A biosphere is anywhere organisms live.1 Thus, any place on our green planet, or microcosms within it, is a biosphere--more importantly it is the only one that we know A well known fact is that our biosphere is becoming less and lesssuitable for sustaining our rapidly increasing population. Gross pollution caused byindustrialism and technological advances have seriously damaged the part of outplanets atmosphere made up of O3, most commonly referred to as Ozone. Anytime weburn coal, wood, oil, or petroleum we are releasing into our atmosphere an invisible,odorless gas, called carbon monoxide, which is eroding our atmospheres layer ofOzone.2 Methyl Bromide is another culprit in ozone thinning, this chemical is used bymost all industrialized nations as a pesticide.3 For us to continue to thrive on thisplanets surface the once unthought of ideal of zero-emissions must become a reality,and quick.An article in the March/April issue of Mother Jones entitled, Nothing Wasted,Everything gained discusses the ecological progress that a town in Colombia hasmade. Granted, we live in a very different world than these rural villagers do, we like tothink that our world is more complex. As of today cement covers well over one-quarterof the continuous 48 states, most of this cement is in the forms of highways, byways,and interstates. Herein lies our complexity-- we are a nation that is completelydependent upon oil, petroleum, and electricity-- comfort is mistaken for complexity. Fossil fuels are our lifes blood that facilitate our comfortable travel to and from work andschool, and all our daily busyness. This article about a zero-emissions village inColombia proves that in fact the opposite may hold true; maybe these villagers are thegenius and we are the ignorance. Cars do not spew their noxious fumes in this place ,instead villagers have bicycles that have, like most other innovations in this small villageof two hundred, been altered to fac...
