ShmoopTube

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Mother Earth giveth natural resources, and mankind taketh them away. [Hands grab resources and takes them away]

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Yeah, there’s a problem. There are already 7 billion people on this planet. [Earth rotates in space]

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By 2050, the United Nations projects there will be 2 billion more, [UNESCO population figure appears]

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and that’s on Highway 5 alone.

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And a lot of these folks are going to want laptops, sushi, and gas guzzlers. [Cars moving on road]

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Can Mother Earth keep up with the insatiable human race? [Limousine arrives]

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Well, resource optimists say, “Hey, no problem.

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We’re always coming up with clever ways to get the resources we need,”

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as they drill for oil and sushi. [Sushi rains from an oil rig]

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Resource pessimists, however, think humanity is toast.

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There are too many people using too many resources, often wastefully,

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and there’s no political will to check population growth or resource consumption. [Man gives presentation]

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Well, this is the debate over natural resources in a nutshell.

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Should we carry on as we are, using what the Earth provides without a thought, [Oil rig drills oil]

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or should we be drawing straws to see, you know,

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who gets the last roll of sushi? [Everyone draws a straw]

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Well, if we’re going to talk natural resources, let’s start with the T. rex in the room:

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fossil fuels. Without oil, coal, and natural gas, [Dinosaur appears and scares man]

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our lives would be very different and very cold…

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And we’re not Elsa—you know, the cold has always bothered us, anyway. [Elsa peeps from behind the rock]

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However, our use of fossil fuels is terrible for the environment.

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Moreover, our inability to kick our oil habit causes economic

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and security problems in other parts of the world.

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Well, sure, we could ditch the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries,

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a.k.a. OPEC, a.k.a. the group of nations that controls much of the world’s oil supply. [OPEC conference is in progress]

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Well, this might do something about our economic and security concerns,

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but then we’d just look to our friendly neighbors to the north for more Texas tea,

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and everybody knows the tar sands up in Alberta are an environmental disaster. [Athabasca oil field photos appears]

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Or, we could frack for oil.

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No, we’re not saying you should cuss the way they do on Battlestar Galactica; [Silver Surfer appears]

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we’re talking about a slurry of chemicals and water poured into the ground

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so we can force up oil to our waiting SUVs. [Pipe injecting slurry]

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Lots of people don’t like fracking, though, because it causes earthquakes

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in weird places and dumps patented blends of chemicals

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into ground water supplies. And speaking of water, [Chemical spills in sea]

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the drinkable stuff is fast disappearing from the planet.

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And then there are the tropical rain forests.

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While the people of Brazil can be forgiven for wanting land [Photos of polluted water]

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on which to raise livestock and grow food,

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well, those trees aren’t coming back anytime soon, [Cow farts]

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and that spells trouble for all of us who want to keep breathing clean air.

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So, yeah, it’s bad. We’re destroying our environment, [Guy enters scene and shrugs]

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and we don’t seem to care.

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The U.S. failed to sign the 1997 Kyoto Protocol

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because or political representatives thought the treaty would put

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too much of a burden on us to lower emissions. [Political representatives look annoyed]

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Well, guess who put the emissions in the air in the first place? Yeah,

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good going U.S. If you’re feeling depressed right now, well, so are we.

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Somebody hand us some chocolate, which might also be a fond memory [Someone brings chocolate for depressed girl]

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sooner than we think. Thing is, we’ve managed to correct

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our erroneous environmental ways in the past. [Girl starts crying again]

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We got on board with the Montreal Protocol of 1987,

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which limits the amount of ozone depleting chemicals

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that get sprayed into the atmosphere. We know this treaty has made [Video plays on TV]

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a difference because the hole in the ozone hasn’t gotten any bigger. [God gives thumps up]

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We’re fighting a battle for life as we know it on planet Earth.

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It’s a battle for glaciers and polar bears, and our ability [Polar bear family floats]

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to eat Dungeness crab in the fall. Question is,

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are we willing to give up some things in order to

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save everything, including ourselves? [Uncle Sam sees doctor]

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