Saint Joseph’s ecological day

On Tuesday 10th November 2015, Saint Joseph’s pupils from year 10 up to year 13 went to the Palais de l’Europe in order to attend to the very  environment day organized by their establishment.  

Students were able to meet scientists and listen to their speeches. They     also participated in activities laid by their teachers. This day was based on themes around sustainable environment such as climatic changes.  We    were sadly warned of the dangers that our planet risks

Global Warming

The Earth’s temperature is increasing, and this fact is today indisputable. The earth’s surface average temperature has increased of 0.85°C since 1880.From now until 2100 the climatologists predict a raise from 2°C to 6°C. Several reasons like CO2 emissions were at the origin of global warming.

The humans’ fault?

Since November, 13th 2015 at 17:00:19 the men have drained the    annual planet’s ecological budget.  Therefore, the strong bullish        increase of the temperatures is due to human activities which have   not stopped to generate CO2. Indeed since the industrial era the        numbers of CO2 molecules have quadrupled. Nowadays, China is     the country with the highest rate of greenhouse gas emissions;          nevertheless Australia is the most polluting country in the individual scale.

 The Ocean a threatened and threatening source

Lionel Guidi a researcher from the CNRS was there to explain and alert     about the impact of climate changes on the oceans. They represent 70%  of the Earth surface.  They have always played a key role, but no one         talked about them even if there are very few laws on oceans. Contrary to public   opinion, oceans play a part on the oxygen production. 50% of the O2 that we breathe is produced by the plankton.  Oceans are in danger    because of the water acidification due to CO2 excess. Water acidification  is also dangerous for some species because CO2 destroys limestone yet    some water animals are made of limestone.  Global warming has other     consequences on oceans such as the ice caps meeting.  This melting           causes rising water; in 2080 oceans could rise 1m and cause the extinction of some islands.

Temperature raises mosquitoes attack

Camille Roumieux, a biologist, talked about the impact of climate change on mosquitoes. We’re used to see mosquitoes from May to August and    sometimes until September. Yet with global warming, we can see             mosquitoes in October, November or maybe even December. There are   about 3500 species of mosquitoes; in the PACA region we can find about  40 species.  But we worry specially about the presence of a kind of            mosquitoes in our region and in other parts of France: the Tiger Mosquito. It was seen for the first time in Nice in 2004, this type of mosquito is very dangerous because it’s a vector of Malaria. Every 30 seconds someone     dies because of a mosquito sting. During the conference one student         asked:“Why don’t we eradicate mosquitoes?” Camille Roumieux                 answered: “Mosquitoes are important for birds because without mosquitoes they produce less eggs, some pecies are considered harmful   for humans, but they are important for other species.”

Is the COP21 going to find solutions?      

 From the 30th November to the 11th December, 196 parties (195               countries+ the European Union) are going to discuss about global              warming and try to find some solutions.  We asked passers-by to tell us   what they think about the COP21. The people we interviewed mostly        sounded hopeless. A man from Paris said “It’s going to be very difficult to stop polluting without compromising the industrial sector.”  

A woman said “ When you see that the countries  known as the cleverest ones, don’t do anything  about the CO2 emissions  […] Look at the            damage the United States made in 200 years […] They don’t want to do  anything” .
 A newsagent was also unenthusiastic: “I don’t think the COP21 is going to change anything, there is nothing we can do, I’d like to but I don’t believe in it.  There’re a lot issues and projects and I really hope they are going to forge a resolution[…]  but there will be 196 countries which are not on as far as sales are concerned wavelength “ 

 The Fresco

       Some students worked on a fresco which is going to be sent to the COP21. The pupils worked on the fresco with the help of their art teacher.  The    fresco is separated in three parts: the first one is the “We don’t want”      part where we can see deforestation, speculation, wars, racism etc. In the middle there are some pupils’ shapes. And other part it’s “What we want “part, we can see solidarity, mutual aid, protection of the forest etc.  This Fresco represents the pupils ‘commitment, and we hope this day alerted  the young generation about global warming and climate change.

Violeta Inzirillo, Raquel Carvalho Caldeira, Meili Pilloix, Clarisse Krajacic