大数据能遏制气候变化吗？

    保护环境刻不容缓。美国宇航局表示，地球海平面过去100年中上升了近7英寸，北极冰面10年之内萎缩了近13%。另据美国大学大气研究联盟表示，地球的表面温度也在稳步攀升。但现在，人类也进入了可以利用大数据寻找环境问题解决之道的时代。大数据在减轻交通堵塞和降低犯罪率方面已经展现了它的效果，所以我们为什么不用它来解决气候变化呢？以下五个大数据项目可能会成为人类解决这一难题的好帮手。

    Something’s up with the environment. Sea levels have risen nearly seven inches in the past 100 years, and Arctic ice sheets are shrinking at about 13% a decade, according to NASA. Meanwhile the earth’s surface temperature has been climbing steadily upward, says the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research. But it’s also the era of using big data to find ways to solve environmental problems. Crunching data already helps with reducing traffic jams and lowering crime rates. So why not climate change? Here are five big data projects that could make a difference.

    谷歌地球引擎

    乌尔米亚湖是伊朗境内一个较大的咸水湖，它在1984年的卫星影像上呈深蓝色。但几年后的卫星影像显示，它的湖面缩小了许多，颜色也变成了绿色。到2012年，我们只能看到它的褐色波纹。谷歌的地球引擎服务汇总了各种公开可得的卫星影像（如乌尔米亚湖的照片），供研究人员定位环境损害并加以解决。通过谷歌地球引擎，巴西科学家得以追踪亚马逊流域的滥砍滥伐活动。谷歌地球部门经理丽贝卡•摩尔表示，与外部研究人员合作最大的一项挑战，就是他们一般并不了解这样大范围的数据的重要意义。“他们想得太小了，我们必须要说，现在你可以利用谷歌地球引擎来研究整个大洲40年来的气候变化情况。”

    Google Earth Engine

    Lake Urmia, a large salt lake in Iran, is a deep teal blue in a satellite video from 1984. A few years later, a similar image shows a much smaller lake with a green hue. By the time the video ends in 2012, the lake is a phosphorescent streak of brown. Google Earth Engine, a service from Google, compiles publicly available satellite imagery like the images of Lake Urmia for researchers to spot environmental damage and fix it. Using Google Earth Engine Brazilian scientists have been able to track deforestation in the Amazon. According to Rebecca Moore, a manager at Google Earth, the biggest challenge of working with outside researchers is they typically don’t appreciate the scope of the data. “They are thinking too small,” she said. “We have to say, you can have an analysis for the entire continent for 40 years.”