tears and talk with people experiencing a changing environment will be ice disappears earlier and it keeps retreating our future depends on what happens here. more than whites in the circle starts december 21st g.w. . the field of science has been helping humans understand the world and has made our lives easier from prehistoric inventions modern communication technology which means also use science to give back to nature by studying renewable sources of energy by building satellites that help us get to the groundwater levels by turning

nice to improve loserville fields for me just a few on today's show we introduce you to some people and projects who are using scientific inquiry to help the and why that alone welcome to equal india i'm sorry that i. our 1st stop to be. invested in this region is one of the worst in the country would be a far more persistent droughts and green for many a farmer who give up farming and become an industrial. but if scientific data could accurately predict weather patterns and provide farmers with information they could still have a short and they primarily like an organization in the region helping farmers best exactly. a look at

a smartphone farm. all he needs to know. now is the ideal time to fertilize his fields he also knows which fertilizer to use and in which quantity the 40 year old resident of shifu village uses the farm precise app which especially developed for farmers in the indian state of maharashtra the app improves by making cultivation and livestock farming easier to organize. when speed and direction the sounds of the birds and when they make these sounds. my final generations used to use these as indicators to identify climate patterns will it end tomorrow we live in the day after we live in at all this is how our elders used to predict the weather a few years later we got the information via the radio then through the television after that through newspapers our farming practices would be entirely based on that

most of the time these estimates were incorrect. they were going to get on the. the mainstream weather forecasts entire regions but local weather conditions can be complete. different. climate change is also making the weather increasingly unpredictable for farmers. time and again droughts and floods lead to harvest failures in recent years. the watershed trust look for ways to help these farmers and to combat poverty in regions the result was farm precise and easy to operate up which functions even with only a weak signal. in these early release. in strong automotive weather stations in the produce relays it is so has to make a community of it and we have trained locally who you would hope using baking

observation from. shared with the community but as the technology are the ones. we started getting online on an hourly basis. or put it out of use to noted down the daily information about the. forecasts and shared with the community. the fun precise op offers 5 day weather forecasts and up to date information for good field management all in simple language and easy to use. resist i wonder whether we used to use any fertilizer or pesticide that we could get our hands on. but with the farm precise if i don't have enough information about a particular fertilized the a pesticide i can just take a photograph of the crop and post it on the chrissy some word for them in the app. within an hour we receive feedback and advice about what we should doubt about or

if we should use a particular substance in a particular proportion after particular time of day. in 2014 farmers in the state of maharashtra pradesh were hit by weather related losses totaling some 900000000 euros. since then the app hasn't only provided assistance for planting fertilization and harvesting crops. the farmers can also find the latest market prices and work out the best time to sell their produce as a result osgod mostly has to use his losses and he's even turning a profit now. mino she mostly also lives in the region and uses the op to tend to whole farm as well. she says barely a thought of all women here on a smartphone she shares her knowledge and wants to motivate other women to take advantage of the available tools laugh at what i'm with over language climate

change is making farming more and more difficult we need technology to help us with this i started a self-help group for 15 women and i encourage them to use this because i've learned a lot from it and they and their families can learn a lot from it they're starting to appreciate it and see its benefits. where we. farm precise developers see over $3500.00 farmers now use their free app which is so far still only available in hindi. that number could easily rise when the watershed organization trust but stay out online in another tree languages. now we may all need lot more it but a lot of the things we use in our life come from fossil fuels this undoubtedly is a detriment to the bobbit need plastics in the ocean or mountains of bio degradable released scientists have been looking for substitutes gong to constrict and

sometimes they've been successful we met a professor in germany who seemingly magical things. in a working substitute for. this building is getting added thermal insulation and damp proofing from polystyrene for every year of the 10000000 tons of the synthetic material are turned into everything from for star cladding to disposable bowls and cups and packaging. but one extremely useful the downside of the material is that it is essentially non-biodegradable and takes centuries to break down and as it does it releases miniscule particles into the ground and our waters. plus. this man has a plan to replace the plastic polluted since 2008. poor and his team have been looking into an environmentally friendly alternative popcorn. similar to

polystyrene phone if it consists of a mass of cavities filled with there are no. i can see them when you go sector piece of popcorn and examine it under the microscope that's what makes it so light . like the market researcher and his team have already used popcorn to create kitchen furniture they're saying many factories the range of potential applications for popcorn the 1st step is to turn it into a massive granules all the same size the original maize is grown in germany well that is land intensive on the plus side the material will help to reduce fossil fuel consumption. and you can read it it tastes a lot like popcorn except there's no sugar or salt or chop wood of course so the taste is a bit boring. so. the granules have been pressed

together to form sheets or panels with plum proceeding providing the bonding agent as opposed to synthetic chemicals this makes the material compostable and even suitable as animal fodder. for the team of pioneers in the field. they also used a hot egg on to compare the thermal conductivity of polystyrene phone to that of popcorn and then measure the heat that penetrates through to the back in the case of polystyrene foam the sensor reads 28 degrees celsius while the popcorn board is even better at absorbing the heat here the reading is under $25.00 degrees. and you could use it in particular in areas of india to provide buildings with insulation from the heat or cold. you can cripple houses with the panels in the walls or on the facades. or you can also use them as insulation for solid building

. the. material also performs better in the flammability test the polystyrene burns up at a frightening speed immediately beginning to melt and release toxic gases. subjected to the same flame the panel of popcorn barely catches fire. in this case the damage was limited to the. grandson being singed. kalyan patch is the design in the team. she started experimenting with popcorn 2 and a half years ago and has now many affected her 1st pieces of furniture with the revolutionary material.

and we might soon be seeing child sized chairs and tables like these replacing their plastic counterparts. when they can other children have grown out of the furniture they can be shredded and recycled to create another new material. in movement and after being replanted can in turn be made into new items on you don't know your object of the house have a state. the research team is working with a number of partners in the packaging and construction industries who have realized the potential and a reason the poor is happy to pass on the fruits of years of research on the material. press conference in the uk he hopes to see environmentally friendly products made from popcorn replacing polystyrene foam on a large scale and the sooner the better.

the 1st popcorn packaging is due to go on the market in the fall of 2021 and will hopefully help to reduce the world's growing mountains of plastic waste. fossil fuels cause harm to our planet yes we all agree to that but to grow means on a large scale as an alternative to plastics we need a large area also for thailand which would otherwise be used for inable crops in the real world how feasible are environmentally friendly substitutes let's ask specialist researchers in germany to find out what. the seeds of the great. food oil and feed for livestock. has developed a means to combat we. toil ecofriendly and could replace the plastic foil and

toxic chemicals used to protect crops. compared to a standard total herbicide such as. oil and natural material that inhibits growth would be preferable. to. a maze is a staple food in much of the world it's also the source of ethyl alcohol used as a bio fuel for cars and trucks it's said to be less damaging to the environment than regular gas maize and rapeseed it too important natural resources. at the campus of the technical university of new nick a team of scientists want to determine under what conditions use of these resources is truly sustainable. the broom has developed contains rake seed starch and other naturally occurring substances. it can be sprayed on the ground around crops such as vines to inhibit the growth of weed.

it's an alternative to the plastic mulch foil much houston farms around the world before helps maintain moisture in the soil and prevent. most of which is made from conventional plastic which is made from petroleum. alternative has considerable advantages some of those conflicts it's made entirely of naturally occurring raw materials. and are sealed to me troll. and water. it's the reverse the tiled. food feed and biofuel materials made from expanded corn might eventually replace palestine and insulation and packaging that would reduce c o 2 emissions that is that enough to make a natural resource sustainable. it is not just about emitting less. we also

consider social criteria fair remuneration in the respective countries. or your regarding the agricultural context where does the maize come from from land that is biologically high value with a lot of biodiversity or fields where old growth forests or rain forests used to be . the father criterion for sustainability is where the materials can be recycled most conventional plastics company p.t. from say bottles can be used. but much too much plastic waste and littering the environment slowly crumbling into ever smaller fragments. from micro plastics can be found in the soil just about everywhere they come from a range of sources rubbish dumps and sewage sludge used as fertilizer on fields and we don't yet know what effect these particles have on the structure of soils or

whether the effect. worked. the spray on rape seed mulch by contrast eventually washes away at a predictable pace. our material is biodegradable plastic foil often soiled and contaminated with other chemicals and has to be disposed of or recycled with great care our material can stay out in the field. as it decomposes all that remains are a few non toxic salts the to kyron they check anyway it's a home this product derived from nature. this is definitely a concern. before finding the perfect vollmer for substituting plastics but what do you want to look at existing supply and demand models and find a solution that big bang will need for example it has had a long tradition of joint production and cultivation but today follows

a producing excess joint and not being able to send all of it leaving behind a huge plus a local scientist seems to have found the well fit solution to this problem. it looks like plastic it feels like plastic but it isn't it's a plant based product. part about you like you can make had this thing it would be the pool packaging materials it would be the normal packaging material you could with the government by getting material it would be the. shopping bag fingal you from paying back as. khan has spent years coming up with a substitute for plastic the raw material he works with is jute from which he creates a water soluble base 40 he then adds a natural starch based binding agent. most certainly in one part. then we use some other chemicals i'm not mentioning this chemical because that is they're

more part of this tradition and then we get this. final. product which can then be made into a for oil now khan is hoping that his invention dubbed dishonestly will draw global interest. this is their different polypropylene you can see that's tied up morning if you can reproduce that drop this is. the group that does it before the market particularly embraced but when you've gone this might finally. if there is no drop of plastic here. just like they perceive after a while ashes all that remains. this is the.

land where probably more jute will be grown like here the plant is the number one natural fiber grown in bangladesh it's composed primarily of cellulose the main component in sauna. is one of 3000000 jute farmers in bangladesh what he's harvesting now he only sowed 4 months ago. the climate in bangladesh is ideal for growing this crop which requires plenty of water heat and humidity. to do. the jute fibers are found inside the stands and have to be separated from the rest of the plant. it's painstaking manual labor the whole family lends a hand. once again it's not been a good year for the fama floodwaters washed away a part of his crop and prices have dropped so he won't get as much for what he's managed to harvest. you have to borrow money just to make ends meet.

buyers who that was i have no idea what will happen alternately because jeered they tell me the government isn't buying much because demand from foreign markets is down so they don't offer us good prices but i have to sell it to them anyway. around 40000000 people in bangladesh make their living from jilt either directly or indirectly. project could change their lives but. at the moment it's still at the experimentation stage. the government is funding the pilot. production at this factory. with this new machine will soon be producing a ton of sonali a day. is that maybe somebody's going to. go for a whole or because it is a lot of. songs and. the juice industry is one of the

biggest economic sectors in bangladesh. it's viewed as a kind of national treasure closely linked with the state's founding and for many years its only export many here hopes on early could help breathe new life into the industry. the digital revolution and the big it has provided us with has given us a big push to be more and more environmentally friendly young people around the world are leading this trend and are more aware and deliberate about protecting the nature that surrounds them in the next. cities we met one such group of students that's the. 1000000 dollar limit livable is best achieved with the help of people who live here via where using new technology to contribute to a better understanding of traffic. i would like to see the city

authorities and the general public taking care of the trees. these students are applying their coding and programming skills to the development of applications and devices to make cities more ecologically sustainable. it looks relaxed but they're actually taking part in an intensive summer school at city lab . the veterans have almost doubled around us is full of technology and had microcontrollers like this you can see how much of it though both invisible and indispensable in our. what's really well hey we want to make things with them selves. that. at various workshops during the 9 days of the summer school the participants develop all kinds of ideas and inventions all in a relaxed atmosphere outside of the classroom the city lab is

a venture that brings people in berlin together to work on sustainable urban development you know if we meet outdoors in the fresh air and work in pretty interesting technology and topics. so much we've got on like you have some online lectures but now we're working together on group projects so cool when it's a misstep because everything has been remote since the coronavirus here now at long last we can work together again as the topics are interesting and some. $54.00 students from 4 berlin universities took part in the summer school this year this online lecture by professor cullinane schrader was about digitalisation and sustainability she says urban development processes need to be more inclusive. zakk and day to be made available to very different groups in society including people who don't have much experience with the internet who can't write computer programs how can they nonetheless access data and use it to develop something new

and because. most of the workshop participants are studying business information systems and are already used to working with technology and computer programs. they relish the opportunity to brainstorm and work on innovative sustainable and eco friendly projects. yeah your line on going to compound which has no names on up on it i've used a solar panels and a lithium battery to build a device to charge a mobile phone i'm on small round i development board and a lot. including spots. it lets you work even when there's no external source of electricity compared to way off grid and. among the projects developed by the students at the summer school. a new system of hydroponics for city plants and a digital map of sustainability initiatives. to

did you tell us you will never numb time digitise ation wasn't considered to be very important in germany and that includes the government it requires major investments so if you want to digitalize an entire country it takes a lot of herself says that's also the case with promoting sustainability and there's still a long way to go up if you're me up tight. these students are seizing the moment to press ahead to make perhaps eventually the larger world smarter greener and more sustainable. the use of science and technology can help intentional action for the good of the i hope even cottage to to be to use your scientific book to help. in walkable big or small we can i'll give you that cotton

see you again next week until the body.

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