Monday, January 01, 2007

Our Breathing Earth

What does a new year bring? Hope? Hangovers? Is it just one more day? Despair? I'm packing to go on vacation, leaving later today. And before I go, I am running through the blog world to say Howdy, and check in. Which is how I found The Breathing Earth over at Dusty's place.

This map shows in real time the carbon emmissions of each country, along with birth and death rates, and population. Now, I have a confession to make. Because I travel, I leave a big carbon footprint. Air travel is a huge contributor to Greenhouse Gasses. I share this problem with Al Gore. I'm a travel agent. I send people on airplanes. And I know that the airline industry is trying to find a way to make more fuel efficient planes.

At home, I drive a Honda Civic Hybrid; I recycle; I use energy efficient bulbs; I don't use air conditioning. But I do get on airplanes and fly. I don't have an answer. How do you help the environment, and how do you harm it? Because we all do both.

Have at it, I will be back in a week.

9 comments:

SB Gypsy said...

Happy New Year, and I hope it brings you everything you need and everything you want.

Frederick said...

Tell me about it, I'm car shopping right now and it's not very easy with my budget to ease the conscience.

Donnie McDaniel said...

Happy New Year DivaJood.

Peacechick Mary said...

Have a wonderful and hopefully restful vacation. See you in a week.

Anonymous said...

Great questions, divajood. I've been contemplating those things myself lately. I don't have answers yet, except the small things. But just today I asked Roger if we could buy a van and convert it to biodiesel. I think this may be our new project.

Have a wonderful vacation. Be well. Rest up.

Anonymous said...

I fundamentally believe that we all simply have to do the best we can. Reduce-reduce-reduce!

I live without a car, but many people can't. It limits my mobility, and the jobs that I can take, but it's also a huge load off of my mind. I recycle like a madman, use energy efficient bulbs, keep my thermostats low, use no air conditioning, but I do still fly. That's a tough one because plane travel is so very hard on the environment.

In other words, I'm still working on paring down my energy consumption.

Yoga Korunta said...

Diva Jood, I first tried to help the environment by reducing consumption, ie, potable water, then by reusing, ie, grey water, and then by recycling it for rinsing dishes or watering plants.

Paper, glass, plastic, and cans are recycled and I drive a good milage car.

The harm is any impact the earth can't absorb quickly.

Unknown said...

Diva, you sure got spammed good up in here!

I drive very little (because I don't have to) but I could drive even less. I recycle, I rarely fly, but I think what I need to change are my cleaning habits. Do you all use things like Fantastic and all taht stuff? It's hell on the environment. I saw a scientist on PBS talking about it. He said he was aghast that it was never addressed - he said think of all the fumes of all that crap you clean with going right out into the atmosphere... amonia, bleach, various other chemicals. And there is an alternative. Many MANY lines of "green" products, esp. Ed Begley's line. So, I'm going to look into that. There are great cleaners that are organic and still get the job done. Wouldn't you rather clean with THAT than something that burns your lungs (like Tilex has to mine)? Think of all the crap you wash your car with (if you do) washing down into the sewers. ICK! Anyway, I could do more than that - I'm not good about always turning off lights - but I'm replacing them wiht the energy efficient bulbs - 1 down, many to go!

pinkfem said...

safe trip.