THE GREEN ARMY| Sustaining Our Planet for Future Generations
Sustaining Our Planet for Future Generations
The Green ARMY
Summary
We are the Green ARMY. Five people around the world working together to advocate and educate people about global pollution. We have created a website which we update regularly on issues that cause global pollution, how pollution can be seen from space, other environmental related issues our world faces and how we can help to create a sustainable future. The website was created to bring awareness to issues we face and show ways in which people can take action. Furthermore, we created a game to educate people on pollution. We have also created a web app using data from NASA satellites and other resources that show fires, hot spots and Greenhouse Gas emissions around the world.
How We Addressed This Challenge
What We Developed:
We have developed a website, web application and an online game.
Why is it Important:
With the wildfires in America raging, the climate heating up and bush-fire season soon to start in Australia, we decided to create a web app that would show where fires, hot spots and greenhouse gas emissions are around the world. This is important since knowing where hot spots and fires are could save someone's life. Moreover, greenhouse gas emission contribute to air pollution and this app shows where some emissions are. This web app is updated regularly so the information is up to date and correct. You can also search for specific locations such as states or addresses and find out if anything is effecting those areas.
The website we created educates viewers on global pollution and other climate issues we are facing. It also shows way in which we can improve our sustainability and lower pollution. This is very important since to reduce our carbon footprint on our planet, and to even have Earth to live on in the future, we must all switch to sustainable ways of living.
The online game will educate people on pollution and how they can make a difference. It is important because the game can be understood by young children so even young age groups can be educated on the effect of pollution on our planet.
What Does it Do:
We developed a website that will inform readers about the different types of global pollution and what they can do help. We have also created a web app that shows fires happening in America, hot spots that may be susceptible to fires around the world and the greenhouse gas emissions from large facilities (mostly Canada). The online game explains the different types of pollution, how pollution can be seen from space, and how humans can help as the you play through different settings.
How Does it Work:
We created our website using WiX. We used information from National Geographic and NASA to create our blog posts about global pollution and other climate related issues.
For our web app we used ArcGIS to create it. Collecting data from NASA satellites and tools, satellites from other organisations (such as United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and other sources we have been able to overlay this data onto a base map to create our web app.
This link will show you some images of our web app: https://botheru.wixsite.com/greenarmy/post/green-army-fire-air-pollution-detector
The online game was made using Scratch and coding. It uses information from NASA and other resources to explain pollution.
What we Hope to Achieve:
We hope to educate people through our website and also help them take action to be more sustainable and reduce the pollution they create. Our web app is designed so people are aware of where fires, hotspots and greenhouse gas emissions are and can stay away from these areas. Global pollution is a huge issue that is ruining our planet and we want to advocate against pollution and push for sustainable living. The game was designed so even young audiences can understand the impact on pollution. This way we hope all age groups can take action against pollution and understand the effect it has.
How We Developed This Project
Team:
Our Team:
Rusandi Botheju - Melbourne, Australia (14 years old)
SATTI VIJAY NAGA SRI DHANANJAY REDDY - Andhra Pradesh, India (20 years old)
Adrish Pati - West Bengal, India (14 years old)
Nicole Florez - Colombia (15 years old )
Nebu Varghese - India (no longer in the team)
This is the link to a small PowerPoint on our project: https://tinyurl.com/greenarmyppt
Motivation:
Our motivation for this challenge starts with a story. I (Rusandi) live in Melbourne, Australia and each Summer we have a fair few bushfires. However, the ones that occurred at the start of this year in January were the worst that I had experienced. My worst experience was when we were visiting a national park with some family friends. Everything was going well and we were enjoying the day when we received the notification. The bushfires which were occurring far away from the park had changed direction and were spreading fast, heading our way! I still remember how we scrambled to our cars, and the anxious looks and calls my parents made as we drove as fast as we could back home. Luckily, we were safe but the smoke from the fire spread fast and soon the sky and Sun were covered by a gray blanket of darkness, you couldn't step outside without a mask, the rain was polluted and houses including mine which were far away from the fires could still see the smoke. We weren't effected by the fires directly like some people who lost their homes, land and important items. Moreover, the environment was effected such as animal habitats being destroyed, animal species depletion, acres of land being burnt and terrible air pollution that lasted for months after the fires were over.
This link will take you to pictures I took during the fires:
https://botheru.wixsite.com/greenarmy/post/bushfire-pictures-in-australia
So what does a fire have to do with global pollution? Air pollution is a major threat on our environment and health, meaning smoke from fires like this can contribute to unhealthy air quality. Not only fires but emissions from factories, and other things such as man-made materials add to pollution.
So our goal was to create something that would educate people on pollution and that is what we have done through our website, web app and online game.
Developing the Project:
Initially, we had planned to just create a website. It would include information on pollution around the world and ways in which people can take action and make a difference. However, we believed this wasn't enough. We wanted to make an impact and help people and that's how the idea for the web app came to be. However, we realised that not everyone would be able to comprehend the web app and website so we created a game that even young children could understand as well.
Tools:
We used WiX to create our website and collected information for our posts from National Geographic and the NASA websites.
We used ArcGIS to create our web app and used data from NASA and other space organisations to complete our map.
We used Scratch to create our online game.
Problems and Achievements:
A problem we had was letting more people find our website so they could improve their knowledge on pollution and what humanity can do to help. We solved this issue by sharing it on social media sites such as Discord, WhatsApp, etc.
We were very proud when we finished creating our web app since it could be used by many people and could potentially keep someone away from a dangerous situation. For example, they would know where fires and gas emissions are and could stay away from those areas. Furthermore, they would also be able to locate hotspots that could lead to potential fires and stay wary of those places.
Links:
This is the link to our website (The Green ARMY): https://botheru.wixsite.com/greenarmy/home
This is the link to our web app ( Green ARMY Fire/Air Pollution Detector): https://www.arcgis.com/apps/ImageryViewer/index.html?appid=bbb1e197b147492ab8869da84ee747cc
This is the link to our online game (The Green ARMY Game): https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/432339734/
How We Used Space Agency Data in This Project
We used information from the following:
Satellite (VIIRS) Thermal Hotspots and Fire Activity
NASA Terra
Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS)
NOAA-20 Satellite (by United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)
Project Demo
This is the link to our YouTube video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOKoiqwbNg4
If the link doesn't work this is the link to the YouTube channel where you can find the video ( video called "The Green ARMY"):
Project Code
Data & Resources
Resources Used:
NASA Data - MODIS, Satellite VIIRS and NASA Terra
Other Space Satellite Data - NOAA-20 Satellite by United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Google Images - images used for the website blog posts
National Geographic and NASA Website - information collected for blog posts
App Build:
ArcGIS - used to build web app
Esri - powers web app
Website:
WiX - used to create website
Online Game:
Scratch - used to create the game