Watch Age of Humans

For millions of years, the amount of water on Earth has remained the same. The amount of freshwater, however, has become scarce thanks to a population explosion and human-influenced climate change. Droughts, floods, rising sea levels, and saltwater contamination of freshwater resources have forced us to confront the challenges facing humanity today. See how science has responded, with solutions such as seawater desalination on an industrial scale, sewage water purification via microfiltration, and programs to address floating plastic debris.

Today, there is more CO2 in our air than during the past three million years. In Greenland and Antarctica, ice sheets are losing 125 billion tons of their mass each year. The changes humans have inflicted upon Earth's atmosphere and climate over the millennia have been dramatic and often catastrophic. But new technological breakthroughs like carbon capture, global shifts in attitudes about clean energy, and even changes to dietary behavior have given scientists and environmentalists hope that can reverse some of the damage we have done.

Ever since humans began living in groups, we have altered the ground we live on, and never has it been more evident than over the last thousand years. Our population has grown exponentially. We have transformed forests into arable land. The technosphere--the sum of all manmade things--has spread wildly. But just as humankind has started to change the Earth's surface, it has also taken measures to alter the impact we've had on it. With breathtaking images captured across the globe, we explore our changing world and what's being done to save it.