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the present day and covers the time span over which human civilization developed
following the last ice age.
Since 2000 A.D., when Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer first coined the term
“Anthropocene” (anthropos = human, cene = recent) to represent the period of time
during which humans have had an impact on Earth’s climate and environment, it has
been widely used and geologists have increasingly asked whether the most recent
part of the Holocene should be recognized as a new, post-Holocene geological
epoch. This question has been raised because human beings have become so numerous and our agricultural and industrial activities have been and still are so pervasive
that our actions have affected the nature of sediments preserved in the latest
Holocene geologic record. Discussions of whether the term is necessary have been
lively and the jury is still out on whether or not the Anthropocene will become formally defined as a geologic epoch.
The level of debate that the term Anthropocene has generated has extended
beyond geologists. Members of other academic disciplines are weighing in and the
Anthropocene has even been mentioned in the media. To complicate matters further
and while it is not yet formally defined, the age of the commencement of the
Anthropocene is a particularly contentious topic, although it seems now that it will
be placed in the mid-twentieth century, linked to the sometimes-heated debate
regarding human-driven climate change.
Despite the controversy, the Anthropocene has a special meaning for me because
it was the physical and chemical alteration, by human activity, of the place where I
was born that sparked my interest in the geologic study of modern environments. I
am from the Basque Country in northern Spain, from a town facing the port of
Bilbao on the southern margin of the Bay of Biscay. My career in geological
research started in 1997 after I was awarded a national (Spain) doctoral fellowship.
I had applied for this funding the previous year without knowing what to expect due
to the highly competitive nature of these grants, although with great excitement
about the project that I had proposed. Maybe my excitement came through in my
proposal! All I knew was that a great opportunity had been presented to me and I
was going to make the most of it.
Why Bilbao? A Bit of History
Given our location and my interests, my PhD advisor and I decided that we should
study the environmental evolution of the Ría de Bilbao (the Bilbao estuary) and the
anthropogenic (meaning human-caused; this is the key to this story) impacts in this
body of water (Fig. 7.1). Our study would encompass the last 8500 years of geologic time, corresponding approximately to the Middle and Late Holocene.
Now, why in the world would you study the last 8500 years to understand anthropogenic impact? Well, if we take a look at Figs. 7.1 and 7.2, it is easy to see that
there is no single place in the Bilbao estuary that has not been modified by human
activity. Therefore, the only way to know and understand the environment is to
E. Leorri
the present day and covers the time span over which human civilization developed
following the last ice age.
Since 2000 A.D., when Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer first coined the term
“Anthropocene” (anthropos = human, cene = recent) to represent the period of time
during which humans have had an impact on Earth’s climate and environment, it has
been widely used and geologists have increasingly asked whether the most recent
part of the Holocene should be recognized as a new, post-Holocene geological
epoch. This question has been raised because human beings have become so numerous and our agricultural and industrial activities have been and still are so pervasive
that our actions have affected the nature of sediments preserved in the latest
Holocene geologic record. Discussions of whether the term is necessary have been
lively and the jury is still out on whether or not the Anthropocene will become formally defined as a geologic epoch.
The level of debate that the term Anthropocene has generated has extended
beyond geologists. Members of other academic disciplines are weighing in and the
Anthropocene has even been mentioned in the media. To complicate matters further
and while it is not yet formally defined, the age of the commencement of the
Anthropocene is a particularly contentious topic, although it seems now that it will
be placed in the mid-twentieth century, linked to the sometimes-heated debate
regarding human-driven climate change.
Despite the controversy, the Anthropocene has a special meaning for me because
it was the physical and chemical alteration, by human activity, of the place where I
was born that sparked my interest in the geologic study of modern environments. I
am from the Basque Country in northern Spain, from a town facing the port of
Bilbao on the southern margin of the Bay of Biscay. My career in geological
research started in 1997 after I was awarded a national (Spain) doctoral fellowship.
I had applied for this funding the previous year without knowing what to expect due
to the highly competitive nature of these grants, although with great excitement
about the project that I had proposed. Maybe my excitement came through in my
proposal! All I knew was that a great opportunity had been presented to me and I
was going to make the most of it.
Why Bilbao? A Bit of History
Given our location and my interests, my PhD advisor and I decided that we should
study the environmental evolution of the Ría de Bilbao (the Bilbao estuary) and the
anthropogenic (meaning human-caused; this is the key to this story) impacts in this
body of water (Fig. 7.1). Our study would encompass the last 8500 years of geologic time, corresponding approximately to the Middle and Late Holocene.
Now, why in the world would you study the last 8500 years to understand anthropogenic impact? Well, if we take a look at Figs. 7.1 and 7.2, it is easy to see that
there is no single place in the Bilbao estuary that has not been modified by human
activity. Therefore, the only way to know and understand the environment is to
E. Leorri