As people across the globe stay home to stop the spread of the new coronavirus, Earth is becoming cleaner and more wild.
, director of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, assembled a group of researchers to assess the ecological changes happening while so much of humanity is housebound. Scientists, stuck at home like the rest of us, said they are eager to explore unexpected changes in weeds, insects, weather patterns, noise and light pollution.
“In many ways we kind of whacked the Earth system with a sledgehammer and now we see what Earth’s response is,” Field said.Among other things, researchers are tracking dramatic drops in traditional air pollutants, such as nitrogen dioxide, smog and tiny particles.
Compared to the previous five years, March air pollution is down 46% in Paris, 38% in Sydney, 29% in Los Angeles, 26% in Rio de Janeiro and 9% in Durban, South Africa, NASA measurements show. “We’re getting a glimpse of what might happen if we start switching to non-polluting cars,” Lefer said.New Delhi’s skyline on Nov. 1, top, and on April 20. India’s air quality improved drastically during a nationwide lockdown to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
Cleaner air has been most noticeable in India and China. On April 3, residents of Jalandhar, a city in north India’s Punjab, woke up to a view not seen for decades: snow-capped Himalayan peaks more than 100 miles away.
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