"A humble lake in a Canadian suburb may soon become the symbolic starting point for a radical new chapter in Earth’s official history: the Anthropocene, or the age of humans.
A group of scientists said Tuesday the best evidence for humanity’s overwhelming impact on the planet could be found at Crawford Lake in Milton, Ontario. The lake’s finely layered sediments contain a thousand-year record of environmental history, culminating in an explosion of man-made disruption around the middle of the 20th century. That’s when scientists say human activities — from nuclear weapons tests and fossil fuel combustion to deforestation and global trade — began to leave an indelible imprint on Earth’s geologic record.
The announcement marks a crucial step in a years-long effort to determine whether people have altered the planet enough to launch a new epoch in geologic time. Since 2009, an obscure scientific body called the Anthropocene Working Group has accumulated evidence that Earth’s chemistry and climate are fundamentally different from the conditions of the last several thousand years. The final requirement was to identify a “golden-spike” — a spot in the geologic record that perfectly preserved the dangerous transformation humans have wrought."
Sarah Kaplan reports for the Washington Post July 11, 2023.
SEE ALSO:
"The Human Age Has a New Symbol. It’s a Record of Bomb Tests and Fossil Fuels." (New York Times)
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