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With the increasing development of tourism, a variety of environmental and resource challenges have been rapidly emerging in ecotourism areas. The study on sustainable, reducing carbon footprint and tourism destinations can enhance the optimization of understanding benefit and the effort of ecosystem service aid for tourism areas. There have been plentiful achievements in the study on reducing carbon footprint and sustainable development of areas visited by tourists abroad and local. The research development was based on the international travel where the impact of climate change and global warming was realized.
The paper looks at the impact of greenhouse gases in EAU and the impact of tourism on the environment and ways to sustain it for continuous ecotourism in the region. EAU is a hub for tourism each year that is effective regarding economic development and growth of the region. However, reducing carbon footprint is a major step to ensure the area continues to receive tourists and gain economically. With the increasing global warming, the tourism destinations will in return become non-conducive for the tourists who visit the region for various intentions leisure, business or vacation.
EAU in the past several years has experienced many environmental issues among the carbon emissions. The threats to the environmental can be attributed to the region's economic activities that have happened to exploit the available resources. The UAE is a developing country and has been striving to utilize the available resources to the maximum. The economy has been in a transition from a traditional economy characterized by the tourism, industrialization, urbanization, agriculture, livestock, and fisheries activities.
Changes in the economic development have resulted in the loss of habitat for the wildlife, coastal and soil pollution because of the oil spills, and affecting the ground water (Maraqa, Ali, Imran, Al Awadi & Hamza, 2012). It is worthy to note that the impact of the various environmental issues varies. Those environmental threats is contributing to significant effects on the tourism, population and the atmospheres. The central focus for these environmental concerns is the level of the devastating effect they bring to the environment.
According to UAE's ministry of energy report on greenhouse gases, oil and gases contribute to approximately 15% of greenhouse emissions during the year2013. The week sustainability event in Abu Dhabi (ADSW 2015) affirmed that much of emissions results from water and electricity generation accounting for 33% followed by the transport, industrial and oil and gas industry sectors accounting for 22%, 16% and 15% emissions respectively (Moenr.gov.ae, 2015). The least contributor to greenhouse emissions is the agricultural sector which accounts for about 1% of emissions. The latest reports highlight the impact of carbon emissions on such an imperative country regarding transport industry (Sbia, Shahbaz & Hamdi, 2014).
As much as UAE plays a vital role in ensuring energy renewal as well as diversification of energy sources to counter effects of climate change, the negative implications of greenhouse gases cannot be ignored altogether. The greatest contributors of greenhouse gases are the carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous compounds as well as fluoride compounds. These gases mainly results from the burning of fossil fuels.
Various researchers have conducted studies to assess the current conditions of carbon gasses as well as their implication on surface warming and the global weather patterns affecting life in the region. Environmental Institute of Sweden carried out some studies in Abu Dhabi to predict the changing weather patterns and effects in the ecosystem, allowing the government to implement relevant measures such as the Masdar Initiative to contain carbon emissions (Sbia, Shahbaz & Hamdi, 2014).
Such studies have helped UAE to attain the fourth position in the global ranking of countries contributing heavily to global warming. Appropriate assessment studies present opportunities for UAE leaders to draft resolution strategies to prevent adverse effects of climate change and also attend to expected health and environmental challenges resulting from extreme carbon emissions. For instance, the rising sea levels affect the infiltration of ground water aquifers, particularly in UAE where water pollution and depletion is a major challenge.
Air and soil pollution includes the biological as well as the chemical processes that distort the living conditions of the fauna and the flora due to the environmental pollution. The pollution occurs many ways, particularly from transport sector and the deposition of materials in the environment that changes the properties of both air and the soil conditions. Air and soil pollution has been a significant concern in the UAE region. One of the main results of the environmental damage or the chief agent of air and soil pollution is the transport pollution facilitated by travel and tourism, acid rain and the industrial emissions (Maraqa, Ali, Imran, Al Awadi, & Hamza, 2012).
Regarding the acid rain, there is the presence of the sulphur dioxide emissions and other traces of gases such as the nitrogen that reacts with the oxygen present in the air (Funk et al., 2014). The resulting compounds forms various acidic rains that fall to cause great harm to the soil. Also, the presence of other compounds in the dry form such as the gases and the particle damages the air. Polluted air damages the chemistry of air composition thus posing a problem of the water and soils. As a result, the plants and animals become vulnerable to exposure caused by the toxic gases. The presence of the industrial development and the eventual increase in the processing process leads to environmental change.
Climate change affects the water temperatures and the thermal power plants. The increased temperature affects the efficiency of the thermal plants thus lowering the amount oration of the electricity produced. For instance, the difference in the sea water temperature within the water bodies in the UAE will have an increased role in the places to locate the power plants because of the inefficiency of the cooling system.
Also, high temperatures in the power plant limit the maximum pressure in the condenser, changes the load of the thermal power thus limiting the maximum amount of pressure in the condenser reducing the access to water due to the presence of the dry spells (Abdelfattah, 2009). The environmental concern is the lowering of the efficacy in the water requirement needed for the electricity output.
Increased disruption in the consider amount of power causes a threat to the energy supply. The major reason for distortion is that there is an increased amount of nuclear and power reactors that will have access to the same cooling water (Clarke & Almannai, 2014). As such, increasing sea water temperature and power plants can be understood as the issue of the plant performance due to the variation in the temperatures change in the cooling system. The UAE region has a considerable presence in the desert environment thus decreasing the thermal efficiency, and hence the reduction of the load plant capacity as well as output from the power plant.
The environmental issue of desertification has brought to increase the loss of land use. "Desertification is an alteration in climate, soil properties, or vegetation, which results in a continuous loss of ecosystem services that are crucial to sustaining life. Desertification impacts largely on the dryland areas around the globe and great cause of effect in human societies" (D'Odorico, Bhattachan, Davis, Ravi & Runyan, 2013).
A large part of the UAE is faced with the rapid change in the vegetation cover, soil properties, hydrologic conditions, and plant community composition (D'Odorico et al., 2013). These rapid changes have resulted in the loss of the ecosystem services to pose a severe threat to a sustainable livelihood. Desertification is thus the entire shift in the natural properties of soil resources and limitation to hold water resulting in the loss of the soil properties. In this condition, there is a continued change in the natural features of soil. On the other hand, afforestation is the measure or efforts to curb land degradation and limit the progress of desertification.
The UAE has a large population comprised of tourists and locals characterized by the presence of this environmental issue regarding desertification. Human activities have accelerated desertification. However, afforestation process has contributed to the measures used to motivate or limit excessive adverse effects caused by increased aridity (Grainger, 2013). As the UAE population increase, the human activities and the climatic variations continue to be evident. Desertification is the environmental issue that has caused dynamics and changes.
Access to water for the past decades has changed to usher in the explosion of the groundwater development for agricultural supplies and industrial use (Shahin & Salem, 2015). Globally, the economic gain from the utilization of the groundwater has been dramatic. The major problem that has emerged in many groundwater reserves have been the depletion to the extent that the yields of water from the wells, the water quality, the pumping costs, and changes in the aquatic ecosystems have been the eventual adverse effects.
The rate of groundwater usage in UAE is about 20 times greater than natural recharge rate, implying that water consumption exceeds its generation and that there is little re-use (Staff, 2015). About 2/3 of UAE water consumption comes from ground water while desalination provides 29% of the same. Therefore, the depletion of groundwater aquifers presents negative implications for the coming future "Groundwater depletion is the natural and inevitable effect of withdrawing water from an aquifer" (Konikow & Kendy, 2011). Depletion leads to a new equilibrium and the removal of addition water leading to substantial persistent declines in the water levels (Shahin & Salem, 2015).
Excessive depletion of the groundwater has been an environmental issue in the UAE. In this regard, the region is subjected to a situation where the groundwater has the inferior water quality (Konikow & Kendy, 2011). As the level of depletion continues, the impacts worsen, calling for the need to adopt possible solutions and options for the future and manage the groundwater depletion, as well as the changing physical and social change (Konikow & Kendy, 2011).
Increased coastal, soil and marine pollution from oil spills and tourism activities Crude oil and the refined petroleum products offer challenges to the environment if they spill to the coastal or other water bodies. The occurrence of oil spills is the circumstances where there is the release of the liquid petroleum to the environment. However, there is the case of oil spills that occurs on a large scale in water bodies. In the Arabian Gulf, this study was unable to identify a centralised database about oil spills, either from oil extraction or transport activities. Therefore, experts may team up to with oil companies to assess areas of oil exploration as well as the impact of aging pipelines.
The oil spills in the water bodies may occur due to the drilling process on the offshore and the oil platform or in the wells (Naser, 2013). Oil spill happens because of the negligence of human beings to cause major pollution. The crude oil may be released in the lands as well. The common thing in the oil spills is that there is increased the damage caused, and it becomes a challenge in cleaning the oil spills. Fares (2014) states that the effects of the oil spill in the water bodies' cause mass death of the water species and other plants of the water. Eventually, the mammals and the birds have a hard time to live with this condition as they fail to have room to regulate the bodily temperatures posed by the oil spills.
The study established that mangroves are the most sensitive of all UAE marine habitats, due to their aerial roots that require constant exposure to free air. In Abu Dhabi, sea-grass is another sensitive marine habitat that negatively reacts to oil spills that prevent direct sunlight from reaching the grass (Funk et al. 2014). However, Abu Dhabi prepared a coastal resource map to sensitize on the environmental implications of direct oil spills. It is recommended that other emirates adopt such a tool of marine pollution
Environmental issues associated with the tourism destination, rapid urbanization, industrialization, and the rise in the living standards has been a major problem. The developing countries have experienced problems with the waste products of the industries. The increasing demands for manufactured goods have resulted in the industries failure to control the level of production thus causing a serious problem to the environment relating to the environmental pollution.
Accordingly, wastes have been the by-product of growth. Vasiljevic-Shikaleska defines waste as "any substance or object or, more generally, any movable good that the holder has discarded, intends to discard or must discard" (Vasiljevic- Shikaleska, 2014 p.107). In this regards, the efforts are a necessity for controlling the pollution arising out of this disposal of present wastes into valuable materials for various resourceful uses. The talk of waste is well understood after an analysis of the industrial development within the area of concern (Vasiljevic-Shikaleska, 2014).
For instance, the area with a severe environmental problem relating to solid waste management shows the traces of mismanagement of solid waste. Lack of disposal methods as well as the institutional framework, and limited or no supportive environmental problems to create a waste management system where the by-products can provide adequate environmental protection (Al-Maaded, Madi, Kahraman, Hodzic & Ozerkan, 2012).
Accordingly, understanding the definition of waste management in tourism destinations, industrial zones and urban waste, and related processes such as the waste transportation and landfill is recognizing the problems related to increased industrial disposal, lack of affordable infrastructure facilities, and lack of responsibility leading to negligence on the part of the management. Therefore, it is a necessity that the relevant body work out the strategy to organize the efficient collection and industrial disposal of the waste management. In the UAE, waste, management is the biggest issue due to the presence of the industrial and urban development for the past few years.
Tourism Development and Environmental Challenges: An Overview. (2023, Mar 26). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/an-overview-of-the-development-of-tourism-and-the-environmental-and-resource-challenges-essay
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