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Planet Now
Blog on Effective Environmental Communication
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This week, I wanted to draw attention to a serious environmental disaster - which hopefully you have already heard about. A train carrying chemicals derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, near the Pennsylvania border. The train cars were marked as “non-hazardous” despite containing vinyl chloride, a gas linked to cancers. Authorities implemented a controlled burn to reduce the chances of chemicals causing an explosion. The controlled burn has released chemicals into the atmosphere that are harmful to humans. Residents of the area are concerned about whether their air and water are safe and if they can trust government officials saying they are safe. The disaster has been devastating to wildlife in the area. Thousands of creatures like fish, chickens, and the endangered hellbender salamander have been found dead near the incident. I saw an interesting tweet about the derailment from environmental writer Eve Andrews. She shared her disappointment with many people on her Twitter feed saying there was a lack of coverage on the derailment despite much coverage.
The tweet made me think about information overload. As we get much of our news from the Internet and social media, we are exposed to different stories and may not come across big stories about serious issues. Additionally, with information overload, we experience selective bias because we pay attention to what fits our beliefs. For example, I’m interested in understanding climate change, so I follow a lot of environmental accounts. I’ve also made friends in my environmental classes and clubs, so I am particularly exposed to environmental media when they share content. Therefore, much of the media I consume comes from people who believe in climate change and are very pro-environment. As a result, I might think the opinions I see a lot reflect how the general population thinks. Clearly, information overload makes it possible to miss important stories and shows the importance of following news sources of various sizes and topics to help us stay informed. There has been an abundance of misinformation about the derailment as area residents and government agencies investigate. However, we should keep paying attention to the situation and learn lessons to prevent future similar accidents. It’s not the first, but hopefully with future consideration of risks, it will be the last chemical disaster.
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Welcome to my blog! It is a combination of posts from my strategic writing (spring 2022) and personal branding (spring 2023) courses at UNC. I hope you will enjoy reading the posts and learning about the environment and communication.
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