Trees are Destroying the Earth (Again)

[@flowerheit4512]

they said they would phase out coal... AND THEN THEY DID THAT! it can be done!

[@vlogbrothers]

Certainly lots more to do!! A lot of other countries have done a better job of adopting EVs than the UK, but at the same time I kinda can't believe the UK stopped burning coal in my lifetime...

[@LoganChristianson]

Say it with me now: nu-clea-r! Nu-clea-r!

[@Jack93885]

Not only was it done but it was done by a conservative government. It gives me hope that climate change is truly seen as a non-partisan issue.

[@0ri0n_Atlas]

​As a Brit, it's one of our nation's finest achievements and I'm so proud of the hardwork that has gone into this moment, we still have loads more to do as part of our duty as the country that kick started ​this climate crisis when the industrial revolution began. We still have chronic underfunding of the ev charging infrastructure, we have very little amounts of tidal power generation despite having some of the strongest and most consistent tides in the northern hemisphere, stop dumping raw sewage in our rivers and we still need to reforest vast amounts of the countryside to their pre-1700s levels. But this is not to retract from this amazing achievement! @@vlogbrothers

[@scal2025]

Good job, UK!

[@emilycarr2913]

“And if you didn’t get high, you were in the shade, and you died” -Hank Green out of context, 2024

[@Emily_Charter]

+

[@CamKoudo]

I legit thought he was talking about humans before I started the video 😂

[@theoriginaledi]

I came to the comments to say exactly this :D

[@gy4bg-iz8wq]

+++

[@byelijahhelton]

+++++

[@elliottmcollins]

Comparing something to trees usually feels like a good thing, so I was not ready for "Humanity is like a forest in that it is precipitating a mass extinction event."

[@charlieistryinghisbest]

Humanity is much worse than the forest though,cause we make much more animals suffer. We are capable of making everything better,despite the fact that we are currently making everything worse.❤ We have to change for the better,and i believe we can.

[@Robertlavigne1]

There was a fun xkcd comic this week talking about how over the course of the industrial revolution the UK dug up and burned 3 inches of their entire country.

[@mariannetfinches]

I'm honestly surprised it wasn't more. But I guess we were also digging resources from other countries, so maybe that slowed us down

[@TristanSharman]

Longtime British viewer here, thanks for the little spotlight! I’m amidst similar circles in celebrating, it’s an exciting milestone that I just hope can encourage others to set a goal to do the thing, and then *do the thing*!

[@TheRupertmcgee]

I think its a bit fascinating that if you think about it, it's not just "trees" that are involved in the two events, it's THE SAME TREES

[@michaels.3709]

Ancient trees are now responsible for two periods of mass extinction. They're clearly out of control and must be stopped!

[@Thelango99]

So... We are undoing it, essentially?

[@okayheykae]

Hank got too used to saying "I'll see you tomorrow" but he won't see him until Tuesday now 😭 (Thanks for a great Pizzamas - everything is a little stressful and this has been good!)

[@vlogbrothers]

Or will I....

[@okayheykae]

@@vlogbrothers Oooooo okay I'm interested

[@HarshitWise]

​@@vlogbrothersIs there a Saturday extra bonanza?

[@Leftover09]

@@vlogbrothers🤔🤷🏻‍♀️😁😂

[@alissa6380]

​@@vlogbrothers does this have anything to do with that significant tuberculosis news which definitely has nothing to do with books... 👀

[@char1194]

It actually blows my mind that there was a time where wood existed but NOTHING could decompose wood. Like yeah it makes logical sense, but the idea that organic material can just be sitting around and they'd never decompose because nature just... didnt know how to is mindblowing to me

[@Thelango99]

A bit like plastic.

[@indi_prime]

@@Thelango99 samples taken from the great garbage patch have found microbes able to digests different plastics, but people reading this comment have good odds of already being algo fed that information too

[@kristateraberry7919]

I always get weirdly emotional thinking about how everything throughout history led to this moment of me living in incredible plenty at the expense of the environment. Beautiful and tragic

[@Fluffy_Cow]

So what I'm hearing is that a group of tree from millions of years ago accidentally caused a mass extinction event. And now, those exact same trees are gonna help accidentally cause another mass extinction event. Wonderful, just wonderful.

[@alissa6380]

holy crap, I hadn't thought about it that way. that's kinda mind-blowing 🤔

[@fsihfhsifihsfshifhis]

Well it's kind of fair if you think of it as necromancy where we disturbed the graves of the ancients and now their vengeful spirits are bent on taking us down with them.

[@jondoe2542]

My favorite time of Earth's history; before fungus had evolved to break down woody material. Trees the size of buildings, too mighty, their roots couldn't support them. Toppling other trees. Thousands of years worth of trees, still whole undecayed. No fungus is site.

[@HarshitWise]

Fungus was there. They just didn't know how to eat wood.

[@VictorLHouette]

I love the part of history where fungus starts to take over, but wasn't prepared for the fact that mammals already won that war before it even started. Fungus basically just cleared out a niche for us. So neat to see how that happens.

[@rosianna]

I was happy to see this in the news this week!! - swampmonster with agency

[@chashahjohnson]

++

[@untappedinkwell]

"all for the love of the bit" is such a pizzamas mentality. I love it.

[@simonmeadows7961]

British person here. Much as we are trying to reduce use of fossil fuels, our main target is to try to use sarcasm as a source of fuel. Once we crack that, then we can power the world. Or at least, the parts of it that can spell colour and aluminium correctly.

[@pattheplanter]

We need to get a nice hot cup of tea in every transport research lab.

[@Martcapt]

Maybe, when Octupi are writing their ancient history in 50M years, they'll say: Humans. Quaint little creatures. Killed themselves quickly. Some of them seemed nice.

[@LoganChristianson]

Humans will not go extinct because of Climate Change. We're a pretty resilient species.

[@ElysianCosmos]

Happy Pizzamas! Here's to more good news to everyone around the world.

[@Sugar3Glider]

"... Because if you don't get high, then you're in the shade and you're dead" "Right on ma'an. I'll smoke to that."

[@seandoherty8858]

I'm happy with the hoodie blanket I got!

[@chantellebehrens]

Okay this was genuinely fascinating.

[@erinodonnell386]

Those trees, first by living and then by dying, have had a wild overall impact on the client.

[@TalesGrimm]

"I can't believe I get to be a witness to the story of Earth" is such a cool thing to say

[@mylittledashie7419]

Knowing this about the placement of easily accessible coal in the world, mixed with the idea that the old world was only able to conquer and oppress the new world as a result of the fact that local species in the old world are more easily domesticated and therefore put to human use; it really paints a picture of how the UK became such a global superpower, and how it really had very little to do with the people living here. We were never better than anyone else, we just spawned in the luckiest part of the map.

[@Ai-yahUdingus]

add in the country being an island which necessitated good ship technology and sea faring culture, it was poised to be at the centre of world trade during the industrial revolution.

[@Gavolav]

Well tbf while they were certainly lucky with the resources, they also had that protestant work ethic that likely helped birth the start of capitalism. And I say this as an Irishman who doesn't like to give credit to the Brits if I can help it

[@mylittledashie7419]

@@Gavolav I'll be honest I'm pretty doubtful that religion plays any serious role in people's work ethic. And there does seem to be at least some evidence to suggest that the idea of "protestant work ethic" in specific is an invented idea, rather than reflective of any real life tendencies. I imagine if you're looking any population group there are going to be people who get satisfaction from working hard, and people who don't, and that's going to be the ultimate difference maker in how much work they do, rather than their religion.

[@justyourlocalrat7]

as always, thank you hank for paying attention and doing all the research it takes to deliver us good news like this with this much care and context

[@levilukeskytrekker]

Happy Pizzamas to all, and to all a good Friday.

[@gy4bg-iz8wq]

F-ing Awesome. I already miss pizzamass. Thank you all

[@IlIlllIllIlIIIll]

The "nothing could break down lignan" hypothesis is starting to be called into question. There are thoughts that the coal band is mostly just a coincidence of an era where lots of biomass got buried.

[@vlogbrothers]

Interesting! I will keep an eye on this!

[@ObjectsInMotion]

@@vlogbrothers Wait, how are trees destroying the earth a second time?

[@Billionth_Kevin]

@@ObjectsInMotion Coal burning, since the coal is made from trees. His argument was since they didn't do it on purpose the first time, we can extend the loosey goosey 'blame' on them the second time as well, though really its just humans, but at least some humans stopped burning coal for power. Guessing they are still using coal for steel, but thats a different thing entirely

[@Billionth_Kevin]

This really bummed me out when I first heard it, since I liked the story of lignan-creation evolution outpacing lignan-eating evolution, but its good chance to confirm I do not have faith in in my beliefs and am open to them being challenged, so bring it on questions!

[@hypotheticalaxolotl]

Aye, it never sounded right to me. We're already seeing fungi and bacteria that can break down plastic, so the idea that it would take hundreds of thousands if not millions of years for fungi to evolve to break down lignin seemed... Incorrect. That they got buried, turned into peat and then into coal, the same way it still happens now (just getting buried in anoxic swamps where the decay process can't occur before it gets compressed and fossilizes into coal) always made far more sense to me. I'm glad to see someone else bringing it up.

[@philidips]

Profound final vid. Thanks for a great Pizzamas.

[@SJPace1776]

I think about that era and how the trees must have stacked up and then how forest fires would take years to wear themselves out.

[@keithmichael112]

It's always something

[@LynxChan]

The next time it's raining sideways and I'm staring forlornly at the tattered remains of another umbrella I'll remember to thank "the complete geographic luck that is the UK's relatively fantastic position with regards to wind resources". Clean air, wet heads, can't lose! 🌧️

[@willemvandebeek]

Thanks, Hank, I needed this kind of news.

[@GustavSvard]

Detailed scientifically accurate maps of previous eras? YES PLEASE. And globes. Gotta have them in globe form. Every geology museum neeeeeds this.

[@pattheplanter]

A globe on the principle of a Rubik's cube.

[@Fs3i]

Oops 🌲 did it again

[@georgegrenvillethe7thpm176]

Tree played with your heartwood

[@mlaine83]

If you can't get high you stay in the shade and die. Feels like there's a metaphor somewhere there about something.

[@ChristophBackhaus]

Replace the trees with hemp and Miscanthus and we can repeat the getting rid of co2

[@Shinyshoesz]

I was one of the ones who celebrated. It honestly brought a tear to my eye, not just because it's a positive to our planet, but because it was such a long time coming -- the birthplace of industrialization being one of the first to turn off its plumes of smoke! I think too, positively, it shows that perhaps in fifty years, it will be rather strange for anyone to use coal at all. These things can happen more swiftly than we think. And perhaps as a side effect of AI wanting ever-more power, we will innovate and be forced to confront much better energy systems going forward. One can hope.

[@pattheplanter]

Or we decide that AI, fake currency, mass travel and social media arguments are not worth the effort of powering them.

[@rivergalen4020]

Now if only they would stop burning ancient forest from British Columbia

[@TyingSaturn]

Misread the title as "teens are destroying the earth again" and my first thought was "wait, had they stopped?"

[@imrustyokay]

I love the title, because it's one of those titles that sounds dumb until you watch the video and go "oh wait that makes sense". Also reminds me of Liquid Trees and wanting more creative solutions to climate change and stuff, yeah. It was a fun pizzamas, peeps, what a ride!

[@leenacloudberry8049]

The UK wins Pizzamas! Good job!🎉

[@michaels.3709]

Something only tangentially related that I learned recently: the Appalachian mountains in North America are so old that they had been forming for hundreds of millions of years _before trees had evolved._ When trees happened, the rock layers in the Appalachians were already hundreds of millions of years old. Edit: fixed auto-incorrect

[@rmkw4291]

I forgot it was Pizzamas, that's why the recent day by day uploads! And, coincidentally, I'm watching this whilst having my usual Friday night dinner of pizza 😄

[@TheJamesawesome]

TREE :)

[@alexbistagne1713]

+++

[@tree427]

hi

[@votekyle3000]

Roller coaster that’s always goes up? Someone is a fan of John Green novels

[@j_fenrir]

oh shit i cant believe i had no idea that we stopped coal power considering i fucking live here

[@mariannetfinches]

I love how ancient that screen with the uk power mix looks 😅 I'm also mildly reassured by our small amount of progress Thanks for an excellent pizzamas, all at complexly!

[@jojomonster29]

Not first but close to it! Thank you for tree facts

[@unlimitedDada]

Splitting my attention away from the video to write this comment.

[@EXRAY479]

haha, I split my attention away from the video to read this comment

[@BenjaminWheeler0510]

I split my attention away from the video to read BOTH of these comments. 😎

[@Tocinos]

So I'm taking it you didn't notice the face in the top right corner.

[@clayadams81]

“I get to be a witness to the story of earth.” Is such a great line!

[@spacebike420]

Bless Pizzamas

[@Sugar3Glider]

3:15 "Hold my Reactor, Watch this!" ~Germany

[@penny3767]

Phenomenal video. 🙏

[@mygodsnameiskyle]

I do blame trees. They know what they are doing!

[@billyalarie929]

Videos like this make it hard to understand why this channel only has 3.79 million subscribers

[@pazz]

they can't keep getTING AWAY WITH IT!!!

[@erfquake1]

AMAZING!!! WELL DONE UK!!!! 😆 (sorry that I can't stop singing the 1812 overture when these things happen)

[@zperk13]

Those trees knew exactly what they were doing

[@JacobODell_]

1 minute in and we’re already talking about getting high, hell yea

[@silverfox9648]

great to know!

[@rtcrook3219]

I'm early! I have nothing to say other than I just ordered socks this week and I am very excited

[@theoriginaledi]

For just a second there I really thought Hank was gonna say "... because now... you know better." :D

[@steviemac2681]

Half of the cooling towers of a coal fired power station near where I live in the UK were demolished last year. It was decommissioned in 2020 before the end of it's natural life. They were very physically imposing and a bit of a landmark but not beautiful so happy to see them go.

[@vsolyomi]

Ancient evil awakens after millions of years of sleep...

[@amycox5733]

Here lies Hank’s Chemo curls, 2023-2024 The hair is almost back to normal. How are you feeling about that, Hank? Do you like the reminder being gone, or will you miss it?

[@jamesonpace726]

No, no, no! We must revere the historical importance of such an auspicious event by maintaining & using forever that coal produced by the deathly sacrifice of the trees! They died for it & so shall we....

[@Brown95P]

UK: 🎉 _[shuts down its last coal power plant]_ 🎉 Meanwhile in China: 🏭📈🏭📈🏭📈🏭📈🏭

[@kuukeli]

great video

[@PlutosTimeslot]

Just a note: "Natural gas" is mostly methane (about 80-90%), which you probably know, but the natural gas industry does a metric fck ton a greenwashing to pretend that they aren't part of the problem. Anyways, it's always great to hear good news. Great video! :)

[@handlethissonny]

Buddy if i have u at volume 1, i wake my whole family up. Please.

[@gelfling]

I'm so excited about the sale! I've been pining for the blanket but it was out of budget and now it's not! I'm heading over to buy it right *now* before its too late!! Thank you for letting us know!

[@pattheplanter]

You are lucky it was not poplar. Sorry, are we not doing tree puns? Was that accidental?

[@kurtisbunker7724]

At the end there... it almost sounds like trees are addicts. ;)

[@christinebrown3359]

Hank, that first animation looks like the conspiracy theory on the expanding earth (in reverse)

[@Alex-cw3rz]

3:01 the way it's written looks like a caveman wrote it. With how simple the terms are like water

[@unduloid]

Trees also keep causing accidents by jumping in front of moving cars.

[@strangehominid]

hello friends

[@RichardFraser-y9t]

Then I got high, then I got high, then I got high....

[@gtsguy4138]

RIP Ratcliffe-on-soar

[@PalmelaHanderson]

Any time someone says "the climate just changes naturally," I'm like "yeah it does, but it's not supposed to happen this fast." We're talking cycles of tens of thousands of years, and that's just within the ice age we are still currently in. If we're talking about changes between ice ages and greenhouse periods, those changes happen over the span of millions of years. The rate at which our climate is warming is *not* normal.

[@mitsypouskat7591]

As a uk resident im like "im in this video!"

[@sensen9124]

❤❤❤

[@Zorilla10]

Tomorrow? We're getting an extra Pizzamas vid on Saturday?

[@snawsomes]

Don't look up is our future. YT and social media in general is just a neat way to cope.

[@mrt88music]

That final power station is near me and I have some mixed feelings about its closure. I know that it’s a net positive for the world and I feel good about that but whenever I travel it’s on the main road I usually come home on so seeing it is a comfortingly familiar landmark. I’m glad to be without coal and glad to have decarbonised but as it’s demolished I am going to miss those towers

[@somniad]

well I blame the trees! it's their fault. they *know* what they did.

[@necessaryevil455]

I hope we learn from the planet's history and stop this ecologically Tree-son.

[@RoxaneJ14]

If quantities are challenging for pizzamas performance, why don't you make everything made to order ? We can absolutely wait ❤️

[@fsihfhsifihsfshifhis]

People on the roller coaster that always goes up: "well this is anticlimactic"

[@JaMaMaa1]

You're telling me the UK has just been vibing there since before humans?

[@PhatPazzo]

I do my best, but I still know that even if I got my entire country of Sweden to reduce all of our carbon emissions to zero… it wouldn’t even show in a graph that includes China (the real china, not the green facade). I’m trying to adopt optimistic nihilism, because it’s better than hopeless depression.

[@gbeezz]

I have been so tempted to get stuff, but shipping and taxes add like 50 bucks, and last year I still had to pay an additional import tax of like 80 bucks once it arrived in my country 😭

[@allanolley4874]

I think people have been burning coal (at a marginal rate) since before 2000 years ago. I think a more common use of coal pre-1700 was carving things out of jet coal.

[@Coriander1988]

Climate change has long challenged me in having hope for the future. here's proof one step at a time change can happen. Let's take it far.

[@ALZulas]

Tell me more about 17% imported power though... After a little bit of digging it looks like that 17% is crude oil, petroleum, natural gas, and coal. So they still import electricity from coal sources, they just no longer produce their own coal power. And that 17% is still almost entirely non-renewable sources

[@Chayat0freak]

As much as I love the achievement of my country I wanna point out some little bits of I fo that might be overlooked. The trees becoming coal because they died before bacteria and fungus evolved to digest lignin is a myth. There's evidence to suggest this ability evolved in tandem with trees it's just this swampy place also had plenty of anaerobic places where the wood could get squished and buried. Also as I live near one of these coal plants i can say that they're not all offline. Many now burn a bamboo like plant which is grown as a biofuel. Coal powerplants don't much care what burns so long as it burns. This is obviously better for the environment though. Finally some plants are getting experimental nuclear upgrades because coal power plants don't even care if something is burning or just a really hot rock.

[@otakuofmine]

what i hate about my ex-home Germany. there are enough places that produce more co2 as they are bigger, and that is their whole argument for "we are not THAT bad". but if you compare how much they produce in relation to their size, they are MUCH worse.

[@HarshitWise]

Did I hear Hank say, "I'll see you tomorrow"?

[@culwin]

✋🌲🤚 our bad

[@Izzy-Maurer]

Rare UK win. But it's also worth noting that the decision to stop mining coal in the UK nearly 40 years ago was an entirely political one (ending coal miners' strikes that disrupted the power supply) that devastated communities centered on mines, many of which have never economically recovered. A day to celebrate the end of coal in the UK is also a great day to say "Screw Thatcher".

[@moonshot9056]

We de-industrialised and exported our pollution to ever lower regulated countries to produce that pollution for us, good job us!

[@vlogbrothers]

There's a thing called "consumption based CO2 emissions" which you can look up! It might be a different picture than the one you have in your head.

[@moonshot9056]

@@vlogbrothers I'm guessing you are referring to what is shown on "our world in data" "United Kingdom: Per capita: how much CO2 does the average person emit?". But it says "These figures reflect ‘production-based’ emissions, so do not correct for traded goods." which would mean my point about exported emissions is correct, if I've understood that correctly.

[@Idefilms]

Just for clarity, Hank, was that previous extinction event an ice age (or some kind of massive global cooling)? In any case, A+ storytelling across the board-I love these massive zoom-outs.

[@vlogbrothers]

We're not sure! It's a geologically messy one...we can see it, but it's mostly ocean organisms (there wasn't as much stuff on land then) and it seems like it may have been a very slow mass extinction.

[@Idefilms]

@@vlogbrothers Fascinating! Thank you for the answer.