Clouds on the Horizon January 4, 2007
Posted by spacemom in : She Blinded me with Science , trackbackI am trying to remember the last warm year. I know we had one about 7 years ago. And we all worried about global climate change (aka global warming). This is a warm year as well, and Soleil constantly asks about where the snow is. I miss it too.
Friends and family often ask how I feel about the Global Warming Debate. To be honest, it is clear that humans are affecting the natural cycle of warming and cooling. We are emitting many more greenhouse gases than the Earth can contain. We are carnivores and instead of eating the meat already here, we grow more meat to satisfy our desires. These animals contribute more to the greenhouse grasses.
We destroy flora, which helps balance out the gas equation without planting enough in return. I cringe whenever I see an evergreen on the side of the street waiting for pick up. At least my town will mulch
them for town projects and residents can also purchase the mulch.
I want to do more. I try.
We recycle what we can. We reuse items many times. I recycle the girls toys to other kids if I can. I keep the "junk" in our house to the minimum. I debate items like florescent bulbs. Are the lower energy
costs worth the flickering that cause migraines? Are they worth the amounts of mercury that are in the bulbs that eventually end up in our streams and ground? (this coming from the girl who got to PLAY with mercury in 3rd and 4th grade, but in 5th they took it away…It was so cool to play with mercury in your hands.)
The fireplace insert I mentioned yesterday is part of this. The efficiency of the insert is 75%. The efficiency of our heater is closer to 50%. So we would be more efficient to use the fireplace insert to heat the upstairs instead of the heater. In addition, the exhaust from the insert is much cleaner than the heater. They both use
a non-renewable resource, natural gas, but hopefully, we will see our gas usage go down this winter.
We got a high efficiency front loading washing machine. Our water usage has dropped by 1/3 since we started using it. My car is not a hybrid, but since I do most of my driving on non-city streets, I can get some
very nice mileage out of it. On our recent trip to Buffalo, I got 33MPG for the highway sections. Not bad for a family sedan.
We carpool to work and daycare. The four of us go in together. We tried public transportation when we first moved here, but it is not time efficient.
What do you do to help reduce our impact on the Earth? What do you think about when you purchase items and think about tossing something?
How can we help more?
I also need to work on getting our town to change to more efficient street lights. Have you ever noticed how much light the traditional street lights put up in the sky? Why waste the electricity? You can install fixtures that direct the light ON THE GROUND which illuminate the roads just as well and reduces the amount of energy you need to use AND prevents light pollution….
Comments»
This is a good post — I need to think about this more. With five of us, we are taking up a lot of space on this planet and we need to do more to reduce our impact. And we’re missing the snow, too.
I love this topic. We recyle everything,mostly beacuse our trash can is so small,we have to.
You do not throw away anything plastic or glass at our house! I also use something called freecylce. It is a yahoo group that you can give away things that you don’t need anymore.So if I buy something,I try to give something away.I buy a lot of clothes at consignment stores and I always pass thme along to friends or family when they outgrow them. Being in san francisco, people are pretty earth friendly. But we need to do more…
Love this topic too! I’ve ridden the T to work since 1984 (minus 3 years when I worked in the burbs)…wow, 20 years. Our main car is the Prius, which. we. adore. Once the warranty is up, R. wants to repurpose it with a lithium battery (he’s already got directions on how to do this). Add two brand spanking new efficient washer/dryer, and I think we’re doing pretty good.
OMG. I held mercury in my hand too. I totally forgot about that.