Green myths (part 3)

I bet you still try to wrap your head around the first 2 parts of the green myths. I also hope that you did your research and found sources about the things I talk about here. I'd love to put them up here but I want the people to learn to research and not be biased to what I say and the links I will provide.

I bet you 'd research those...

 

Next time someone tells you that we need to start growing more trees (more than the ones we already have??) tell him this: Forests in the tropical belt around the equator benefit the planet. They absorb CO2­, in a process called carbon sequestering, which helps lower temperatures. It's the forests outside of the tropics that may have little or no impact on climate change. Wait what? Since school everyone told you how forests help... They lied?

The farther away from the equator forests are, the more likely they are to trap heat in their dense canopies, raising temperatures. This is known as the albedo effect. In a study conducted by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Carnegie Institution and Université Montpellier II, scientists found that forests in mid-to-high latitudes could increase temperatures by up to 10 degrees F (5.5 degrees C) in the next 100 years than if those forests were not there. I bet you hate me already...

So since we are treehugging let's go to our very favorite forest of myths! Yes the Amazon! Amazon forests are disappearing right? This is what everyone says... Actually only a 12.5% of the original Forest is deforested. And 1/3rd to 1/2nd o that is fallow or regenerating... Meaning that we are left with a whooping 94%. Now I don't know about you but still this isn't how terrible they present it on TV eco news.

Forest acreage is actually increasing. In 1920 U.S. forest covered 732 million acres and today it covers 737 million acres. In Europe forests expanded from 361 million acres in 1950 to 482 million in 1990.

Also they say that Amazon forests are the lungs of the earth. Not true. Only the fast growing young trees that take up CO2 and releasing oxygen. When a tree falls the chemical reaction is: Wood + oxygen = CO2. And this is a major problem with the forests there.I don't say we should go and make em paper but still things aren't as many want them to appear.

Not that Amazon dummy...

Also everyone talks about CO2 being a pollutant and the enemy of all humanity... This is absolutely not true. Nitrogen forms 80% of our atmosphere. We could not live in 100% nitrogen either. Carbon dioxide is no more a pollutant than nitrogen is.  CO2 is essential to life on earth. It is necessary for plant growth since increased CO2 intake as a result of increased atmospheric concentration causes many trees and other plants to grow more vigorously. Unfortunately, the Canadian Government has included  CO2 with a number of truly toxic and noxious substances listed by the Environmental Protection Act, only as their means to politically control it. 

Now don't tell me that we should make more factories to increase it. As it is now, it's OK I assume. Either way it is less than 3% of the total atmosphere "cocktail".

Now as for the ozone layer and how we destroy it... On October 1, 1999, CNN reported that "the latest NASA images of the ozone layer shows that a hole in the atmospheric layer that protects Earth from the sun's harmful radiation is shrinking. This year's ozone hole is smaller than last year's, (but) scientists say it will be a while before the hole disappears completely -- 2060 at the earliest." Really? I thought every chicken little said that it will eventually grow till we are all under water and the sun's radiation will kill us all...

Another recent report either ignored or rejected out of hand by environmental activists came from Beijing in June of this year. A professor of geological sciences named Yang Xuexiang wrote in the May Chinese edition of the Scientific American magazine that solar wind is the root cause of the ozone hole, rather than the use of freon.

Yang makes the argument that solar wind has made the atmosphere at the South Pole thinner, and that the eruption of volcanoes in the southern hemisphere has released large amounts harmful gas, contributing to the hole. Another factor is that the solar high-energy particle currents consume ozone both at the South Pole and the North Pole when they enter the earth's atmosphere.

Yang makes the point that the northern hemisphere is where the use of freon is most prevalent and so if the freon theory is correct, the ozone hole should have appeared above the North Pole instead of the South Pole.

So my final point to close these green myths is that use your brain, make research and of course don't through your trash all over the place. We already have a huge problem in space not just earth. Imagine we take so much space with our trash... where... in friggin space! Finally question why there is such a huge movement called green. It is green for another reason than you think:

As much as I believe in the good in people, I doubt corporations do anything without earning a buck or two or millions... Food for thought...

Green myths (part 2)

I bet most of you still can't believe how stupid recycling and hybrids were. But have no fear I have more to add to the list!

After I learned this I seriously started questioning the motives of all the green movement which is funded mostly by wait for it... large corporations. Who is dangerous to say but with some research you will find out. They are not really hiding it, they just hide the true motives behind it.

So how many times someone told you to turn off the light to save CO2... Kinda makes sense right? No. Why? it's worth bearing in mind that the total amount of CO2 that can be released by power plants and other industrial facilities across the EU between now and 2012 is fixed by the European Emissions Trading Scheme. This means that if the UK power sector reduces its emissions, extra carbon permits get freed up for use elsewhere, such as German power stations or French cement plants. In other words, the same amount of CO2 will be released, just from different sources.

Now after 2012 honestly I couldn't find if the European Emissions Trading Scheme has extended this but we will find out in the future. I know that by turning the lights off you save money but you don't do anything for the environment. Also the new type of bulbs do save money also but they have mercury inside so if they break they are dangerous to everyone around and the environment. They have to be recycled and disposed in a facility so that means more energy (unconfirmed). So try to understand what is good for the environment isn't most of the time good for your pocket. 

I forgot to mention in the previous post that according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, agriculture is responsible for 18% of the total release of greenhouse gases world-wide (this is more than the whole transportation sector). Now I know it might sound silly but cows farting and burping produce more greenhouse gases than your cars. I don't know the numbers but still... Feeling bad now for eating them? Eat a cow, save the planet!

A recent study brought to everyone's attention (at least those that bothered to research it) that air quality is getting better. One example is that it now takes 20 new cars to produce the same emissions as one car produced in the 1960s. A Gallup poll found that only 17 percent of the members of the Meteorological Society and the American Geophysical Society think that the warming of the 20th century has been a result of greenhouse gas emissions — principally CO₂ from burning fossil fuels. 

More than 100 noted scientists, including the former president of the National Academy of Sciences, signed a letter declaring that costly actions to reduce greenhouse gases are NOT justified by the best available evidence. While atmospheric carbon dioxide has increased by 28 percent over the past 150 years, human-generated carbon dioxide could have played only a small part in any warming, since most of the warming occurred prior to 1940 — before most human-caused carbon dioxide emissions. I think someone is playing with us here... And I d probably trust the dudes with the lab coats than the suits in any Government.

Christmas are behind us and I got tired listening to people that everyone should get plastic ones and not real ones so we save the trees... Sorry to break it to you my green dumbass friend but for the most part, Christmas trees are not simply cut down from the local forest where Bambi lives. The majority of sold Christmas trees are grown as crops and are therefore grown entirely for this purpose. Secondly, real Christmas trees are 100% biodegradable. Most fake Christmas trees are made from polyvinyl chloride aka PVC, a plastic that is non-renewable and does not degrade.

Lastly, real Christmas trees create insignificant amounts of CO2 in their production in comparison to fake Christmas trees. Real Christmas trees require no manufacturing processes and have relatively low shipping distances while the same cannot be said for fake ones. So if you are aiming to be more eco-friendly, keep going with the real deal and don’t buy a fake Christmas tree!

And of course I have to answer to the smartasses that say that the receding glaciers and the calving of ice shelves is proof of global warming. Here you got me you are... well wrong again but it's always fun to give false hopes to people that take no time to even do some basic research about stuff that they are interested in. I guess the same goes with religion... So what the truth is? 

Glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for hundred of years. Recent glacier melting is a consequence of coming out of the very cool period of the Little Ice Age. Ice shelves have been breaking for centuries. Scientists know of at least 33 periods of glaciers growing and then retreating. It's normal. Besides glacier's health depends as much on the precipitation as on temperature.

Another myth is that as for the earth’s poles are warming; polar ice caps are breaking up and melting and the sea level is rising. The answer to this is that the earth is variable. The western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer, due to unrelated cyclic events in the Pacific Ocean, but the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder. The small Palmer Peninsula of Antarctica is getting warmer, while the main Antarctic continent is actually cooling. Ice thicknesses are increasing both on Greenland and in Antarctica. 

Sea level monitoring in the Pacific (Tuvalu) and Indian Oceans (Maldives) has shown no sign of any sea level rise. And don't tell me about the floods etc. People that build their houses in areas where stuff like that happened in the past and still happen need to move. Same with people that build their houses near active volcanoes and wonder why they have lava in their living room. (George Carlin)