Does Earth Have Limits?: The Chemistry of Pollution, Episode 4
5/14/202630 min
Pollution is only one way humans are altering our planet. There’s climate change, sea level rise, biodiversity loss, and much more. Earth system scientists, including biological oceanographer Katherine Richardson, developed the nine planetary boundaries, a framework to understand what Earth systems are critical for life, and what will happen if human-caused changes to our planet continue. Katherine unpacks these boundaries, revealing how chemistry sits at the heart of both the problems and solutions to the equilibrium of many of these critical systems. It’s a sobering yet hopeful look at humanity’s future on a finite planet.
Transcripts and episode sources at acs.org/chainreaction
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Transcript preview
First 90 secondsMargot Wall· Host0:01
[upbeat music] This is Chain Reaction, a podcast from the American Chemical Society, where we link chemistry's past to its future. I'm your host, Margot Wall.
Sam Jones· Host0:14
And I'm Sam Jones.
Margot Wall· Host0:15
To start things off, Sam, I'm taking us back to the 1960s. [upbeat music] The smell of hairspray in the air is strong. Women's hairdos are sky-high. Freon is pumping through our refrigerators to cool our milk and government cheese. And Americans are blissfully unaware of the damage they're causing to the atmosphere, particularly the stratosphere.
Ted Koppel· Soundbite0:46
Our topic, perhaps the most imminent danger now confronting this planet. Good evening. I'm Ted Koppel, and this is Nightline. If there were intelligent life forms in outer space, and if they were doing to our stratosphere what we are doing to it, we would regard that as an act of aggression. Think about it that way for a moment.
Sam Jones· Host1:14
I think I know where this is going, Margot. Hairspray, Freon, we're getting into CFC territory. That is chlorofluorocarbons.
Margot Wall· Host1:23
Yeah, yeah. A few short decades following the height of the beehive hairstyle, scientists stumbled