German carmaker BMW said on Monday that it would reduce CO2 emissions per vehicle by “at least one third” across its entire fleet by 2030.
“As a premium car company, it is our ambition to lead the way in sustainability. That is why we are taking responsibility here and now and making these issues central to our future strategic direction,” said Oliver Zipse, chairman of the board of management (CEO) at BMW.
The targets should be reached throughout the entire lifecycle of BMW vehicles, from the supply chain through production to the end of the use phase, said BMW.
For around 2.5 million vehicles, which BMW produced in 2019, a reduction of CO2 emissions by one third would correspond to an annual reduction of more than 40 million tons of CO2.
Having already lowered production emissions per vehicle by more than 70 percent since 2006, BMW would now aim to reduce its emissions by a further 80 percent from 2019 levels by 2030 at its own plants and sites responsible for around 90 percent of BMW’s overall emissions.
In addition, BMW set a target of more than 7 million electrified vehicles with around two-thirds of them with a fully-electric drive train within the next ten years. By the end of 2021, BMW is planning to offer five fully-electric production vehicles.
Already at the beginning of July, BMW announced plans to produce electric drives for more than half a million electrified vehicles per year by 2022 at its largest European production site in Dingolfing, Germany.
To that end, the German carmaker also announced to expand its plants in order to increase “production capacity significantly” in the coming years as BMW was seeking to “ramp up electromobility and set standards for the transformation of our industry.”
The prices of single-use plastic bags will increase significantly, as the Parliament accepted a regulation on disposable plastic packaging materials because of environmental protection.
The Secretary General of the National Association of Packaging and Material Handling, Miklós Nagy, spoke about the legal tightening regarding the single-use plastic bags so many people use during grocery shopping, and how the prices will be affected, reported novekedes.hu.
Originally, the regulation would have banned all plastic bags with a thickness of under 50 microns. “Fortunately, we have been able to modify this. Thus, according to the compromise supported by the EU, bags with a wall thickness of fewer than 15 microns will still be allowed to be manufactured and used, but in return, the product fee has been significantly increased,” Miklós Nagy explained.
The price of non-degradable products was increased from 57 forints (approx. €0.16) per kilogram to 1,900 forints (approx. €5.4). At the same time, the bags made of degradable material had no fee before, those will be sold at 500 forints (approx. €1.4) per kilogram from now on.
Nagy believes the customers will pay the increase in prices. If they know they have to pay for the bags while buying fruit and vegetables, they will start to realise they are using a plastic bag, and they will begin to think about how many bags they actually need, which will eventually lead to the decrease of using single-use plastic bags.
“When a survey is conducted, everyone is environmentally conscious; everyone accepts more expensive but so-called environmentally friendly packaging. However, when you actually go into the store, almost everyone chooses the cheapest solution,” Miklós Nagy revealed how environmentally-friendly Hungarians really are. But he also added that manufacturers are the same; when they see the price of an environmentally friendly way, they will go back to the way they did things in the first place.
Hungary’s agricultural sector is vital to the country’s national self-esteem, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said at a book presentation on Thursday.
A look at the past decades reveals that rural Hungary “was among the biggest losers” when it came to the distribution of resources, developments, investments and the drafting of modern regulations, Orbán said at the presentation of “Everything for the Future of Rural Hungary” co-authored by former Minister of Agriculture Sandor Fazekas.
The prime minister said Fazekas had been appointed minister in 2010 with the task of “getting the countryside back on its feet”. Since then, the government has protected the Hungarian farmland, provided significant opportunities for the agricultural sector and “we’re now close to being able to say that life in a Hungarian village can be of similar quality to life in the capital”, he added.
“The farmer is the archetype of the Hungarian man,” the prime minister said.
He argued that people living in the countryside oversee their own plots which have clear borders and assume responsibility for the way and quality of life on that land.
Orbán said it was this sense of responsibility that explained why rural Hungarians “have given so many good leaders to Hungarian politics”. He added that it was also important to convert that sense of responsibility into action, “because one can’t just stick to talking about things, but must actually do them”.
Orbán said this was another reason why it was difficult to understand “all the clumsiness” surrounding the upgrade of Budapest’s iconic Chain Bridge, arguing that such a scenario was “completely foreign to the political attitude coming from the countryside”.
The prime minister said it was a good thing that many members of government came from the countryside, because through them rural Hungary could “contribute its life instincts to leading the country”.
Orbán noted that in the 1990s much of the country’s political discourse was focused on the future of agriculture. The sector needed predictability and the issue around farmlands needed to be settled.
The matter was ultimately settled by allocating 80 percent of farmland to small and medium-sized holdings and 20 percent to large landowners, he said. There is peace among Hungarian landowners “and it’s worth keeping it”, the prime minister added.
He said the government’s job was to allocate the necessary resources and technologies, devote enough attention and guarantee the proper legal environment to the countryside and farmers. This way, the sector will be able to increase its output, he added. Though the agricultural sector has already seen significant improvement and change, “it has not yet reached its peak”, Orbán said.
“Representing the countryside will always be an important mission to those who come from this world,” the prime minister said.
Fazekas said the book details the state of Hungary’s agricultural sector from the decades before the country’s transition to democracy all the way to the changes enacted by the second and third Orban governments between 2010 and 2018.
Based on the latest report of the European Environment Agency, Budapest is the only city in Europe where the amount of nitrogen dioxide in the air exceeds the level measured before the coronavirus epidemic. Many say that this is because the government allowed free parking in the Hungarian capital, during which more people started to use their cars and sat in traffic jams in the last few weeks.
According to mfor.hu, air pollution decreased globally during the quarantine since fewer people used their cars, and many continued their work from home. As a result, for example, one could see the peaks of the Himalayas in India or the Fuji in Japan from even hundreds of kilometres.
Clean Air Action Group said, however, that this trend reversed in Hungary, and based on the data of the different monitoring stations in Hungary, the level of nitrogen dioxide gas started to increase again in July, even though it was below the 2019 data last month. Interestingly,
the quantity of the PM2,5 particles (particulate matter) responsible for most of the early deaths
did not decrease during the epidemic. In contrast, it increased in the last few months.
Furthermore, based on the latest report of the European Environment Agency, Budapest is the only city in Europe where the amount of nitrogen dioxide in the air exceeds the level measured before the coronavirus epidemic. That is surprising because alternative transport modes became very popular during the pandemic. For example, Budapest, like many other European cities like Brussels or Milan, took many downtown roads from the cars to give them to the cyclists.
However, in Hungary,
the government allowed free parking in Budapest until July 1 which was unnecessarily long
and, as a result, car traffic increased significantly. Mfor.hu thinks that this is the reason behind the shocking discovery of the European Environment Agency.
In most European countries air pollution increased after the first phase of the virus, but they are still below the 2019 levels. It is also a global trend that people would not like to use public transport. For example, the number of people using the London underground system is still 12 pc lower than before the epidemic. The trend is sorrowful since it will shortly result in worse air quality which weakens our immune system allowing coronavirus to break through.
President János Áder has written to his Ukrainian and Romanian counterparts complaining about large quantities of plastic bottles and other waste coming into Hungary via the Tisza and Szamos rivers.
Áder asked Volodymyr Zelensky and Klaus Johannis to intervene to get the authorities to deal with the matter.
The letters posted to the Office of the President’s website on Tuesday note that floods sent currently epidemiologically dangerous waste over the borders, with an impact on fishing and tourism as well as on wildlife.
The president noted the Hungarian government had turned to the authorities of the neighboring countries several times to little avail.
The main problem is waste dumping in the floodplains of rivers, he added.
The Tisza has been encumbered by 2,258 cubic meters of solid waste so far this year, Áder wrote. Fully 938 cubic meters of waste was removed from Szamos on June 13.
“I find it disappointing that the pollution … has not ceased,”
the presiden wrote, adding that the waste posed a lasting threat to the rivers’ fragile ecosystem. Áder said this was not worthy of European standards.
In Europe, air pollution decreased by 40 pc during the coronavirus epidemic. The same happened in Budapest, as well. Furthermore, never have more people used their bikes in the amazing Hungarian capital than now. In contrast, the air is worse than it was before the virus, which is unique in Europe. Greenpeace says that, among others, the reason behind that is free parking which the government allowed during the peak of the epidemic.
The government made parking in the Hungarian capital free on April 6. They said then that they would like people to use their cars instead of buses or trams to avoid unnecessary personal contacts – hvg.hu reported. However, even though the first (and hopefully the last) phase of the virus has been over for weeks, drivers can still park for free in the city. The deadline for that is July 1 and, as a result,
recently, it has been almost impossible to find parking places in the downtown districts.
Many people circulate for even half an hour or more which, of course, has its effects on the air of the city. Greenpeace says that authorities should reduce the number of cars and they support the idea to preserve the temporary bicycle lanes created during the last few months.
The competent deputy mayor of Budapest in the issue, Dávid Dorosz, said that they will decide about the new lanes in September. He added that, like before, the Danube embankment of Pest will remain a carfree zone at the weekends because they would like to show everybody that
the embankment of the river is not a motorway anymore
but a link between locals and the Danube.
Because of the coronavirus epidemic, many cities in Europe introduced measures that resulted in cleaner air. After the reopening, of course, the air quality worsened in almost every city. Still, it is unique in Europe that Budapest produced worse numbers in this respect than it had before the epidemic.
Interestingly, hvg.hu says that the number of bikers broke all previous records in the Hungarian capital. Experts noticed the trend in May, and the number of cyclists keeps rising steadily. They say that there is a good chance that those who started to bike during the quarantine
will keep that new habit in the future.
In case of the quality of the air, it is important to mention that from 2022 on, Hungarian cities having more than 25 thousand inhabitants can only put electric buses into service.
Researchers nowadays talk about climate change as an obvious fact, but most people do not experience anything of it, except for the warmer summers and the snowless winters. A Hungarian researcher from Debrecen explained how dangerous the current processes are for everybody living in Hungary because they can result in the desertification of large territories.
Valasz Onlinedid a long interview with Balázs András Lukács, researcher of the Centre for Ecological Research of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Centre of Excellence. He said that regarding the Hungarian water supply, a new notion has to be introduced known until now only in Mediterranean countries: temporary water. These are waters that do not exist throughout the whole year. They did not exist in Hungary 6 years ago; however, today,
there are at least 37 streams in the country that are only temporarily filled with water.
Photo: Wiki Commons
Furthermore, thanks to the regulation of the River Tisza, the level of the groundwater is sinking in the Hungarian Great Plain, because of which large areas of soil dry out. That means that, soon, they will not be able to produce anything for the Hungarian agriculture. And this is how, in the end, the Hungarian Great Plain would become a desert in Central Europe.
The other very problematic factor in this respect is agriculture: the intensive cultivation of the land and the constant use of fertilisers. Mr Lénárd says that in agriculture, local interests always override not only regional but also national interests. For example, after a heavy rain, everybody is interested in getting rid of the huge amount of water that came down. However, they forget that
the water should be collected to help them irrigate in the dry periods of the year.
He added that angling also harms the natural balance since lake owners bring non-indigenous species and are interested only in profit, so they do not pay attention to preserving the sensitive balance of their lakes. The result is unhealthy waters in which fish are also unhealthy. Mr Lénárd says that apart from the Balaton and some quarries, there are no healthy lakes in Hungary.
According to the data of the Centre for Ecological Research, there are
207 bodies of water in Hungary that dry out at least temporarily.
He also said that the drying processes can be very quick, so the next generation in Hungary will probably think about moving to Canada or Sweden if Hungarian authorities do not act as soon as possible. He says that they can still do a lot to avoid the catastrophe in Hungary, but they need the green light from politicians to do so. Furthermore, he thinks that a Ministry for Natural Resources should be established in the country, and
nature should be first
when somebody thinks about convincing foreign investors and foreign capital to come to Hungary.
SMOG-P is the first Hungarian 1-PocketQube-sized (5x5x5cm) satellite developed at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics (Budapesti Műszaki és Gazdaságtudományi Egyetem in Hungarian, abbreviated BME), within the framework of the SMOG project. The device was launched on December 6, 2019, and it has already recorded 2000 measurements.
The satellite serves a dual purpose. On the one hand, it creates a suitable environment for the operation of its equipment on board and on the other hand,
it continuously measures and analyses electrosmog, the electromagnetic radiation emitted by electronic devices, according to the instructions received from Earth and sends the data back.
The SMOG-P has been in a 350 km high orbit for six months, and it monitors a circular area of 4,000 km diameter. Based on the received signals, the satellite has already recorded 2,000 measurements, András Gschwindt, honorary associate professor of the Department of Broadband Infocommunications and Electromagnetic Theory at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Informatics of BME and the head of the SMOG project told to Hvg.
The Hungarian picosatellite is the world’s first 5 cubic cm-sized, functional space device.
The professor added that, based on the height of the satellite’s orbit, it would expectedly reach a denser atmosphere at the end of September and it would burn.
“The measurement data from SMOG-P also allowed us to the electrosmog coverage of the Earth. The satellite’s orbit is signal-free over the oceans because there are no signal sources,” said András Gschwindt.
The faculties and departments of BME have been conducting a number of research and science workshops connected to space exploration for decades. These scientific activities range from basic research and technological developments to the practical implementation of various tools and services and different forms of education and training. BME is one of the major advocates of the Hungarian initiative to introduce space engineer training and in December 2019, the university’s Senate unanimously supported the establishment of a space engineering master programme at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Informatics. The preparations are currently ongoing, and the training is expected to start in the autumn of 2021.
The opposition LMP party is working to build an environmental policy for a healthy and liveable environment now and for future generations, Erzsébet Schmuck, the party’s co-leader, told an online press conference marking World Environment Protection Day on Friday.
Schmuck insisted that LMP would be in a position to set up an environment ministry “in 2022 the latest” and institute a sustainable climate policy.
The incumbent government “does not take the issue seriously”, she said, adding that “from time to time they try to show they are turning green, but those attempts always turn out to be communications tricks”.
The government tends to put its short-term business interests before the environment, Schmuck insisted, noting that the cabinet abolished the previous environment ministry and watered down green regulations.
“That is why a multitude of toxic materials can be detected in our bodies and more people die in Hungary because of environmental pollution than fall victim to coronavirus,” she said.
The Hungarian parliament on Wednesday passed a law on climate protection. A government official said after the vote that thanks to the government’s strategies, Hungary may achieve climate neutrality gradually by 2050 without endangering economic growth or burdening Hungarian households.
Péter Kaderják, a state secretary of the innovation and technology ministry, said the country is now poised to outperform its commitments on cutting greenhouse gas emissions in transport, waste management, agriculture and building energy by 2030.
Hungary‘s achievements in climate protection over the past thirty years show that economic growth, environmental protection and energy security are reconcilable goals, Kaderják said, citing data from 2018, when Hungary managed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 0.9 percent while maintaining economic growth of 5.1 percent.
Hungary supports the European Union’s objective of achieving full climate neutrality by 2050, he said.
But the emphasis should be on making big polluters pay the costs of a climate neutral economy and money should not be taken away from cohesion funds for that purpose, thereby depriving poorer countries of funding, he said.
Kaderják said the new legislation showed the government’s readiness to take action against climate change. Other measures in the field include this year’s energy and climate policy strategy and the climate and a nature-protection action plan announced by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in the spring, he said.
Hungary’s climate and nature-protection action plan allocates 32 billion forints (EUR 92.6m) to SME’s transitioning to sustainable energy production.
It also plans to raise the capacity of solar plants six-fold, and supports the distribution and use of cheap electric cars.
From 2022, only e-busses will be newly deployed to city transport, he added.
The government aims to make 90 percent of Hungarian electricity production carbon free by 2030, by using mostly nuclear and solar energy, he said.
The opposition slammed the law and demanded the government set stricter goals than those outlined therein.
Erzsébet Schmuck, the deputy group leader of green LMP, called the vote “the shame of [ruling] Fidesz” and said that
the ruling parties had bowdlerised the opposition’s original proposal on the climate emergency.
LMP will continue to put pressure on the government to join EU goals setting stricter targets than those outlined in Hungarian law, she said.
The Párbeszéd party’s Bence Tordai said the ruling parties had stripped out all elements of the proposal that “would have made it worthwhile supporting”. However, “having a Hungarian climate protection law is a sort of success, regardless of the content,” he said.
The biggest opposition fraction Jobbik lawmaker Zoltán Magyar said
the issue of climate change carried such weight that “not even the government can sweep it under the rug”.
The Socialist Zita Gurmai said the government was unfit to handle the issue “because they don’t understand the danger the country is in”. The opposition does not support “window dressing”, she said.
Within the next ten years, The Hungarian State Railways (MÁV-Start) plans the replacement of the recently used BZ-Mot diesel-powered railway trains – which have been running since the 1970s – for the most modern zero-emission vehicles.
As the Hungarian news portal Origo reports, these will be powered by a pantograph on the overhead lines and by an internal battery on the non-electrified sections.
As the railway company writes in its announcement, basically two types of vehicles can be diversified in the case of double-acting multiple units.
diesel-electric and electric overhead line hybrid multiple units;
hybrid electric multiple units with zero emissions (pollutants), which may be either battery and overhead electric trains, or, e.g. hydrogen-powered (fuel cell) vehicles.
Of these, MÁV-Start intends to procure battery-powered double-acting electric vehicles.
This technology is a novelty worldwide, and over the next ten years, the goal is for these low-end vehicles to serve passengers on low-traffic extension lines instead of the current diesel-powered trains.
MÁV-Start has launched a European Union public procedure for the procurement of twenty 200-seats and thirty 150-seats new, zero-emission hybrid electric motor trains. The 200-seat vehicles are scheduled to arrive in 2023-2024, while the 150-seat trains will probably get to Hungary between 2024 and 2029.
The hybrid vehicle is a technically innovative solution not only in Hungary but in Europe as well. Up to now, only the German province of Schleswig-Holstein decided to purchase 55 Stadler Flirt Akku motor trains last autumn.
The vehicles are equipped with modern passenger comfort; they are quiet, air-conditioned, equipped with electrical outlets and USB connectors.
Just like in the case of electric vehicles, the length of a single charge is critical for electric trainsets. It needs to be heated from a battery in the winter and cooled in the summer, and these might be challenging for the cells.
Despite the drawbacks, current diesel-powered vehicles cannot be used for a long time due to the strict carbon regulations. Even now, only those diesel engines are permitted on the market that meet the so-called Stage V emission limits, but manufacturers do not yet offer vehicles that do so.
Even though, the old motor trains, railcars and locomotives that are already running may remain for the time being; still, the International Railway Association plans to require zero-emission operation for its members by 2050.
Opposition LMP on Monday called on the government to join the European Union’s initiative aimed at promoting green jobs.
After coming to power in 2010, the government scrapped the environment ministry and began dismantling the institutional network around the sector, Péter Ungár, a lawmaker of the party, told a press conference.
But the government later “did a complete 180”, Ungár said, arguing that the co-ruling Christian Democrats had “declared themselves a green party” after partaking in a plastic-free month last August, while this past February, the prime minister announced that his government “had become green overall”.
Meanwhile,
the cabinet last year refused to get behind the EU’s 2030 climate goals and the foreign minister declared the German car industry more important than goals to fight climate change, Ungár said.
In addition, the government this year stayed away from joining the EU’s initiative for creating more jobs in the environmental sector, he said.
LMP‘s MP Ungár criticised the government’s handling of a bill on banning single-use plastics, saying that the cabinet submitted it to parliament before withdrawing it and later submitted it again at the call of ruling Fidesz.
He said LPM was prepared to cooperate with the government on necessary measures.
The Ministry of Innovation and Technology aims to forbid the usage of single-use plastic bottles and other plastic carrier bags made out of a certain plastic material that degrades with oxidation, from next January on.
Daily News Hungary reported before that the use of a range of single-use plastic products would be banned from next January under a bill tabled to parliament by the Ministry of Innovation and Technology on Wednesday. Other news portals reported the details of this decision shortly after it was announced.
Index reported that the new law about banning plastic products in the country is based on another one announced in February which aims to protect the climate and the natural environment and contains several steps about the possible methods and techniques.
While PM Orbán and the government would like to delay the action plans of protecting the environment, the European Union urges them from the other side.
The law would include popular plastic products people only use once, like plates, bottles, straws, q-tips, and other plastics which degrade through oxidation. In the EU, countries would face stricter laws than the states which are not part of the Union and would not have the opportunity to use light and very light plastic products like carrier bags from January 1, 2021.
The EU suggests to companies and factories which produce these plastic products to come up with alternatives in the future. The government, therefore, would provide 13 million EUR/year to change their technologies, expand the factories, and increase capacity.
The European Union decided to come up with this suggestion as well as an early introduction as recent studies shockingly revealed that 85% of the pollution in European seas and on their shores is plastic, which is 75% of all kinds of pollution and garbage in the seas of the continent. As part of the decision, campaigns and effective communication need to advertise the reason why the EU decided to ban plastic products.
The newly produced products need to have descriptions in the future about how much plastic material they contain, how they should be properly thrown away, and all the negative effects they have on nature.
Along with banning, collecting and completely recycling all the plastic products of the EU by 2025 is also an essential part of this project. All EU states are obligated to collect 90% of plastic products – especially bottles – by the end of this year.
Since 1950, humanity has produced approximately 350 million tonnes of plastic products.
Scientists discovered that China and Indonesia are the main sources of single-use plastic pollution: bottles, packaging, and bags pollute the oceans. They estimate that China and Indonesia alone are responsible for around 5 million tonnes of plastic waste ending up at sea each year. To prevent plastic pollution, several countries have already made decisions about the complete ban on them. Africa, for example, takes the plastic bag problem very seriously; more than fifteen countries on the continent have either banned them completely or tax them. Before the first ban was introduced in 2003, South Africa had actually named plastic bags their “national flower” due to their overwhelming presence in trees and bushes.
In some Asian countries and some states and territories of Australia, decisions about the ban of plastic products have been made. China, for instance, banned thin plastic bags, although the country still produces many tonnes of this material.
Currently, the United States of America is the only part of the world which has not introduced any kind of state ban or measurement regarding the production of plastic products. On the other hand, an increasing number of U.S. states and cities have taken matters into their own hands. For example, in 2014, California became the first state to ban plastic bags and charge for paper bags. Other areas that are fighting the use of plastic bags with either bans, taxes, or special recycling programs include New York, the District of Colombia, Rhode Island, and Puerto Rico.
Plastic Free July was a complete failure in Hungary
More and more people know about the damaging effect of plastic waste on nature. However, the initiative of Plastic Free July was not successful in Budapest at all, RTL News reported. Moreover, there were 150 tonnes more plastic waste generated than in June, before the challenge. The initiative of 2011 has become global by today. The purpose of the action was to make households produce less plastic. It was not successful in Budapest, though. 1,362 tonnes of plastic waste was produced in the capital, which is more than the amount of the previous month (1,212 tonnes) and last year’s July (1,329 tonnes), based on the data of FKF (private Ltd. of public space maintenance in Budapest).
Despite a state of emergency in light of the coronavirus epidemic, the government continues working to implement goals in its climate and environment protection action plan, a state secretary of the innovation and technology ministry said on Wednesday, marking Earth Day.
Anita Boros said that Hungary, where Earth Day is marked for the 30th time this year, is an active participant in efforts to meet the challenges of a changing climate, with “a number of initiatives focusing people’s attention to opportunities for conscientious and environment friendly ways of life and for joint action to preserve the assets of nature”.
Priorities in the government’s action plan, adopted in February, include eliminating illegal waste dumps and banning disposable plastics in Hungary, Boros said.
LMP
Capital-driven globalisation will push the Earth into an abyss, the co-leader of opposition LMP said on Wednesday, marking Earth Day.
“We can’t continue from where we left off before the pandemic,”
Erzsebét Schmuck said.
LMP proposes that parliament should put on its agenda the main issues for establishing a crisis-resistant economy, Schmuck told an online press conference.
She said the government’s measures demonstrated that it still hoped to quickly restore an “extremely vulnerable” economy dependent on multinationals, the car industry and external markets.
LMP is calling for a paradigm shift to develop an economic structure that is resistant to crisis and includes “less globalisation and much more local economy”, which can produce the goods needed for everyday use even during times of crisis.
“It is a matter of political will whether we continue rushing towards the abyss or slow down and choose the green way,” she said.
Conservative opposition Jobbik said humans must stop wasting resources and travelling by air so frequently, at an online press conference held to mark Earth Day. A green expert of the conservative party highlighted connection between the coronavirus pandemic, human life-styles, consumption and climate change.
“We must change our life-style in order to slow down global warming and discontinue to exploit our planet,”
Tibor Nunkovics said, adding that the coronavirus “was not the last pandemic for humankind to survive”.
Although the coronavirus pandemic now dominates people’s interests and news portals, climate change is still a problem looming over our heads, and while the restrictions made by governments all over the world helped our environment to regenerate somewhat, going green is just as important as ever.
Highlighting the ever-important topic of protecting our environment, National Geographic made a list of the five most forward-thinking European cities, and Budapest stands proudly among them. It is no wonder, however, as for many Hungarians, climate change is considered to be one of the most pressing problems of our modern world. In 2018, E.ON, an energy supplier company, conducted a survey in seven countries and found that Hungarians considered climate change to be the most pressing problem of modern society. 81% of the participants also said that they had made changes in their lifestyle to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Apart from Budapest, the four other places are Lahti, a Finnish city that might become carbon-neutral by 2025, Lisbon, the Portuguese capital halving its CO2 emission, Lyon, the gastronomic centre of France, and Edinburgh, the UK’s greenest city with 112 parks.
“The Hungarian capital recently saw the launch of the crowd-funded Green Guide Budapest map. Printed using soy-based ink, the free fold-out guide aims to steer visitors away from the usual attractions by highlighting parks, markets, and eco-friendly stores around the city,” said National Geographic about Budapest.
Over the past couple of years, Hungary’s capital has been going greener and greener. There are many similar movements, like Green Guide Budapest, that try and help change people’s lifestyle to become more eco-friendly or to produce less waste. For example, last Summer, the zero-waste approach skyrocketed, and several shops opened not only in Budapest but in several other cities in Hungary. If you would like to find out more about these stores and more environmentally friendly ideas, start here:
Air pollution in Ukraine’s capital exceeded the normal level by several times on Friday as a forest fire was burning in the exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the Kiev region, Interfax Ukraine news agency reported on Friday.
At 9 a.m. (0600 GMT) on Friday, Kiev topped the global list of cities with the most polluted air with its pollution index reaching 380.
The visibility in the capital was significantly low. Kiev city administration urged residents not to open windows and stay indoors.
Currently, 1,100 personnel and two helicopters are working on extinguishing the blaze that started on April 4 around the Chernobyl exclusion zone.
According to the IQAir service, the air in Kiev will be clear by Saturday morning.
Today, all of us are experiencing a tough period. The worldwide crisis caused by coronavirus will remain etched in our memories for a long time. Not only due to the necessary restrictions introduced in most of the countries in order to prevent the spread of the pandemic; but also due to its social consequences, as a result of which several factors in our lives including health, time, money, work, education etc. require different attitude than before.
In order to preserve our health and get through this critical period as soon as possible, we should obey the safety rules and – if possible – stay at home. In this dramatic situation, we would like to encourage our Dear Readers with some positive thoughts that might brighten some minutes of our days spent in home quarantine.
1. More free time
Under normal circumstances, the majority of people race against time.
‘Beating the clock’ has become a fashionable social disease by now; however, this period shows us the importance of slowing down a bit and enables us to spend more time with our loved ones.
Image: MTI/Balázs Attila
Due to our rushing lifestyle, we tend to neglect our favourite hobbies and preferred activities, but here is the opportunity to catch up on everything.
2. On the way of development
In the middle of March, the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán announced that Hungary’s public education will be converted to digital education. The announcement concerned millions of people – besides children staying at home, their parents and teachers also had to restructure their daily lives. As the Hungarian news portal divany.hu reports, the introduction of online education had already been planned; however, due to the extraordinary situation of coronavirus, its realisation has been speeded up.Thanks to the persistent Hungarian teacher community, online education has been successfully introduced in most of the cases.
Image: MTI/Komka Péter
The digitalisation enables students to learn together in virtual groups, following the learning materials available on online platforms.
We must clarify that the transition process was not that easy; it required discipline from all the participants; however, during this short period, the education system has made significant progress.
Due to the restrictions, the majority of employers have taken similar actions by the introduction of the home office. This experience can lead to the long-term transformation of the previous structure, realising that employers do not have to maintain huge offices in order to provide smooth workflow; furthermore, the home atmosphere might improve employee performance in some cases.
By the end of this period, home office might become part of the work schedule at least 1-2 times a week.
3. Increased creativity
Besides education and work, creativity has improved significantly in several other areas.Everyone intends to adapt to the unprecedented situation that has arisen. After the first shock, the majority of entrepreneurs started to search for some solution by which their product could become available in the online space as well.
As a result, one could find his/her favourite trainings, yoga classes, drawing courses, workshops etc. in an online version.
Image: MTI/Balázs Attila
Of course, these possibilities had also been provided before; however, those who did not believe in it or did not feel its necessity now managed to take up the beat in time. Not to mention the massive amount of cultural products, including theatre and circus performances, musical shows, online film premieres, exhibition halls and virtual museums that have become available in the cyberspace.
A further positive factor can be discovered in the environmental conditions.
There are several reports about the pandemic’s beneficial effects on the planet, including dropping air pollution, clearing waters, decreasing emissions from coal combustions etc.
Even though, nowadays our first reaction is accumulation, later on, human consumption can also become reduced in the longer term (for example in the case of fuel, fast food or fast fashion) that will undoubtedly have a positive effect on the environment.
Despite this factor, we must admit that the shutdown has several destructive impacts as well; however, the human is stronger than ever – nowadays, we manage to survive as we would never have guessed.
5. The truly important things
As a result of the pandemic, the focal point of communication has changed. Obviously, coronavirus is in the main focus of the media;
however this hard period also symbolizes the strength of community.
Nowadays, we must pay particular attention to the older ones and help them as much as we can – indirectly, without meeting them! In order to enhance togetherness, more and more world-famous celebrities – Olympic champions, Hollywood stars, world-renowned singers – encourage their fans to join the ‘Stay Home’ campaign and self-isolate themselves during the pandemic period.Several associations donate money to support the sacrificial work of health professionals.
Today, we support each other and keep the soul alive through online communication.
6. Solidarity
Concerning attention, there is one more positive factor we cannot miss – solidarity.
This period perfectly shows the best of human nature.
By way of example, we must mention those
young people who help the elderly generation by doing their shopping;
companies that provide financial support for digital learning to the ones that cannot afford it;
volunteers who support homeless people and the ones living in extreme poverty;
singers who give strength with the power of music;
and above all, health care workers for their sacrificial work, without whom we could not succeed.
We all know that in this hard period, it is difficult to see the bright side of life; however, we are all in this together, and we will manage to get through this tough period by common force.
“Hope is the only thing stronger than fear.”
Never lose this treasure. Take care of each other – stay patient, stay safe, stay home!
In order to properly mark the event, this year’s Earth Hour took place in a digital way, World Wildlife Fund (WWF) informed Xinhua in a press statement.
“In the midst of the coronavirus epidemic, the Earth Hour is also a sign of solidarity for the planet: communities around the world are organizing their events digitally. WWF is also relocating this year’s Earth Clock to the online world,” the press release said.
WWF Hungary was asking people to step up to preserve the planet with one or more commitments from March 28, and to announce what they would do differently in their lives to protect nature and sustainability if life returns again to the normal wheel.
Photo: MTI/Mónus Márton
Organizers were asking people to share their engagement as public posts on community platforms. The commitment can be a text post, a video or even a poem that is recited.
Earth Hour is a global initiative first launched by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in 2007 and soon became a popular movement worldwide.
On every last Saturday of March, individuals, communities, enterprises and government departments around the globe are encouraged to turn off their lights for an hour, with the purpose of inspiring reflections and actions regarding environmental issues.
Gyõr, Hungary. Earth Hour in Hungary. Photo: MTIGyõr, Hungary. Earth Hour in Hungary. Photo: MTI
Hongkong:
Earth Hour in Hongkong. Photo: MTI/EPA/Jerome Favre
