The ozone layer serves a very important purpose: it protects Earth from harmful rays from the Sun. It absorbs these rays so they are less powerful when they reach us. A new film and mobile game created for the United Nations are aiming to help young people understand the challenge of protecting the ozone layer.

The new film and mobile game are both called Reset Earth and are set in the year 2084, where three teenagers are trying to find the cause of a deadly disease called “The Grow” . In this alternate reality they discover it’s because humans did not do enough to save the ozone layer by improving products: such as fridges, air conditioners and aerosols. Some of these items use substances that can become greenhouse gases and harm the ozone layer. Thankfully, in real life, people did come together and put rules in place in the 1980s to protect the ozone layer and give it a chance to recover.

The free animated film is being released first, and it tells the story of the three heroes -. Knox, Sagan and Terran - as they travel back to different points in history. The mobile game version of Reset Earth follows on 10 February and will put you in the characters’ shoes for a platform game set in four different “time zone jumps”.

“The protection of the ozone layer cannot be considered a done deal. It must be a continuous effort by us and by future generations,” says Megumi Seki, from the United Nations’ Ozone Secretarial department, which created Reset Earth. “If our children learn about the grim consequences of a ruined ozone layer. . . they will be aware of its importance and protect it. ”

A report from Greenpeace USA shows only a small amount of the plastic we think we’re recycling is actually getting recycled. The rest of it is transported to landfills(废弃物填埋场).

“It was surprising, even to us,” says John Hocevar, Greenpeace USA’s Oceans Campaign Director. “There are billions of us going through trillions and trillions of throwaway plastic items a year. Almost none of that is recycled.”

According to the report, only 8.4% of the total post-consumer plastic waste created in the USA is recycled. That’s out of nearly 35 million tons of materials.

Ian Monahan from I Love a Clean San Diego says they’ve been working for years to educate people around the county about what should and should not be put in the blue recycling bins(回收箱).

The county has a website, waste freesd.org, which includes a full database of recyclable items and also runs a customer service hotline for people to ask questions. Monahan says people in San Diego can feel confident in putting #1 PET (common water and soda bottles) and #2 HDPE (plastic jugs and household bottles) plastics in their bins, as well as most other kinds of rigid(具刚性的) plastic.

But the long-term future of recycling is up in the air. In 2018, China, which had been the largest importer of recyclable materials, stopped buying recyclable plastic from the USA. What’s more, the cost of making new plastic is now cheaper than recycling old items. Therefore, Monahan says people need to focus more on “reduce” and “reuse”, and less on “recycle”.

Monahan suggests people who want to do better should pick one plastic item to eliminate(消除) a month, like straws(吸管). As they get used to that, they can eliminate another, and eventually, he says, they can reduce the need for plastic altogether.

To help, Greenpeace USA is putting pressure on companies to stop using plastic packaging,   and also fighting for tougher standards to make sure items marked as recyclable can actually be recycled.

While riding hard on a bike, do you feel like you are saving the planet? Or do you just feel out of breath? In fact, cycling is now considered one of the best weapons mankind can use in the fight against climate change.

The United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution (决议) in March supporting bicycles as a tool for dealing with climate change. The resolution calls on member states to “add the bicycle to public transportation, in the city and countryside, in developing and developed countries”, with all 193 members of the UN agreeing upon the resolution.

The decision has received positive comments from different groups in support of cycling and the environmental awareness internationally. “It’s an important step toward the recognition of cycling as an important means of transport,” said the European Cyclists Federation.

The resolution from the UN comes at a time when climate change has returned to the center of the world’s attention. On February 28, the UN published a new report assessing (评估) recent climate change trends (趋势). The report warns that the world’s average temperature will rise by 1.5 C above pre-industrial levels (1850-1900), with more than 40% of the world’s population being “easily affected” to these temperature changes.

Cycling is an environmentally friendly means of transport. Choosing to take a bike instead of a car just once a day can reduce a person’s carbon emission (碳排放) from transport by 67 percent, according to a research by the University of Oxford. The research also found that cyclists produced 84 percent lower CO 2 emissions from all daily travel than non-cyclists.

Cycling has grown in popularity as people who take public transport to work wish to stay away from crowded public transport and also like taking any opportunity to exercise. Cycling culture has been further encouraged with the influence of COVID-19. In May 2020, bike sales in Spain increased 22 times compared with 2019. In London, large parts of the city are being closed off to cars so that people can walk and cycle safely.

More importantly, the resolution focuses on bike-sharing services, which could be seen as recognition of China’s bike-sharing success, noted CGTN. China has some of the largest bike-sharing systems in the world. This means of transport that produces zero emissions reduces the amount of CO2 sent out into the atmosphere (大气层) by 4.8 million tons every year, according to a 2020 report from the World Resources Institute.