This is an article of notable issues relating to the environment in

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

. They relate to

environmental law Environmental laws are laws that protect the environment. The term "environmental law" encompasses treaties, statutes, regulations, conventions, and policies designed to protect the natural environment and manage the impact of human activitie ...

, conservation,

environmentalism Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology, and social movement about supporting life, habitats, and surroundings. While environmentalism focuses more on the environmental and nature-related aspects of green ideology and politics, ecolog ...

and

environmental issue Environmental issues are disruptions in the usual function of ecosystems. Further, these issues can be caused by humans (human impact on the environment) or they can be natural. These issues are considered serious when the ecosystem cannot recov ...

Christian Aid Christian Aid is a relief and development charity of 41 Christian (Protestant and Orthodox) churches in Great Britain and Ireland, and works to support sustainable development, eradicate poverty, support civil society and provide disaster rel ...

report December 2019 evaluated the costs of floods, fires and storms in 2019. Climate crisis was linked to at least 15 over 1 billion cost destructions in 2019.Climate crisis linked to at least 15 $1bn-plus disasters in 2019
Guardian 27 Dec 2019

Statistics 2019

* Year 2019 was Australia’s hottest and driest year on record ( National Bureau of Meteorology) * Europe was 3.2°C warmer in December 2019 than the standard reference period for December for 1981-2010 (The European Union's

climate change Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...

monitoring agency, Copernicus) * 2019 was second hottest year on record for the planet’s surface. The five years 2015-2019 and the decade 2010-2019 were the hottest in 150 years. High temperature increase severe storms, floods, droughts and wildfires. * The heat in the world’s oceans reached a new record level in 2019. Oceans are clearest measure of climate crisis as they absorb 90% of heat trapped by greenhouse gases.

Environmental issues

Plastic pollution

2019 was the year the worldwide revolt against

Plastic pollution Plastic pollution is the accumulation of plastic objects and particles (e.g. plastic bottles, bags and microbeads) in the Earth's environment that adversely affects humans, wildlife and their habitat. Plastics that act as pollutants are catego ...

. Production and disposal of plastic used already nearly 14% of all the world’s oil and gas. According to the

International Energy Agency The International Energy Agency (IEA) is a Paris-based autonomous intergovernmental organization, established in 1974, that provides policy recommendations, analysis and data on the global energy sector. The 31 member countries and 13 associatio ...

plastics annual carbon budget may become equivalent of the world’s fifth largest climate heating country, emitting more than Germany or the UK. 359 m tonnes plastics were produced in 2018. Ca 8m tons

plastic waste Plastic pollution is the accumulation of plastic objects and particles (e.g. plastic bottles, bags and microbeads) in the Earth's environment that adversely affects humans, wildlife and their habitat. Plastics that act as pollutants are cate ...

run to the sea via rivers. Since 2010 the petrochemical industry has invested about $200bn, and $100bn more is planned to be spent, plastic production is expected to grow 40% by 2030.

Sixth mass extinction

Sixth mass extinction The Holocene extinction, also referred to as the Anthropocene extinction or the sixth mass extinction, is an ongoing extinction event caused exclusively by human activities during the Holocene epoch. This extinction event spans numerous families ...

: According to the first global scientific review of insects in February 2019 found that more than 40% of insect species are declining and a third are endangered. The rate of extinction is eight times faster than that of mammals, birds and reptiles. The total mass of insects is falling by a precipitous 2.5% a year. In May 2019 was published

biodiversity Biodiversity is the variability of life, life on Earth. It can be measured on various levels. There is for example genetic variability, species diversity, ecosystem diversity and Phylogenetics, phylogenetic diversity. Diversity is not distribut ...

report, that pointed out the biodiversity to decline in threatening speed. It will be crisis to life of plants, animals and humans.

IPBES The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is an intergovernmental organization established to improve communication between science and policy on issues of biodiversity and ecosystem services. It ...

reported that 25% of plant and animal species are threatened with extinction as the result of human activity.

Microplastics

In January 2019, the

European Chemicals Agency The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA; ) is an agency of the European Union working for the safe use of chemicals. It manages the technical and administrative aspects of the implementation of the European Union regulation called Registration, E ...

(ECHA) proposed to restrict intentionally added

microplastics Microplastics are "synthetic solid particles or polymeric matrices, with regular or irregular shape and with size ranging from 1 μm to 5 mm, of either primary or secondary manufacturing origin, which are insoluble in water." Microplastics a ...

Events and news

;March Extreme weather includes Storm Eberhard across the Netherlands, Belgium and central Germany in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

in March 2019. Cyclone Idai killed 1,300 people in

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

Mozambique Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique, is a country located in Southeast Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west, and Eswatini and South Afr ...

and

Malawi Malawi, officially the Republic of Malawi, is a landlocked country in Southeastern Africa. It is bordered by Zambia to the west, Tanzania to the north and northeast, and Mozambique to the east, south, and southwest. Malawi spans over and ...

in March, 2019. It ranks as the second-deadliest tropical cyclone on record. The only system with a higher death toll is the 1973 Flores cyclone that killed 1,650 off the coast of

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

. ;May Cyclone Fani struck

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

and

Bangladesh Bangladesh, officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world and among the List of countries and dependencies by ...

in May and June. A stronger than usual monsoon killed 1,900 people in India. In May 2019 according to

University of Bristol The University of Bristol is a public university, public research university in Bristol, England. It received its royal charter in 1909, although it can trace its roots to a Merchant Venturers' school founded in 1595 and University College, Br ...

UK emissions of CFC-11 from north eastern

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

particularly in or around the provinces of

Shandong Shandong is a coastal Provinces of China, province in East China. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilization along the lower reaches of the Yellow River. It has served as a pivotal cultural ...

and

Hebei Hebei is a Provinces of China, province in North China. It is China's List of Chinese administrative divisions by population, sixth-most populous province, with a population of over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. It bor ...

had increased by around 7,000 tons per year after 2013. A global ban on the use of CFCs has been in place since 2010 to prevent

Ozone depletion Ozone depletion consists of two related events observed since the late 1970s: a lowered total amount of ozone in Earth, Earth's upper atmosphere, and a much larger springtime decrease in stratospheric ozone (the ozone layer) around Earth's polar ...

. ;August Typhoon Lekima (2019) was the second costliest typhoon in Chinese history. ;September The typhoons Typhoon Faxai (2019) and Typhoon Hagibis (2019) in

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

in September and October 2019.

Hurricane Dorian Hurricane Dorian was an extremely powerful and catastrophic tropical cyclone, which became the most intense on record to strike The Bahamas. It is tied with the 1935 Labor Day hurricane for the strongest landfall in the Atlantic basin in term ...

in the US east coast, killing 673 people. Hurricane Dorian was the most intense tropical cyclone on record to strike the Bahamas, and is regarded as the worst natural disaster in the country's history. ;November

Venice Venice ( ; ; , formerly ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 islands that are separated by expanses of open water and by canals; portions of the city are li ...

Italy had the highest water levels for more than 50 years caused hundreds of millions of euros of possibly irreparable damage in Venice. ;December The 2019 United Nations Climate Change Conference was held in Madrid, Spain, from 2 to 13 December 2019. 2019 California wildfires had over $25bn cost in damage. The Australian wildfires in December 2019 were intense. Record low rainfall contributed to a continent-scale emergency that burned more than 5 million hectares and alarmed scientists, doctors and firefighters. On 19 December 2019 average temperature maximum in Australia hit the record 41.9C. According to

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

Fires in New South Wales and Queensland emitted from August to December 306 million tons of carbon dioxide, which is more than half of Australia’s total greenhouse gas footprint in 2018.Bushfires Release Over Half Australia’s Annual Carbon Emissions
Time 24 December 2019

References

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