Greenhouse gases work by absorbing heat emitted from Earth’s surface. This is known as the Greenhouse Effect and it keeps Earth warmer than it otherwise would be. Greenhouse gases are naturally present in Earth’s atmosphere, and I’ll assume that you already know a bit about them. I have a post on this here, if you’d…

All plastics are made from lots of small units stuck together like beads on a necklace. There are many types of small units, so there are many types of plastic. The units for almost all plastics come from fossil fuels, but an increasing number come from plants. If you could look closely at some plastic,…

Plants appear green because they contain chlorophyll, which is a green pigment. Chlorophyll absorbs most parts of visible light, but it does not absorb the parts we see as green. These are reflected by the plant and can be detected by our eyes. The reason why most plants are specifically green (rather than black) is…

Greenhouse gases keep Earth warm enough for things to live on it. Examples of greenhouse gases are water vapour, carbon dioxide, and methane. Greenhouse gases are types of gases found in Earth’s atmosphere. That is, the blanket of gases that surrounds Earth’s surface. You might hear the words ‘atmosphere’ and ‘air’ used interchangeably, and that’s…

For much of the year, the familiar yellow and black stinging wasps are active hunters of other insects, which they feed to their growing larvae. Other types of wasp are very important to ecosystems all over the world, including the fig wasp, which is relied upon by well over a thousand different species of animals…