Scientists see 1950 as the start of the “Anthropocene” – Wel.nl

TORONTO (AP/RTR) — A group of international scientists say they have found evidence that the “Anthropocene,” the geological age of humans, has begun. Researchers from the Anthropocene Working Group (AWG) regard 1950 as the starting point of the period in which changes in Earth’s climate and ecology are primarily driven by human activity.

Scientists have researched soils around the world, but have seen in a Canadian lake the strongest evidence of the start of the Anthropocene, which is derived from the ancient Greek word anthropos: human. Plutonium has been found in the sediments of Crawford Lake, near Toronto. This would come from tests with weapons of the fifties. According to the AWG, the use of fossil fuels has also increased enormously during this period and land use has changed due to artificial fertilizers, for example. All of this would be reflected in the geology of the last seventy years.

The history of our planet is divided into geological periods. Officially we are still in the Holocene, as the Anthropocene has not been recognized by the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS). The Holocene is now 11,700 years old, since the end of the last Ice Age. The earlier periods all lasted millions of years.

The scientists want to present their evidence to the ICS to make the Anthropocene an official epoch. According to the AWG, so many things have changed in our soils, but also in biodiversity, for example, that we absolutely no longer live in the Holocene. Their researchers see 1950 as the starting point, other scientists sometimes refer to the industrial revolution of the 18th and 19th centuries as a geological turning point.