Although it seems that some of our governments aren’t taking climate change seriously enough – why is Tanya Plibersek approving new 30 – 50 year coal mines, for example? (Where is the ACTION)? There is some hope in the power of local communities to build momentum for change where climate change is concerned.
For example, you may have read about the very real and concerning issue of air quality throughout the world. The Guardian published a very eye-opening article about air quality in Europe. Air pollution kills a surprising number of people every year, and that is just the direct impact. Indirectly, particulate air pollution contributes to many more illnesses and deaths.
Yet the Global Citizen Science Partnership is currently trying to build a program that will facilitate mass monitoring of air pollution in a number of cities throughout Europe and the world via the efforts of citizen science.
Local government power
The exciting thing is that a number of mayors in Italy have requested these monitoring programs to be implemented in their cities (Rome, for example). These local government actors do have quite a lot of control over things like traffic patterns and other environmental processes that could significantly improve air quality.
This excites me because local governments have the power to create real change. Another level of excitement is the fact that the environmental initiatives and controls that address air quality are likely to have flow-on impacts on carbon emissions and so, these kinds of programs clearly have the capacity to contribute to the reduction of the impacts of climate change.
The power of scientific research
The point is that once all the citizen scientists submit their data and the research projects are complete, the evidence for air pollution will be irrefutable. In countries and states where this kind of evidence is not buried or ignored (for example in Texas, where after citizens contributed to a research project proving the presence of heavy metals and other toxins in their water, a law was made banning citizens from taking samples and reading of the water! – ouch!!), it can have quite significant impacts on the actions of the powers that be.
Scientific research on the topic of climate change has the potential to allow local people and local governments to make changes that improve our environment. So, citizen science has the potential to be a real force for change.
It is exciting stuff!