Report Depicts NC Environment 100 Years From Now

(24 June 2003 — Raleigh)  In cooperation with a panel of leading North Carolina conservation scientists, Environmental Defense today released a report that envisions the health of the state’s environment and natural systems in 100 years.  “Horizon 2100” contrasts the healthy and prosperous North Carolina environment that would result from aggressive and comprehensive conservation with the impoverished environment that will likely result from continuation of current sprawling development, casually managed growth and limited conservation.  The report is at www.environmentaldefense.org/go/nchorizon.

“Horizon 2100 shows the path to the green and healthy North Carolina our grandchildren deserve to enjoy.  It’s based on sound science and offers real specifics to strengthen the prognosis for North Carolina’s environmental future,” said Dave McNaught, senior policy analyst for the Raleigh office of Environmental Defense.

“For too long conservation has been misunderstood as a longing to recreate some idyllic or imagined pristine condition of the past,” said David Jones, director of the N.C. Zoological Park and panel co-chair.  “Horizon 2100 does not seek to recreate what once was, but to allow the natural evolution of the best that still can be.  Aggressive conservation protects the human habitat and will broaden choices North Carolinians will have in the future.”

“In addition to maintaining as much of North Carolina’s diverse array of native plants, animals and ecological communities as possible, we must also restore and protect the ecological processes that drive and define natural systems,” said William Schlesinger, dean of Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences and panel member.  “To have truly conserved North Carolina in 2100, we must also address such inevitabilities as climate change and sea level rise.”

“Horizon 2100 offers some good strategies and recommendations for improving conservation efforts statewide,” said Betsy Bennett, director of the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences and panel co-chair.  “Environmental education is essential.  Every resident of, or visitor to, North Carolina should understand the opportunities and challenges of aggressive conservation, and how their choices today will dictate the possibilities for future generations.”