Seven Light Pollution Facts Which Shed A Light On This Forgotten Problem

Everyone could view a stunning, starry night sky less than a century ago if they looked up.

Millions of youngsters throughout the world will now never see the Milky Way from where they live. The rising and widespread use of artificial light at night not only distorts our perception of the cosmos, but also has negative consequences for our environment, safety, energy consumption, and health.

Industrial civilization has resulted in light pollution as a secondary consequence. Exterior and interior illumination of buildings, advertising, and streetlights are various sources.

Many types of night-time outdoor lighting are wasteful, too bright, poorly aimed, insufficiently protected, and, in many circumstances, utterly unneeded. This light, as well as the power required to make it, is being squandered by leaking it into the sky instead of focusing it on items and regions that people want to be lit.

After reading about the adverse impacts of the excessive usage of artificial light on light pollution, also check out beach pollution facts and air pollution facts.

Types Of Light Pollution

Light pollution comes in a variety of sources and forms. Light pollution can take the form of visible light disruptions caused by too much artificial light.

It can also take the form of a lack of light sources, which takes away a form of natural illumination and replaces it with an artificial means.

The radio-wave spectrum contains light that cannot be seen. When individuals discuss light pollution, they usually refer to one of five types.

Over-illumination is one type. The overuse of lighting is to blame for this. Lights left on the street during the night or street lighting that isn't adjusted for daylight savings time can waste millions of barrels of oil.

Glare is a two-fold issue that occurs when light is reflected off surrounding surfaces, scattering and causing visual impairments. It doesn't affect night vision, but it makes it more difficult to recognize and locate objects.

Light clutter is a purely human problem caused by bad location design. A cluster of business lights or streetlights can generate contrasting lighting that obstructs night vision.

Skyglow is a name for the nearly dome-like light blanket that covers city regions. The light that escapes from street lamps, signs, residences, and businesses travels up into the atmosphere, changing the quality of light, and then returns to the city via the atmosphere.

Light trespass is not just a kind of pollution, but it is also illegal in many places. Unwanted light invading someone's property is referred to as light trespass. It might be light from a sign shining into a neighborhood or something similar.

Effects Of Light Pollution

Excessive, misdirected, or obtrusive artificial light is referred to as light pollution. The air pollution caused by this can affect our natural cycle. This energy efficiency can have many negative health effects. According to research in New York City, light pollution can harm our natural habitat.

These artificial light emissions form a silvery cloud that can have negative impacts on the world's population. This may lessen outdoor lights (street lights) causing us to have dark nights. Even in a city, you could step outdoors at night and see the Milky Way galaxy arch across the natural night sky a little more than 100 years ago.

We are losing touch with our cultural history by permitting electric light to wipe out our starry night skies. We're also losing sight of what can motivate future generations.

Hong Kong Light Pollution

According to the University of Hong Kong's research in their school of science, the local metropolitan night sky is up to 1,000 times brighter than international standards, making it the world's most light-polluted metropolis.

Hong Kong residents now have to struggle with retail districts that are lit up excessively.

Even rural parts of Hong Kong, such as the adjacent island of Lantau and the city's Wetland Park to the north — a world-famous migratory bird staging site — were shown to be influenced by man-made lights. According to research, Wetland Park was 100 times brighter than the standard.

Due to the enormous number of billboards and floodlights nearby, Hong Kong's most light-polluted location was the Hong Kong Space Museum in Tsim Sha Tsui, which was more than 1,000 times brighter than international standards.

Public Health Impact

It has been proved that the improper sort of light, or too much light, has negative health impacts and lowers the quality of life. Humans on Earth have a circadian rhythm imprinted in their DNA that requires a consistent pattern of light during the day and darkness at night.

When these natural circadian rhythms are interrupted, it can lead to cancer, cardiovascular disease, depression, and sleeplessness, among other things. Life on Earth has persisted in a rhythm of light and dark for three billion years, produced only by light from the Sun, Moon, and stars.

Artificial lights now outnumber the darkness, and our cities sparkle at night, breaking the natural day-night cycle and upsetting our environment's delicate equilibrium. The negative consequences of losing this inspiring natural resource may appear intangible.

Human Impacts On The Environment

Changing the environment to meet societal requirements has disastrous consequences. Population expansion, overconsumption, overexploitation, pollution, and deforestation are some human activities that harm the environment on a global scale (either directly or indirectly).

Some of the issues, such as global warming and biodiversity loss, have been described as posing catastrophic hazards to humanity's survival.

An anthropogenic impact or item is one that is caused by human action. Russian geologist Alexey Pavlov used the word in a technical sense, and British ecologist Arthur Tansley coined it in English to allude to human effects on the environment.

In the mid-'70s, atmospheric scientist Paul Crutzen coined the term 'anthropocene.' This word is usually used to refer to pollution caused by human activities since the beginning of the Agricultural Revolution, but it also refers to all major human-environmental consequences.

The combustion of fossil fuels from a range of sources, such as power plants, vehicles, planes, space heating, manufacturing, or forest destruction, is responsible for many of the human acts that lead to a warmer atmosphere.

Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly facts for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for light pollution facts then why not take a look at coal pollution facts or car pollution facts.