[cjmerlincnc]

Thanks for that Martin.

On the other hand, Using less electric is good too. They have recently been harping on about it on the telly, "Switch things off,Switch things off"!

The only thing I want to do is switch the telly off. But because of the genius who made my television, when you switch it off it loses all the channel settings and you have to reprogramme it again when you switch it on. So you leave it on standby right.

Wrong! I live in a part of the UK where farmer down the road switches his BIG machine on and I get a brown out about 2 or three times a week so I bought a UPS to keep the telly on standby permanently.

Then we went "Digital" cos the TV reception got so poor since the farmer down the road started growing trees for fuel in the field at the back.

Now these Sky boxes, latest technology right, press your remote to switch it off, little red light comes on and I go to bed happy in the knowledge I've turned it off (on standby) and saved the planet.

In the morning I turn it on to watch the news and noticed the 'Sky box' is still warm to the touch, I say warm, It's alot hotter than I would like for something that has been off all night. Pondering the idea that laying a slice of bread on top so I can have toast when I get up, I did a bit of research into this phenomenon and was suprised to find that switching it on standby just turns off the video output and the rest of the works has been happily burning my electric.

I do have the option of turning it off at the plug but thats "down the back" amongst all the cables and spiders webs and I don't feel like crawling around and stuffing my arm into those places before I go to bed every night.

I'm sure that we have the technology to make a small circuit that uses a gnat's fart of electric to keep all our precious gadgets on standby instead of the usual 12 Watts that my TV uses.

Lets make the manufacturers save us from ourselves!


Regards

[martinw]

Dear cjmerlincnc,

Could I possibly congratulate you for a most magnificent rant??

The very thought of all those gadgets on stand-by and their wretched remotes is enough to make anybody seeth.

By the way, how can it possibly be that mankind seems incapable of coming up with a battery compartment cover that doesn't break within a fortnight?? All mine are held together with Band-Aid, masking tape, rubber bands etc. If we can't solve that problem, what hope have we of "saving the planet"?

Best wishes,

Martin

[MIKE JEFFERS]

yup cj..... why is it that any audio visual bit of harware does that
you cannott switch the fookers off unless you unplug then
our big telly,ninty wee,dab radio,surround sound stuff ,and it all Humms away
on stand-by
ffs save the planet ...........bolloks

[martinw]

Here is something that may be of interest. Chilling stuff really. These are not my words

A document published by the Institute of Public Policy Research is entitled "Warm Words - how are we telling the climate story and can we tell it better?" It was written to advise pressure groups and environmental campaign organisations on how to mould and influence public attitudes to climate change.

The following paragraphs, with only minor changes of wording, appear twice in the document and form the overall conclusion drawn from what the authors call "research".

"Treating climate change as beyond argument
Much of the noise in the climate change discourse comes from argument and counter-argument, and it is our recommendation that, at least for popular communications, interested agencies now need to treat the argument as having been won. This means simply behaving as if climate change exists and is real, and that individual actions are effective. This must be done by stepping away form the "advocates debate" described earlier, rather than by stating and re-stating these things as fact.

The "facts" need to be treated as being so taken-for-granted that they need not be spoken. The certainty of the Government's new climate-change slogan - "together this generation will tackle climate change" (Defra 2006) - gives an example of this approach. It constructs, rather than claims, its own factuality.

Best wishes

Martin

[blackseabrew]

Have you or anyone else on this site seen the documentary shown by the BBC called the 'Global Warming Swindle'? I doubt it gets shown in America. It's very believable and make's Al Gore's production look really bad.

[[email protected]]

Of all the people that are complaining about global warming, how many have planted a tree? Or better yet, how many have planted an acre of Christmas trees? Everyone wants to scream holler and yell and wait for someone else to do something.
Sad regards Walt..

[cjmerlincnc]

Hi Walt, You're the man!

I've almost read all there is on the Global Warming debate, and cutting all the political bulls*^t the sure thing I know is it is going to happen whether we like it or not. Mankind is not going to influence it in any way (perhaps a small bit but not enough) and do we want mankind f**king around with the weather?

I agree with conserving our energy and doing our bit and planting trees is the way to go keeping mankind on the planet.

It's the best way of hedging our bets, planting helps lock up CO2 thereby reducing warming - but if at some point the Gulf stream ceases thus causing massive cooling we can cut the F**ker's down and burn them to keep warm!

LOL..

[Yardbird RC]

Just wait a few years.

When We (USA) pull out of the middle east and Iran fills in the power vacuum. They will have a strangle hold on the worlds oil supply and We'll all be riding bicycles.

[sdantonio]

Of all the people that are complaining about global warming, how many have planted a tree? Or better yet, how many have planted an acre of Christmas trees? Everyone wants to scream holler and yell and wait for someone else to do something.
Sad regards Walt..

Does my garden count. It consumes quite a lot of CO2, and unlike a tree, I can eat the fruits of my labor (saving harvesting power and transportation power and store refrigeration power).

[[email protected]]

When it comes to planting trees, I was refering to farming Christmas trees. Plant them care for them 8 to 12 years. Shear them to make them look like a Christmas tree and then someone from green space, or what ever they call themselves, come by to protest you harvesting the "crop" because they are giving off oxygen and taking in CO2. They will protest, carry signs, get in your way etc,etc, but ask them to help you plant another 4000 seedlings and they will cry they don't have time or someother piece of crap. But, they really have time to protest but, not enough time to work to solve the problem, only time to protest what someone else it doing. Please don't tell them I just cut down a tree in the backyard that was going to fall on my house in the next wind storm. It was only 30 feet tall and 20 feet in diameter. Had about 200 bushels on leaves every year. Most of them stuck in the eaves. I think I am going to plant about 200 Black Walknut trees in the back forty. Plan on letting them for the great grand kids, maybe the great great grand kids. Let them deal with the folks from green what ever. Maybe they can throw walnuts at them.
Best regards Walt.

[martinw]

When it comes to planting trees, I was refering to farming Christmas trees. Plant them care for them 8 to 12 years. Shear them to make them look like a Christmas tree and then someone from green space, or what ever they call themselves, come by to protest you harvesting the "crop" because they are giving off oxygen and taking in CO2. Walt.

Dear Walt,

I wish it was that simple. By all accounts, coniferous trees out-gas terpenes which are apparantly a "greenhouse gas". This was pointed out, I think by Geof.

I do not know how long coniferous trees have grown in North America, but it must have been "a good few years"... perhaps even longer than grapes.

During those " good few years", the wretched dangerous things must have spewed out quite a bit of the deadly planet-destroying stuff. Thank Heavens that commercial logging came on-board to save us all.

Best wishes,

Martin

[Hibo]

Im watching these hapless white fat bears sliding off their melted little ice berg on a bright sunny day into the balmy sea, warmer than a gator pond in south florida.

Just as I was ordering my tickets to Juno for scuba diving..... another program comes on ....

These Ice Road Trucker guys are driving in the same area as the bears but.... as my dad use to say.. witches tit in brass bra.. 160 below, snow blowing 80 knots, guys freezing , gas freezing . Ice berg 1/2 mile thick, freeze to death in 2 hours, spit turns to ice before it hits the ground and always dark and kinda cold as hell looking.

Now, the tv is telling me two different stories about how it is up there. And it's all I really know, i dont go up there to see for myself.

An Alaskan reality show, where every one on the set has to stick their tongue on a brass pole once a week for 2 years. At the end, we run a statistical regression of all survivors that can lick their eyebrows.

gh

[Prosper]

Well, Global warming is the term scientists(or layman?) use as a term only...however, we are in the throes of climate change...I consider climate change are a more accurate explanation. The earth is going through a change..the change is not only in climate, but in our social order etc. This is because humans are changing and now, we can truely see the differences between the "good", kind and considerate peoples, as opposed to the power hungry, "evil" and bad hearted peoples on this planet. While I am not a religions person, I do believe in the creation, and I am happy that anyone can laugh at me for that thought...because in my heart , I know that it is true. While we might be made of dust, there is a Superior Being that created us from this dust.
To get to the point, yes, we are facing climate change, and surprisingly, some parts of this earth may experience cooler weather, or extremes of weather..However, this is just the precursor of what is to come. Eventually, we are going to live in a "paradise like" world, where the climate in many parts of this world will be very comfortable for habitat.
No doubt may people might think that I have been taking drugs to be writing this, but nothing can be further form the truth. I am a person that do not smoke and do not take any drugs, nor have an alcohol habit. In fact, I am writing this with a fractured shoulder blade after an accident...and I can't get treatment because the hospital system is on the verge of collaspe.... a long story .....yet I take no painkiller, despite the awful pain I am experiencing.
Anyway, we are in the throes of change, and some will survive for the future, many who intend to destroy this world will not..and that's the simple truth of the matter.

[sdjdave]

I went through Los Angeles in 1974 and rode in a cab with the windows open. The air was so filthy you couldn't see more than a couple hundred yards in either direction. By the time I reached LAX my eyes were burning and the white shirt I was wearing had a yellowish brown stain around the back where I had sweated and the air had contacted it. I went back in 2004 and you could see for miles and after driving around with the windows in the car open for four days my eyes were just fine. The air is cleaner now than it's ever been, yet we keep hearing that the world is a rotting **** heap and it's all our fault in the industrialized world. I have news for all of you - Industrialized nations can afford the technology that makes things clean! Go to Africa and look at how clean things are there. Who is building Coal powered electric plants with no scrubbers on them at a rate of a score or two a year? Try China, the bright light of Communism. Who else is industrialising as fast as they can? Do I hear India? Between China and India there's a total of 4-5 Billion people who are suddenly trying to hurl themselves into the 21st century with less than 21st century technology. If there are any air problems I would think they would be the first people we would point the finger of blame at, since there isn't any country that has a dome over it to ensure it pollutes only its' own air.

To get down to the bare basics of the whole global warming/America is the earth's despoiler rant, there are people who hate America. They hate our Ingenuity, our Productivity, our Prosperity, but most of all, our Freedom. Unfortunately, too many of those people live in America. There are a lot of people all over the world that want to see America destroyed for whatever reason their tiny little minds can latch on to. Eventually, it will happen, but I don't think the world will be a better place because of it. Once America is destroyed, who will be next? Europe? Half of the countries there are well on the way to being nonentities right now. Canada? Australia? Who is going to take the place of the prosperous Democracies who generate most of the wealth and take care of the rest of the world? Does anybody think that Somalis and Cubans will show up with food, medical teams and building supplies the next time a tsunami hits Indonesia or an earthquake clobbers Turkey?

What makes me grind my teeth more than anything is to have to listen to the sanctimonious, know nothing prigs like Al Gore and the Hollywood Intelligentsia preach at me about my lifestyle. I work my tail off at a regular job and run a small business on the side making parts with my little CNC mill for people who can't afford big shop prices. I run the business out of my house, and I pay about $1500 a year for electricity. Al Gore lives in his palace, uses $20,000 a MONTH for electricity, but has the nerve to lecture me about my profligate lifestyle? The hell with all of them. I'm going to live my life the way I damn well please, and I'm telling my kids that they're entitled to whatever lifestyle they can earn and maintain honestly. I recommend everyone else do the same, we don't have long before 'our betters' take everything away.

[Prosper]

It looks like there are many people in this world who are aware of the change that is here with us. Also, there are many frustrated individuals who are tired of the rantings by politicians and scientists regarding climate change. No doubt in the USA, there are groups od learned people who are trying to make life better and to clear up the pollution.
In poorer countries such as China and India, they are just trying to catch up, and in that process, their actions can be considered as polluting. As SDJDAVE had pointed out, in 1974, California was quite steeped in smog..I passed by LA in 1976, and noticed the smog in the city as well....well, the USA had gone from the industrialised world and has done their fair share of pollution in the sixties and seventies...(I had been reading "Time Magazine" during that period and can say that scientists at that time were so fearful of the pollution and the disaster that may occur) ..to a leading authority in many high tech discoveries and achievements, and I applauded that. If we think in a global sense, we can understand that many countries are trying to get out of their present unfortunate situation and "progress". Can we blame them for that? Hence, they are going through the same situation as what the USA and Europe had gone through. However, their timing is not good, as these "underdeveloped" countries are caught up in a bad situation.
Would it be better if other developed countries chip in and assist them instead of blaming them? What good to throw blame and accusations if the final outcome will be more pollution, anger, disatisfaction with the West etc? We no longer live in a world where we can hide our heads and not care for what is going on in the rest of thr world.
Also, remember, we also buy very cheap items from the very countries we accuse of polluting the world. I have been to China very recently and yes, many places are full of pollution and the sky is so hazy we don't see the sun at all. Can the more developed country assist? If not, then I think we are going to face some difficult moments in the future...and who, then is to blame?



.
So,

[Rekd]

Man did not cause global warming. Rather, global warming caused man.

To get to the point, yes, we are facing climate change, and surprisingly, some parts of this earth may experience cooler weather, or extremes of weather..However, this is just the precursor of what is to come. Eventually, we are going to live in a "paradise like" world, where the climate in many parts of this world will be very comfortable for habitat.

Climate change is a natural cycle. Pollution is not. We can reduce pollution. I lived in the the very place sdjdave is talking about. I was there as a child in the late 60s and early 70s. The smog was terrible. Today it is clear, except for some smoke.

The pollution is all but gone now, and removing it likely did nothing to help curb climate change. But it helps me breath and see better, so that's a good thing.

I don't think destroying the US economy is going to do anything, but the US could help China and India curb their pollution.

(BTW, the amount of US pollution is going down, the amount of pollution from all other industrialized countries is going up, so please don't talk to me about that Kyoto crap. )

[Prosper]

Yes, pollution is something man made out of their need to "develop" a more comfortable lifestyle. However, in our pursuit of such, we are making life difficult for ourselves and this pollution is going to affect our health and wellbeing. I do agree that we need to build a cleaner environment. Going through the history of human kind, we still have a lot to learn. We are still very "primitive" in our thoughts and ideals, we still make war on each other and we still our have bias and prejudices. We still treat each other with suspicious, and we still have the fear of each other that we want to vanguish our fears by destroying each other. Well, this is the reality of our human existance at the moment. Can we cooperate with each other for our own survival? We must eventually, if we want to survive. Terrorism and pollution have no place in our world. So, which countries will lead the way to a better world? The talking is now over, and it is time for some positive action. Individuals and industries can help in many ways, but it is the countries that are pollution this planet that must take stock and start to look at their industrial processes and act fast. The world is a sphere, and one country's pollution will eventually spread to another, depending on the time and tide. "Kyoto" seems a whitewash, just lip service to a world suffering from the effects of human "progress" and existance.

[dynosor]

Prosper, we can all agree that pollution is bad. It is in defining what pollution is that some of us are going to disagree.

Burning hydrocarbons with enough oxygen produces carbon dioxide and water. If CO2 is "pollution" why isn’t water? After all, water vapor is a much more potent greenhouse gas that CO2 - ever notice how clouds in the day keep things cool and how clouds at night keep things warm?

No one is going to fall for distilled water being defined as pollution. However, the TV watching generation could easily associate carbon dioxide with carbon monoxide, and carbon monoxide is a real pollutant; hence catalytic converters.

As an aside, burning petrol also produces oxides of nitrogen, with larger quantities produced by the new generation of ultra efficient lean burn direct injection engines such as the VW 2.0 liter turbo. Curiously, the US does not allow this engine to run in full efficiency mode as the lean combustion produces excessive NOX. This, while the European market welcomes the reduced cost of ownership and accepts the NOX that accompanies lean burn operation. NOX is a real pollutant and yet Europeans whine about the need to reduce CO2.

As I have stated before, the CO2 emitted during the combustion of fossil fuel is putting that CO2 back where it came from before the plants incorporated it into their tissues a long time ago.

Eliminating pollution and terrorism by force is going to result in other kinds of fall-out much worse than CO2. This world is going to become an unbearable place because of the political response to CO2 and not because of the gas itself.

Treat others with the respect you seek for yourself and hold your politicians to their promises. Remind them that they work for you and vote accordingly. If you can develop a car that runs on water, more power to you. Just don’t spout the idea that forcing the development of such technology is a moral imperative.

What's next? The UN collecting taxes from all of us to fund the development of control rod technology for throttling the sun?

[Prosper]

Okay, Dynosor you hit the nail on the spot.
Pollution is difficult to define because there is no acceptable standard as yet. I think that pollution is basically how much, how toxic, and how fast the pollution can be dispersed.
Yes, water vapour in great quantities can be considered pollution. However, I really don't think that carbon dioxide is as bad as mentioned. You see, carbon dioxide is a heavy gas and as such, it sinks to the earth, providing part of an element for photo synthesis during sunlight. Yes, CO is toxic and detrimental to health.
Of coures there are many types of pollutants produced by industriies, namely sulphur dioxide, nitrous oxide, chlorine and their deriatives etc. There are also dust particles, water vapour mixed with toxic chemicals etc.
The best way for us to live in a sustainable way is to avoid burning fossil fuel as best as possible. We can generate our own power individually using whatever means available for our disposal, such as wind, water, solar, and even geothermal etc. I am very confident that we will succeed if only we use our Creator given intelligence. We can produce more efficient appliances and equipment, we can monitor our power consumption and regulate what we need and avoid wastage. We have the technology right now....so what are we waiting for?
I am doing research in renewable energy and have spent a lot of time, and if everybody think of a solution, I am sure there is light at the end of the tunnel!

[martinw]

Just don’t spout the idea that forcing the development of such technology is a moral imperative.

Dear dynosor,

Thank-you for that wise point.

The moral imperative people seem to have elevated the debate into some kind of religion where there are "believers" and "un-believers". The latter are to be cast into outer darkness for their doubts.

Whatever happened to scientific debate?

My guess?

No problem...no funding, and no opportunity to tax and control.

Best wishes

Martin