Every year on April 22, the global community sets aside a day to celebrate the big blue sphere we call home. Amidst the all the festivities we are also asked to reflect on our impact on Earth, which grows increasingly harmful with each passing year. Since the first Earth Day 46 years ago in 1970, the global population has doubled and demand for food, energy, and natural resources has continued to take a devastating toll on the planet that we rely on to sustain us. 
 
 While the real takeaway on any Earth Day is the well-worn adage that ‘every day is Earth Day’ and that we should be proactively reducing our planetary footprint at all times, there are some unique features to Earth Day 2016. Some are good. Some are bad. Some are just coincidence. 
 
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 First, the coincidence: Friday also happens to be the first day of the Jewish festival of Passover, an eight-day affair primarily commemorating the freedom of the Jews from slavery, but also the arrival of spring and the role of the agricultural cycle. Even in biblical times, nature was to be respected and honored. We all need reminders of the importance of the things we come to take for granted. 
 
 During the Passover Seder, Jews recite the Four Questions, which all start with “Why is this night different from all other nights?” These questions act as a reminder of the meaning behind the Passover rituals. 
 
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 Secondly, big things related to the health of the planet are actually happening on Earth Day this year. At least 155 nations will gather in New York on Friday to sign the historic Paris Agreement on climate change reached last December—including the two largest greenhouse gas emitters, the United States and China. The Paris Agreement is the first time in history that all nations have reached an agreement to take action on climate change. While it’s not a perfect treaty, it is a bold step in the right direction and the more people pushing for future action and making sure that promises are upheld, the more impact it will have in the long-run. 
 
 According to the U.N. press release, the event will represent the most signatories ever on the opening day signing of an international agreement. 
 
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 Third, the planet is REALLY REALLY hurting this year. The combination of El Niño and climate change has created the perfect heat wave, and for the last 11 months the world has been baking like never before on record. Last year was by far the hottest ever recorded, and carbon dioxide concentrations continue to rise unabated. While the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere may not always appear to have palpable effects, fear not—or actually fear a lot—they are there. For example, right now the Great Barrier Reef is bleaching in such an extensive fashion that scientists are freaking out and tearing up with emotion. 
 
 As climate change continues to worsen, extreme weather in every manifestation will make each subsequent Earth Day seem even more dire, with the call to action even more urgent. Every effort to mitigate emissions now and adapt to anticipated changes will make future adjustments that much less painful. 
 
 As Earthjustice President Trip Van Noppen said in a statement, “this Earth Day can go down in history as the day we declared our independence from fossil fuels.” 
 
 Courtesy of HotWhopper 
 
 Courtesy of HotWhopper 
 
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 Judging by the number of press releases I’ve gotten regarding Earth Day action and awareness, the atmosphere for change is as charged as ever. According to Earth Day Network, every year more than one billion people participate in Earth Day—making it the largest single-minded observance in the world. One day we might wake up and realize this is not the beautiful planet that we wanted. Earth Day is an annual reminder to take heed of all the warning signs around us and, more importantly, to take action. ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| The first Earth Day, on April 22, 1970, was a milestone event for the planet. An estimated 20 million people took to the streets across the U.S. to raise awareness about the impacts of human activities on the environment. 
 
 Since then, the annual tradition has grown to involve billions of people around the world. This year, Earth Day turns 48. To mark this anniversary and to show how much has changed since 1970, we assembled 48 of the most significant accomplishments of the environmental movement since the first Earth Day. 
 
 1. 1970 "Environmental Magna Carta" 
 
 The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 went into effect the following year, becoming a landmark law that requires every major decision of the federal government to be evaluated for its impact on the environment. This began the era of requiring environmental impact statements for building dams, roads, and other major projects. It has been called the "environmental Magna Carta" for its wide impact and for the precedent it set in government, both in the U.S. and abroad. 
 
 2. 1972 Notorious Toxic Chemical Banned 
 
 DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) is a colorless, nearly odorless insecticide that was widely used in the post-war era to increase farm productivity and fight mosquitoes. Although a Nobel Prize was awarded for its discovery, scientists eventually realized that DDT was causing problems in the environment, including thinning the shells of birds' eggs. Rachel Carson popularized this research in the 1962 book Silent Spring. After DDT was banned, bald eagles, peregrine falcons and many other endangered bird species returned from the brink of extinction. 
 
 3. 1972 Regulating Pesticides 
 
 In 1972, the Federal Environmental Pesticide Control Act was passed, updating a 1910 law that had required truth in advertising for pesticides. The new law charged regulators with considering the impacts of pesticides on human and environmental health, which at the time was a relatively new concept. The Environmental Protection Agency was given more teeth to police the market and restrict and outlaw toxic chemicals. 
 
 4. 1972 Cleaning Up Rivers 
 
 In 1972, the Clean Water Act passed, with the goal of making all rivers in the country swimmable and fishable again. In just a few years, the resulting efforts to restrict pollution led to rivers that no longer burst into flames. 
 
 5. 1972 Marine Sanctuaries Created 
 
 Although governments had been protecting land as wilderness areas for more than a century, the idea took longer to catch on for the ocean. In 1972, the Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act started the country's system of marine sanctuaries. These special places now protect priceless biological, historical, and cultural treasures, from the reefs of the Florida Keys to shipwrecks in the Great Lakes. The sanctuaries also become a boon to the tourism industry. 
 
 6. 1972 Saving Whales 
 
 Whales, dolphins, seals, and manatees received strict protection from hunting and harassment in U.S. waters with the Marine Mammal Protection Act. As a result, their numbers began to slowly recover in the ensuing decades. A robust eco-tourism business followed in their wake. 
 
 7. 1973 Saving Species 
 
 The landmark Endangered Species Act resulted in substantial protections for listed plants and animals, including bans on harvesting and a framework that protects critical habitat. In some cases, captive breeding and reintroduction programs began in an effort to reverse decades of population declines caused by human activities. Species that showed significant recovery as a result range from the toothy American crocodile to the plucky Delmarva fox squirrel. 
 
 8. 1975 Global Agreement on Endangered Species 
 
 The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species was drafted for signatures in 1973 and went into effect in 1975. Signatory countries agree to ban or restrict trade in endangered species and their body parts. Although black markets arose for such products as tiger skins and elephant tusks, countries have also worked together to combat such trafficking. 
 
 9. 1974 Safe(r) Drinking Water 
 
 View Images Thanks to conservation efforts, bald eagles were removed from the Endangered Species List in 1995. Photograph by Klaus Nigge, Nat Geo Image Collection 
 
 In response to rising concerns and scientific awareness about the impacts of pollution on health, the Safe Drinking Water Act set quality standards for all U.S. drinking water systems. 
 
 10. 1974 Getting the Lead Out of Gas 
 
 In 1974, the EPA began a phaseout of lead from gasoline in the U.S., a process that completed in 1995. The toxic element was originally added to boost engine performance, but scientists eventually discovered that it was building up in soils and becoming a serious air pollutant. The EPA estimated more than 5,000 Americans died per year from heart disease linked to lead poisoning. Since the ban, the average level of lead in the blood of Americans has decreased by more than 75%. 
 
 11. 1976 Chemical Control 
 
 The Toxic Substances Control Act oversees the introduction of new chemicals into the marketplace. Those substances that are found to pose a significant risk to human health or the environment may be restricted or banned. A notable example was the banning of PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) after 1978. The chemicals were widely used in industrial applications but were found to cause cancer. 
 
 12. 1978 Love Canal Causes National Outcry 
 
 After hundreds of residents of the Love Canal planned community in Niagara Falls, New York, were sickened by leaking toxic waste, a spotlight was shined on the dangers of industrial pollution. Local parent Lois Gibbs organized the community after her son took ill, starting a model for grassroots environmental activism. The neighborhood was eventually demolished and cleaned. 
 
 13. 1980 Superfund Program Launched 
 
 Outrage over Love Canal helped lead to the passage of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980, commonly known as Superfund. The goal of the law is cleaning up toxic sites, and the Environmental Protection Agency can try to recover the costs of doing so from the polluters. Love Canal became one of hundreds of sites cleaned up by the program, though many more locations are still awaiting treatment. 
 
 14. 1980 Vast Alaskan Lands Protected 
 
 Congress passed and Jimmy Carter signed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act in late 1980, creating a massive series of national parks, reserves, and refuges that protected more than a hundred million acres of wilderness for future generations. Highlights include the national parks Wrangell-St. Elias, Glacier Bay, and Gates of the Arctic. 
 
 15. 1982 Saving More Whales 
 
 In 1982, the International Whaling Commission finally adopted a moratorium on commercial whaling around the world, in response to more than a decade of protests and pressure from scientists. Although pirate and controversial "scientific" whale hunts continued, the end of large-scale whaling marked a big turning point for the animals, and most species began a slow recovery from the brink of extinction. 
 
 16. 1986 McPackaging Improves 
 
 In 1986, McDonalds started using biodegradable packaging, in response to criticism from environmentalists over mountains of Styrofoam containers littering roadways and choking landfills. Campaigners declared a major win, and the effort helped usher in a new era of companies both working with advocacy groups and acting on their own to reduce their environmental impact. The effort also helped raise consumer awareness about the impact of their own daily choices. 
 
 17. 1986 A Civil Action 
 
 In 1986, the sprawling Woburn, Massachusetts pollution case was decided in court. Although the result was mixed for the families that sued polluters over injury to their children, the high-profile case set a big precedent in environmental law and in the court of public opinion. The case was depicted in the 1995 book (and later movie) A Civil Action. 
 
 18. 1987 Saving Condors 
 
 In 1987, wildlife biologists made the tough decision to bring all 27 remaining California condors into captivity. They launched a breeding program, which was almost derailed by a tragic fire. But eventually, scientists were able to successfully reintroduce some of the offspring. Combined with efforts to protect the birds in their native habitat, the result has been a slow recovery of the species, which now numbers over 400. 
 
 19. 1987 Plugging the Ozone Hole 
 
 In 1987, many of the world's nations came together to agree on the Montreal Protocol, which outlawed a series of chemicals that had been destroying the Earth's protective ozone layer. Most famous among these were chlorofluorocarbons. Scientists were concerned that the loss of the ozone layer could lead to blistering rates of skin cancer and other problems. The ozone hole is now healing. 
 
 20. 1987 Cleaning Up Sewage 
 
 View Images Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama both took steps to preserve ocean waters. See fact 40 for more information. Photograph by Brian Skerry, Nat Geo Image Collection 
 
 Once industrial pollution was reigned in, regulators turned to another major source of water quality problems: sewage waste. The Water Quality Act of 1987 created the Clean Water State Revolving Fund, which helped finance the upgrade of water systems across the country. 
 
 21. 1988 Cleaning Up Medical Waste 
 
 In the late 1980s, the public was shocked after waves of medical waste washed up on beaches where children played. The response was the 1988 Medical Waste Tracking Act, which compelled healthcare providers to treat their waste seriously and make sure it gets disposed of properly. 
 
 22. 1989 Get the Asbestos Out 
 
 In 1989 the U.S. began a phaseout of asbestos from many products, after evidence mounted that it could cause a rare form of lung cancer. Asbestos was previously considered a new wonder material thanks to its light weight and resistance to fire. 
 
 23. 1990 Clearing the Air 
 
 Although the Clean Air Act was originally passed in 1963, it received a major update in 1990, which targeted acid rain and ozone depletion. The law also established a tougher permitting and oversight system for polluters and required cleaner gasoline. 
 
 24. 1992 Rio Earth Summit 
 
 The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development was a major event in Rio de Janeiro that helped focus the world's attention on big environmental problems. It spurred all kinds of solutions, from government to civil society and business. It was there that countries agreed to start working together to address climate change. Countries also committed to increasing their use of renewable energy and to respecting the needs of indigenous people, efforts that were amplified when the UN met again in Rio 20 years later. 
 
 25. 1991 Saving Ferrets 
 
 In 1991, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service scientists began reintroducing black-footed ferrets to the American West. The species was declared extinct in 1979, but a few dozen individuals were later found and entered into a captive breeding program. Now, there are an estimated 1,000 of the animals in several populations in the wild. 
 
 26. 1993 Erin Brockovich Wins Her Case 
 
 Later immortalized in film, determined law clerk Erin Brokovich and her firm Masry & Vititoe scored a $333 million win against a California utility accused of poisoning people's groundwater with a toxic chemical. It was the largest settlement ever paid in a direct-action lawsuit. 
 
 27. 1993 Green Building Takes Off 
 
 In 1993, the U.S. Green Building Council was founded, helping kick off a revolution in environmentally friendly design that continues to grow each year. Architects and manufacturers have made big gains in energy efficiency, renewable energy, and sustainable materials. 
 
 28. 1993 Protecting Biodiversity 
 
 In 1993, the Convention on Biological Diversity went into effect after being ratified by enough countries. Nations pledged to work to protect biodiversity around the world, in a decision that is often seen as the foundation for sustainable development. 
 
 29. 1995 Gray Wolves Reintroduced to Yellowstone 
 
 After generations of absence, wolves were returned to an iconic national park. They quickly regained their past position in the web of life, restoring balance to prey species and even changing the course of rivers. Today Yellowstone remains a critical preserve as well as living laboratory for ecology. 
 
 30. 1995 Bald Eagle Recovery 
 
 In 1995 bald eagles were removed from the Endangered Species List, helping prove the power of the law. Eagles retain legal protection from hunting through other laws. 
 
 31. 1997 Early Climate Agreement 
 
 View Images Solar panels, like these in Germany, have become much more common around the world in recent decades. Photograph by Luca Locatelli, National Geographic 
 
 In 1997 the Kyoto Protocol was adopted by some countries (although not the U.S). It marked an early serious attempt by world leaders to address global warming in a coordinated way. 
 
 32. 2000 Hybrid Revolution 
 
 Toyota first introduced the Prius in Japan in 1997, but it came to America in 2000. The high-tech car introduced the hybrid drivetrain to many consumers, helping kick off a movement toward greater fuel efficiency. Within a few years, almost every car company began offering hybrid models. 
 
 33. 2000 Green Awareness 
 
 As the old millennium ended, environmental awareness climbed toward an all-time high, spurred by decades of educational and activist campaigns. Few politicians or corporations could afford to overtly ignore the environment any longer. 
 
 34. 2001 Roadless Areas Protected 
 
 In January 2001, the U.S. Forest Service adopted the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, which protected 58.5 million acres of pristine forests and grasslands from most road construction and logging. The rule remains controversial to industry but is cheered by conservationists. 
 
 35. 2002 California Goes Solar 
 
 In 2002, California passed an aggressive Renewable Portfolio Standard in order to help stimulate the clean energy industry. After a series of adjustments, the final result is that utilities in the state must get half of their energy from renewables by 2030. Many other states passed similar standards, though the Golden State's is the most ambitious. 
 
 36. 2002 Cradle to Cradle Is Published 
 
 The book Cradle to Cradle by William McDonough and Michael Braungart helped introduce their concept of biomimetic, clean design to the public. This helped kick off a new movement to rethink all manmade processes to be more in-line with nature, including the idea of ending the concept of waste and replacing it with the idea that everything can have a use as a material for something else. 
 
 37. 2003 Electric Cars Get Cool 
 
 Tesla Motors was founded by Elon Musk in 2003, helping make electric cars cutting-edge again (after they languished in obscurity for a century). Other manufacturers also pushed forward with a new round of innovation, helping ramp up a technology that many pundits think will be a boon for the environment. 
 
 38. 2006 Al Gore's Movie 
 
 Love it or hate it, the documentary An Inconvenient Truth helped raise public awareness around the threat of climate change. 
 
 39. 2006 Sharing Fish 
 
 In 2006 the U.S. started regulating the commercial fishing industry through catch shares, in an attempt to make fishermen partners in conservation instead of adversaries. The basic idea is that each fisherman is awarded a percent share of the total catch. So the more fish that can be caught, the more each person can benefit. This helps incentivize conservation measures and accelerated the recovery of many declining U.S. fish stocks. 
 
 40. 2007 Fuel Efficiency 
 
 The Energy Independence and Security Act resulted in tougher new fuel economy standards, including the phase-in of standards for SUVs and even large commercial vehicles. Manufacturers had fought the standards for years but eventually worked with the government to meet the standards. 
 
 41. 2007 Rise of Walking 
 
 View Images Legislation, global accords, and pressure from environmentally-conscious people have all led to increases in energy efficiency and renewable energy. Photograph by Robb Kendrick, Nat Geo Image Collection 
 
 Walk Score was founded in 2007, rating cities, neighborhoods, and more for how pedestrian friendly they are. The company helped raise awareness of the growing walking and biking movements, which aim to get people out of cars and into more livable communities. 
 
 42. 2007 Big Green Apple 
 
 Mayor Michael Bloomberg issued PlaNYC in 2007, a comprehensive plan to reduce New York City's impact on the planet. It included ambitious goals to take the city toward zero waste (by promoting recycling and composting), and supported energy efficiency, tree planting, green space, biking, and much more. Many other cities around the world have issued similar plans. 
 
 43. 2009 Massive Marine Monument 
 
 In 2009, George W. Bush created the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, which protects some of the most pristine waters in the ocean. The monument was expanded by Barack Obama to nearly 490,000 square miles (1.3 million square kilometers), making it nearly three times the size of California. It protects endemic species of coral and fish, turtles, whales, and much more. 
 
 44. 2010 Protecting the Atlantic Coast 
 
 In 2010, the Department of the Interior announced a ban on oil and gas drilling in federal waters off the Atlantic Coast until 2017. This was the latest in a series of efforts to limit development off the ecologically sensitive U.S. coasts. 
 
 45. 2012 Dams Come Down 
 
 In 2012, Washington's Elwha dams were removed, restoring a wild river to Olympic National Park. This was arguably the most high profile dam removal in a growing movement that has sought to restore natural rivers and see the return of salmon runs. 
 
 46. 2015 Climate Agreement 
 
 In late 2015, nations came together in Paris and agreed to a new plan to limit global warming. The deal opens for formal signatures on Earth Day, and it will require countries to reduce emissions according to their pledges. Environmentalists are cautiously optimistic that the agreement represents a global turning point. 
 
 47. 2017 Tougher Ozone Standards 
 
 In August 2017, the Trump administration EPA dropped its decision to delay new Obama-era regulations on ozone, a long irritant that forms when sunlight irradiates emissions from vehicles, power plants, and other sources. In October 2015, the Obama administration tightened the ozone national standard from 75 parts per billion to 70 parts per billion, citing ozone’s toll on public health. The Obama administration estimated that the reduction would yield $2.9 to $5.9 billion worth of health benefits in 2025, outweighing its estimated annual cost of $1.4 billion. 
 
 48. 2018 Species Show Recovery 
 
 In April, the lesser long-nosed bat became the first bat to be taken off the Endangered Species List. After decades of conservation work, including working with agave growers to harvest tequila in a manner more friendly to the bats, the species has recovered its numbers to an estimated 200,000, up from just a few thousand. In June 2017, Yellowstone’s grizzly bears were removed from the endangered list, while the American wood stork was removed in 2014. These examples show that the Endangered Species Act is working, conservationists say. 
 
 Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument was created in 2006; it was actually created in 2009. 
 
 Update: This story was first published on April 22, 2016 and updated on April 18, 2018. ||||| Looking for news you can trust? 
 
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 A lot of champagne was popped on the night of Saturday, December 12, when diplomats from almost every country on Earth finalized the text of the historic global agreement to combat climate change. In the Paris Agreement, countries committed to hold global temperature increases to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, an ambitious target considering that the world is already more than halfway to that limit. The deal also laid out a system for wealthier nations to help poorer ones pay for adapting to unavoidable climate impacts. 
 
 But finalizing the agreement was only one step on the long road to actually achieving its aims. The next step is happening today, on Earth Day, as heads of state and other top officials from more than 150 countries will gather at the United Nations headquarters in New York City to put their signatures on the deal. Secretary of State John Kerry, who was a driving force in Paris, will sign the document on behalf of the United States. 
 
 Earth Day had generally declined into little more than a “news” hook for PR flacks to harass reporters about eco-friendly guns and cheeseburgers. 
 
 Signing the document is mostly a symbolic step, indicating a country’s intent to formally “join” the agreement at some later stage. In order to “join” the agreement, national governments have to show the United Nations the piece of domestic paperwork—a law, executive order, or some other legal document—in which the government consents to be bound by the terms of the agreement. Some small countries, including some island states that are among the most vulnerable to climate impacts, are expected to offer up those documents at the same time they sign. Other countries will take longer. The agreement doesn’t take legal effect until it is formally joined by both 55 individual countries and by enough countries to cover 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions (a threshold that essentially mandates the participation of the United States and China). 
 
 The World Resources Institute made a pretty cool widget for experimenting with various ways to reach those thresholds. You can play around with different options to see what it would take. Once countries start signing the agreement, the widget will automatically update accordingly: 
 
 President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping have promised to join the agreement this year. Obama is expected to join using an executive agreement, which will allow him to avoid sending the deal to Congress. (Executive agreements account for the vast majority of US foreign commitments.) He’s able to do this because the United States says it can fulfill its Paris promises without any changes to domestic laws; instead, the Obama administration is holding up its end of the bargain by imposing new EPA regulations on emissions from power plants. 
 
 “Walking away from the agreement would instantly turn the US from a leader to a defector and would almost certainly trigger a diplomatic backlash that would hamper our other priorities.” 
 
 Unlike a treaty, an executive agreement does not require ratification by the Senate. It’s not bulletproof; a future president could unilaterally abandon the deal. But for Obama, there’s a clear incentive for pushing to reach those 55 countries and the 55 percent thresholds as quickly as possible: Once the agreement goes into force, it requires a four-year waiting period before a country can withdraw. In other words, in the event that either Ted Cruz or Donald Trump—both vociferous climate change deniers—succeeds Obama in the White House, they wouldn’t be able to back out of the agreement until their (*shudder*) second term. 
 
 The odds are against the agreement taking force before Obama leaves office because adoption by the European Union—which in the Paris Agreement acts as a singular unit—requires domestic actions by all of its 28 member states, which could take some extra time. Still, if the next president bails, he or she will have to pay a heavy diplomatic price for it, cautioned Elliot Diringer, executive vice president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. 
 
 “Walking away from the agreement would instantly turn the US from a leader to a defector,” he said, “and would almost certainly trigger a diplomatic backlash that would hamper our other priorities.” 
 
 The upshot is that the United States will likely join soon after today’s signing ceremony. A slew of other nations will follow, and the Paris Agreement will become binding international law sometime before 2018, when it calls for a global check-in on emission reductions. 
 
 Of course, none of this puts the world any closer to averting devastating climate change than we were back in December. As they stand today, the country-level plans (nationally determined contributions, or NDCs, in UN jargon) enshrined in the agreement fall woefully short of the “well below” 2 degrees C target. The chart below, from a recent analysis by MIT and Climate Interactive, shows a variety of possible future scenarios. The blue line is what would happen without the Paris Agreement—a world where the impacts of climate change would be truly horrific and many major cities would become uninhabitable. The red line shows what will happen if countries stick to their current commitments. The green line is what a successful outcome of the Paris Agreement would look like (and, to be clear, even that level of warming will come with severe consequences): 
 
 As you can see, by 2025 or so countries need to be doing far more than they have committed to thus far. The Paris Agreement states that in 2020, at the next major international climate conference, countries must roll out new plans that go well beyond their current ones. So we’re very much not out of the woods yet. But we’re moving in the right direction, at least. 
 
 Since the first Earth Day in 1970, the holiday has generally declined into little more than a “news” hook for corporate communications people to harass reporters about eco-friendly guns and cheeseburgers and other dumb stuff. So it’s kind of nice to see the day being used for something of actual historical significance. ||||| What will be labeled a global triumph will in reality likely be a tragedy for rich and poor countries alike, and especially for the poor. 
 
 Friday marks the forty-sixth Earth Day, but this year will be different. This year the United Nations has decided to hold an elaborate ceremony to gather the signatures of the countries who endorsed the Paris climate agreement last December. Of the 196 countries that attended the Paris confab, more than 130 countries and 60 heads of state are expected to sign the pact at the UN’s headquarters in New York City. 
 
 Alarmists will herald Earth Day 2016 as the moment all humanity joined together to save the planet from man-made global warming—also known as human profligacy wrought by high energy consumption, individual liberty, and economic freedom. That a majority of the world’s nations would sign an agreement “recognizing that climate change represents an urgent and potentially irreversible threat” requiring an accelerated, “deep reduction” in global greenhouse gas emissions is, indeed, an unprecedented but tragic event in mankind’s history. 
 
 What will be labeled a global triumph will in reality likely be, if actually implemented, a tragedy for rich and poor countries alike and especially for the poor wherever they reside. The Paris agreement represents the first energy regression in mankind’s history. It’s a regression imposed by the ruling elites of the world’s most prosperous and educated countries, abetted by legions of UN functionaries and their kin in non-governmental organizations (NGOs). 
 
 Multiple public opinion polls in developing and developed countries, however, show that action to combat alleged global warming is last on a list of a dozen genuine public priorities such as employment, education, and health. 
 
 A Return to Pre-Industrial Days 
 
 Accelerating a transition from fossil fuels to renewables means subsidizing and mandating a return to pre-industrial energy scarcity when the energy upon which fundamental human welfare depended was far more expensive but less efficient, versatile, and reliable. The grand delusion of climate policy is the assumption that renewable energies can now supplant fossil fuels and still affordably provide the myriad of services, goods, and food handily provided by the highly concentrated and controllable energy in hydrocarbons. As Google’s engineers concluded, renewables are a “false hope.” 
 
 As Google’s engineers concluded, renewables are a ‘false hope.’ 
 
 For decades, the UN’s Convention on Climate Change (UNCCC) has unsuccessfully tried to forge a globally binding agreement to curb man-made greenhouse gases. The poorer countries of the world have understandably refused to jeopardize the energy availability necessary to reduce poverty and power economic growth while richer countries have refused to cede sovereignty and shackle their prospering economies with onerous carbon cuts. 
 
 The Paris agreement evidently overcame this impasse by making the carbon cuts each country pledges voluntary. Yet this change from a binding to a voluntary plan makes the Paris agreement futile if avoiding the wrath of the weather gods is the real goal of the enterprise. The aggregate reduction of greenhouse gas emissions each nation pledges through what the agreement calls “Intentional Nationally Determined Contributions” is not at all enough to avoid the dangerous warming predicted by the reigning science of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “Much greater emission reductions will be required,” states the agreement, if catastrophic warming is to be averted. 
 
 Developing and developed countries finally united to support the agreement because prosperous countries, for the first time, caved to the demands of the poor countries. In the Paris agreement, rich countries agreed to undertake “economy wide absolute emission reduction targets,” while poorer countries promised to develop less economically onerous programs for adaptation to climate change. 
 
 Developing Countries Get a Free Pass, Others Handicaps 
 
 Unlike mandatory carbon cuts enforceable under the rule of law as in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Clean Power Plan, the developing countries’ individual pledges to reduce greenhouse gases are conditional. Most developing countries pledged carbon reductions only if such measures do not constrain economic growth. 
 
 While EPA rules drive major U.S. coal companies into bankruptcy and destroy thousands of U.S. jobs, China is now building 368 coal plants. 
 
 On that note, the likelihood of actual implementation of developing countries” pledges is slim. While the media extols the Paris Agreement as a global agreement to end the era of fossil fuels, more than 2,400 coal-fired power plants are under construction or planned, according to a study by four institutes for climate research. While EPA rules drive major U.S. coal companies into bankruptcy and destroy thousands of U.S. jobs, China is now building 368 coal plants; India has 297 coal plants under construction. 
 
 The prosperous countries even acceded to another developing-bloc demand that had long been an insuperable barrier: climate payola from rich to poor countries. The Paris agreement institutionalizes a Green Climate Fund to be financed by annual contributions of $100 billion from developed countries. Given weak economic growth and increasing geopolitical tensions across the world, the likelihood of contributions reaching $100 billion every year is also slim. 
 
 It’s Not about Climate, But Redistribution 
 
 Everybody loses on the path laid out in the Paris agreement, both the rich countries embracing the decarbonizing but awash with energy or those beginning the grand energy transformation without full access to electricity. Man-made energy scarcity will stymie existing economic growth in developed countries and constrain if not preclude economic growth in developing countries. 
 
 ‘One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. … We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy.’ 
 
 There is nothing inviolable about fossil fuels. Who knows what energy innovations creative human minds will achieve? At the moment, however, there is no comparable substitute for fossil fuel or the massive, seamlessly operating energy infrastructure built around these rich hydrocarbons across the world. 
 
 The Paris agreement formalizes wealth redistribution on several levels: from rich countries to poor countries and from poor people to rich people. Former UN climate official Ottmar Edenhofer candidly reveals the endgame: “One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. … We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy.” Subsidizing and mandating still far more expensive renewables forcibly redistributes the earnings of the poor to the rich elites who can afford higher energy prices. 
 
 UN Climate Program chief Christina Figueres admits her program now creates the political and organizational wherewithal to replace the economic system that made modern economic growth possible. As she nonchalantly comments: “This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution.” 
 
 If fully executed, the Paris agreement would slow or arrest the still-growing advances of the last century that have extended the average human lifespan and increased per capita income 10 to 20 times over. The Paris agreement may be futile, but this climate chimera is dangerously political and morally offensive. ||||| April 22 is Earth Day, the event that environmentalists created 46 years ago to raise awareness of issues such as pollution and deforestation, and the need for us all to come together to find solutions and protect the planet where we live. But it's also a good time to learn more about the Earth, and some of its characteristics. Here are seven things that you may not know about the Earth. 
 
 No. 1. It's not a perfect sphere. The Earth might look perfectly round from space photos, like the globe on your bookshelf. But scientists say that the Earth's mass is unevenly distributed, so that it is squashed a bit at the poles and swollen at the Equator, where the distance to the Earth's center is about 13 miles greater. 
 
 No, Earth Isn't Flat: Here's How Ancients Proved It ||||| Earth Day has been celebrated on April 22 since 1970. Although public support for environmental protection grows, legislative action has nearly ground to a halt. 
 
 More than 20,000 gathered on a hilltop at Philadelphia's Fairmount Park to celebrate the first Earth Day in 1970. 
 
 For the past 46 years, Americans have celebrated Earth Day on April 22. 
 
 "Earth Day is all things to all people," Frank Maisano, an energy-industry spokesman in Washington, told The Christian Science Monitor in 2008. "It's a symbolic representative of the desire for everything we need to do to respect how we treat the earth." April 22 is the officially designated Earth Day, but it's become more of an everyday mentality since its inception in 1970. 
 
 While public support for environmental protection has continued since the first Earth Day 46 years ago, little legislation has been passed at the federal level. Policy analysts and environmental historians say the drastic decrease in legislation between April 22, 1970 and April 22, 2016 can be attributed to congressional attitudes. 
 
 "A major thing has happened, and that's bipartisanship," Anthony Leiserowitz, director of Yale University's Project on Climate Change Communications, tells the Monitor in a phone interview. 
 
 "The environment – and more specifically climate change – is a highly contested political issue, which is very different from the 1970s," he says. "The politicians have gotten ever more divided [on environmental issues] but that's only because the parties themselves have become more divided. In the 1970s, people were co-sponsoring, voting across the aisle – but now it is all party line." 
 
 The 1960s and 1970s witnessed environmental legislation such as the Clean Water Act, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air Act, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, and more. But Earth Days in the 21st century don't have legislation to celebrate as frequently. The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, which encouraged energy efficiency, and the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act of 2009, which granted wilderness protection for 2 million acres of US land, account for the most recent nationwide legislation put into law. 
 
 Americans' views of environmental issues have "not changed drastically in recent years," according to a 2007 study from Pew Research Center. While the percentage of Americans wanting stricter environmental laws fell from 90 percent in 1992 to 82 percent in 1994, this rate has remained in the low 80s until today. And between 2009 and the first quarter of 2016, environmental issues have only increased in salience among Americans, suggests Gallup, with 64 percent of Americans worrying a "great deal" or a "fair amount" about global warming. 
 
 But although overall support for environmental protection remains stable, Pew notes, there has been a growing increase in partisan differences. In 1992, Democrats led Republicans in wanting stricter environmental laws, but only by 7 percent. This divide grew to 17 percentage points in 2003 and then up to 30 points by 2007. And in 2014, Pew found that a 43 percent gap between Republicans and Democrats who considered climate change a major threat to the US. 
 
 "There was a period of time at the turn of the 21st century [where public support dipped] but really for the last 50 years you see public opinion at 70 to 80 percent support," Steven Cohen, the executive director of Columbia University's Earth Institute in New York, tells the Monitor. "It's an issue that may have been controversial in the past but it hasn't been for a very long time – except for in the minds of about 30 people in the House of Representatives." 
 
 In fact, public support for environmental protection may even be stronger today than it was around the time of the first Earth Day, despite less legislative productivity. 
 
 "People have gone through school learning about these things, so the level of environmental awareness is much higher today than when I worked at the EPA in 1977," adds Dr. Cohen. "We barely understood environmental science. The average high school student knows more today than we did." 
 
 In those days, Earth Day was "in the spirit of 1960s and 1970s demonstration politics – it was symbolic politics," Cohen says. Today, he believes the holiday is better integrated with education and research, a reminder of "how important the planet is," and that the US needs to advance climate science in addition to environmental legislation. 
 
 Despite the legislative inaction that plagues recent Earth Days, the continued, broad public support for environmental protection is encouraging, some climate experts say. 
 
 "There are some things that are widely shared, [such as] the idea that the health of the environment is a good thing," adds Dr. Leiserowitz. "No one says it's OK to drive species extinct, for example, but that doesn't mean that these battles aren't incredibly intense."
– Friday marks the 46th celebration of Earth Day, and there's no lack of commemorative trivia, deals, and think pieces honoring Mother Nature and the environment. Here, a roundup of our favorites: No, the Earth's not flat, but it's not exactly perfectly round, either. Discovery.com explains that, and 6 other surprising facts about our planet. Starting with 1970's "Environmental Magna Carta," National Geographic lists 46 milestones that have taken place since the first Earth Day. CNN explains why, despite "melting ice sheets, intensifying heat waves … [and] dying elephants," we're not completely doomed. Some Earth Day deals from around the Web via ABC7, including a big Best Buy sale on energy-efficient appliances. Fusion reveals why this Earth Day is different from all past Earth Days. Point: why more than 130 countries signing the Paris climate agreement at the UN Friday is a bad idea, per the Federalist. Counterpoint: why it's a "genuinely good" idea, according to Mother Jones. The Christian Science Monitor gets philosophical and wonders: Do people even care about Earth Day anymore? Check out which celebrities have been deemed the "greenest" stars in the past.