Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Our changing Earth Day

Friday, April 28, 2000 | 10:13 a.m.

Mike O'Callaghan is the Las Vegas Sun executive editor.

EARTH DAY 2000 has come and gone but this time there was very little snickering and fewer snide remarks about environmental activists. Certainly the atmosphere, if not the air we breathe, is much more friendly for these activists today than it was for the first Earth Day in 1970. Also, this time, many of the activists were in business suits or were working women with families. Gone were the large numbers who needed to bathe and get a haircut.

If the Earth Day 1970 message wasn't accepted by the American public because of the messengers' appearance, what they said has had some effect. More importantly Mother Nature, and how she has reacted to human abuse, has made us listen to her.

Over the past three decades we have learned that with proper action we can often reverse the damage done to our environment. Protected endangered species, such as the bald eagle, have been returned from the brink of extinction. Several cities and waterways have had their air improved for breathing and water cleaned up for the return of trout. While all of these advancements are being made in the United States, the problems of even greater air pollution and the destruction of rain forests have increased in Third World countries. Still not enough Americans comprehend that we all live on the same planet.

We now recognize that there are many environmental changes that must be recognized as Earth problems. What is most disturbing is, for example, that changing weather patterns are too great for us to manage. Where we believe we have solved some environmental problems, they have now changed in form and are affecting other parts of our globe.

Global warming is now an accepted fact and no longer just a theory put forth by environmental nerds. There is some disagreement over the exact cause for this warming. There is little disagreement that if it continues over the next century it will affect the weather, and sea levels will rise and flood many areas now covered by land. Receding ice caps at both poles are already early warning signs.

When I was a kid in the Midwest the Great Lakes were like the Atlantic Ocean to us. A recent study of them shows that this March they are several inches below their long-term average depth for the month. The Washington Post quotes hydrologist Roger L. Gauthier saying, "The Great Lakes are 3,500 years old in their present form, and they have fluctuated dramatically countless numbers of times. The problem here is that it is happening so quickly and it is going from one extreme to the other." It's too early to say this will be a long-term affliction.

It's not too early to recognize a very sharp change in weather patterns here in North America. We, in Nevada, may enjoy warmer days in December and January, but the lack of snowfall in the upper Midwest during these months can affect our nation's food supplies. Changing water current patterns in the ocean also has affected our supply of seafood and the increase in hurricanes and typhoons hitting populated areas with greater intensity and frequency.

We have learned the health value of wetlands and forests in our country and the rain forests of Central and South America. Many of our countrymen contribute to funds used in protecting the rain forests. Here at home, public and private efforts to restore our wetlands are moving forward. But in the big picture we see millions of acres of rain forests being destroyed and wetlands being filled in and replaced with homes and shopping centers.

By the way, there is a finite amount of fresh water for drinking, which is only renewable by rainfall. Did you know we are doubling our use of fresh water every 20 years? Today 1.3 billion people don't have safe drinking water and half of the world's population has no sanitary means of disposing of human waste.

So what will we be talking and writing about during Earth Day 2030? Will we have finally made some progress in facing the major problems now facing our planet? We have saved the bald eagles, can we save ourselves?