Environmental Talk

“You light up my life . . . in an energy efficient, socially conscious kinda way . . .”

Thomas Edison once said, “Genius is one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration.”

He might have added, “Idiocy is one percent comprehension and ninety-nine percent intervention.”

Politicians in California gave the fluorescent green light to a bill that would ban the incandescent light bulb. Similarly, in New York City, Mayor Bloomberg is looking to continue a trend of imposing his personal preferences on people in the city by mandating the use of compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs).

The incandescent bulb isn’t the only thing getting screwed here. The concepts of free trade and individual choice are taking major hits.

In California, Assemblyman Lloyd Levine (D-knucklehead-Van Nuys) said he “drafted his bill to specifically target incandescent bulbs because he wants to send a message to the public that compact fluorescent bulbs are ideal lighting substitutes.”

Levine has such a high opinion of his constituents that he figures they won’t be able to figure that out for themselves. Or maybe he figures that the CFL companies aren’t savvy enough to advertise effectively, so Levine will just give them a little help.

Levine also conveniently neglects to mention that CFLs are more environmentally troublesome to dispose of and can cause a health hazard because they have mercury in them.

The economics of CFLs over ordinary light bulbs are available to anyone who cares to take the time to do a little simple math or a simple Google search. A good article on incandescent vs. CFLs vs. LED bulbs can be found at productdose.com They even have an Excel spreadsheet you can download and tweak for your individual cost and use.

If cost and energy efficiency were the only criteria we used in making a decision, we’d all be riding bicycles instead of driving cars. Fortunately, it hasn’t come to that yet.

If Assemblyman Levine wants to use CFLs in his house, he should certainly do so. If he wants to go on TV and proselytize about the benefits of using CFLs, I’m okay with that, too.

As a matter of fact, I’ll probably switch to CFL bulbs on my next shopping trip, but it will be my choice. On my worst day, I wouldn’t even think of strong-arming anyone else into purchasing them any more than I’d threaten to beat up someone who chose a different breakfast cereal.

It’s about time we reined in politicians all across the board from using governmental power to force people to do what the politicians feel is the “right thing to do.”

We’ve got an education system and health care system that both could stand a little work. You’d think that might be a bigger concern than trying to legislate what kind of bulb I’m going to put in my desk lamp.

global warming, climate change, Bloomberg, California, light bulb, fluorescent light bulb, CFLs, LEDs, Levine, LLoyd Levine, government force

“I got global warming FE-ver . . . and the only prescription is . . .”

Good evening, ladies and Guernseys. A funny thing happened on the way to controlling greenhouse gasses. It turns out humans aren’t the biggest problem. As anyone who’s read Gary Larson knows, it’s the cows.

In urgent and responsible fashion, government officials in Europe are springing into action to protect the world from . . . cow farts. An official EU declaration “demands changes to animals’ diets, to capture gas emissions and recycle manure.”

The action is all part of the concern about global warming and was triggered in part by a 400-page U.N. report entitled Livestock’s Long Shadow,that states that cow “emissions” are more damaging to the planet than “cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together.”

It turns out that cow flatulence and manure emit more than one third of planet’s methane, a greenhouse gas which warms the world 20 times faster than carbon dioxide.

Our path is clear. We need a Kyoto Protocol to set the cow population back to pre-1990 levels.

I’m thinking a massive barbecue ought to do it. You know, one last party before we all burst into flames.

This should take some of the heat off SUV owners and put it squarely where it belongs - on all those smug milk drinkers.

P.S. - Glad to see the U.N. has gotten such a good handle on the whole world peace thing that they can take time to put out a 400 page report on cow manure.

“Hey, I thought you were supposed to be watching what was going on in Africa . . . “

global warming, climate change, methane, greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide, Gary Larson, Far Side, cows, more cowbell, SNL, Christopher Walken, Will Ferrell, UN

“What are you saying, Rick . . . the whole carbon trading plan is a scam?”

To the surprise of, hmmmm, . . . let’s see . . . exactly nobody with half a brain, an article in the Financial Times suggests that trafficking in “carbon credits” is, how shall we say, a bit of a rigged game.

As the FT reports:

“The growing political salience of environmental politics . . has seen a dramatic expansion in the number of businesses offering both companies and individuals the chance to go “carbon neutral” . . . A Financial Times investigation has uncovered widespread failings in the new markets for greenhouse gases . . . Widespread instances of people and organisations buying worthless credits that do not yield any reductions in carbon emissions . . Brokers providing services of questionable or no value . . Companies and individuals being charged over the odds for the private purchase of European Union carbon permits that have plummeted in value because they do not result in emissions cuts.”

I can hardly believe what I’m reading. Political pressure and pull resulting in a systemically corrupt system of graft and double-dealing?!

I haven’t been this surprised since I found out George Michael was gay. Or since the UN was implicated in an arms-for-oil scandal.

Despair not, young enviro-shysters, there’s still plenty of money to be made. The FT predicts that the “burgeoning regulated market for carbon credits is expected to more than double in size to about $68.2bn by 2010.”

To give you an idea just how burgeoning that is - that’s even faster than the projected level of CO2 emissions increase from pre-Industrial Revolution times to the end of this century. And you know what an urgent piece of business that is.

How crazy is the carbon credit market? One offsetting company, Blue Source, is making money on carbon credits while drilling for oil.

But, wait, it gets better. “Blue Source said that because of the high price of oil, this process {i.e., drilling without the carbon} was often profitable in itself, meaning operators were making extra revenues from selling ‘carbon credits’ for burying the carbon.”

Who said there were no benefits to global warming?

Or as it played out in Casablanca . . .

Rick: How can you close me up? On what grounds?
Captain Renault: I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here! (a croupier hands Renault a pile of money)
Croupier: Your winnings, sir.
Captain Renault: (sotto voce) Oh, thank you very much.
(aloud) Everybody out at once!

global warming, climate change, carbon credits, carbon offset, Casablanca, CO2 emissions, carbon neutral, arms-for-oil scandal, UN

“Hey, we’re all going to go to jail for cutting these flowers . . . “

If you’ve been thinking about taking a vacation to Italy, you should go soon because traveling to the cradle of the Renaissance is about to get a lot more dangerous.There is currently a draft bill in the Italian parliament that will criminalize crimes against the environment.

Let’s ignore, for a moment, the gigantic hurdle of the total implausibility of a “crime” against the “environment” and just take a look at the proposed law itself.

According to a recent Breitbart.com article, “perpetrators of ‘environmental catastrophes’ would be punishable by up to 10 years in prison.”

Perhaps even scarier is the fact that the draft bill “‘anticipates’ a planned European Union directive on environmental crimes and puts Italy in line with ‘the largest European countries’” according to a government statement.

The law is, on its face, absurd and would appear to subject every citizen of Italy to prosecution on some kind of environmental crime. The law addresses all manner of “crimes” and “criminals” as evidenced by the following classifications:

“Polluters would be jailed for between one and five years and pay fines ranging from 5,000 to 30,000 euros (6,800 to 41,000 dollars).”

In the same way one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter, this would appear to allow anyone who drives a car, smokes a cigarette or has a barbecue to be locked up and fined by the pollution police.

“‘Environmental catastrophes’ will be punishable by between three and 10 years in jail and fines of between 30,000 and 250,000 euros.”

Let’s think about this one. Ridding your house of a colony of ants or termites could certainly be considered an “environmental catastrophe” for the insects. The tougher case might be if your power-generating windmills wiped out a bunch of birds . . .

“…’alterations of natural heritage, flora and fauna’ by one-to-three-year jail terms and fines of between 2,000 and 20,000 euros.”

You have to admire the sheer egalitarianism of this law. This section of the law would appear to eliminate all building, gardening or even cutting your own grass. You might as well issue warrants right now for farmers, the old lady next door tending to her roses and the entire construction industry.

There will be those who say that nobody would take the law literally and that prosecutions would be reasonable and judicious. How’s that working out with those other laws like eminent domain, tax laws, drug laws and the Patriot Act?

Yeah, that’s what I thought.

Full enforcement of this law would turn Italy into a boot-shaped, weed-covered penal colony within a few years.

So, make your reservations now.

global warming, climate change, Italy, Under the Tuscan Sun, eminent domain, Patriot Act

He’s affected by global warming.

Him . . . not so much.

I think we need a 24-hour news channel that will broadcast nothing but obvious news. The channel would feature hard-hitting stories like:

Tattoos Hurt Job Prospects
Paris Hilton Does Something Trashy
Pope Says Capitalism to Blame for Everything

And the same way that E! News has a standing Hollywood Minute segment, the ON Network (motto: Obvious News, obviously) would feature a regular segment “It Sucks to be Poor.”

Every time it aired, this segment would open with the headline:
Poor People Hit Hardest by ________

I got alerted to just such a piece the other day by my Google Alert. The story was headlined: Poorest people will be hardest hit by the effects of global climate change

No kidding. Here’s another news flash . . . poor people are hardest hit by everything.

They’re hit hardest by taxes, rising gas prices, crime, bad schools, food shortages, re-runs of The Apprentice and having to watch Rosie O’Donnell on The View.

You don’t have to have read Journalism For Dummies to know that any time you want to write about a topic and just want to hash over the same tired bromides, all you have to do to freshen up the story is to describe how whatever it is your talking about affects poor people more than everyone else.

The article further cemented its place as an early front runner for Obvious News Article of the Year with the following observation:

For the first time, the scientists broke down their predictions into regions, and forecast that climate change will affect billions of people.

Hmmmm, considering that climate is always changing and everyone on the planet deals with the weather on a regular basis, it would seem that billions of people really could be affected.

Stay tuned tomorrow when we’ll cover such topics as Billions of People Depend on Breathing for Survival and Millions Enjoy Having Pets.

global warming, climate change, Donald Trump, Rosie O’Donnell

Once upon a time, there was a little girl in Hollywood we’ll call Goldilocks. (I know she’s got dark hair . . . work with me on this one.) Goldilocks came across an issue that would make her feel important. Whenever there was any kind of unusual weather, she’d say it was the fault of global warming.

“Ahhhhhh,” said Goldilocks at last, “that level of political control is juuuuuust right.”

. . . . Sorry to scare the kids. -MJ

global warming, climate change, Laurie David, Al Gore, Inconvenient Truth, global warming consensus, Goldilocks, fairy tale, Sheryl Crow

Sheryl Crow is a deep thinker. Apparently, she does some of her best thinking in the same place I do mine, because while she was blogging on her recent biodiesel bus tour she came up with something we can all do to help save the planet:

I have spent the better part of this tour trying to come up with easy ways for us all to become a part of the solution to global warming. Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating. One of my favorites is in the area of forest conservation which we heavily rely on for oxygen. I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting. Now, I don’t want to rob any law-abiding American of his or her God-given rights, but I think we are an industrious enough people that we can make it work with only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where 2 to 3 could be required.

I’m not even going to speculate how this proposed “limitation” is going to be enforced. Maybe a 5-day registration period for toilet paper or “can cams” throughout the country.

Great, Sheryl, you’ve solved the problem of global warming and spawned an internet explosion of fetish videos.

Some other ideas that in Sheryl’s mind might be “worth investigating” include using magic crystals for energy and having unicorns use their power to grant wishes to stop global warming.

global warming, climate change, Sheryl Crow, toilet paper,

“Every day we can wind up Rove . . .”

It’s only a matter of time before a food fight breaks out at the White House correspondents dinner. The affair has become increasingly nasty and has morphed from a jovial gathering into annual bloodsport.

Depending on who you talk to, Laurie David and Sheryl Crow approached Karl Rove at this year’s dinner to convert him from global warming skeptic to true believer - something David disingenuously says she “really believed” was possible.

The story gets a little fuzzier from there depending on who you talk to. David insists, “I went over to him and said, ‘I urge you to take a new look at global warming.’ He went zero to 100 with me. . . . I’ve never had anyone be so rude.”

Rove remembers it as, “She came over to insult me and she succeeded.”

David has a history of favoring a confrontational approach and has embraced the whole topic of climate change with a disturbing level of absolutism and fanaticism.

The topic of climate change is quite complex and does not readily lend itself to the type of messianic fervor that many of the hard-core proponents seem to embrace. This fervor inevitably leads to force as climate change advocates feel as if people need to be compelled to believe in the doctrine and comply with any and all proposed solutions.

Enthusiasm for a topic is commendable; blind devotion that brooks no disagreement and demands submission is an affront to any person who wishes to think for themselves.

global warming, climate change, Sheryl Crow, Laurie David, Karl Rove, White House correspondent’s dinner

That’s a relief!

It was a stroke of pure genius on my part. Using the capabilities of swivel.com, I would simultaneously tackle two of the hot-button issues of our time - immigration and global warming.

Thesis: That rising levels of immigration to the U.S. have exacerbated global warming.

It certainly sounds like a reasonable thesis. After all, immigrants are coming to our country from less industrialized nations. Once here, these immigrants have access to all kinds of harmful carbon producing products that they did not have back in their home country.

At the very least, the sheer number of immigrants entering the world’s most productive and industrial economy surely would raise the level of America’s carbon footprint.

I couldn’t believe no one had thought to link these two items before. I had visions of testifying in front of Congress, patiently instructing our nations leaders on how the immigration issue and global warming were inextricably linked.

I might even get to meet Matt Lauer!

It was at this point that my project hit a minor snag. The data didn’t match the theory, as you can clearly see from the above graph which show both the number of Guatemalan orphans coming to the U.S. and global temperatures.

Oh yeah, there was one other problem. The teal line tracks the average global temperature anomalies since 1990 and it is the orange line that tracks the number of Guatemalan orphans coming to this country.

As a global warming agnostic, I shouldn’t have been surprised that the trend in temperatures over the last 16 years is down. Despite my best efforts to resist, I had fallen victim to the media clamor about the coming climate Armageddon.

Sorry. I promise I’ll be more careful next time.

global warming, climate change, immigration, global temperature anomalies

Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund

April 16, 2007, will be remembered as one of the darkest days in the history of the Virginia Tech community and the world beyond.

To remember and honor the victims of those tragic events, the university has established the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund to aid in the healing process and generate financial support.

The fund will be used to cover expenses including but not limited to:

• Grief counseling
• Memorials
• Communication expenses
• Comfort expenses
• Incidental needs

If you plan to give, please click the link below:

How do you like your burger? Raw?

Here it is, folks, just in time for summer grilling season… a solar-powered grill.

Imagine how impressed your friends will be when you invite them over for a tasty - yet socially conscious - meal cooked on the revolutionary new Salmonella 2000.

Retail price is a DiCaprio-like $250… but, can you really put a price on saving the planet?

Here are some testimonials kudos comments from readers over at Gizmodo.

“Looks a bit like some sort of arty bench. I feel for the poor bastard who stops by for a chat and takes a seat.”

“that’s some serious dough for pasting some aluminum foil on the inside of a sawed open beer keg.”

“Plus, if you’re standing in front of it flipping burgers, you’d be blocking the sun wouldn’t you?”

In a future post, we’ll show you how you can turn your car’s trunk into a crock pot.

global warming, climate change, Al Gore, barbecue, carbon footprint, Leonardo DiCaprio

Security issue? Sure, throw it up against the wall and see if it sticks . . .

First, it was a scientific issue. Then, it was a moral issue. Now, it’s a security issue. If there is a danger to be exaggerated, you can be pretty sure that, sooner or later, somebody will try to connect it to global warming.

We can all sleep better knowing that the U.N. is on the case and treating global warming as a security issue. The organization that has raised the phrase “U.N.-designated safe haven” to iconic oxymoron status, is holding hearings on the implications of climate change on world peace.

I wouldn’t trust the U.N. to pick up my mail if I went away for a long weekend . . . but I’m supposed to believe the group that screwed up so spectacularly in Bosnia and pretty much crapped the bed on the entire continent of Africa will be able to handle this issue?

China’s deputy ambassador, Liu Zhenmin, summed the whole thing up nicely when he said, “. . . the Security Council has neither the professional competence in handling climate change — nor is it the right decision-making place for extensive participation . . .”

You know you’re in trouble when you find yourself nodding along in agreement with the representative from communist China.

If global warming is a threat to world peace, does that mean if by some chance the planet cools over the next 50 years that we’ll be looking forward to a golden age of tolerance and tranquility?

I didn’t think so.

global warming, climate change, China, Africa, UN, United Nations, Security Council, security, security issue

If there was a season for the cherry picking of facts, the official opening would be this weekend on April 22nd as Earth Day festivities get under way.

As for the week-end weather forecast . . .
Look for gusty conditions as hot air from politicians mixes with long-winded speeches from publicity-seeking activists.

There will be increased precipitation in the form of leaflets and other propaganda raining down on rally attendees and a high-pressure system of rhetoric will serve as a backdrop for the resulting media coverage.

And everyone will assert that it is in the name of a “good cause.”

What will be absent from much of the debate is a discussion of the darker philosophy that is behind the movement to use global warming as an excuse to limit progress.

In an op-ed entitled On Earth Day, Remember: If Environmentalism Succeeds, It Will Make Human Life Impossible, Ayn Rand Institute board member Michael Berliner argues the real danger we face is from the ideas that serve as the basis for much of the environmental agenda.

Now, that’s food for thought.

global warming, climate change, environmentalism, Earth Day,

The scientific consensus about global warming in Arkansas isn’t quite as rigorous as you might think . . .

Be careful or the following letter from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette will confirm every stereotype you ever had about people from Arkansas.

Thanks to dk over at the dkReport for the afternoon chuckle.

Just be glad the North won the Civil War.

global warming, climate change, daylight savings time, DST, Congress

“Honey, if you eat that corn, mommy won’t be able to drive to work . . .”

“There is no such thing as a free lunch” is one of the basic truisms of economics. As I started to write what I thought would be an easy post on the problems of using ethanol as an alternative fuel, I found that, when it comes to global warming, not only is the lunch not free but no one can even agree on the price.

The debate on ethanol resembles the overall global warming debate on a smaller scale. Scientists, purporting to measure the same thing, come up with wildly different conclusions. Even scarier, I’ve already come across articles suggesting that a “consensus” on this fledgling topic exists such as this quote from Julia Olmstead on Grist:

“. . . the majority opinion within academia and industry is that ethanol and biodiesel do result in net energy gains. Most skeptics concede that if the balance isn’t positive now, it will be soon.”

And yet, earlier in the article, Julia notes that there are a wide range of estimates regarding the balance required to produce ethanol - anywhere from negative 29% to a positive 67%. (There seems to be even a little bit of spin going on with those figures as a well-known study UC Berkeley professor Tad Patzek concluded ethanol “contains 65 percent less usable energy than is consumed in the process of making it.”)

What isn’t under dispute is that taking land previously devoted to food production and substituting for energy production has driven up the cost of corn and many other agricultural products, resulting in increased hardships on many citizens of developing nations.

Actions have consequences. The balance here is, in my opinion, way out of whack. We’re proposing or actually incurring real present-day costs and hardships for a dubious and uncertain policy goal in the future.

global warming, climate change, biofuel, ethanol, Grist, corn,