1) Drones That Plant Trees
Did you know: The world loses 18.3 million acres of forest each year, or 27 soccer fields worth of trees every minute, according to the World Wildlife Fund.
This is happening even though trees are vital to life on earth. As the biggest plants on the planet, trees provide us with oxygen, store carbon, they balance the soil and provide us with delicious fruit – not to mention materials for tools and shelter. Plus, they’re just plain beautiful.
While planting seeds by hand helps, it’s becoming increasingly challenging to match the pace of industrial deforestation.
That’s why engineers from around the world are developing all types of new and innovative solutions. One UK-based company is actually using drones to spray tree seeds throughout destroyed forests and claim they can plant 1 billion trees per year!
According to National Geographic, once these planting drones map out the ideal locations, they hover 6 feet above the ground and fire seeds so fast that they get perfectly implanted into the soil.
Don’t know about you – but this is one innovation we are incredibly excited for!
2) Solar Panels Of The Future
Solar panels have become increasingly popular – you may even have one on the roof of your house. That’s where they are usually installed or in large fields to gather massive amounts of direct sunlight.
While these panels continue to help the environment and the negative effects of climate change, scientists are still looking for new ways to harvest solar energy.
After years of experimentation, Chinese scientists may have found a way to harvest energy from raindrops (say, what?!).
Even solar panel roads are now being tested, and researchers at Michigan State University strongly believe that every window and cell phone screen could begin harvesting the sun’s energy. If these experiments actually do what scientists believe they can… it could be an absolute game changer.
3) Technology That Blocks Out The Sun
2019 has been one hottest Summers (and really, years) ever recorded. If that wasn’t bad enough, a recent report by US government agencies predicted that temperatures could rise by about as much as 7.5 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century if current trends continue, which would cause catastrophic environmental changes.
Unless there’s somehow a massive reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, researchers at Harvard are now proposing to send “sun-blocking particles” into the air to cool the planet and hopefully prevent a ton of negative consequences that climate change could bring.
This might sound like “end-of-the world” technology, but interestingly enough, the same particles they are recommending are already being released into the atmosphere by cars and factories, according to a Harvard geo-engineer.
A well planned and intentional strategy to block the sun, he said, “could help to buy some more time for countries to reduce their emissions — the only realistic way to avert climate change.”