Science World[R] celebrates Earth Day! April 22 is Earth Day. What are you going to do to help save the planet?The first Earth Day took place 37 years ago. The event was a call to action: The planet was in trouble and it needed help. Just one year earlier, on June 22, 1969, Ohio's oil-polluted Cuyahoga River Cuyahoga River River, northeastern Ohio, U.S. It flows past Akron, where it drops into a deep valley and turns north, emptying into Lake Erie at Cleveland. It is navigable for lake freighters for only about 5 mi (8 km) of its total length of about 80 mi (130 km). had caught fire. And that wasn't the first time for a waterway to ignite. Similar scenes were taking place on the Buffalo River Buffalo River can refer to:
New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of State, and the Rouge River in Michigan. Concerned citizens banded together on the first Earth Day in 1970 to demand a change in the government's response to polluters. Soon after, the Clean Water Act was put in place with a goal of cleaning up the country's waterways. According to the Environmental Protection Agency Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), independent agency of the U.S. government, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1970 to reduce and control air and water pollution, noise pollution, and radiation and to ensure the safe handling and (EPA EPA eicosapentaenoic acid. EPA abbr. eicosapentaenoic acid EPA, n.pr See acid, eicosapentaenoic. EPA, n. ), approximately 60 percent of our lakes and rivers are safe for swimming and fishing today, compared with just 36 percent in 1972. This Earth Day, people around the world will celebrate the environmental gains made so far and set fresh goals. Your generation faces new challenges: global warming, destruction of rain forests, and loss of species, to name a few. But you can make a difference. In this issue, Science World takes a look at what young people are doing to protect the planet. For instance, Bobby Ungwiluk, a teen from St. Lawrence Island St. Lawrence Island is located west of mainland Alaska in the Bering Sea, just south of the Bering Strait, at about 64° North 170° 28' West. It is part of Alaska, but closer to Russia than to the Alaskan mainland. St. , Alaska, is spreading the word about the threats of global warming (see p. 8). And this fall, students from around the globe will gather in Australia to race the environmentally friendly cars that they've built (see p. 12). What can you do to help the planet? Check out Science World's list of Earth-friendly actions (p. 18). Then, go to www.scholastic.com/earthday to share your Earth Day plans with other teens. --Happy Earth Day, Patricia Janes, Editor |
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