Appoquinimink High School

Have you noticed the lack of snow?

Have you noticed the lack of snow? That has become more of an apparent question in recent years. Or, will we ever expect to see more than a couple of flurries? With climate change, I can answer the question for you, no. Climate change is becoming more apparent than ever, and people still call it a hoax. Since 2000, this year 2023 saw the least amount of snow accumulation recorded at only 0.4 inches compared to last year at 10.7 inches (“Most Yearly Snow in Wilmington History,” n.d.). It is obvious that climate change is real, and to be able to foster this challenge of creating a better and healthy planet, we need to first understand climate change. Climate change is to put it simply the changing of our climate, so the temperature and weather are alternating from what would normally occur. For example, the abnormal snowstorm that occurred in Texas last year, without a doubt, was caused by climate change. From the snow and freezing temperatures agriculture was affected, and the crops, livestock, plants, and trees were all killed (Schattenberg, 2021). So climate change is occurring throughout the world because of OUR actions, we have caused and allowed this to happen. We continue to only care about ourselves, and not our planet. The main contributor to climate change is the burning of fossil fuels, like coal, or natural gas. These are non-renewable so they cannot be replaced, so to continue to produce the energy we have to CONTINUE to burn fossil fuels. These toxic pollutants like carbon dioxide are then released into the air and this harms the environment, thus resulting in climate change. I could go on and on about how climate change is created but the main issue here is how we fix it.

To begin, the first step in creating change is making people aware, people need to be exposed to the hard truth of our climate reality. But the key to the future is through me, well not exactly, but through the children, teens, young adults, and future generations because WE are the future. If we do not inform the generation of children now then they will not care about the climate for the future and that mindset will continue with their children until we do not have a planet left to care for. The main idea is to bring people together. I want a healthier Delaware, and I bet other Delawareans can agree.

The next step would be to start creating solutions once people become aware. We currently have electric cars but what about cars that are powered using solar panels, instead of gasoline-powered cars? While this could pose a challenge during cloudy days and the winter months since we get less sunlight during that time, we could use artificial sunlight. This could perhaps cause people to also use more public transportation. To branch off, public transportation should become more common in southern areas of Delaware, not just in the north like Wilmington, but like Middletown, and Townsend because it is not as common. If we utilize public transportation than there will be less cars on the road emitting all those harmful pollutants. Also, another idea is to just plant more trees, as Delaware becomes more populated and companies continue to build more housing, trees are getting torn down. While I do not think we will be able to stop the production of residential buildings, we can plant more trees to help clean the air. We could create a law to require people that own single-family homes to plant 2-3 trees on their property if space allows it. We the youth could come out and help plant those trees for people, it does not only bring together the community of Delaware but it helps our planet as well.

Also, just continuing the use of recyclable energy from the use of nuclear power plants, the steam that is produced spins a turbine to generate electricity so no fossil fuels are being emitted (Office of Nuclear Energy, 2021). There are still cons to nuclear power plants like they are expensive to build/maintain, and can produce radioactive waste. But overall, these are just some of ideas that could be used to help put a stop to climate change.

However, the real question would be how do we as a community in Delaware get these plans set in motion? We as the youth living in Delaware can act through protest to get our voices heard, to request a change, and to request more action from the government. So, bringing the youth together in Delaware is key so we can collaborate and come up with ideas to create a healthier Delaware. These ideas that we came up with for Delaware could then branch off to the rest of the United States, like I said before change starts with US. I want a future here in Delaware, I want my kids to be able to have a future here in Delaware but that can only happen if we take action NOW to put a stop to climate change, because I want to see more snow. Don’t you want your kids to be able to make snow angels? We need more than a couple of flurries to do that, so let’s create change now!

Works Cited

Most Yearly Snow in Wilmington History. (n.d.). https://www.extremeweatherwatch.com/cities/wilmington-de/most-yearly-snow

Clark, C. (2021, March 2). Agricultural Losses From Winter Storm Exceed $600 Million – Texas A&M Today. Texas a&M Today.

https://today.tamu.edu/2021/03/02/agricultural-losses-from-winter-storm-exceed-600-million/

Reasons Why Nuclear is Clean and Sustainable. (n.d.). Energy.gov.

https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/3-reasons-why-nuclear-clean-and-sustainable