|
 |
Seeing the world's endangered places -- responsibly
 Top Five Eco-Destinations
Visit the Go Green Travel Center!
Share Your Ideas for Green Travel
Go Carbon Neutral on Your Next Flight!
Do you want to go skiing in the Alps, see the glaciers that gave Glacier National Park its name or scuba dive among the brilliantly colored corals of the Great Barrier Reef? If so, you'd better hurry -- thanks to the realities of global warming, these destinations and many others are in danger.
Awareness of these growing environmental threats has created a new trend in the travel industry, known variously as climate change travel, climate change sightseeing, global warming travel, even the tourism of doom. Spurred by the threat that global warming poses to many popular destinations, travelers are hurrying to see these places before they disappear. But in doing so, they may be contributing to the problem; carbon emissions from flights, rental cars and other tourist activities only help further climate change.
This conflict creates an ethical dilemma for travelers looking to see the world without harming it. Can the benefits of travel outweigh its environmental impact? What questions should you consider when deciding whether to visit an endangered destination? And if you do decide to travel, how can you minimize your environmental footprint? Read on.
Disappearing Destinations
Global warming has left few places untouched. Rising temperatures have damaged Vermont's maple syrup industry, shortened the ski season in the Rocky Mountains and contributed to the rise of a beetle that's decimating Canadian forests. The combination of melting glaciers and rising oceans threatens to flood low-lying lands such as Bangladesh, the Netherlands and the small Pacific island of Tuvalu. Global warming has even been blamed for the hurricanes that have devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in recent years.
However, though climate change will continue to affect many beloved tourist destinations, there are certain areas of the world that are particularly vulnerable -- to the point that they may be altered irrevocably over the next few decades. Here are a few:
Alaska: Alaska is warming five times faster than the rest of the planet, jeopardizing its famous glaciers and frozen tundra. That's bad news not only for travelers seeking snowy scenery but also for Alaskans living in remote coastal villages, where receding ice is literally melting the ground out from under their feet.
Venice: This most beautiful and fragile of Italian cities is no stranger to floods; thanks to its location on the shifting sediments of a lagoon, Venice has been sinking for centuries, and tides have long ebbed and flowed through the city's stately squares. However, in the second half of the 20th century, the flooding accelerated. In 1900, St. Mark's Square was only flooded seven times; in 1996, it happened 99 times. Rising ocean levels due to global warming pose a huge threat to this low-lying city. The Italian government has begun constructing steel gates at the entrances to the Venetian lagoon, designed to block tidal surges from flooding the city. However, these barriers may not be enough to cope with global warming, and may also cause ecological and waste management problems for the city.
Glacier National Park: In a few decades, the name of Montana's famous park may be a misnomer; according to current projections, the glaciers here will be gone within 30 years. They have already receded so visibly that scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey are using the park as a major site for research on climate change.
The Great Barrier Reef: Australia's Great Barrier Reef encompasses one of the world's most fascinating ecosystems -- but it's also one of its most vulnerable. Rising water temperatures and other factors such as over-fishing and coastal land use have wreaked stress on delicate corals, leading to several mass bleaching events in the past decade. One Australian scientist predicts that "reefbuilding corals are likely to disappear as dominant organisms on coral reefs between 2020 and 2050." The loss of the reef's coral will have a ripple effect on the rest of the marine ecosystem in the decades to come.
The Alps: Scientists predict that most of the glaciers in the Alps could be gone as soon as 2037, and the region's annual snowfall has also been on the decline for the last few decades. Many local ski resorts have had to produce more snow (which, ironically, contributes to the problem of global warming by using more energy), while others have closed up shop altogether. And a few have taken a more drastic step: wrapping their glaciers in blankets to prevent further melting.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
Share This Page:
E-Mail
Print
RSS
Save
|
