Google Earth’s new Timelapse feature, released Thursday, offers a bird’s-eye view of nearly four decades of environmental transformation, allowing viewers to see how the climate emergency, a planetary crisis powered by fossil-fueled capitalism, has unfolded since 1984. .
The new tool “was inspired by the desire to show us exactly what climate change looks like,” he said Fashion
Rebecca Moore, a director of Google Earth, wrote in a blog post Thursday that “visual evidence can get to the heart of the debate in a way that words cannot and convey complex issues to anyone.”
As Fashion reported:
Using 24 million satellite images representing quadrillion pixels collected over 37 years (largely thanks to NASA), TimeLapse is an interactive, 4-D experience that illustrates how certain parts of the planet have changed at an incredible rate. See how sea ice in Greenland has melted as the planet warms, contributing to global sea level rise; how deforestation in the Amazon has intensified over the past 20 years; how the Aral Sea has dried up to a fraction of its size since the early 2000s; how decades of wildfires have hit Yellabinna, Australia. In Naypyitaw, Myanmar, and Dubai, UAE, you can see skylines popping up seemingly overnight, referring to the environmental costs of rapid urbanization.
According to Kate Brandt, Google’s sustainability officer, “These kind of poignant images play a very important role in the environmental movement.”
“I think a lot about the ‘Earthrise’ image taken by the Apollo 8 crew in 1968, where the Earth rose above the lunar horizon – people often call that a catalyst of the modern environmental movement, because we suddenly [grasped] the fragility and preciousness of the planet, ”Brandt said Fashion.
“Photos of the Cuyahoga River that caught fire in 1969 because it was so polluted, including imprisoned people,” she added. “It led to water regulation and ultimately the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. We think Timelapse has a similar power to educate, inspire and visually show what is happening on our planet.”
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To see ‘what’s happening’ to our fragile and precious planet, explore Google Earth’s Time Lapse feature, a powerful new tool shown in this video:
“There is a place in our universe. How we treat it today will determine our future,” says the narrator. “What do you think, what are you going to do, when you see our world change before your own eyes?”
Google has also produced videos that focus on the specific consequences associated with the decline of oceans and forests, as well as the rapid expansion of cities.
Watch how oceans have changed:
Check out how forests have changed:
See how cities have changed:
As Fashion noted, “Brandt is quick to mention that Timelapse isn’t just a bunch of bad news. In Rondonia, Brazil, we can see how the Surui people have protected their homes from deforestation, or how China has installed hundreds of solar parks in its landscape.”
“We’ve had so much impact on the planet in just 37 years, but this also points to ways we can have a positive impact,” Brandt told the magazine. “Science tells us we have to do that in the next decade. We want this to be very visceral and real to humans, and a ray of hope that we can actually do a lot.”