That was their point- aside from aluminum cans, it doesn't help the environment and it actually is deleterious because of lower energy efficiency. But it makes everyone feel good.
I'm in a busines that uses a lot of plastics; when we first got into this, I researched the whole recycling thing and found out the stuff that P&T talked about. It was a great shock to me, but not so shocking that I don't print a little recycling symbol on our products; that's what our customers want, so that's what I'll give 'em.
speaker said:
Still the USA is responsible for one third of the worlds air pollution. The government did not sign the Kyoto agreement for obvious reasons.
I can't really speak for the new EU members as I did not ask for them. Saw a documentary about Lithuania just when they were 1 day member of the EU; they have very large quantities poison stocked in leaking barrels that originate from the communistic period of the country. The environment guy of their government spoke about the costs of hundreds of millions to clean it all up and he expected the EU to financially help them out
Quite a good start for a new member !
I do not expect USA to take care of the pollution within the next few years. And the international community can't do much either, since the USA is the big daddy in the world and they can just decide to ignore whatever they want to ignore.jean-paul said:
About the new EU countries: many are not ready, and many will suffer because of their addition. Both in the old EU countries as in the new ones. But sooner or later, I hope this is going to pay off.
I can't really speak for the new EU members as I did not ask for them. Saw a documentary about Lithuania just when they were 1 day member of the EU; they have very large quantities poison stocked in leaking barrels that originate from the communistic period of the country. The environment guy of their government spoke about the costs of hundreds of millions to clean it all up and he expected the EU to financially help them out
As any beginning, it will not be easy. The problems will be many(sounding a bit like the iraqian info minister?).
There is also the possibility that there will never be full consensus in the new EU, who knows. What is clear for now is that the old countries must roll out many billions euros.
But in the end, this is not a subject to be discussed here.
roibm said:
Why not? You are more than willing to point out & discuss the perceived faults of the USA. A fair-minded individual would agree that it is reasonable to also discuss the shortcomings of the EU as well, yes?
The EU is now larger than the USA in terms of land occupied. Your contribution of pollution to the world surely exceeds ours when you factor in the new members.
speaker
roibm said:
I'm sorry you feel I'm bashing the EU but you opened this line of discussion. You commented that thinking today was typified by driving a 10MPG vehicle and using class-A amplifiers. That led me to believe you wished to explore environmental issues beyond oil usage in deeper detail.
Sorry, my mistake.
speaker
Ok. Here we go.speaker said:
First point
I have said:
which should be read like this(please note that my english is not my native language and that it is a far cry from being perfect):
By "thinking for today" I mean thinking about present and not much about the future.
Second point
I was more like refering to what I wrote and what jean-paul wrote(not the entire thing he wrote, just the following quoted text)
I for one don't like your judgment, and especially what you wrote:
I do believe this is a very serious situation and should not be treated as any other scary movie/book because it ain't anything close to that. What the guy is writing ain't b***scheit and he doesn't have next to him a lot of worthless people. Contrary.
I do believe that we are approaching the real oil problem, and quite fast. The alternatives are none(or better said, I see none, but please, if you do see some share them with all the others). And you must only look at our economy and what is the element that drives it. I believe everything depends on energy.
One think you must agree with is that the oil reserves aren't great at all. On the other side the demand is always on the rise. Where is this heading towards? I bet it ain't a wonderful heaven on earth.
So please give it a second thought as it really isn't your average scary book.
There's no oil shortage and gas prices are quite cheap if you figure in inflation. If we had to use them, there are many untapped reserves in the states, but I hope we buy and use up the rest of the worlds oil first so we're not at anyones mercy when it does start to dry up.
A for me, I'll continue driving my 5.9 liter 85 miles an hour with the air condition on (9.4 MPG at last check). And I'll keep my A/C in my big house down to 70 degF as my Alephs idle at 450 watts each.
And about the Kyoto agreement, CO2 is not a polutant. It is a harmless byproduct of fuel use and the lifeblood of the rainforest.
A for me, I'll continue driving my 5.9 liter 85 miles an hour with the air condition on (9.4 MPG at last check). And I'll keep my A/C in my big house down to 70 degF as my Alephs idle at 450 watts each.
And about the Kyoto agreement, CO2 is not a polutant. It is a harmless byproduct of fuel use and the lifeblood of the rainforest.
Brian Donaldson said:
Congrats. I hope you will ever feel as good about yourself as you do now. Otherwise you would find yourself in some sort of problem. The biggest problem is not that you are doing it.
The biggest problem is that there are a lot of people like you.
Sometimes it is very hard to understand people, but I sure know I have never ever met someone like you in Europe.
Christ man, what can I say: where is the difference between us and a virus on this planet? Same behavior...
http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/05/04/thewarming.west.ap/index.htmlBrian Donaldson said:
As about your CO2 theory, it is flawed.
CO2 in lower quantities is what you describe.
The only problem is that there is to much CO2 and it will not be reduced anytime soon.
For me at least it's shocking to see people like you. I ever thought about americanas: they drive their 10MPG cars but still having at least an idea about what they are doing. It looks like I was wrong.
roibm said:
don't you have to prove that we are in an era of too much co2 for your hypothesis to work? what if we are in an era of low doses of co2?
roibm said:
It is shocking for me to see people making empty statements like the ones you have made so far without actually thinking through the problem.
roibm said:
you are wrong in the sense that your stereotypical americans don't exist.
roibm said:
Congrats. I hope you will ever feel as good about yourself as you do now. Otherwise you would find yourself in some sort of problem. The biggest problem is not that you are doing it.
The biggest problem is that there are a lot of people like you.
Sometimes it is very hard to understand people, but I sure know I have never ever met someone like you in Europe.
Christ man, what can I say: where is the difference between us and a virus on this planet? Same behavior...
Well, what was it Henry Kissinger said back in the 70's?
Something like "The US has 6% of the world population and
consumes 64% of the world resources. The goal of US
foreign politics is to maintain that."
Christer said:
well, you cannot blame him. It is like how each of us thinks: "I work less than the guy next house over but make more money. My goal is to keep it that way."
I have yet to hear a country's goal is to lower the standard of living for its citizens, both in absolute and relative terms.
Expecting anything else is naive at best.
millwood said:
And defending that situation and not expecting to be hated
by at least the poor people on earth is even more naive.
BTW, what happens when the oil resources are eventually
running low, will the US use its military machinery against
Europe and Japan to make sure it gets the last drops?
http://www.ocs.orst.edu/forum/BigPicture.htm[img]http://www.geographia.com/aruba/mill.jpg[/img]wood said:
http://www.co2science.org/subject/other/co2con_onethousand.htm
I am no scientist in this field so I cannot prove anything, but there are some historic data, and if I read the graph correctly, the current level of CO2 is the highest ever.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Who's the person you are talking about?
Or were you accidentally looking in the mirror while writing the reply?
It really ain't like that.[img]http://www.geographia.com/aruba/mill.jpg[/img]wood said:
The resources on this planet are an international concern. It concerns each and every life form. You are like a plague on this planet, consuming everything you can, not caring for how long the resources will last nor what will come afterwards. More or less the entire humanity is the same, but the US is the leader.
What is worst for us(and not for you for short term) is that you knowingly support the so called president that perpetuates the usual behavior: secure resources(through any means) and leach them as fast as possible.
No one must wonder why many hate USA.
In general is nice gawking at you like @ a car crash.
You prove so many point
Christer said:
It may happen but my track record predicting the future hasn't been exactly great so I will leave that to the "experts" here.
As to oil resources running out, I am not worried about that at all. Humans have proven very resourceful in dealing with those problems. Not too long ago, the Chinese were worried about running out silk worms and having no silk for clothing. I am sure that those same folks, if they could see what we wear today, would be laughing at themselves.
I will venture a guess that people of the future will find alternative energy sources that I cannot even begin to imagine, given my limited knowledge on that. And I will also predict that our reliance on oil will diminish in the future and in spite of that, our total consumption of energy will continue to grow.
If history proves out to be true again.