease of nitrogen dioxide emissions observed, researchers expect to eventually see an improvement in drinking water quality, which continues to be an issue for some communities. Essentially, we are seeing in real time the chain reactions that our actions as humans can create for the well-being of wildlife, the natural environment, and each other. If we return to business as usual, it is guaranteed that the positive impacts we are observing on our environment will revert to pre-pandemic states once restrictions are lifted.
There is also a chance that following the pandemic, we could enter environmental conditions that are worse than our pre-pandemic state due to changes we are making in the short-term. While there has been some reduction in the use of certain resources, some sectors have seen an increase in resource usage. Increased online delivery, to-go food ordering, and medical waste is leading to more inorganic waste. For example, the six-fold increase of medical waste occurring in China is ultimately producing 240 metric tons of medical waste per day. In addition, the increased use of personal protective equipment is leading to its improper disposal and many have observed PPE littering the streets. Grocery stores are also reverting to disposable plastic bag use, and many have limited the use of reusable bags in an effort to mitigate viral spread. Taking advantage of this opportunity, the Plastic Industry Association messaging endorses the use of plastic bags at grocery stores. To make matters worse, many recycling centers have closed in the US due to risk of viral spread. It is well understood that increased use of disposable material leads to more polluted land and water, animal endangerment, and increased methane emissions from landfills. While this increase in trash pollution is potentially short term, there are likely to be long-term effects related to the slow decomposition of inorganic material and increases in methane emissions from landfills. Moreover, there is a possibility that our new normal may instill wasteful habits among humans and increase the overall material throughput in years ahead.
Long-term Effects of COVID-19 Policy Changes on the Environment
Unfortunately, we are already seeing some of the environmental benefits being reversed to their pre-COVID-19 levels as restrictions lift and people become more fatigued with stay at home orders. Comparing daily global carbon emissions to values from the same times last year, we see that carbon emissions were lower by 17 percent in April, but as of mid-June they were only down by 5 percent as compared to June 2019. So, while some of these short-term environmental effects are seemingly silver linings to the darkness of the coronavirus crisis, long-term shifts are more likely to come from legislative and economic changes.
Some governments, most notably the United States, have responded to the crisis with, as Naomi Klein describes, “shock doctrine”. This is the notion that governments take advantage of chaos and public disorientation to push unpopular pro-corporate measures. For example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) started allowing factories and power plants to regulate their own water and air pollution, sped up the federal approval process for new pipelines, highways, and mines, and limited states’ powers to oppose energy projects like pipelines. Moreover, the fossil fuel industry has benefited extensively from stimulus spending and new state laws in Kentucky, South Dakota, and West Virginia that criminalize actions often taken by pipeline protestors. The plastic industry has also been utilizing the pandemic to lobby for the removal of single-use plastic bans that were in place across the nation, arguing that single-use plastics, especially grocery bags, are the safest option during the pandemic. Meanwhile, minimal federal aid has been provided for the clean-energy industry and many clean energy companies have even been hit with retroactive rent bills, despite the targeted relief for oil and gas companies.
In a post-pandemic world, after the effect of the pandemic on the economy is no longer a major concern, it is unlikely that these companies that spent billions to lobby for exemptions will go back to following the more stringent environmental restrictions without a fight. Further, the clean energy industry could potentially face even more barriers for new projects than pre-pandemic, given the disadvantaged economic position that the government has placed them in. Ultimately, these short-term decisions do not put the US in a position to effectively deal with the climate crisis in the long-term.
Other similarly grim shifts are seen across the globe. In China, pollution is quickly reverting to pre-COVID-19 levels, partially due to a surge in new permits for factories. Additionally, the indigenous people of the Amazon rainforest have been especially hard-hit with high COVID-19 case and death rates as they also face accelerated illegal deforestation as a result of scaled back environmental protection measures by the current government.
There is some positive news for long-term changes, though. For existing renewable energies, the pandemic has created the potential for them to become more popular as utilities suffering revenue losses turn to electricity from wind and solar farms for their cheaper operation and rely less on coal power plants. Additionally, voter support for the Green New Deal has increased considerably since the beginning of the pandemic, and many companies are likely to permanently adopt work from home practices.
Action Items for Sustained Change
As we all adjusted to the restrictions imposed by stay-at-home orders, some took comfort in the apparent environmental silver linings. There was some relief in witnessing the unprecedented decreases in emissions and positive impacts on wildlife and the natural environment. However, many continue to hope for legislation and economic changes that will provide real comfort. As things begin to look “normal” again, we can look at this unintended experiment as instructive and start to imagine a better future. Maybe we can imagine a future where it is possible to scale back excesses in the airline industry or in private vehicle use, for example. How can we learn from this experience to make long-lasting and equitable changes that benefit our planet and our lives? Here are some action items that could allow us address climate change more effectively in this new reality:
- Collectively, we must pressure governments to extend social safety nets and envision a different kind of economic well-being (i.e. beyond GDP) that includes environmental and social indicators. For example:
- Pressure governments to support organizations that lend themselves to community resilience and sustainability, organizations that support a regenerative rather than extractive economy.
- Pressure governments to invest recovery funds in projects and jobs in local, reliable, clean energy, and energy efficiency, rather than bailing out or incentivizing oil, gas, and other megacompanies that deplete resources and pollute.
- Individually, COVID-19 has forced us to reckon with some of the failures of our government, as it remains primarily beholden to corporate interests even in the midst of a public health crisis. The government’s failure to contain the disease forced many to take personal responsibility for the well-being of their communities. Likewise, we should extend this understanding of personal responsibility to the problems we face in climate change and the environment. Where the government denies the facts and fails to act, we must do our best to protect ourselves, each other, our natural resources and environment. In countries like the US, this might look like:
- Creating or contributing to mutual aid networks to support individuals and communities that may face the effects of environmental and climate disasters.
- Personal commitments to reducing our environmental impact, just like many of us take it upon ourselves to wear masks during the pandemic to protect ourselves and each other. For example, we might individually reduce waste, reconsider our consumption habits, or use alternative transportation. While individuals are not responsible for the bulk of carbon emissions, individual action can often be a catalyst for collective action.
Bineh Ndefru is part of the 2019-2020 INFEWS program cohort and a PhD student in Materials Science and Engineering. Her research is on battery degradation and reliability of renewable energy systems. Both from the 2018-2019 cohort, Stephanie Kawecki is a Bioengineering PhD student (focused on developing composite scaffolds for co-culture of myocytes and adipocytes) and Priera Panescu is a PhD in Chemistry and Biochemistry (researches polymeric materials for the stabilization and controlled release of agricultural actives). Priera will be graduating fall 2020.