This story is part of #CoveringClimateNow, an effort by more than 220 news organizations worldwide to bring about a greater understanding of the real-time impacts of climate change.This week media organizations across the world, including KPBS, are telling stories about climate change.
We are focusing our coverage on people directly impacted by a changing climate. And that is especially true of the younger generation.
Here are five San Diego teenagers sharing their thoughts on climate change.
"With the way that the oceans are headed and the climate is headed it's scary because we want to think we have the same opportunities that every generation before us has had. But at this point we don't. And I'm fortunate to be in a generation where we're so active and engaged in the community and how we can make a change.
But it's scary to think that it's not beneficial to have a family anymore and it's not beneficial to live the same convenient lifestyle that we've spent so much time trying to develop. So yeah, it's definitely always on the back burner with whatever I'm doing." — Thalia Miracle
"I don't think there's really anything more important than climate change and global warming because it could impact us today and in 30 years, it could happen at any time. It doesn't scare me, it feels like I'm learning but also being in dialogue while talking about something I believe shouldn't be happening." — Kuymandre Abdallah
"I believe that climate change is really important, and it's going to impact the Earth if we don't change it. If there are ways to stop global warming then I think that we should, because if you destroy the Earth you're going to destroy what you live on, and how are you going to live in the future. In the future, since sea levels are rising, I think there won't be as much land, or there will be, it'll just be covered in water." — Omariyana Oulds
"The issue of climate change is not something that just a few people should be thinking about. It should be, education should bring it to the forefront of everyone's minds.
The mentality that I think a lot of people have is, if I do something like, say, using less plastic in the long run it's not going to make a big difference — it's just me, I'm just a single person out of millions. But if everyone had that mentality then nothing would change."— Arabel Meyer
"I don't blame them because other bad stuff is getting done to the earth, like people are dumping trash into the water and people are killing animals and all the wildfires in the forests are killing the environment and the ecosystem.
Sometimes people don't have the resources that other people do and maybe that's what they have to do to survive or stay breathing."—Thaddeus Boudreaux
