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Thread: Perhaps We are but Insects on this Planet

  1. #31
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    Someone asked how much a carbonfoot print you as an individual leaves everday....I have to admit....I carry a mean carbon footprint. Dont want too...its cost is mostly passed on to my customer. I run up and down the highway repairing/ installing large commercial HVAC and large walk-in coolers /freezers. So not only am I burning 33 gallons of gas every 300 miles, at alot of stops I am repairing refrigerant leaks, which means I bring out my oxy/acetylen rig to braze the holes away, burning refrigerant as I do this...which changes refrigerant tophosgene gas,of which just few parts per million will kill you.Anyone remember "purple haze" from vietnam? Phosgene was a big partof it.I make it just about everyday...and it doesnt feel good as it takes your breath away at just the slightest inhaltion. So...my "footprint" is huge ...and I am doing my best to lighten it, which boils down to planning. I can no longer go from call to call inorder of receipt. itisnow injected with plan, to catch as many customers as I can on a shorter route... But mostly it is to save my business money and be more efficient. I'm meeting with a Dodge Sprinter van salesman next wed to discuss numbers. From what I've heard, I should get at least 24 mpg, which will double my mileage and halve by carbon footprint..

    I think everyone will get on wht the conservation when it touchs their lives to the point of hurting the purse strings.
    Always remember that you're unique. Just like everyone else.

  2. #32
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    Oil consumption is world wide. Developing countries are using more and more every day. I feel what we conserve is miniscule compared to what percentage other countries are increasing. It is one of those " we save a gallon...they use two gallons more" kind of scenarios.
    I really , really wish the problem could be solved with conservation of fossil fuels. Eventually we will run out of oil. Forty,eighty, maybe 150 years. Hate to sound pessimistic, but conservation is only going to delay the inevitable.

    I think homo sapiens are very clever, and when we have our backs against the wall, we will come up with a new revolutionary source of energy. Too bad most of us will not be alive to see it.

    Gary K.

  3. #33
    I feel that CO2 could more easily trigger the Earth's more delicate tipping points like if the tundra melts, the ground is darker and will absorb more heat and release more stored CO2 in the process.

    I think the biggest answer to CO2 is changing the power plants to burn with clean coal technologies rather than how they work now. The cars will need more of a long term solution. We need to get to a point where dependence on the Middle East is a distant memory. If solar could be improved, cars covered with cells sitting in a parking lot all day could get a portion of their power for startup or acceleration that way. Producing and wiring them needs to be as simple as a new paint job for that to take hold though. For electrics to really work, they also need a backup power source too. If you could make it to work and back without using the backup source and paying for fuel, you would probably tend to change your driving habits to fit those types of trips.
    ULS 135 watt w/rotary, Mazak QT-6T CNC lathe, Dapra machining center, Sherline CNC, Tormach CNC, Acad, Rofin welding laser, YAG laser w/ rotary, 4500 watt Fiber laser
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  4. #34
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    Non-linear effects make prediction and understanding of this issue quite difficult. I still don't think weather prediction is above 80-90%...predicting climate change over time and what causes it, gack...makes my head hurt. I dunno...I think this scare (whether real or not and whether human induced or not) might be beneficial in general to the human race.

    That said, I've decided to move towards a more energy conservative nature for my and my family's lifestyle. I bike 28 miles per day to work and back 5 days/week. I do it for several reason: health, enjoyment, and the challenge. It sure is fun scooting down the road at about 15-20 mph passing cars backed up at lights.

    I hope gas keeps going up and more people use public transportation or hop on their bike. It might hopefully help the healthcare crisis I see in the US and free up the parking lots seen on the "freeways" in the mornings/evenings in all large cities across our nation. It may also help us move off of foreign energy dependence and fund alternatives.

    It surely is an interesting time for us. Do what you feel is best for your children.
    Wood: a fickle medium....

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  5. #35
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    Jun 2003
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    Westphalia, Michigan
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    We never really learn........

    First, a thankyou to Ed for starting this thread. A few comments.
    I think the only constant we humans can be sure of is the arrogance of man... It seems the universe should revolve around us ultimatly superior humans and our omnipotant minds.... I agree with Ed out of principle because I'm willing to admit that I have no real clue about how much we affect the environment around us in the macro sense. I can say that there are many wonders in the world that should be protected or used judiciously. Wood that is not readily renewable should be carefully managed. (Old growth and tropical rainforests). I hate to see wanton clearing of these rescorces for fast profits. I have worked as a sawyer/logger and am not at all apposed to a reasonable harvest.
    I wonder about things like why we call Greenland, Greenland. And why there are 1940's airplanes 100 ft. below the ice there.
    I think about beliefs held a centry or 2 ago and wonder how they could be so stupid back then. I think we are just a little less ignorant today. Maybe we are just a little more sophisticated in our ignorance today.
    What would the world look like if we took greedy profit out of business and held the human person as infinitly valuable.
    I think we have a long way to go to get out of barbarism and depravity. And no, I am not a globalist economicly, but maybe I should be.

    Regards to all. Paul. Trying to live in the Christian tradition.

  6. #36
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    Yeah, for those interested there is a lot of material that pretty much tanks the whole global warming, oceans are rising / sinking stuff. If the thoughts / fears regarding same will help us be nicer to mother nature, I'll play ignorant.
    "A hen is only an egg's way of making another egg".


    – Samuel Butler

  7. #37
    Well.... photos taken 75 to 95 years ago show the disapearance of some mighty hefty glaciers and a huge hunk of Antarctica. Man-made problem? I Dunno.

    We ARE draining our lakes though - with more toilets, showers, lawns, cornfeilds being installed all the time - that IS our problem. An example in Fla., :

    """It looks like someone pulled the plug out of the bottom of Lake Okeechobee.

    How dry is it? So dry that there is now a 12,000 acre fire in the dry grasses of the exposed lake bottom. Okeechobee is the largest lake in Florida, a key source of water for five million residents of south and central Florida. It also supplies water to the enormous citrus groves and sugar cane fields that sit north of the Everglades."""

    Too late to stop the sprawl there, huh?
    Last edited by Mitchell Andrus; 06-18-2007 at 2:49 PM.
    "I love the smell of sawdust in the morning".
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  8. #38
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    Quote Originally Posted by glenn bradley View Post
    Yeah, for those interested there is a lot of material that pretty much tanks the whole global warming, oceans are rising / sinking stuff. If the thoughts / fears regarding same will help us be nicer to mother nature, I'll play ignorant.
    LOL...... Glenn you crack me up . I always enjoy reading your posts. You have a good way of summing things up.
    Gary K.

  9. #39
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    I do agree that the planet is warming (currently because of typical environmental impacts, not permently because of man's impact). Are we to blame, PROBABLY not. The planet goes through warming and cooling cycles constanly. Look at temperatures in the 40's they dipped below what they were experiencing in the twenties and thirties. It was a mini ice age (loosley named). Did we all of a sudden stop producing c.d. in the 40's to make the temperature drop like that. Doubtful. We used more in that era than before because of war, millions of tanks, war vehicles, and airplanes burning a gallon of gas for every mile they traveled. Then we had global warming starting in the 60's. Then it went to ice age is immenent in the 70's and now we are back to warming. The temperature after Krakatoa dropped 2 degrees over the next year! Laki and Asama in the late 1700's caused one of the coldest summers and the next three years to be some of the coldest on record. These eruptions put out more c.d. in one eruption than man has ever produced, or could produce at our current rate of production in a decade.

    If we take out trees, that helps speed global warming right? Forests, after all, cool the atmosphere by drinking in carbon dioxide from the air. A new study, however, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reports that forests' other climatic effects can cancel out their carbon cleaning advantage in some parts of the world. Using a three-dimensional climate model, the research team mimicked full global deforestation and also studied the effects of clear-cutting in different regions of latitude, such as the tropics and boreal zones. Apparently, these natural carbon sinks only do their job effectively in tropical regions; in other areas, they have either no impact or actually contribute to warming the planet. In fact, according to this model, by the year 2100, if all the forests were cut and left to rot, the annual global mean temperature would decrease by more than 0.5 degree Fahrenheit.

    We look at glacial retreat as proof. Proof of what? A natural cycle or one cause by man? Political and scientific numbers can be bogus, skewed for purposes of agenda or belief. Global warming started at around 1700 and subdued around 1938. Since then the temperature has gone up and down since then. We are just in a peak right now. I would not be suprised at all, if in the next decade we see temperature return to pre-global warming pandemic numbers. Look at the past hundred years, we are a half degree warmer than one hundred years ago, compared to from 1700 to 1800 the temperature rose a full degree or more.

    We are comparing temperature over a hundred years, What's the normal temperature, ice age or tropical climate. The united States area has been both in the past 20,000 years. Man was not even here in thet time to screw it up. I think we need to stand down from pressing the panic button and realize that we are on a planet that has weather and climate changes. Has had for mellinia and will continue after man has been wiped off the face of the planet by an asteriods, or lizzards evolving back into dinosaurs. Now there are real threats!!!

    I submit to you---- (toungue in cheek) LET'S BAN ASTERIODS AND COMETS FOR THE SAFETY OF THE PLANET.

    I may get barred for that coment
    Be a mentor, it's so much more fun throwing someone else into the vortex, than swirling it alone!

  10. #40
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    Kudos...Tyler... enjoyed your post. I like your insights.
    Gary K.

  11. #41

    Smile Back to wood working

    Time to enjoy life ~ it's to short
    Happy turning
    Brian~ 86 degrees today- at least It's not snowing

  12. #42
    I did see something that was interesting on the Science Channel the other day; someone had a liter soda bottle of air and another filled with CO2. They both had digital thermometers sealed onto the cap to measure the temp inside the bottles. Left in the sun, the CO2 bottle did start to read something like 6 degrees higher in a short time. That was a bit scary to see so bluntly and undeniably. It definitely absorbs more heat than air alone. I can see how cities or power plants will definitely warm things up more than without the CO2.
    ULS 135 watt w/rotary, Mazak QT-6T CNC lathe, Dapra machining center, Sherline CNC, Tormach CNC, Acad, Rofin welding laser, YAG laser w/ rotary, 4500 watt Fiber laser
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  13. #43
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    This whole discussion is moot if over population is not factored in.

    Is there some reason we can't slow down the population increase of humans and pets?

    I can see a real need to add a large tax on pet and baby food. Neither pets nor babys are good for this planet.

  14. #44
    here is a little something to think about

    they say that the temperatures are going up

    well here is my question

    where are they being measured at?

    cause you know if the temp was measured in say new york city in 1907 and measured today i can guarantee it would be higher just because of the concrete and blacktop reflecting the suns heat

    simple science says you have to have all conditions equal before you can have a result

    cause a pot of water sitting on a warm stove will be warmer than one on a counter

    i personally have tried to conserve-combine trips, turn off lights i dont need, just little things. but to me it has to do with trying to keep more money in my wallet

  15. #45
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chris Rolke View Post
    i personally have tried to conserve-combine trips, turn off lights i dont need, just little things. but to me it has to do with trying to keep more money in my wallet
    I hear ya Chris. We've been doing the same exact thing. Trying to conserve as well as keep as much in our family budget as we can.
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