# What are you and your country doing to avoid global warming?



## aleCcowaN

Hi, everybody!

I've started this thread to discuss about the efforts -probably the lack of them- to avoid climate change.

I live in Buenos Aires, southern tip of a region believed to be one of three or four to be deeply affected by global warming.

In the course of my life, I have wittnessed the progressive change of BA climate. We are suffering now the warmest winter I can remember. Typical cold fronts that clears the skies and bring low temperatures, including many frosts have almost disappeared. In antient times, BA used to suffer a snow fall every four or five years and a major snowstorm every 25 years. The last one was in May 1918, and the last slight snowfall was maybe 15 years ago in the sourroundings.

The climate here has becoming even more wet of what it used to be, and "temperamental" weather conditions typical of tropical and subtropical regions are now usual.

We have this July, the coldest of the year with an historical average of 8°C (47°F), many days with highs above 20°C, and the temperature raised up to 25°C. The frosts, usually 10 to 30 each winter, have dissapeared, and bouganvillas, a very extremly rare plant three decades ago have became common. Magnolias and camelias are almost extinct. In Automm, trees don't know weather loose their leaves or not and become brownish instead of yellow or reddish.

A lot of plagues are developing in the city sourroundings. Some birds dissapear and new species replace them. 

Later, I'll add more information about this climate catastrophe that is developong here, and some data about how other countries are attacking mine with their ill consumption of hydrocarbons.


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## panjabigator

Well, our president refused to sign some environmental treaties, I believe.  I think one of them is the Kyoto treaty...


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## ukuca

Turkish government also refused to sign the Kyoto treaty and I can say that they do almost nothing to avoid global warming. They simply cover their ears to this global problem as if they are not a part of it.


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## aleCcowaN

I'm not surprised that President Bush administration chose not to sign the Kyoto Protocol. I think Turkey may be temporarily excused of doing so, as that country doesn't throw as much greenhouse gases as the first economy does, and regarded some economic troubles in the last decade.

When I went to the States twelve years ago I watched and obscene consumption of fuels. I that time, car gas/petrol was 1.15$ a gallon, while in Argentina, an oil exporter, was 1$ a liter. The reason: Argentina charged a 0.60$ tax on each litter, USA doesn't.

I was shocked when I knew they charged a tax on fuel used by Diesel machines, far more efficient in fuel consumption, so discouraging the use of these fuel saver vehicles.

I made some numbers and arrived to the conclusion of, charging them a tax on fuel of 1 cent each quarter, on an incremental basis, they could discourage fuel consumption and resulting polution, and gather a lot of money ( I calculated 50 billion dollars a year by 2004 and 100 billion by 2014) to invest in:

benefits for non poluting generation of electricity
development of new engines with lower fuel consumption
benefit for those buying a new car with such engines
development and benefits for public transportation in major US cities
buying land in developing countries to preserve forests and for planting trees thus sequestrating carbon from the atmosfere.
paying developing countries to do so (the actual Carbon Bonds)
investigation of the whole problem
If such "imaginary" plan had magically started at the time I was thinking about it, now they had got 360 billion dollars to invest, and a couple of billion tons of carbon would be in some other place but not in the air.

The ironic angle of what I'm saying is that, with an increasing of oil prices of 5% a year and this tax, today they could buy gasoline at a price of 2.60$ a gallon. How much do they pay now?

Each thing to discourage oil consumption in the USA and other major poluters has inmediate effect on the oil prices. But they chose the sacred market to do the leveling. OK, this is what you have, a lot of money for oil companies, middle ages' sovereigns, Hitlers with turban and tropical Mussolinis. And what they are saying about us? Let them for a lightning to break these people in pieces!

With two coutries to dissapear in a few decades -Maldivas and Vanuatu-, half of Nile Delta to be covered by sea, I got the least of the troubles when I have to kill mosquitos in May and sponge the humidity condensed in my windows.

But I am aware. Are you?


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## ukuca

The funny thing about our government (Turkish), they declared that they won't be able to sign the Kyoto Protocol until 2020 which by the way it does not reach out to that year. They don't even know that!!!


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## aleCcowaN

I've started this thread 11 day ago. Since then only 66 people have read it. Other issues like what color of bra do you prefer have gathered thousands of views.

What happened these eleven days? Just triffles: 

A historical heat wave in Europe and North America with hundreds of dead and a mortality rate increased in many thousands a day. 

Black-outs in many regions, people having hydrants as the only source of relief. Economical losses.

Yesterday, in Buenos Aires, as we continue to live the warmest winter perhaps in history, we had a hail of biblical proportions. A typical summer storm condition in the middle of winter, became a hail storm with peach-sized chunks of ice resulting in hundreds of thousands window glasses, windshields and neon signs broken.

A new topic here are gardeners and garden enthusiast speaking of plants that spring and blossom in winter, strange pests, plants dying without a reason, etc.

I'm afraid the aswer to "What are you and your country...." is "Nothing, nobody cares".
Shame!


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## badgrammar

That's ahar question to answer. On a local level, the city of Paris is discouraging the use of private vehicles and encouraging the use of public transport and bicycles, by reducing the amount of space alotted to the former and increasing the amount of space allotted to the latter.  It's not much on a global perspective, but it's something.  

Personally I avoid using my car, refuse to install air-conditioning in my home, and I compost as much of our refuse as I can, to avoid it going to an incenerator or landfill.

But that doesn't amount to a hill of beans, does it?


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## aleCcowaN

badgrammar said:
			
		

> That's ahar question to answer. On a local level, the city of Paris is discouraging the use of private vehicles and encouraging the use of public transport and bicycles, by reducing the amount of space alotted to the former and increasing the amount of space allotted to the latter. It's not much on a global perspective, but it's something.
> 
> Personally I avoid using my car, refuse to install air-conditioning in my home, and I compost as much of our refuse as I can, to avoid it going to an incenerator or landfill.
> 
> But that doesn't amount to a hill of beans, does it?


It really is something! One aspect of Paris' uses I really hated was that they regulate their heating systems to 24°C ( 77°F) what comes up in heavy fuel consumption 10 months a year. I live in a more mediterranean climate and I chose to low the heat system from 21°C to 19°C and wearing a sweater in winter inside my home. I reduced from 8 to 6 months the time the heating system is on, and my bill of natural gas felt 50% during winter (global warming "aid" including).

No effort is small. As Francis of Azzizi said (in good Italian, not my bad English) "let ourselves be as stones for being built into an spiritual temple"


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## Miguelillo 87

I have to say that Mexico is trying to do sth for avoid it but corruption and the mafias are really too hard to cope with them. Mexico has big areas of forest and jungles who provided oxygen to the world and also regulate the weather, appalling money can more than environment, and a lot of mafias of the wood, cut thousand and thousand of hectares per year. These guys the “talamontes” (cut down mountains) clear our forest and leave such a horrible view of devastation, Government wants to do sth but these guys have better weapons than them and obviously people won’t risk their life for a piece of wood, even if that piece of wood it’s the future of the planet. 
 
As you should know Mexico city  it’s one of the biggest cities all over the worls and as it is surrounded by mountains all the gases and pollution remains here until a big wind take all the pollutin away, you should see the view of Monday (I work on The floor 24 so I have a beauty view) I could see the volcanoes, the green mountains and a lovely blue sky , but today I hardly see the “toreo” “Bullfighting plaza” which its 10 min away form where I am!!!! I mean I think we have to reduce the consumption of oil and start to change our cars for public transport. Appalling Public transport in Mexico it’s not very good, The subway is clean, cheap and “fast” but as many people used a lot don’t want to go by it, Buses ar horrible, the only good think it’s the metrobus, so it’s really hard to change form the commodity of your car to the uncomfortably of public transport.
(I use public transport)
 
About weather changes, here on Mexico we had the worst hurricane  season ever, you shoul know about the devastation of Cancún, I mean the sea swallow thousand of kilometres of beaches, and in Chiapas (where jungle is) the river grow up too much that they take almost half of towns on the water  , and rivers flooding wholes cities that on the south.
On the north heat it’s unsupportable, on these summer more than 10 persons has dies as a consequence of high temperatures!!!!


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## Bonjules

Hola alecC, 
 I am not surprised at the poor response you are getting (9 responses in over a week). I started 'The mad concept of private transport' which is of course related to yours and it was limping along slowly. Then I started 'Surgery in Beauty contests' and it got more responses the 1st 24 hours than the car issue.  
 I don't think we will pay attention until the water is up to our necks.
saludos


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## french4beth

I'm very much interested in this topic, but it's not something that I'm familiar with, so I wanted to do a bit of research.

I found some good news about the US government (for once!) here:



> Federal programs promote the development of: cleaner, more efficient technologies for electricity generation and transmission… renewable resources, such as solar energy, wind power, geothermal energy, hydropower, bioenergy, and hydrogen fuels… fuel-efficient motor vehicles and trucks, research and development options for producing cleaner fuels… programs to reduce the number of vehicle miles traveled… partnership programs with industry to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases, promote source reduction and recycling, and increase the use of combined heat and power… voluntary partnership programs promote energy efficiency in the nation’s commercial, residential, and government buildings (including schools) by offering technical assistance as well as the labeling of efficient products, new homes, and office buildings… conservation programs


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## aleCcowaN

french4beth said:
			
		

> I'm very much interested in this topic, but it's not something that I'm familiar with, so I wanted to do a bit of research.
> 
> I found some good news about the US government (for once!) here:


I regret USA may be investing billions of dollars in such programs but it still remains a "warm" effort, in comparisson the damage that country is doing to the our planet. US is now responsible for 23% of greenhouse gas emitions and 30% of the total emision during the last century. Moving a lot of bussineses to "subtropical" cities like Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, etc. with thousands of new buildings with curtain walls and air conditioning is by itself more destructive than a dozen of well publicited programs to avoid that destruction.

The sole World's concrete industry in the world adds 1 billion tons of CO2 a year to the atmosphere. But US avoid do the right thing: develop a tax system that charge the poluters and use the money to prize the sustainable activities and benefit those who are the loosers in poluting industries, for instance, charcoal miners. I use the example of the concrete industry because there is known technology to reduce emisions in 70%, but that cement is about 15% more expensive than the usual. An additional tax up to 20% on traditional portland cement would foster the production of the new less harmful cement, and it'd add only 15 billion usdollars worldwide of costs to an industry which is trillonaire. Today, about 80% of CO2 mankind releases to the atmosphere is taken by the seas. One of the systems that captures this CO2 are coral reefs, that convert this CO2 to calcium carbonate. But the reefs themselves are under atack for many kind of polutions and the increasing level of the seas, produced by global warming. This is the kind of vicious circle we all are involved and some programs announced with horns are only a smoke curtain to cover that, in an esencial way, is little what is be doing about the matter.


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## GenJen54

> The sole World's concrete industry in the world adds 1 billion tons of CO2 a year to the atmosphere. But US avoid do the right thing: develop a tax system that charge the poluters and use the money to prize the sustainable activities and benefit those who are the loosers in poluting industries


 
Sadly, so long as big business has its hands in politics' pockets, this will never, ever change, and we will be faced with a world that will one day not be able to be sustained.  

Money corrupts, power corrupts, and right now, the state of our ecology is being sold off in the name of "progress."


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## Bonjules

Actually, the monies spent on the programs Beth 'found' are puny, in absolute terms and esp. in relation to the seize of the economy or the scope of the problem. Suggesting a 'figleaf' situation.
Why isn't gasoline heavily taxed to discourage our wasteful ways and pay for some 'real' reaserch? And provide alternatives.
 In Europe they are paying 2 to 3 times what we are paying and even that doesn't come anywhere close to covering the real cost  for dealing with the consequences.
 We decided that someone will have to pay for it later. Our kids will love us for that.


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## justjukka

I'm hoping hybrid vehicles become standard one day.  The fuel consumption will lessen and it's better for the environment.


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## badgrammar

Bonjules said:
			
		

> Our kids will love us for that.



Agreed.  With all the harsh environmental consequences we are just beginning to face, I look at my kids and think "they're the ones who are going to suffer".


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## aleCcowaN

I love numbers and I tend to explain in numbers all you can measure.

The cost of carbon sequestration of an oil barrel in soil and forest is about 4.60 USD (today in Argentina). That oil barrel is about 75 USD. Be sure avoid this problem is cheaper than everybody think.

Hybrid cars are very good as they save about 40% of polution. If you charge a two cent tax over each gallon of gas/petrol. You have 110 billion gallons spent in the US every year. You'd get 2.2 billion dollars. You'd be able to give a 5,000 dollar bonus to every person who buy a hybrid car. You'd benefit 440.000 car owners. This year, 250,000 hybrid cars are expected to be sold in US over a 14 million total.

Don't you like to loose the 2.2 billions? Give people a 90% total value loan in 60 months without interest. You don't care about loosing that money? Pay the bank interest of such loans, and all other cost emerging of such finantial plan. You may give a total o 20 billion dollar credit, financing then 2 million hybrid cars sales each year.

As I said, I love numbers. They show that things could be done when you want to.


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## Otter

Hi Alec,

I haven't found time to read everything on this thread so I don't know if there are any previous references to _An Inconvenient Truth_, Al Gore's film which includes documentary footage of a slide show he has presented over 1,000 times around the globe on this subject.

In it, you'll see that we, in the U.S.A., are by far the world's worst contributors to global warming.

It's a fantastic film and I hope everyone finds their way to it soon.  I also wish Gore had presented himself as he does in this film, back when he was running for president.  

Our current administration has every intention of avoiding doing anything.  We are stupid, I'm embarrassed to admit.  And I, personally, have great interest in this subject, beyond global concern.  If WE do not reverse global warming (and it is reversible, I'm happy to say), my apartment will be under water in about 10 years.  Maybe that's why I seek to be an otter.

Otter


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## übermönch

There are a lot of laws in Germany, recently the Green Party was in coalition with the ruling Social Democrats. Many things were done (including wrong things like stopping nuclear power generation in GER), but since the gaz price got higher, transport prizes also have risen and thus everything got more expensive and the electors got angry at the Green envoirmentalists. In general, the principle of nationalism with democracy are egoistic interest of a defined nation, so nothing will change. But fear not, in 50 years there'll be no oil left, this will slow the greenhouse effect down.


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## Bettie

At least in my city you have to ricycle, I mean divide your trash, the system is not as good as the one I saw in Spain, but far much better that here in the States that if you really want to rycicle you have to make a big effort!!!


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## GenJen54

In my city, recycling is optional. Sadly, few people partake even though it is very easy. I would venture that of the approximately thirty houses on my block, only three or four recycle.

The sad part is, it's no more difficult than taking out the trash. Any cans, newspapers and plastic bottles are thrown into a separate bin - provided FREE of CHARGE by the City (upon user request) - and the recycling truck picks it up on the same day as our regular trash is picked up. 

We are much better at recycling at the office.


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## saturnian

*What are you and your country doing to avoid global warming?* 

Bueno, yo, como otros (por lo visto), no hago nada más que echar la culpa al gran Satánas (Estados Unidos, por supuesto).

¿Realmente hace falta hacer más que eso?*

(*= comentario irónico)


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## aleCcowaN

Hi Otter and übermönch!

I really want to see Al Gore's film. I'm not so sure about we are going to have 50 years and just wait and see all the oil wasted. Every time the oil prices reach a new level, charcoal consumption begins to raise again, and the planet have reserves of coal that are 10 times the size of oil.

They can't forecast weather, they can't forecast the real effects of this global menace. Do we have 50 years?

My reflection here is that we have live in the past 35 years a lot of sharp raises of energy prices involving free market and political issues together. But we seldon see any tax policy in major countries designed to avoid those raises and to finance and prevent those political issues.

Wasn't a developed and rich Vietnam cheaper than a Vietnam War?

Politicians don't want to establish this policies when energy is cheap to avoid loosing votes. And when the prices raises, they don't want to do it even more. That's why people contiousness is so important about this subject. We have to accept gradual policies to avoid major damages in the future.


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## Otter

aleCcowaN said:
			
		

> Hi Otter and übermönch!
> 
> I really want to see Al Gore's film. I'm not so sure about we are going to have 50 years and just wait and see all the oil wasted. Every time the oil prices reach a new level, charcoal consumption begins to raise again, and the planet have reserves of coal that are 10 times the size of oil.
> 
> They can't forecast weather, they can't forecast the real effects of this global menace. Do we have 50 years?
> 
> My reflection here is that we have live in the past 35 years a lot of sharp raises of energy prices involving free market and political issues together. But we seldon see any tax policy in major countries designed to avoid those raises and to finance and prevent those political issues.
> 
> Wasn't a developed and rich Vietnam cheaper than a Vietnam War?
> 
> Politicians don't want to establish this policies when energy is cheap to avoid loosing votes. And when the prices raises, they don't want to do it even more. That's why people contiousness is so important about this subject. We have to accept gradual policies to avoid major damages in the future.


 
Hi,  It seems, from the documentation which Gore presents, we definitely DO NOT have 50 years.  Maybe 10 before downtown NYC is gone.  At least that's how it looked to me.  Just from the photo documentation of the polar ice caps, Glacier, etc.

I think you're looking for logic and logic is not what it's about.  Gore quotes someone, can't recall who at the moment, who said something like, "It's very difficult to get someone to understand something when his paycheck depends on his not understanding".  That's where our politicians are.  Anyway, An Inconvenient Truth is what I would call the definitive film on this subject.  I suggest we all see it (again) and come back for discussion.


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## Suane

It's dissapointing to see how many high-school students have car in USA.  In Slovakia, like 1! high-school student (in my school) has a car along with few teachers. Everyone uses public transportation, but it's more because of money. We do not have money to buy car for every member of the family, just one per family. We do not have money to waste our food, so we eat the dinner from the previous day. We do not have money, so we have like 5 televisions per school, not in every classroom!!! I don't know but maybe also money spoils people a bit.
Also, there are problems with sprawl. In Slovakia, majority of people live in the apartments, not in their own house (although the actual size of the apartment is the same as most of the houses in US, the difference is that they are on top of each other, so they do not take so much place, and houses have also "garden" that is more like a terrace or balcony in a lot of cases)
 I don't know, I came to only possible aswer to all ecological problems, maybe we should not replace the source of our harmful actions (that bring another problems itself) , maybe we should stop doing that action!!! Kill the civilization and all ecological problems would stop, of course with exceptions of consequences of already existing ones.


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## maxiogee

aleCcowaN said:
			
		

> The sole World's concrete industry in the world adds 1 billion tons of CO2 a year to the atmosphere. But US avoid do the right thing: develop a tax system that charge the poluters and use the money to prize the sustainable activities and benefit those who are the loosers in poluting industries, for instance, charcoal miners.



Charcoal is not "mined". You must be thinking of some other form of coal.

Charcoal is obtained from the anaerobic burning of wood.


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## aleCcowaN

maxiogee said:
			
		

> Charcoal is not "mined". You must be thinking of some other form of coal.
> 
> Charcoal is obtained from the anaerobic burning of wood.


You're right. I was thinking in antracite, lignite, et al. Is it called "mineral coal"?

Only Canada and USA have more than 2 trillion tons of that mineral. China and India use an increasing ammount of this source of energy. Russia uses a lot to let them export their petroleum and natural gas.


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## Chaska Ñawi

(I'm glad you started this post, Alec!)

Being a Canadian is seriously embarassing at the moment.  Canada DID, unlike the U.S., sign the Kyoto accord; and did NOT, unlike the U.S., make any changes whatsoever in legislation or anything else to reduce emissions.  Our emissions have, in fact, increased instead of decreased; and yet our politicians go around thumping their chests implying that simply signing the thing is sufficient.

Here, too, we have birds, plants and insects moving in from warmer climates.  Our winters are shorter and overall are warmer, but with vicious freeze-thaw cycles.  Because of the shorter winters, we are experiencing explosions in the insect populations.  The water tables are falling, and communities that sustain themselves with snow and glacier melt are looking at the probability of going dry this century.  The ice floes are breaking up or disappearing early, affecting many species of animals that breed on the sea ice.

In my part of Ontario, we are having increased storms ... ice storms in the winter, thunderstorms in the summer, tornadoes in places that didn't have one.  Two years ago a tornado funnel passed a few hundred yards in front of our house, touched down, and killed a neighbour.  This used to be unheard of.

Re transportation, all our cities are designed around the use of private transport.  Public transport is expensive and inefficient, except in the city cores.  We have huge areas which are specifically residential, commercial or industrial, instead of smaller boroughs with mixed zoning where people can walk to work.  

In the country, public transport is minimal or non-existent.  Mexico had the best public transport system I've ever seen - you could take a bus from anywhere to anywhere.  If there was a road, there was a bus.  Canada has a lot to learn from this attitude.  As a horrible example, I'm teaching at a school 100 km from my house.  There is no public transport, there is nobody with whom I can car pool, and so here I am, one person burning a horrendous amount of gas every day so I can work.  I cannot afford not to work until I can get a job closer to home.

Our whole society is based on individual car ownership, and the politicians are terrified to tackle the issue in a responsible manner.

When it comes to industry controls, the standard answer is that industries should be immune from most emissions controls, because emission controls will impede economic development.  Even the incredible cost of cleanup in the wake of factory discharges (a prime example being the tar ponds in Sydney, Nova Scotia) has taught no lessons to our politicians.

Our neighbours to the south have been far more proactive than Canadians.... you just don't hear much about it.


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## Miguelillo 87

Chaska, Thanks for have flatter our public system, and yes you’re right here on Mexico, you only have to walk 5 or 10 min and sometimes 1 min in order to take a bus which will take you every where you wanna go, And the metro, wow, I mean for only 2 pesos, (.20 c of american dollar) and that will take you from north to shout, from orient to western even to another states of the republic. Unfortunately Buses (not metro , metro is perfect for me) are not really nice, although Government forced to the owners of public transport (microbuses) to change their units (some are too old) they remained to have the same old units and it’s for that that sometimes people prefer to get out on their cars instead of use the uncomfortable buses, even if that causes 2 hrs and  half stock on the traffic.


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## aleCcowaN

Hi, Chaska Ñawi!

I read your very interesting post. I think your southern neighbours "seem" to be more proactive, but the fact remains the emisions of greenhouse gases in USA and Canada raise at a similar rate (3.5 to 4% per year). I am worried about the timber industry in Canada. Are they doing something to replace trees they pull down? Surprisingly, deforestation and mainly soil humus losses are a major source of greenhouse gases.

I wonder about the mythical Argentina, and its fertile pampas and forests. One century ago we had a thick layer (up to 2 meters) of rich soil, having then impressive crops (nothing in comparisson with those nowadays technology can give). As a result of fertilizers and other techs, the content of humus have decayed thus adding a huge ammount of CO2 to the atmosphere. A conservative estimate is that Argentina, Uruguay and Southern Brasil have released about 15 billion tons of CO2 from this source, almost 2 years of actual worlwide emissions from fossile fuels.

If we can revert soil deterioration worldwide, we can sequestrate up to 300 billion tons of CO2. But, how can we manage without fertilizers? Biotechnology can give an aswer, but it is suspected by the very people who also protest against global warming. Ecology is too much important to leave it to ecologists. Some of them are a real danger to the environment.


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## geve

Here are a few things that come to mind concerning France:

Recycling is being promoted, there are three different garbage bins in my building. But for the moment, it is not sure that what is saved by recycling covers the environmental cost of three different garbage trucks going to three different locations, instead of just one...

The city townhall hands out stickers to put on letterboxes saying "no ad please", to reduce the amount of paper wasted on promotional material. Companies pledged that they would respect it (I can't tell if they do, I haven't put that sticker on...)

The company in charge of public transports in Paris has a few electric buses - but I'm not sure they plan to have only those in the future...

I think that recently a new tax was implemented on airplane tickets? The tax was supposed to go to environmental funds... 

The problem is that environmental measures as such seem so tiny compared to what we've already done to this planet...  And it's also true at the individual level. The little things that we do seem to account for nothing seeing the gravity of the situation. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't do them, as you said, "no effort is small"... But the problems are huge.


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## Chaska Ñawi

aleCcowaN said:
			
		

> I am worried about the timber industry in Canada. Are they doing something to replace trees they pull down?



Welllllll ..... yes and no.  The giants in the timber industry hire an army of tree-planters in the summer, and claim that they are environmentally responsible because they replant the forests.

This is not really true.  These high-tech logging operations take everything, not just the mature trees.  A logged hillside in British Columbia looks like the aftermath of WWI, with nothing vertical left on it.  The resulting erosion has buried salmon spawning beds, and the lack of tree cover by the spawning streams has caused them to shrink or completely dry up.  The logged areas are planted with only softwood seedlings, so that the resulting "forest" is a plantation instead of a forest.

One of my friends in northern Ontario does things a different way.  He goes in with a team of Belgian horses, who can remove the timber without damaging the younger trees .... and is careful to only take timber where there is a good crop of seedlings to replace it.  His micro-enterprise is not an example of general Canadian logging practices, alas.


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## aleCcowaN

Hi geve and Chaska Ñawi!

About France, I've seen a lot of recycling but numbers say that turning down the heat system a couple of degrees is much more friendly with the environment (especially with global warming) than recycling all the garbage. Recycling is good for other kind of environmental threads but not global warming.

Chaska, you told what I was afraid to hear. We have a similar situation here. I am for taxes on land taylored based on carbon content of the soil and vegetation. If they chopped and acre and later they have to pay a 1000 dollars tax a year for the lost of carbon, they will take care of replacing carefully each piece of natural materials they use. An hectare of mature woodland can have about 300 tons of carbon as part of both trees and soil. The kind or soil erosion you described let the land without basic mineral to recover by itself.


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## panjabigator

How about deforestation in the rain forests?  At the rate we are at, how long before there are no more in South America?


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## cirrus

In the UK much of the action is limited to mouthing bons mots and feeling smug compared to the US rather than doing anything constructive.  Recycling has a higher agenda than it used to and people are starting to be fined for not recycling but still a ridiculous amount of energy is being wasted.  Any amount of electrical items waste energy even while they aren't switched on, many buildings have all their lights blazing throughout the night even though nobody is in them.  People have a major car habit albeit with smaller cars than the US and petrol at about a pound a litre (eg $1.80 US / €1.40).  The government  has  belatedly realised that  oil isn't going to  last for ever - the gas and oil in the North  Sea is running out and peak oil may well be here now.  Rather than promote reducing energy demand the government seems be hell bent on going back down the nuclear route.  To me it feels like laying more track for a run away train and feckless in that we are giving future generations yet more rubbish to deal with. 

In London, a city where millions of people live below sea level the only thing between us and a catastrophic flood which would make post Katrina New Orleans look like a picnic is a barrier on the Thames. It was designed in the 70s to be used once a year.  Now it is used once a month.  Some token attempts are being made to look at alternative energy but again much of this is talk.  On a local and personal level there are some more promising signs which mirror those mentioned elsewhere in this thread.  

An interesting development is the London government has put a toll on all vehicles using the centre of London from 7 in the morning to six or so in the evening.  The mayor is proposing to increase this to £25 for gas guzzlers - the trend for ridiculous 4 by 4s hasn't passed us by.  There is also more investment in public transport but that is in the context of public transport having been at the back of the queue for investment for many many years. 
You are right Alec to point out the lack of interest.  I think this is denial is far easier than engaging with what feels like a doomladen scenario, a nightmare none of us want to consider.  Going to work on my bike and eating sustainable organic food and composting rather than using the bin feels at best marginal when we set this against the size of the problem.


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## panjabigator

When I lived in New   York (from 85-95, sob...I miss it!), there were actually bottle crushing machines and can crushing machines.  My father and I would lug a whole garbage worth of recyclables to the local Path Mark (grocery store) and get nickels upon nickels worth of change!  The money wasn't really the objective here, but it certainly was good motivation.  I have never seen anything similar in Florida, but Seinfeld has a good episode on this if anyone is interested (PM me hehe).


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## Fernando

I am happy to say that temperature in Buenos Aires now (10 AM) is 2º C (36º F), according weatherchannel.com

Well, I am not doing anything to deal with greenhouse effect. As a matter of fact I have installed A/C this year. I have to say I am very happy of having done it. I have been able to sleep. Otherwise I would have had 30ºC inside my house.

About my country. Well, 

- We have signed the Kyoto agreement 
- We susidize the sun-produced electricity (its cost is 6 times the fuel-produced). 
- We are going not to meet with Kyoto since our GDP has grown much more than expected during the last years (and we have 4 million more people).
- We have a ban on new nuclear plants (count this as environmental protection or aggression, at your will).
- We love to buy expensive 4x4 and German big-engine cars. Well, except me.
- Hundreds of km2 of wood are burnt every year (last year 11 people died in one of these fires).


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## GenJen54

HEREs an interesting article about what Great Britain is doing in cooperation with the state of California.  It seems that since Bush and his cronies are too deeply mired in the rhetoric of big business (oil and automotive in particular), this may prove the way to go. 

It will be interesting to see how it pans out.


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## geve

Fernando's post made me think that there were things done to promote the integration of environmental criteria in constructions in France too: There is a set of financial subventions and abatements when you're doing work on your house to reduce energy expenditures.

Further investigation led me to the "nouvelle réglementation thermique" adopted in 2001, that applies to construction and aims at reducing by 20% the energy used in houses (contrary to the above, it is compulsory).

There's also the HQE norm for public constructions (Haute Qualité Environnementale) but that's more a global approach to integrate a building in its environment at large.

(sorry all these links are in French only  )


[I have another hypothesis for your (relative) lack of response: while I feel confident enough in my level of English to speak about toilet paper, I might sometimes refrain from entering threads on certain subjects, from fear of lacking the required vocabulary in English... Maybe there are other shy members too!]


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## danielfranco

When I saw your thread opened way back, I knew I hadn't really read anything about global warming. I was, like many people, only familiar with the buzz-words of "catastrophe", "crisis" and "sudden climatic changes" that are often bandied about by the media.
So, after all these days I finally grabbed a few books and read some stuff, to find out a little bit more about this "global warming".
Now, perhaps I have misinterpreted the information, and perhaps my feeble brain hardly is capable of dealing with the necessary processing power to formulate the right perspective, so I'll just tell you a few things I found out, and explain this reaction I have to all the information I've read so far:
I believe there is an impending crisis. But I don't think it has to do with "climate" (which is meant to signify weather changes over a time interval). But I think we have been bombarded with many things at once that are not related to each other. For example, the threat of global warming gets lumped in with pollution. Now, I think pollution generated by humans has reached levels that truly threaten our continued existence on this planet. Also, I believe that humans have a definite influence on nature. However, I don't believe that nature has an intrinsic "natural balance" and that all we have to do is leave it alone and it all be fine. You see? Humans have been influencing nature around them for the last fifteen to twenty _thousand _years. It's more noticeable now because there's so very many more of us than ever before (ten percent of all humans EVER to have lived on this planet are alive today!).
Anyway, since these kind of ruminations seem to spiral out of control even inside my head, let me tell you about a few things I've read, and hope they can be independently verified by anyone who wishes to look for the information.
The oldest measurments of temperature for the USA go back to 1826, which is about twenty or so years before the "global warming concept" started as a concept. These are measurements taken at West Point, NY, and they show a wild variance of temperature before 1916. Although there's some missing data, the data has been kept current and when compared to the data for the year 2000, the AVERAGE temperature of that location shows that in 1826 the average temperature was slightly under *51 degrees* farenheit, and in 2000 the average temperature was slightly over  *51 degrees *farenheit. (!)
Also, every single graph of temperature variance shows that any measuring station in an area that has not developed as a urban site shows that the average temperature has either remained steady, increased slightly, or actually _decreased.
_But the increase in CO2 levels has steadily risen throughout all these years. When I looked at the graph, I was shocked to see such a steep slope on the curve. Then I looked a bit closer, and saw that the graph was steep because it was represented in increments of five units. In the graph, it shows a current level of about 379, whereas in the past it was closer to 300. But three-hundred what, I thought? I read the graph description, and it said that it was measured in "parts per million". (!) Which is why, I think, some countries didn't want to sign the Kyoto treaty, which proposed to reduce the CO2 concentrations to 319 parts per million, even with the cooperation of all the proposed countries. I guess some countries didn't see how the bottom line ($) could possibly be advantageous.
And on and on and on, the info goes in this vein... The one thing that actually had me worried was how that huge iceberg was calved from the Antarctica Peninsula. I thought, oh my gosh, there goes all the ice... The sea-levels are going up! Help!
Actually, sea-levels graphs look pretty much like the temperature graphs: mostly flat.
Also, I learned that the peninsula is 2% of the Antarctic ice. And I learned that the Antarctic had been melting for the last *six thousand years*, but that presently it has been growing _thicker._
So I don't know what to think anymore...

EDITED for typos


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## panjabigator

Daniel, can you tell me the resource you used for that?  I was watching a Discovery channel program on Global warming the other day and they were showing the size of the artic circle in 1970 and in 2000 from an ariel view.  It was shocking to see the land mass difference.


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## aleCcowaN

I'm amazed about inconsistent policies. Governments spend one trillion dollars a year in "defense" because some countries may or may not be a threat to their security. But governments don't spend nothing but coins in major environmental menaces, because it is not proved that may or may not cause irreversible damage.

Is it people asking governments to do so? In this age of democracy, potilitians try to keep their "customers" happy. So, if there are lots o people asking for increasing expenditures in defense and saying we should neglect environmental issues... Oh! surprisingly it is the other way round. Give me a break!

We are mislead by selfish interests to believe that "recycling" will do. That is like staring at the dirtiness of a window while the whole building is ready to fall. Elemental moral considerations of any culture tell us we must sacrify some confort in order to keep "the whole" safe.


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## danielfranco

I'm looking through my computer to see if I have some of the links for you guys...
In the meantime, let me tell you of something I read back at the end of the 90's.
Supposedly, some statistical studies were conducted about the frequency of the usage of words such as "catastrophe", "crisis", "risk", and other buzz-words that have been key in presenting the "global warming" situation to the public.
It was apparent that the usage of such words became prominent and a fixed feature of newscasts around 1989.
What happened in '89? The fall of the Berlin wall. The end of the cold war.
The report went on to comment that _*fear*_ has always been the number one method of controlling an eclectic society. Once the cold war was gone, it seems a new boogeyman needed to be found...
I wonder how come they haven't tried to scare us with the OTHER scientific theory about the weather, you know? The one that is positive that we are on the verge of plunging into the next ice age...

Anyway, let me look for the links...


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## aleCcowaN

Daniel, I used to think there's some guilty-thinking in the human mind that put us to create myths about apocalyptical developments, and many group take advance of this in order to control the weak minded. I still think that in some way.

I used to think too, that all men are entitled to get a piece of land and make of it whatever they want. One day I made a simple multiplication. Before that multiplication I had answered the following

Is any human being entitled to get by legal means a 2ha (4.5 acres) piece of land ? Of course
May he or she modify that land the way he or she like? Sure, being it legal.
May he or she plant rose bushes, and exterminate all plagues that may atack them? Of course.
May he or she exterminate all insects and snakes he or she considered dangerous of simply ugly? Go ahead!
And may he o she take all that land and transformed it in a lawn pad? Sure!

Well, if all 6.5 billion human exercised "that right we are entitled" the whole surface of the emerging land will be transformed and almost all land species will be extinct. My mind chande for ever.

We simply do not have that rights we believe we are entitled. We believe we have them as 80%-90% of mankind cannot exercise that rights, and many or the rest don't want to exercise them. We are certainly capable of destroying the whole planet, and we are somewhat doing so.

Environmental catastrophes are not the punishment gods reserve to us for our pride and contempt. Are what we'll get by our own behavior. We are building them brick by brick. I've just decided not to be one of those bricks.

Do that multiplication. There are 20 million of square kilometers left - Antarctica, North Pole ices and higher mountains. With population rising, in 12 years we'll have to melt them to provide the plenty-of-rights-people with their acres.


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## danielfranco

Hi, Alec!
I do not doubt for a minute that we are doing ourselves in. I really believe it. I think we are very much on the brink of discovering how very little of the stuff necessary to sustain human civilization is really left on the planet. Including living space, like you mentioned.
Here, have a look at this thread.
Most of the days I don't think the end is really that close, but many other days I'm positive it will be sudden and soon.
Anyway, here's some of the references I found. I think I lost a whole bunch of them when I erased other files. Ah, well...

- "Side-looking radar measurements show West Antarctic ice is increasing at 26.8 gigtons per year, reversing the melting trend of the last 6,000 years."
Joughin, I., and Tulaczyk, S., 2002, "Positive mass balance of the Ross Ice Streams, West Antarctica." Science 295: 476-80.

- Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Columbia University, New York: GISS station page

- Global Historical Climatology Network, mantained at NCDC and CDIAC of Oak Ridge National Laboratory: Home page

- United States Historical Climatology Network (USHCN): Home page


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## Bonjules

Short answer: very little to nothing.
Puerto Rico is a small island (~40x100mi) with 4plus mill. 'habitants and 2.5mill. cars (monthly increase: ~ 10,ooo).
Green is rapidly disappearing, AC is on the increase...
Meanwhile, the 'Guardian' writes about the newest Porsche like if it was a wonderful success...
Cars are of course only part of the problem. Just to show how little awareness there still is; not only here!
DanielFranco, I think your projection (2021) is not that far off. At least things will be very different from how we know them much sooner than we thought. We are still going as if everything was hunky-dory....
It seems we are just that way: We will not wake up until the water is literally up to our neck. Always been that way. Some think it's because we have evolved not  having to think beyond the next village or the next harvest...


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## aleCcowaN

danielfranco said:
			
		

> "Side-looking radar measurements show West Antarctic ice is increasing at 26.8 gigtons per year, reversing the melting trend of the last 6,000 years."


-I found this article mentioned only in three conservative web sites.
- 26.8 gigatons/year of water is about what River Santa Cruz (Patagonia) releases in the Atlantic. It's nothing. It's less than 1% of total snowfalls on Antarctica.
-It has been explained many times that this increase is due to ice moving faster from Pole and "East" Antarctica towards the Ross Ice Shelf due to global warming. How about Antarctica's totals?
- "reversing the melting trend of the last 6,000 years" Oh! Wow! Do you know what a "non sequitur" is? I'd prefer "Reduce Fat Fast" addvertisment. It is much more logical and loyal with the customers.


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## danielfranco

No, Alec, I have no idea what a "non sequitur" is. I'm such a (fat) dumbo that I often confuse it with "ad hominem".

But, back at the ranch, I like this exchange of information. If I understand you correctly (which has been implied might be beyond my powers), the article I mentioned is useless because:
1) Doesn't have the required number of "conservative" endorsements,

2) 26.8 gigatons/year of *ice* is nothing compared to all the ice of the whole continent,

3) Erm... You are right: "How about Antarctica's totals?" I don't know. Hopefully someone can quantify this for the forum's benefit.

4) 6,000-year melting trends have nothing to do with any of the above.

And, you know? That's fine. We are all here to learn. I only wish more people were involved in this discussion. For sure, it's highly unlikely we'd reach a uniform agreement as to what different countries are (or, most likely, are NOT) doing about "global warming". But with more different points of view we'd be able to have more sources and references so that we'd all go our different ways and learn more about our planet, and the challenges we face in the very near future.
Like an environmentalist TV ad says, "if not for us, for our children, then..."


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## tafanari

Did anybody already say that in the US we are sitting patiently waiting for all of the science to come in?


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## aleCcowaN

danielfranco said:
			
		

> No, Alec, I have no idea what a "non sequitur" is. I'm such a (fat) dumbo that I often confuse it with "ad hominem".
> 
> But, back at the ranch, I like this exchange of information. If I understand you correctly (which has been implied might be beyond my powers), the article I mentioned is useless because:
> 1) Doesn't have the required number of "conservative" endorsements,
> 
> 2) 26.8 gigatons/year of *ice* is nothing compared to all the ice of the whole continent,
> 
> 3) Erm... You are right: "How about Antarctica's totals?" I don't know. Hopefully someone can quantify this for the forum's benefit.
> 
> 4) 6,000-year melting trends have nothing to do with any of the above.
> 
> And, you know? That's fine. We are all here to learn. I only wish more people were involved in this discussion. For sure, it's highly unlikely we'd reach a uniform agreement as to what different countries are (or, most likely, are NOT) doing about "global warming". But with more different points of view we'd be able to have more sources and references so that we'd all go our different ways and learn more about our planet, and the challenges we face in the very near future.
> Like an environmentalist TV ad says, "if not for us, for our children, then..."


I never tried to be sarcastic about anyone -at least in this thread I mean-, just I can't tell nothing about the article based on the sole sentence



> "Side-looking radar measurements show West Antarctic ice is increasing at 26.8 gigtons per year, reversing the melting trend of the last 6,000 years."


 
as the comma doesn't imply "then", "therefore" or any logical link between both phrases. Whether it is a non sequitur or we depend on more information which is out of the sentence. I need to read the article to have an opinion. 

About the other points

1) It was a fact, but the word "gigtons" instead of "gigatons" could narrow the search results. It is interesting when you got an article cited by people who hold different opinions.

2) That's true by far. I make a rough calculation based on data I got in my library. It may be a double or a half, but roughly the total amount of ice of Antarctica reaches about 6 million cubic kilometers. A cubic kilometer of ice is about a gigaton. This figure is compatible with sea level rising 16 meters when all this ice melt.

3) It would be good to get a serious comprehensive source with this fact and its trends.

4) It would be marvelous, but, once again, where's the relation between the two parts of the sentence?

It's just inconsistent policies that worry me. We have lots of "factual studies" to justify any policy. Even the same study can be called in support of one policy and ist opposite.


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## danielfranco

He, he... All throughout I hadn't noticed the word "gigtons". I'm pretty sure I messed up and was supposed to have been "gigatons".
Sorry, I'll double-check on that later.
Laters.


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## tvdxer

We're buying more efficient SUVs.


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## aleCcowaN

danielfranco said:
			
		

> He, he... All throughout I hadn't noticed the word "gigtons". I'm pretty sure I messed up and was supposed to have been "gigatons".
> Sorry, I'll double-check on that later.
> Laters.


No, Daniel, it wasn't you. Let me explain.

I found the abstract of that article. It's here.

I'd really like to read that report, it seems to be serious. But I suspect somebody taylored some conclusions that report may not have. The last sentence of the abstract is a good example of it: "The overall positive mass balance may signal an end to the Holocene retreat of these ice streams." As the retreat of the ice streams means that ice is not flowing to the seas, an "end of the retreat" can signal many things, but certainly not a "false alarm!".

The first phrase of the sentence you cited here is shown in three web pages. This is one of them. Read it, as it is full of "good news". Here is the exact sentence you cited, and suspectedly the "source" of those "good news".

Correcting gigtons to gigatons, and looking for "reversing the melting...", only two results, same "quality". If someone can access this article

*Positive Mass Balance of the Ross Ice Streams, West Antarctica*
*Joughin and Tulaczyk*
*Science 18 January 2002: 476-480*

please, tell us if the "quotation" exists. I doubt it.

As a person with "DHMO awareness"    , I recommend everyone to take a look to DHMrg . These people are brilliant! Reading those pages was intellectually one of the most happy experiences of my life. You should be able to understand why. In case you don't, having read carefully that site, don't hesitate in sending me a PM to ask about, as everybody should be aware of this sort of things.


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## aleCcowaN

I found this article refering studies performed by University of Colorado at Boulder researchers. Some paragraphs:

"The team used measurements taken with the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment, or GRACE, to conclude the Antarctic ice sheet is losing up to 36 cubic miles of ice, or 152 cubic kilometers, annually."

152 cubic kilometers of ice is about 152 gigatons.

"A study spearheaded by CIRES researchers at CU-Boulder and published in September 2004 concluded that glaciers on the Antarctic Peninsula - which juts north from the West Antarctic ice sheet toward South America -- sped up dramatically following the collapse of Larsen B ice shelf in 2002. Ice shelves on the peninsula -- which has warmed by an average of 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit in the past 60 years -- have decreased by more than 5,200 square miles in the past three decades."

Animation of the GRACE mission available here.

What I can tell after this little research on Internet is that most of citations of articles are heavily customized to the "writer's opinion".

This article from NASA cite Joughin's opinion (he's one of the authors of the Science Magazine article):

“It’s amazing how much change we’ve seen in less than a decade. Some ice streams appear to be speeding up and others slowing down,” said Joughin."

...

"Joughin concluded that the nearby region of the Antarctic ice sheet has a positive mass balance for the time being, which may be good news for residents of New Orleans, but bad news for the Texas-sized Ross Ice Shelf. If the ice streams are carrying less ice to the shelf, it could possibly collapse in the future."

The fact remains that global warming is here with us, it is a slow catastrophy, we have to do with it, and we can avoid or temper it by actions that will not affect our life style heavily as individuals, but in fact they will affect heavily corporative and governments' interests.


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## elizavazquez

well...for starters.. I sold my car a year ago and started to take public transportation and walk, walk, walk... I feel that by taking such decision I made a small contribution to my planet... 

My country (federal gov) implemented the summer saving time (or whatever is called) just 5 years ago... not everyone liked the idea.. but this change was finally accepted due to the strong output from the gov. to inform people the benefits...

The Department of Native People has provided electric stoves for lots of families, this is to discourage families from using wood, carbon, etc.. this is mainly in rural areas and native communities where people don´t even speak spanish...

so well... good news I guess from Mexico

Saludos y Buen día


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