The UK is almost alone in Europe in honouring Kyoto pledges to cut greenhouse gases, a think-tank claims. Ten of 15 European Union signatories will miss the targets without urgent action, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) found.
see
tee-hee!
I saw that today, too, and had to laugh:
What's the point of signing if you aren't going to meet the requirements?
-john
p.s. Remember how Al Gore burned 439,500 lbs of fuel to attend the Kyoto Summit? You'd think that the guy who invented the internet could at least have tele-conferenced in.
Where are vultures that attack the US whenever it does anything wrong? I have been watching this thread for a few days and nothing? I guess there are a bunch of political hypocrites. Stupid liberals, only attack people that they don't like, never one of their own.
I also noticed that some of the countries that have not met the Kyoto protocols are some of the biggest Socialist countries in Europe. Shows you how effective their systems are.
The truth hurts for some of the wieners out there.
"ms" a écrit dans le message de news: snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com...
You asked for it: the figures:
Yours is bigger (Greenhouse Gas Emissions Per Capita) than mine (Fr) by 2.5 times, and UK beats us too. Still the US beats us all in Europe, and at least we are doing something about it.
In a few years, the barrel will be over 150$ and going up, that will help solve the pb.
And, also, I do not hide myself behind some phony mane.
Regards JM
Well said Jean -
It is an intering thing to see Australia up there at the top. And it got me thinking about an article i read many many years ago where the Airconditioner was blamed as the cause of real energy waste and the worst device ever invented in terms of environmental impact - because it allows European lifestyles to exist in areas of the world where it becomes so energy inefficient, as we all assume that living in a cold climate will demand the most energy, but this is not actually the case.
Any TTFN
Jonathan
Looking at the articles you supplied, it looks like if the US could get some clean power production going, they would be just as good, if not better than the some of the other countries. But wait, we can't because of the liberals/militant environmentalists that block nuclear power. While nuclear power is probably not the ultimate solution, it has the highest power to land use density of any source that is available. Also, if the dorks in Washington (I don't know who stopped this) would pull their heads out of their butts, they could recycle spent fuel rods and significantly reduce the amount of radioactive waste that we keep hiding in the deserts.
They are even blocking wind power projects (go figure) and show that even when people do what they want the environmentalists are not satisfied.
If the whining liberals want the US to be a better place, why don't they stop whining and blocking the very avenues needed to move forward. A book could be written about how liberals complain about something then block it all in the same week.
"There are lies, damn lies, and then there are statistics. " -- Various
Now, if you overlay the greenhouse gas emission 'per capita' with the Gross Domestic Product 'per capita', do you think it would reveal anything interesting? There's a chart right there on the page that shows this data for the U.S. Population rising, GDP rising, emissions per $GDP dropping. Perhaps the U.S. does have the highest emissions per capita. So what. That data point in a vacuum is meaningless.
Jim S.
? - OOps you forgot to point out that the emissions per capital - it has flat lined. 'Emissions per $GDP' has dropped because the US is 'more' efficient at getting the more out for every tonne of 'greenhouse gas'- as expected when the price of Oil goes up - No one is accusing US business of ignorance when it comes to increasing profit, you have to squeeze the more out of the oil and that is a good thing.
However as you avoided pointing out , the amount of CO2 produced is a direct linear correlation with the population increase. So an American in 1990 burns as much CO2 as an American in 2000.
So bare with me - say the US pop has grown by 10% (just a hypothetical figure but approximately right) in the decade then the 'Greenhouse gas' as grown by 10%. Now is the US population growing by natural childbirth or immigration. A combination of both probably
- but the people coming in are most likely to be coming in from countries that have a less CO2 per capita - now I am not arguing against imigration - but just stating this so that it illustrates why I think the US and other Developed countries have to lead in reducing CO2 emmisions per capita not just per $GDP. The people coming into the US want to live the good life that we very fortunately enjoy,and they have the right to better themselves and their families. Those that remain in the developing world also have the desire and right to better themselves and they can see the way we live and want the same.
So over time we have to show leadership and develope ways of living more efficiently per tonne CO2 - not per $GDP so that this is the 'aspirational' norm that the poor in the developing nations will see strive for, because the world with its huge inequalities cannot be sustained in the modern interlinked future. If you think that the US can carry on using 25% of the world resources with 6% of the population then you may personally live in paradise but you will have created a fortress for your grandchildren, but those on the outside will see as a prison of your own making.
The earth is in the vacuum !! - and that is the whole point - economic arguements about $GDP etc are all well and good when trying to stear a world economy that has room to grow and manouver within an apparently limitless ecosphere, but we are now pressed up against mother nature and a world of finite resource . Perhaps we have three generations of mankind to find social way of living sustainably or the human race will live out a twilight and miserable existance. and then who will look after the nuclear wastedumps !! - sorry (storage facilities). Nuclear fission is just plain mad - Fissionable material is a finite reasource, just the same as oil - and the waste is around for a long long long ........... long time. Think back to the Bronze Age and then double the number !!
Nuclear Fusion - mmm perhaps if we can just get it to work, before we are all flushed down the toilet.
Anyway
TTFN
Jonathan
>"Jim Sculley" a écrit dans le message de news: 4PidnfMep4QQTyPenZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com...
That means that if the population of whole world was emitting like a US citizen, the total amount of emission would be tenfold (or more?).
as for "emissions per $GDP", here we consider that what is important is the people, the person, not the $.
Regards JM
I hate to participate in such off-topic discussions, but I feel compelled to react to this part. Read the article about reactor design in a recent Scientific American (probably the last two or three months, certainly within the last year). Fission resources can last much longer, proliferation of weapons grade material will be much less, and waste will be a smaller problem for much less time with the right reactor and fuel cycle design.
Jerry Steiger Tripod Data Systems "take the garbage out, dear"
Was this an article on Thorium based reactors that 'eat' plutonium. I think India is about to build the worlds first to test this new fuel cycle. It is an interesting idea and has many advantages - however with nuclear power it is still difficult to divorce the civil from the military, no matter what scientist say and I am just sceptical about the 'know how' in the nuclear field spreading around the world. Don't for one moment imagine that this know how will always remain in the hands of people that will just have peacefull intents.
As an aside if the Thorium cycle works then it looks good for Oz, India and the US, because that is, I think, 80% of the world's Thorium split evenly, but even Thorium is a finite reasource. So places like China and Europe will still be Uranium / plutonium based and scrabbling around for the limited supplies there are, even if nuclear scientist like to promote the idea that these various fuel cycles 'magically' create fuel that can be used in other typre of reactor. My nuclear physics is a bit rusty but I suppose in pure energy terms one can always use 'future' technology that will use radiactive fissional material until it is all converted to lead ! Its just the consequetional wastemanagement that will be the problem. ;-)
Is it just not easier to use less energy?
TTFN
Jonathan
I don't remember Thorium being mentioned. It is a type of breeder reactor.
One of the advantages cited in the article is that it severely reduces the amount of fuel processing required. There are lots less chances of people getting their hands on material that can be easily processed into weapons grade fuel. (This is my shaky recall, so get your hands on the article.)
In essence, the technology ends up converting the non-fissionable isotopes into fissionable isotopes. No magic, just clever engineering. Since the fissionable isotopes are only a few percent of the total, the amount of usable fuel increases tremendously. Limited supplies wouldn't be a problem for a long, long time.
Since the cyle uses the fuel so much more efficiently, there is very little waste left to handle and it has much shorter half-lives. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.
Quite possibly not. I'm all for efficiency, but I also believe that solutions need to make economic sense. Most of the proposed methods for reducing greenhouse gases have huge negative economic impacts. Meanwhile, the third world (and large parts of the first) are burning massive amounts of coal, putting more radioactive waste into the atmosphere every year than all of the nuclear power plants ever did. (I got that from a scientifically literate talk show host, Dr. Bill Wattenburg, so I don't have a citation.)
Jerry Steiger Tripod Data Systems "take the garbage out, dear"
Wheelabrator, a former sister company to my employer, has a back log of several years and several hundred million dollars worth of work. They design pollution control equipment for installation on power plants. There isn't a piece of pollution control equipment on the plant that squeezes more out of a given fuel.
And produces significantly *more* using that same CO2.
Have you seen pictures of Mexico City?
If you are producing more using the same, you are by definition being more efficient.
Yawn.
That's what the 'Chicken Little' scientists of the work said three generations ago. You are aware that the scientific community is split when it comes to Global Warming, yes?
Afraid of the 'zoomies' eh. Well, I guess once you've crawled around inside a nuclear reactor building, it's not so scary.
Jim S.
And if they were producing tenfold in terms of GDP, what would that mean?
OK. Put your money where your mouth is. Send me your current life savings, and your paychecks for the rest of your life. You clearly have no need for it.
Jim S.
"wingers" ? sorry don't understand the term. Perhaps my error is to have omitted 'some' infront of scientists.
mmmmm - I was under the impression the CIA thought everyone was upto it in their secret bunkers.
yep - in Thorium reactors of which there are none yet. In the meantime I thought the US had contrated a French company to de-commission its plutonium warheads or have things changed in the last few years. Perhaps the shipping of Plutonium around the planet is just getting too hazardous or the French are not to be trusted?
TTFN
Jonathan
I'll try and see if its online. I'm afraid I let my sub to scientific American subside a few years ago - only because of poverty on my part.
mmm . I just get a little skeptical about these resource figures and how easy resources are to get hold of .
On the surface it does and perhaps it is if you are prepared to let future generations do the handling ;-) - I just am not convinced that the best and brightest minds could not be better utilised elsewhere on other technologies.
In standard 'Return On Investment' economics I think the jury is out but tat the start of the process, you're probably correct - - however at the the core of Economics is investor confidance. The world economy is dependant on the people of this world being confident that the future is going to be better than the past. This has been at the core of all western capitalism since Adam Smith first documented capitalism and how money is raised and invested. Now if a significant section of the population begin to loose faith in the future I am afraid it is is a bit like a 'run on' the banks we all see in Westerns. So if ,as a global community, we can agree to certain polution rectifying technologies and standards (and on the coal issue with China I could not agree with you more) then the the ROI economics of companies can still be calculated and maintained.
I am sure your correct - so are you suggesting it means nothing is done? I know the Chinese are a dictatorship and it can be galling to realise that they have managed to gain a a mutal wrestling lock on the US (and world economy) where they have so much hold over US $ reserves that theoretically they could pull the plug on the US - but correspondingly it would of course be mutal descruction as their US$ would become worthless. However I think it is really a question of handing over clean coal technology or if you dare hand over nuclear technology , but just make sure you don't dismantle all your nukes. Not a pleasant thought but I am afraid its probably the way things will go.
Anyway
TTFN
Jonathan
Thats not what I meant - I meant just as you point out - using fuel more efficiently in the first place.
Is Mexico higher or lower than the US in CO2 per person? I don't think so - 3 Mex compared to 20 US from the list provided, however Mexico City is I am sure a vision of hell on earth
I'll admit I got a bit sanctimonous :-)
My grandfathers generation ? - I was under the impression that in that era - science was the future and Dan Dare was everywhere.
I had heard a rumour about it ;-) - is it the same rumour that there are scientists in America that also believe that dinosaurs and humans co-habited ? Is it the same even split ? 50-50 ?
I've been in one - our college had a research reactor we undergrads could visit - but not touch the controls . As you say not very scary
- rather mesmerising with the glow from the water. But I afraid I don't understand your point about 'zombies' ?
I understand about breeder reactors - but as I say my knowledge of nuclear physics begins to breakdown at this point ( pun intended) but I have never yet seen an arguement that reconciles the fact that your simple post implies that the fuel is inexhaustable - is this a form of perpetual motion based on the continaul abstraction of energy within atoms and that it is without end? Perhaps it is - do you have the link to an paper that shows how the breader chain is inexhaustable?
Now thats a challege Cliff - no need for a quick response - but I am open to persuasion that in theory one can just keep on breeding fuel - it would be great if you could also get an article on how it is not only feasable, but economically feasable , but I fear we are not yet that advanced.
TTFN
Jonathan
Happier ? - mmm - perhaps not, but certainly alot of 'stuff' in the garage!
LOL - a loan ? a gift perhaps as I fear the US may be in danger of exceeding its overdraft facility.
Perhaps Jean has already given his money away to other worthy causes, but feel free to join the queue. Just wait in line and don't overdress or appear too well fed or you will embarass yourself and the others in the queue.
TTFN
Jonathan
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