Nature is sending us a message with the coronavirus pandemic and the ongoing climate crisis, according to the UN’s environment chief, Inger Andersen. The pandemic has claimed thousands of lives and infected many more people, but we can still think about the positive impacts that our global lockdown has had on the environment.

 

In the ever crowded, high rise New York, pollution levels have fallen by 50% from the lockdown in attempts to curb the virus. Meanwhile, coal usage has fallen by 40% in China’s six largest production factories. Researchers have found that this huge improvement in air quality may have saved 20 times more lives than the corona virus has taken. Michael Burke, a Stanford researcher, in an optimistic estimate, has suggested that it has saved the lives of 4000 children under 5 and 73000 lives of those over 70. However, this huge decrease in emissions comes alongside the huge fall in production and global shares prices, suggesting that the use of non renewables is still a huge part of the global economy.

 

Another factor that has hugely impacted the decrease in emissions is the sudden drop of transport emissions, as huge numbers of flights are cancelled and people curb their travelling. At the same time, however, there may be an increased demand for energy as people spend far more time on home entertainment, driving up emissions again. Ultimately, all of these impacts are temporary, and it is likely that emissions will soar when the global state recovers. It has been said that the environmental impacts will be similar to that of the 2007-8 global recessions with the huge fall in industrial output. However, one difference is that people will have become used to not driving or taking other forms of transport, and studies have shown that once we have been given the option to travel again, the frequency of us taking them will have dropped.

 

At the same time, our spraying disinfectant everywhere can have a negative impact, as will the fact that climate change has moved down priority lists. Ultimately, all the effects on the environment from the corona virus will be mostly temporary, but as seen by the water in the Venetian canals becoming clear again for the first time in years, it is a call from nature for us to start reconsidering our emissions and pollution