Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
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 While President Bush wishes for greenhouse gas emissions reductions, the international community is wishing President Bush would set measurable emissions caps -- something he has been reluctant to do because after he ran out of fingers and toes, he could no longer count the tons of CO2 actually being produced. That's why all polluters in the U.S. are officially recorded as producing exactly ten tons of CO2 annually.
The economy vs. the environment
The argument about cutting greenhouse gas emissions has long focused on the economy vs. the environment. |
| These are the same scientific minds who have been advising President Bush on environmental policy over the last several years and who have convinced the President to announce a greenhouse gas emissions reduction plan that essentially offers no reductions.
Which is sort of like writing a recipe book that lists no ingredients. Or riffing on stage with rock band Linkin Park and then realizing you're only playing the air guitar. Bush is clearly playing air guitar with environmental policy, and he's jamming out tunes that nobody else can hear (because they only exist in his own head). |
| REPPED: (NewsTarget Satire) In a significant nod toward pro-environment politics, the Bush Administration yesterday announced a major initiative to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by encouraging everybody to engage in "Wishful Thinking" to cut emissions without harming the economy. "Wishing for change is far more important than actually cutting greenhouse emissions," Bush said in a prepared statement. "We urge all Americans to take up Wishful Thinking to lower CO2 emissions and, if necessary, to even use up their birthday wishes in this national effort. |
| Not everyone is convinced that Wishful Thinking will actually result in greenhouse gas emissions reductions. Lawmakers were quick to leap on the obvious weakness in President Bush's ambitious plan. Rep. Ron Paul, a commonsense Congressman gaining popularity among those Americans who still have any brains left, pointed out that, "When Kennedy announced a plan to send a man to the moon, they actually built a rocket. Under Bush's plan, I suppose we could have just asked everybody to wish a man to the moon and skipped the rest. |
Mark Lynas
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 Like a slowly boiling kettle, the oceanic system has very long response time to changing conditions, and the seas will go on slowly rising for centuries even if all greenhouse gas emissions stopped tomorrow. With Tuvalu already experiencing regular flooding events due to past sea level rise - as I documented in High Tide -this extra rise in the world's oceans will sound the death knell for this fascinating and lively island society.
Tuvalu, with only 9,000 inhabitants, is actually one of the smallest of the five atoll nations which will shortly cease to exist. |
David Steinman
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 These are all petrochemicals whose production contributes to greenhouse gas emissions and which often are used in products where petrochemicals could be replaced by environmentally safer and less cosdy chemicals. Thousands of VOCs are known to be capable of causing all kinds of illnesses and ailments, including neurological and organ damage, cancer, and multiple chemical sensitivities. All of these carbon-based gases are either directly alleged to be or are the end products of processes connected to global warming. |
Mark Lynas
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| With higher levels of warming (up to 8°C regionally, for example, if greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise unabated) most of the ice sheet will disappear over the next 1,000 years, still giving humanity plenty of time to prepare for the full 7 metres of inundation - even though lower-lying areas would go under much sooner.
In addition, some of the melting will be offset by increased snowfall, leading to thicker ice in the centre. This is another result of rising temperatures, as a warmer atmosphere can hold more water vapour. |
| These changes were caused not by greenhouse gas rises, but by an
11 per cent increase in solar radiation hitting the higher latitudes of the northern hemisphere between 130,000 and 127,000 years ago. Although as mentioned earlier global temperatures were only 1-2 degrees higher than today, the polar amplification of warming led to much hotter summers in the Arctic - hot enough, as we just saw, to radically shrink the ice sheet on Greenland. So how did polar bears survive that prehistoric bout of warming? The answer is that they didn't need to - because they didn't yet exist. |
James Howard Kunstler
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 That said, however, carbon dioxide is certainly an effective greenhouse gas, and the amount of carbon dioxide as a percentage of the atmosphere today has not been so high since the days of the dinosaurs. By putting large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, humans are exerting pressure on an inherently unstable climate system that might produce a drastic change without much prior warning. |
Mark Lynas
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| Where the soils remain too wet for oxidising decomposition, anaerobic bacteria move in and produce vast quantities of methane - an even more dangerous greenhouse gas than C02 due to its more powerful short-term effect on the climate. In other areas carbon can dissolve directly into water, and be released as C02 from rivers, lakes, and the Arctic Ocean.
None of these feedbacks is theoretical: all have been observed - though obviously to a much smaller extent - in the current climate, where permafrost degradation is already well advanced across the Arctic. |
Joan Liebmann-Smith, Ph. D., and Jacqueline Nardi Egan
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 The situation is even worse in New Zealand, where a whopping 60% of greenhouse gas emissions come from livestock. vomiting blood, and bloody stools.
(See The Scoop on Poop, below.) Finally, excessive burping with severe nausea or vomiting may be danger signs of a heart attack.
FREQUENT FARTING
Farting probably provokes more laughter and embarrassment than any other normal bodily function. Because of the sounds and smells that often accompany farts, they're hard to hide.
Excessive gas in the digestive system is medically known as flatulence or flatus. |
Mark Lynas
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| Shifting from coal to wood biomass, therefore, although desirable in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, would by this measure end up displacing even more of nature than we already have.
States of denial
Energy realities are not the only reason why our response to global warming has hitherto been so half-hearted. Our evolutionary psychology preconditions us not to respond to threats which can be postponed until later. We are good at mobilising for immediate battles, less good at heading off challenges which still lie far into the future. |
Mark Schapiro
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 The limitations on energy use agreed to by the signatories of the Kyoto accord have given a huge boost to European development of more efficient technology and alternative energy sources like wind and solar, which are growing yearly in the double digits and offering new export markets, while helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
By contrast, the United States was arguing against change at a time when citizens on both continents were calling for greater environmental sensitivity in the marketplace. As C. |
| China is second only to the United States as a greenhouse gas emitter. At the end of 2006, it released its first-ever report on the effects of climate change. The China Meteorological Administration predicted that the average temperature in China would rise by 1.3 to 2.1 degrees Celsius by 2020, and by 2.3 to 3.3 degrees Celsius by 2050. It forecast increasingly violent weather patterns that could lead to declining crop yields of as much as one third by the end of the century. |
Phyllis A. Balch, CNC
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 Because CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the more of it there is in the atmosphere the warmer the climate will become.
Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)
These CFCs, used widely in industry and especially as a refrigerant in air-conditioning systems, are commonly known as freon. There are several commercial forms of freon; all are greenhouse gases. The latest form of freon being used extensively is designated R134. An older form, R12, was used as a solvent and in air conditioners through the 1990s (and is still used in some countries). |
David Steinman
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| The process to become "qualified" took Quad/Graphics nearly two years by first measuring the greenhouse gas emissions of its operations and then developing and implementing a plan to reduce those emissions even further. Measures-taken by the printer included switching over to aerodynamic trucks, implementing anti-idling technology, and installing small diesel engines that heat and cool the cab of the truck so drivers do not have to keep the entire truck running while parked. |
| Meantime, Mitsubishi's entire production facility works toward sustainability, promoting zero emissions, and reducing greenhouse gas and chemical emissions. Mitsubishi presents some startling refrigerator facts at its Web site: "In fact, in Japan alone, the combined savings in electricity from use of Mitsubishi Electrics latest model refrigerator throughout its full product lifecycle can yield sufficient energy savings to serve approximately 72,000 average-sized homes in Tokyo—a major metropolis with more than 13 million inhabitants—for a full year."52 Visit www.mit-subishielectric.com. |
| The Mercury hybrid would also emit more than 90 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than conventional autos and get 33 miles per gallon on city streets and 29 on the highway. (See explanation on page 228.) That's the beginning of a new green American future that we should all value.
I felt bullish about Ford. I liked the Mariner. I'd buy one. It was a great car and really showed some vision. And it was just the beginning.
Ford is going to be America's first green motor company, and that will save its future.
I'd been following Ford for some time. |
| Very often what you see on the label can quickly tell you whether the product you are purchasing is good for you and good for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. For example, a label that lists preservatives such as any of the parabens (methyl, ethyl, butyl, or propyl), quaternium-15 (one of the leading causes of allergic reactions in cosmetics) or other quaternium-based compounds, diazolidinyl urea, imida-zolidinyl urea, methylchloroisothiazolone, or isochlorothiazi-line should signal to you that this is a product heavy on the petrochemicals and toxins you want to avoid. |
Mark Lynas
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| As one Canadian newspaper remarked, the Inuit may have twenty words for snow, but they're rather short of terms for 'climate change' and 'greenhouse gas'. They do however have a word for crazy weather: uggianaqtuq, which translates more or less as 'to behave unexpectedly'.
A lot more than words is at issue, however: ways of life that have depended for thousands of years on the predictable changing of the seasons will be thrown off balance as winter loosens its grip and traditional food supplies disappear. |
Phyllis A. Balch, CNC
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| Carbon Dioxide
Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas that is normally found in the atmosphere. As we use oxygen, we generate carbon dioxide, which is exhaled with each breath. Luckily for us, plants that use photosynthesis need this carbon dioxide to live. They take it in, use it, and excrete oxygen. This has been a good relationship. At present, the concentration in the air is around 360 parts per million (ppm). This varies with location and season (it's a bit higher in the summer). |
Brian O'Leary
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 Methane is twenty times stronger than the same quantity of carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas. The icing on the warming cake is that our gaping polar ozone holes allow more sunlight to come into the atmosphere and be trapped as heat.8
But the upward spiral of temperatures may not end here. Rising levels of oxides of nitrogen (NOX) from fertilizers dumped into coastal waters add even more greenhouse gas to the atmosphere.9 While the quantities are smaller, the NOX gases are 200 times stronger in warming the air than the same amount of carbon dioxide. They are also poisonous. |
David Steinman
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| Other sources say transportation carbon dioxide emissions account for one-third of all carbon dioxide emissions, "more than from factories, homes, and all other individual sources."16)
The industry's emissions are currently on track to rise by over one-third over the next fifteen years and double worldwide by 2050. If this happens, some experts say they will exacerbate the current global warming trend.17
It doesn't take a Ralph Nader to know that federal officials and consumers have shown a decided lack of leadership when it comes to fleet fuel economy standards in the nineties. |
Alex Steffen
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 There may be another interesting use for algae: getting the critters to eat carbon dioxide
(the greenhouse gas emitted when we burn fossil fuels like coal and oil) and then turning them into biofuels. Chemical engineer Isaac Berzin has developed a method of capturing the carbon dioxide from smokestack emissions using algae. His process, based on technology he developed for NASA in the late 1990s, captures more than 40 percent of emitted C02 (on sunny days, up to 80 percent). |
| Understandably, Angelenos remedy the situation by cranking their AC, but that costs them an arm and a leg, not to mention releasing copious amounts of greenhouse gas into the air.
A more economical remedy? We can plant more trees around our houses. Shade trees not only cool down our homes, but they also generate oxygen, limit soil erosion, and beautify our neighborhoods. Careful planting strategies, such as arranging the trees to provide maximum
Green Roofs mbmm While we worry and complain that cities are running out of room, we sit underneath a vast amount of unused space. |
| Oregon, Washington, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire have passed binding limits on power plant C02, while Northeast states are coming together to shape a mini-Kyoto to cap power sector emissions through the Regional greenhouse gas Initiative. California, Washington, and Oregon are working toward a similar framework through the West Coast Governors Climate Initiative.
Overall, about 30 percent of the American population lives in states or cities that either have adopted or are set to adopt policies in accord with the Kyoto protocols. |
James Howard Kunstler
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| In addition to posing danger to humans attempting to mine it, methane freed into the atmosphere is a ten times more effective greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. Released in any quantity, it would accelerate the problem of climate change. So far, attempts to recover methane hydrates have resulted in releases of methane into the atmosphere proportionately much greater than the gas recovered in the process.
Zero-Point Energy (ZPE)
This is an arcane process posed theoretically by quantum physicists. It has been called "the ultimate quantum free lunch. |
Ray Dodd
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 For example, a call is rising aimed at the producers of goods to reduce energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, air and water pollution, and waste from unnecessary packaging. Companies are made up of people, members of the community, and more and more are recognizing that in a global economy environmental problems and human problems are everyone's problem. The supply of products can only be sustained if the living Earth and its communities are revered and protected. |
by Michael Murray, N.D. and Joseph Pizzorno, N.D.
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| What many people do not realize is that according to the EPA, the world's livestock herds are the largest single source of emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas contributing to ozone depletion and climate change.
We hope that these concerns about livestock farms will encourage you to eat a moderate amount of the foods described in this chapter. If you choose to eat meat, we encourage you to:
• Limit your intake to no more than 3 to 4 ounces daily—about the size of a deck of playing cards. |
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