It has been a little over a year since the COVID-19 Pandemic hit the United States and forced life as we knew it to come to a screeching halt. People were instructed to stay home, wear masks, remain six feet apart, and avoid crowds. For months, the world remained on lockdown whilst trying to flatten the curve and wait for a vaccine to rollout.

The Good: Although uncomfortable for us humans, our planet recovered slightly from the ongoing environmental crisis. The mandatory shutdowns allowed the Earth’s atmosphere to see a significant reduction in air pollutants. NASA researchers found that since February 2020, the pandemic enforced restrictions reduced global nitrogen dioxide concentrations by nearly 20%. Nitrogen dioxide, an air pollutant produced as a result of the combustion of fossil fuels (industry) and road traffic, was severely reduced due to the changes in human activity in order to prevent the virus from spreading. In a way, COVID-19 was like some sort of magnifying glass revealing one of our nation’s pressing issues, climate change.

The Bad: Unfortunately, the environmental benefits seen at the outset of the global pandemic was shortly lived. In the span of six months, our carbon footprint has increased and people started generating more waste. The augmentation of single-use products and panic buying have increased production and consumption, hence spoiling any effort made towards reducing plastic pollution. With restaurants closed, takeout, served in disposable containers, is the preferred method of dining. Trips to the grocery store have been replaced with delivery systems, causing an influx in trucks in residential neighborhoods and an increase in plastic bags. The worst of it all, is the utilization of disposable personal protective gear and single-use products. If humans continue with a standard of one disposable face mask per day, the pandemic could result in a monthly global consumption and waste of 129 billion face masks and 65 billion gloves. All of these combined have complicated the challenge of overcoming plastic pollution.

The Ugly: The effects of the chain reactions set in motion by COVID-19 have had a mixed impact on the environment. For example, although auto travel reduced significantly during the quarantine months, we cannot help but be concerned as employees are expected to return to work and children back in school. It is likely the air quality benefits we reaped during the shutdown will fade away and it is unsure how the environment will fare with the continued use of personal protective equipment (PPE). Celebration from a post-quarantine world will likely cause a surge in the use of airplanes in an attempt to visit friends, family, and places we could not before. Restaurants fully open will likely result in the return of dining-in in lieu of take out, which will of course reduce the amount of residential trash but likely increase commercial trash. The real unknown, however, lies within the negative externalities in our economy. A booming economy, most times, results in an increased consumption of non-renewable resources, global warming, the potential loss of environmental habitats, and higher levels of pollution. How this will pan out for us, as we approach the post-COVID-19 world, is the real unknown.