Today we will discuss the topic of “consumption, resources, environment, what we need to know”. With the rapid development of science, technology and economy, our demand for materials is getting bigger and bigger, and even our spiritual needs will be met through material needs. When we meet our own needs, consumption is an essential link. The impact of consumption is multifaceted, so how can resources be developed? Will the environment be affected? These are the problems that people need to think about today.
Consumption means the development of resources, and the development of resources means that the environment may be affected. Personally, these chain reactions are symbiotic. Almost all the products we consume now are obtained by exploiting natural resources. But there are many kinds of natural resources, which can usually be divided into renewable resources and non-renewable resources. Non-renewable resources are usually mined or extracted from the subsurface, which include fossil fuels, metallic minerals and non-metallic minerals, and cannot be regenerated in a short time or at all. However, in order to protect the environment, we can try to make up for it by renewable resources. With the rapid development of science and technology, biological renewable resources can better replace non-renewable resources, which will greatly reduce the environmental problems caused by over-exploitation of ore resources.
With the increasing population of the world and the rapid development of economy. What we need to pay more attention to is how to look at it and how to consume it. We can divide consumption into direct consumption and indirect consumption. Direct consumption means that we buy a commodity directly, while indirect consumption is often the public facility we use, and we are a part of consumption. The rapid economic growth is inseparable from the development of resources. What we can see is that the more developed a country is, the higher its gross national product will be and the more resources will be exploited. Consumption and economic growth are usually in direct proportion, while consumption and resource consumption are also in direct proportion.
Human beings will have an impact on the environment while consuming and utilizing resources, and a large part of these impacts are caused by excessive emission of greenhouse gases. The principle of greenhouse effect is that the short-wave radiation of the sun enters the ground through the atmosphere, and then the long-wave radiation released after the warming of the ground will be absorbed by carbon dioxide and other substances in the atmosphere, thus producing greenhouse effect. (Greenhouse Effect) and excessive emission of greenhouse gases often leads to drastic changes in climate. We can see that more and more natural disasters are happening in recent years. For example, sea level rise has caused many coastal areas to be submerged, drought and heavy rainfall have caused economic losses in some areas, and hurricanes have threatened more people’s lives. （Lesson 5）
Finally, I hope everyone can realize the seriousness of the environmental problems I have described, and take better measures to reduce the over-exploitation of natural resources and avoid the occurrence of natural disasters. We can conduct environmental assessment through LCA. Although there is no simple answer by using a complete LCA, LCA provides us with a standard quantitative method to evaluate the impact of products on the environment, so as to make a more meaningful comparison between products. (Lesson6) As consumers, we should perform our duties well. This is what we should do for the common environment. Thank you.
