Snail shells still remember the heavy rain in Zhengzhou three years ago丨Environmental Trumpet

Hello everyone, this is the 16th issue of the Environmental Trumpet column. In this issue, we have collected the following environmental research and news worth reading:

1) Tiny snail shells record major events in Earth’s climate

2) What? Sending emojis can also exacerbate global warming!

3) Chinese athletes wear “waste plastic” on their bodies

4) The building has a strange shape, but it is for "natural cooling"

5) Report: More than 47,000 people died from heat in Europe in 2023

6) Energy companies deliberately conceal damage to biodiversity, and public information is questionable

Tiny snail shell,

But it records major climate events on Earth

In 2017, Indian scholars used snail shells to estimate India's past rainfall, reflecting the potential connection between snail shells and rainfall. Recently, a study from China published in Science Bulletin confirmed that snail shells are "recorders" of major climate events, and the isotopic composition of snail shells will change due to extreme climate .

The study is about the Chinese snail (Cathaica fasciola)｜Pixabay

As extreme climates continue to increase, humans can use tiny snail shells to understand the changing trends of rainfall from past history, and thus better predict the frequency of extreme rainstorms in the future.

What? Sending emojis can also exacerbate global warming!

A research team from the UK published an article in Knowledge Management Research & Practice, arguing that the proliferation of emoticons and emails will have a negative impact on the global climate .

Huh? People really can't live without emoticons

Emojis are also network data, and they are often stored in the "cloud" for people to use. However, these data centers consume a lot of energy while storing data, releasing a lot of heat to the outside world , accelerating the process of global warming. Therefore, the storage of too much emojis and other data will actually have a negative impact on the global climate.

But the researchers are not only concerned about this. They found that among the many data stored in the "cloud", 68% of the data has only been used once and has never been used again . This data is also called "dark data". The storage of a large amount of dark data not only reduces the efficiency of data centers, but also creates unnecessary environmental burdens on the earth. Therefore, whether it is emoticons, screenshots, or emails and chat records, the most effective way to reduce the burden on the earth is to clear the dark data in the "cloud", not just emoticons.

So you can still send emojis (heave a sigh of relief)! If there are files, emojis or emails that you will never use again, just delete them with a flick of your finger. This is not only a digital decluttering, but also a contribution to reducing global warming.

Chinese athletes wear "waste plastic" on their bodies

At the Paris Olympics, the award-winning uniforms worn by Chinese athletes added a touch of green to the Olympics. The uniforms were made by Anta using recycled polyester, recycled nylon and other environmentally friendly fabrics.

Whether it is recycled nylon or recycled polyester, they are mainly recycled through the recycling of waste nylon products . These raw materials include waste clothing, fishing nets, foam materials, and a type of household waste that we are all familiar with - waste plastics. After being sorted and recycled, they go through processes such as "pretreatment-physical and chemical treatment-low-temperature melting-spinning forming" and finally form what we see on the podium.

Waste plastics are stuck to athletes? | Xinhua News Agency

In addition to "turning waste into treasure", this award-winning suit also has excellent elasticity, breathability and water resistance, is easy to care for and does not easily deform. I hope manufacturers will work harder to allow waste plastics to "change their vests" and continue to play their value.

The building is oddly shaped.

But it is for "natural coolness"

Recently, a study published in Nexus found that designing the building's exterior wall into a zigzag structure can improve the building's ability to cool naturally without consuming any energy. If you can't imagine a zigzag exterior wall, take a look at the picture below.

Oops! The building has teeth! | Ossip

This design divides the wall, which originally had only one surface, into two surfaces with asymmetrical inclination angles, one facing the sun and the other facing the ground .

The side facing the sun receives solar radiation like a normal exterior wall, while emitting radiation toward the sky . Using specific materials or coatings, the radiation emitted by this side can penetrate the atmosphere and reach outer space without being absorbed by carbon dioxide molecules in the atmosphere.

The side facing the ground can reflect the radiation emitted by the ground . The ground absorbs solar radiation during the day and heats up, releasing the heat to the outside. When the exterior wall reflects this part of the radiation, it can reduce the heat absorption inside the building.

In this way, the jagged exterior walls can better emit and reflect radiation outward, accelerating the rate of cooling.

In order to further explore the actual cooling effect of the exterior wall, the researchers used relevant materials to make samples of the serrated exterior wall, and used ice-water mixture and 60°C black aluminum foil to simulate the real sky and ground respectively. The results showed that the serrated exterior wall has a very good cooling effect, and compared with traditional radiation cooling materials, the building temperature can be further reduced by 2~3°C . When the sample was placed outdoors for actual testing, the researchers found that the cooling effect of the exterior wall was still very good.

However, in actual application, such a design still has some problems. Since the design requires a high reflective capacity of the exterior wall, the wall is also very likely to cause light pollution while reflecting radiation; in addition, there is a lot of dust floating in the air in reality, so how to keep the wall clean is also a problem to be solved.

More than 47,000 heat-related deaths in Europe by 2023

According to a report released by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), more than 47,000 people died from heat stroke in Europe in 2023. Although this is lower than the number of deaths in 2022 (when the estimated death toll exceeded 60,000), the situation is still very serious for Europe.

Europe is the fastest warming continent in the world , with a warming rate about twice the global average. Local residents have to face increasingly serious high temperature risks. The Barcelona report found that the top three European countries with the highest heat-related mortality rates in 2023 are Greece, Bulgaria and Italy, all of which are concentrated in southern Europe; if we look at the number of deaths, the top three countries last year were Italy, Spain and Germany.

The outdoor temperature in Rome even exceeded 40℃｜Cecilia Fabiano/LaPresse via AP

Despite the unbearable heat, the report found that most of the deaths were not caused by heat stroke, but by heart, lung and other physical diseases . The high temperature caused the disease to deteriorate rapidly.

The report also further analyzed the characteristics of the deceased and found that in Europe, the heat-related mortality rate for women is 55% higher than that for men ; and the heat-related mortality rate for people over 80 is also much higher than that for people aged 65 to 79. In the face of the fierce heat weather, in addition to taking basic preventive measures, society should also pay detailed attention to different groups of people from the perspective of human physiology and age structure, and provide more segmented support.

High temperatures not only in Europe, but also in China, pose health risks to many people. A report published in a Lancet journal last year pointed out that the health risks of climate change in China are also rising. In 2022, record-breaking heat waves caused the average number of heat wave days in China to reach 21.0 days, and the number of deaths related to heat waves reached a record high of 50,900 (this figure is based on model calculations).

Author: Xiao Xiaoze

Edited by: Yellowtail Pollock