Save The Earth

Human influenced facts

2011-03-22T07:58:00.000-07:00

If just 25% of U.S. families used 10 fewer plastic bags a month, we would save over 2.5 BILLION bags a year.
On the average, the 140 million cars in America are estimated to travel almost 4 billion miles in a day, and according to the Department of Transportation, they use over 200 million gallons of gasoline doing it.
Every year we throw away 24 million tons of leaves and grass. Leaves alone account for 75% of our solid waste in the fall.
Over 100 pesticide ingredients are suspected to cause birth defects, cancer, and gene mutations.
Every ton of recycled office paper saves 380 gallons of oil.
About 1% of U.S. landfill space is full of disposable diapers, which take 500 years to decompose.
Energy saved from one recycled aluminum can will operate a TV set for 3 hours, and is the equivalent to half a can of gasoline.
Glass produced from recycled glass instead of raw materials reduces related air pollution by 20%, and water pollution by 50%.
Americans use 50 million tons of paper annually -- consuming more than 850 million trees.
Homeowners use up to 10 times more toxic chemicals per acre than farmers.
By turning down your central heating thermostat one degree, fuel consumption is cut by as much as 10%.
Insulating your attic reduces the amount of energy loss in most houses by up to 20%.
Enough glass was thrown away in 1990 to fill the Twin Towers (1,350 feet high) of New York's World Trade Center every two weeks.
One ton of carbon dioxide that is released in the air can be prevented by replacing every 75 watt light bulbs with energy efficient bulbs.
Many banks lent large sums of money to developing nations. In order to pay those debts plus interest many nations have turned to the mining of their natural resources as a source of financial aid.
Every day 40,000 children die from preventable diseases.
The public transportation that we have is a wreck. The U.S. continues to promote and invest in private car travel rather than public transportation.
The human population of the world is expected to be nearly tripled by the year 2100.
A three percent annual growth rate will result in the doubling of consumption and production of food and other products in 25 short years. The amount of motor vehicles that are expected to be operated will increase 15 million a year until at least 2010.
The world's per capita grain production has been on the downfall since 1985 despite the use of fertilizers and pesticides.
Already a train system has been developed (back in 1987) which is based on magnetic levitation and causes minimal pollution. These versions of a train are already in use in several countries.
Fibre optics, made of glass, are being used to replace copper cables throughout the world.
The uncontrolled fishing that is allowed has reduced the amount of commercial species. Some species, up to one-tenth of their original population.
Every day 50 to 100 species of plants and animals become extinct as their habitat and human influences destroy them.

Banning Usage of Plastic Bags DOES NOT save the Earth

2010-11-23T03:00:00.000-08:00

Firstly, I don't give 2 hoots about the Environment - it's pointless, becoz of the number of hypocrites that's occupying this planet. In fact, I think the Indonesians who burns down forest for their farming needs are even more honest than those who profess to be environment saviours but prefers to tackle only the easy issues and turning the blind eye against the real issues which are destroying this earth.

The banning of plastic bags usage only serves to delude the people even more. By not using plastic bags, are u really stopping the Earth from further damage and saving it? Or as some of you would say , this is the best we can do? Or, does some of you say, we're waiting for someone to lead us, then we will support the cause. Those are ALL excuses that makes you a hypocrite ! It does NOT make any difference at all !

Would you even dare to be honest with yourself and tell yourself, it is too small an effort and you need to tackle the real problem to save the Earth? The emission of polluted smoke bellowing 24/7 from the chimneys of palm oil processing factories, the increase in number of vehicles that plies the highways everyday, the clearing of lands to build more towers and commercial buildings. These are the REAL reasons why the earth is degrading, but since I last pointed this out over a year ago, which drew a lot of flak from readers, none of those who critisized me did anything to mention about saving the environment in CB after that.

So don't give me the bulls**t that you support the ban of plastic bags ( yes - I am critisizing LGE of DAP Penang for his shortsightedness on this matter ) because you care for the environment. YOU DON'T . YOU'RE JUST LIKE THE OSTRICH WHO PUT HIDES YOUR HEAD IN THE SAND THINKING THAT WOULD SAVE YOU . And becoz you delude yourself into thinking what you're doing is enough to save the earth, you dont go about trying to do your part in tacking the bigger issues. And that will be the reason why Earth will be doomed sooner or later.

Take out your AK-47s and shoot me with your criticism. Does that save the Earth? Go reflect on that before your close your eyes and sleep soundly tonight.

Mother Nature Always Bats Last

2010-10-03T16:18:00.000-07:00

I've always thought that the Captain Planets and other Eco-warriors have, more often than not, handled the ongoing affront to our home planet in a pretty ineffective manner.

Any struggle needs a strong propaganda machine to drum up support from the home base and maybe even convince some naysayers. It's all about branding. It's all about the message. And, unfortunately, at the onset of the green movement, cheerleading "Save the Earth" just didn't do it for a lot of people, for a lot of reasons.

For starters, that battle cry is missing an all-too-important enemy for people to rally against. It's too vague. Save the Earth, but from what shall we save it? Deforestation? Mountaintop removal? Carbon emissions? Suburban sprawl? Disappearing bees? A monstrous island of plastic in the Pacific Ocean?

The answer, of course, is all of the above, but most people don't realize they have the ammunition to fight all of these battles. It's too daunting. That's why orchestrated and specific local initiatives have always been much more successful.

Second, that war whoop is a bit of a misnomer. You have to take a big spoonful of self-importance if you think the human race can drastically alter the course of the third planet from the sun. The real inconvenient truth is that we're the expendable ones. If things get too "bad" here on the surface – pick your own doomsday scenario – the Earth can shut down, reboot and start over again. Mother Nature always bats last. She'll be just fine in a couple million years. It's happened before, and life went on – just not all forms of it.

Instead of "Save the Earth," maybe the bumper stickers should have read "Save the People," because that's what's really at stake here – humans' ability to survive in an environment that we, as a whole, are influencing.

I think the green movement would have gotten better footing, instead of getting politicized, if the Eco-champs had pandered to people's true inclinations. Which isn't altruistic, it's economic. Maybe the bumper stickers should have read, "Save the Money" to be more effective.

It's a sad truth, but people by and large are more concerned with the size of their pocket books than they are with the size of the rain forest or how they keep their homes heated or cooled.

Though it may not be blatantly obvious, all of these things are connected – especially the correlation between money in the bank and energy at home.

In this issue, we have two stories that deal with energy at home: a feature on Richard Levine's Raven Run Solar House, a beautiful active solar power home – over 30 years old and still revolutionary – built by a true pioneer of solar energy here in Lexington; and a feature on home energy audits, where a professional energy consultant will come to a home and evaluate its "envelope" to make suggestions on how the homeowner can, affordable, make changes to reduce wasted energy (and reduce their carbon footprint).

For the home energy audit feature, our Smiley Pete Publishing colleague Sheli Mays graciously opened her home to our editorial team and two energy auditors as a guinea pig for the feature.

Our thanks go out to her and her family, especially her husband, Tommy, who suggested, as a later editorial feature, we come back and hammer out some of the energy auditor's recommendations.

Author: Robbie Clark

The 11th Hour (film)

2010-09-29T10:59:00.000-07:00

Copyright©: The 11th Hour is a 2007 feature film documentary, created, produced and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio, on the state of the natural environment.

Experts interviewed underlined that everyone must become involved to reverse the destruction and climate change. The role of humans in the destruction of the environment is explained from the viewpoint of several different professional fields including environmental scientists, oceanographers, economic historians, and medical specialists. The many experts called upon in this documentary effectively demonstrated a consensus concerning human-caused climate change, and the many other impacts of industrialization such as the dramatic loss of species (biodiversity.

Save the Earth, if You Can

2010-09-14T00:40:00.000-07:00

Even if you have a ‘green’ conscience, behaving according to your green principles can be a difficult thing if you live in Belgrade. In the city of around two million residents, there are just 39 on-street recycling facilities. And although glass amounts to 10 per cent of household waste, there is now nowhere to leave it for recycling.
In some parts of Belgrade, even finding recycling bins can be quite an exercise. With just 39 across the city most Belgraders simply choose to throw out waste that in many countries across the world would be recycled. If by some chance you do find a site, make sure you don’t take glass bottles and jars as there is now nowhere in the city to take them.

Although the city’s waste management department, Gradska cistoca, put out recycling bins for plastic (PET), metal and paper over a year ago, glass can still not be recycled as there is no local market for it.
“The thing is that... primary raw materials are quite cheap. A glass factory in Paracin made an offer to buy glass for recycling at just 1 dinar per kilo, but for that amount we cannot afford to even transport the glass waste,” explains Ilija Djordjevic, manager for recycling at Gradska cistoca.
Djordjevic further says that though there aren’t any glass bins in the city, residents can still collect glass and contact their municipality in order to properly dispose the waste.

With a little effort, the citizens can recycle plastic, metal and paper, but it seems that many aren’t sufficiently environmentally aware.

“In Belgrade, the number of people who separate waste and use recycling facilities is rather low,” says Djordjevic.

Elsewhere, people have been cajoled through a mixed system of penalties and incentives, be that deposits on returnable bottles, or financial incentives for separating waste or indeed penalties for not doing so. In some European countries the use of such measures has increased the recyclable percentage of household waste up to 90 per cent.

Here in Serbia, the picture is reversed, with only 10 per cent of waste being recycled. However, the ministry of environment and spatial planning has recorded a sharp increase of companies involved in recycling waste since 2003.

“The ministry of environment and spatial planning has issued 107 licences. However, 20 per cent of firms carry out recycling activities, while the other companies are only involved in collecting and transportation of waste,” says assistant minister Aleksandar Vesic.

Recycling one ton of paper saves about 17 trees, 32,000 gallons of water and about 4,000 KW of electricity and the latest data for recycled paper per capita shows that while Bulgarians collect 60 kg, Romanians 80 kg and Slovenians 200 kg, in Serbia the figure is 35 kg. Another 85,000 tons of paper end up in landfill.
Worldwide the recycling industry is valued at 160 billion dollars and employs more than 1.5 million people. More than 600 million tons of waste is recycled and traded but according to the Serbian Association for Recycling, in the last year just 37 new jobs were created and more than 200,000 tons of various plastic materials were disposed of.

Although Gradska cistoca, the City government and the national government have put together strategic plans which envisage recycling centres in the city these are, at least in part, reliant on access to cash from various international funding bodies.

Glass makes up 10 per cent of household waste and because its structure does not deteriorate when reprocessed, its one of the rare materials that can be recycled indefinitely. If it’s not recycled, a glass bottle can take more than 4,000 years to decompose. In many countries there is an increased demand for recycled glass known as ‘cullet’ in the glass industry, because it costs much less than the raw material used to manufacture glass from scratch. Recycled glass also uses less energy than manufacturing glass from sand, lime and soda. Recycling of one glass bottle can save enough energy to light a 100 watt bulb for 4 hours.

In order to increase the amount of recycled waste, Gradska cistoca introduced ‘Eco bags’ in the municipality of Savski venac. 120 litre bags were delivered to the home address of every resident of Savski venac. Residents are encouraged to collect paper, metal and plastic in the bags, for sorting and separating by employees of Gradska cistoca. Once a week, bags left in front of the apartments are collected by the city’s cleaning department. Officials express themselves satisfied with the results so far and are planning to introduce this programme in the Stari grad, Zvezdara, Palilula and Vracar districts.

How to save the Earth

2010-09-06T03:51:00.000-07:00

You’d think world leaders would be boasting that in 2009, for the first time since 1992, global emissions of man-made carbon dioxide did not increase over the previous year.

Indeed, in the industrialized world — us — they dropped a record 7%.

Unfortunately, the major reason wasn’t the increasing use of renewable energy.

It was the global recession set off in 2008 by the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis.

By contrast, increasing emissions in the developing world, led by the expanding economies of China (annual emissions up 9%) and India (up 6%), completely offset the 7% cut in the developed world.

These estimates come from the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (NEAA), a leading monitor of global emissions, funded by the Dutch government.

Canada reported in April our total greenhouse gas emissions dropped by 2.1% in 2008 as the recession began to kick in, but won’t have the 2009 figure until next April.

The reality is recessions are the only things that dramatically and consistently reduce emissions, not publicly-subsidized wind turbines, solar panels, or the shell game of buying and selling carbon credits.

The reason is simple. When people and nations become poorer, they have less money to buy things, which means it takes less fossil fuel energy to provide them.

Conversely, when an economy grows, emissions rise.

As the NEAA notes, 2009 was “the first time since the 1992 recession that global CO2 (carbon dioxide) emissions have not increased. Previous recessions due to large increases in oil price(s) led to global decreases in CO2 emissions in 1974-1975 and 1980-1982.”

Recessions have always been key to the schemes of global planners in their ostensible battle against climate change.

When the Kyoto accord was crafted, its creators arbitrarily and retroactively factored into their calculations massive reductions in carbon dioxide emissions prompted by the recession following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

This accounting trick was designed to help Europe meet its reduction targets and gave Russia — an environmental basket case — billions of dollars of “hot air” credits to sell to nations with much better environmental records.

Despite constant green propaganda that reducing emissions leads to more jobs and greater prosperity, real-world experience indicates the opposite.

Given the present unreliability of renewable energy, which can’t provide the on-demand power an industrialized economy needs, the only way governments can reduce emissions — other than by accounting tricks — is through recessions and delaying economic recovery.

Of course, governments didn’t create the subprime mortgage crisis to lower emissions and you’d think no government would deliberately pursue such policies.

But that’s exactly what our federal government is constantly being urged to do by those who advocate putting a price on our carbon dioxide emissions ahead of the United States.

Not only would this mean deliberately hobbling our economy in relation to our largest trading partner, it would drive even more industry, investment and jobs offshore to countries that have no intention of pricing carbon.
As we head into the next round of interminable UN global negotiations to draft a successor to Kyoto in Cancun this November, let’s understand what’s really being debated.

Specifically, how much more are we willing to lower our standard of living — how much poorer are we prepared to make ourselves — to cut emissions?

And how many hundreds of billions of dollars are we prepared, along with other industrialized nations, to ship to developing countries, in order to perform the “mission impossible” of lowering their emissions while growing their economies?

Amid the hysteria coming our way in Cancun about doing “whatever it takes” to “save the planet” because 2010 was “the warmest year ever” — meaning, less spectacularly, the warmest in the last 150 years or so of comparable temperature data, as opposed to the 4.5-billion-year history of the Earth — these will be the real choices we face.

Let’s not allow ourselves to be stampeded into doing anything stupid.

My House Plants Pictures

2010-06-29T00:07:00.000-07:00

Copenhagen climate summit: the climate change sceptic's Q&A

2009-12-08T09:45:00.000-08:00

Climate sceptic's questions answered by Fred Pearce of the New Scientist
By Fred Pearce, New Scientist senior enviroment correspondent
Published: 7:00AM GMT 08 Dec 2009

Whilst nothing is irrefutable, the evidence for climate change caused by human activity is overwhelming. Photo: REUTERS

How can scientists claim to predict climate change over 50 or more years when they can’t even get next week’s weather forecast right?

They can’t tell us in detail. But forecasting climate change is more like forecasting the seasons than the weather. We know winters are cold and summers are warm. Always. And it’s like that with greenhouse gases. Physicists have known for 200 years that gases like carbon dioxide trap heat. These gases are accumulating in the atmosphere, thanks to our pollution. They will heat up the atmosphere just as certainly as the summer sun heats us.

But surely it’s the job of scientists to deal in irrefutable evidence rather than predictions?

Nothing is absolutely certain or irrefutable. We could be hit tomorrow by an asteroid or a mega-volcano that wipes out warming for centuries. But I’d say climate science is a good deal more reliable than most economic predictions, because it is based on natural laws rather than how markets behave.

Anyway, how can they be sure that the earth has warmed in the last few centuries?

It hasn’t. Evidence from tree rings, the pollen in the bottom of lakes, gas bubbles in ice cores and a lot else, all suggests strongly that it was warm 800 or 900 years ago; then cooler during the little ice age; then warmer again in the 19th century. All this was due to explainable natural cycles. But during the second half of the 20th century there was fast global warming for which there are no known natural explanations. Only the known physics of our soaring emissions of greenhouses gases can explain events.

But increases in CO2 follow periods of warming don’t they, not the other way round?

Both are true. The evidence here comes from gas bubbles in ice, which give us a timeline of atmospheric temperatures and CO2 levels. The two go in tandem in and out of the ice ages over hundreds of thousands of years. But temperatures change a few years earlier than CO2. That’s not surprising. The ice ages come and go because wobbles in the Earth’s orbit change solar radiation, heating the earth. So temperature changes first. But a lot of the subsequent warming (or cooling) is due to CO2 switching between the ocean and the atmosphere as a result of the initial temperature change. The world starts to warm because of a wobble; and as it warms, CO2 bubbles out of the oceans, adding to the warming.

Isn’t it a complete myth that the Arctic ice cap is melting?

Haven’t you seen the satellite pictures? It melts every summer, of course. But in recent years the melt has been greater. In 2008, probably for the first time in thousands of years, both the northwest and northeast shipping passages through the Arctic, north of Canada and Siberia, were ice-free.

And hasn’t the world stopped warming since 1998?

Yes. For now. Global temperatures have been more or less stable since the super-warm El Nino year of 1998. Even so, 2009 is expected to be the fourth or fifth warmest year on record. Some researchers predict stable temperatures, or even modest cooling, for another five years or so. This is due to natural cycles in the oceans that affect air temperature. Nobody ever said that man-made global warming would abolish natural cycles. Or if they did, they were dumb. But greenhouse gases are still accumulating in the atmosphere. Once natural cycles move back to a warming phase, global warming will go into overdrive.

If there is warming, isn’t solar radiation really to blame?

Obviously we would be frozen without the sun. But changes in solar radiation cannot explain what has happened in the past half century. If anything, they would have cooled us since about 1980, during the period of most rapid warming.

And what about water vapour?

Water vapour is a major natural greenhouse gas. Always has been. It didn’t start recent warming, but it roughly doubles the warming caused directly by CO2. That is because if you add CO2 to the air and warm it, then evaporation increases, putting more water vapour into the air, causing further warming.

Didn’t those email leaks from the University of East Anglia prove that global warming scientists suppress opinions they don’t agree with?

Yes. Sometimes. To be fair, how many of us would come up smelling of roses if a selection of our most ill-advised emails were published on the internet? But even so, the emails showed a bunker mentality among some climate researchers, who have a hard time dealing with critics who work outside the "priesthood" of peer-reviewed research. But trying to shut out the critics, however disruptive they may be, is bad for science, which is (and should be) an adversarial process of open debate. Did the researchers succeed in suppressing opinions they disagreed with? No. Did the emails reveal a conspiracy to lie to us about the climate science? I have read most of them. I am a journalist. I love conspiracies. But the answer is no.

Isn’t the whole climate change scare a plan hatched by governments as a justification to hike up taxes?

Hardly. Governments have been dragged kicking and screaming to get serious about climate change. They’d just love it to go away.

Isn’t the suggestion of Lord Stern and others that we divert 1 per cent of the world’s GDP to prevent climate change a colossal misuse of money that could be better spent on improving human life – eradicating killer diseases such as malaria, for instance?

Stern says it will cost us a great deal more in the long run if we don’t tackle climate change. The trouble is that if climate change isn’t halted, it will carry on getting ever worse. Carbon dioxide hangs around in the atmosphere for centuries. So even if current emissions stayed as they are, we won’t stop at 1 or 2 degrees of warming, we will go on up to 4 and 6 and even 8 degrees. How hot can you handle? Ultimately, the only question is whether we stop it, or it stops us.

No rainforest, No monsoon: Get ready for a warmer world

2009-10-03T11:25:00.000-07:00

BY 2055, climate change is likely to have warmed the world by a dangerous 4 °C unless we stop pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere the way we do now. This is the startling conclusion of a study by the UK Met Office, unveiled at a conference in Oxford this week.

Why so soon? Because temperature rises caused by greenhouse gas emissions are expected to trigger dangerous feedback loops, which will release ever increasing amounts of greenhouse gases. The nature and scale of these feedback loops is a subject of vigorous debate among climate scientists, but warmer oceans, for instance, may liberate more dissolved CO2, and plants may decay faster in a warmer climate. The Met Office ran 17 different models with these feedbacks. All concluded a 4 °C world by 2055 was likely if emissions continue to rise. Even if we are lucky, we are still likely to hit 4 °C by 2070.

The average global temperature is likely to be 4 °C higher than in pre-industrial times by 2055 if greenhouse gas emissions are not slowed – that means a 16 °C rise in the Arctic (Source: Met Office Hadley Centre)

What will a 4 °C world look like? Brace yourself: the picture painted by the 130 climate researchers at the Oxford conference is not pretty. An average global increase of 4 °C translates to a rise of up to 15 °C at the North Pole. Summers in parts of the Arctic would be as balmy as California's Napa valley. Sea levels would rise by up to 1.4 metres, according to Stefan Rahmstorf at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Germany. Even the less pessimistic estimate of a 0.65-metre rise by 2100 would put at least 190 million people a year at risk from floods, says Rahmstorf's colleague Jochen Hinkel.

The glimmer of hope? It doesn't have to be this way. If politicians at the UN climate change talks in December agree to cut emissions by 3 per cent every year, the world can limit temperature rise to a "safe" 2 °C, the Met Office says.

The Amazon - Gone
In a 4 °C world, climate change, deforestation and fires spreading from degraded land into pristine forest will conspire to destroy over 83 per cent of the Amazon rainforest by 2100, according to climatologist Wolfgang Cramer at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany. His climate models show global warming alone converting 30 per cent of the Amazon into degraded shrub land and mixed woodland by 2100. Even this grim estimate is based on the hopeful assumption that extra CO2 in the atmosphere will "fertilise" the forest, buffering it from drought. But we can't be sure this will happen, says Cramer. "If we've overestimated the magnitude of CO2 fertilisation, we risk losing the entire Amazon."

Water lifeline cut
Millions of people in India and China depend on monsoon rains to water their crops and for drinking water. Climate change could sever this lifeline. Anders Levermann at Potsdam University in Germany has developed a model which reflects the physics that drives monsoons. His simulations suggest that in a 4 °C world there will be a mix of extremely wet monsoon seasons and extremely dry ones, making it hard for farmers to plan what to grow. Worse, the fine aerosol particles released into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels could put a complete stop to the monsoon rains in central southern China and northern India. Monsoons are generated by sharp heat gradients in the atmosphere where warm land meets cool ocean. By blocking solar energy, aerosols cool the coastal atmosphere and sap monsoons' strength.

Trapped!
Lack of water, crop failure and rising sea levels could force up to 200 million people from their homes by 2050. Attention in rich western nations has focused on the prospect of millions of climate migrants clamouring at their borders. The reality is likely to be harsher, says François Gemenne, a migration expert at the Institute of Sustainable Development and International Relations in Paris, France. From a study of the impact of 23 recent environmental disasters he concludes that the people most vulnerable to a 4 °C rise are also least able to escape it. "At 4 °C, the poor will struggle to survive, let alone escape," he says. Invariably, the poor can't afford to flee, and they lack the social networks which would otherwise facilitate migration, Gemenne says.

Climate change is already forcing people to migrate, says Gemenne. Sea level rise is driving an exodus from Tuvalu, Kiribati, Papua New Guinea and the low-lying Carteret Islands, while water stress is forcing people in Mauritania, Sudan, Ghana and Kenya to migrate. Melting permafrost is pushing people out of parts of Alaska and floods are forcing others out of the delta regions of Bangladesh and Vietnam.

Gemenne's research, conducted in conjunction with the EU Commission's EACH-FOR project, will be published in the Journal of International Migration next year.

Fire down under
Projections for Australia present a conundrum. It looks likely to escape extreme temperatures rises of 10 °C or more seen elsewhere (see map, top right), but rainfall projections paint a more troubling picture. There was very little consensus between the different models run by the UK Met Office. More alarmingly, a study of the probability of forest fires suggests that the number of "extreme fire danger days" per year - when uncontrollable fires are likely to break out as a result of low humidity, strong winds and high temperature - will treble by 2050. "Even under a low warming scenario, the frequency rises by 10 to 50 per cent," says David Karoly of the University of Melbourne, who reviewed a range of wildfire projections. "We are unleashing hell on Australia."

Save Forests and Wildlife

2009-10-03T11:02:00.000-07:00

As man learnt about nature he started to interfere with the laws of nature. He cut off the forests for agriculture and tamed wild animals for his food and clothing. Man was able to conquer nature, yet he can't control it. A balance exists between all living and non-living things in nature. Ecological disasters are bound to happen if there is any disturbance in the natural equilibrium. Increased industrialization and human requirements have led to the destruction of our forests and wildlife, which are interdependent in more than one ways.

Forests are indispensable to mankind. They provide us with wood, raw materials; prevent floods and soil erosion; increase underground water supply and humidity of air; provide an abode for the wildlife, check air pollution, etc. On a sunny day a large elm tree gives off vapor which is equivalent to 1500 gallons of water. Annual world production of forest products exceeds US $ 150 billion, thus playing a vital role in the economy of a nation. According to a UN report, rain forests have been destroyed to a large extent. Man has mercilessly chopped off trees without paying any attention to the destruction he is causing to his own life and future. Hillsides have been stripped off its vegetation cover in the Himalayas, which has become a major cause for the earthquakes, avalanches, and landslides. Deforestation not only diminishes the natural beauty of any place but also upsets the ecological balance of that place. It is believed that the Thar Desert is a man-made desert. Yes! Emperor Akbar went for hunting there.

Wildlife is at the brink of destruction! Due to destruction of forests, pollution, climatic changes and extensive hunting of animals, many species of wildlife have become extinct. With extension, when a species disappears, it is gone forever! Wildlife destruction has upset the whole mechanism of natural regulation and balance, which could endanger our very existence. Animals are being used widely in drug research nowadays. Scientists believe that animal experimentation is necessary for the progress of medical sciences. They may be right but what we need is a balance between biomedical research and animal welfare.

The day is not far away when sighting a tusker will be a rare occurrence in India. The world famous Hangul, a reindeer species found only in Kashmir, is endangered. Maybe the future generation will not know what a Hangul was! Chiru, the Tibetan antelope, is also facing the threat of extinction due to its extensive hunting for the fleece, which is required to weave the famous Kashmiri Shahtoosh shawls. India is one of the world extensive networks of officially Protected Areas. These areas a re a place of biological diversity and harmony but are now under a ruthless assault due to urbanization, population pressure, industrialization, etc. trade in wildlife products is a vast business involving billions of dollars!

Some of the facts that point out the urgent need to save our national wealth are:

*A national survey in India in 1980s revealed that humans inhibited 69% of Protected Areas.
*It is believed that an area of tropical forest 4 times the size of Switzerland disappears every year!
*Forest lands in the developing countries have declined to half of the original!
*Destruction of forests leads to the destruction of wildlife. For every plant species that becomes extinct upto 30 dependent animals and insects die.
*Earlier in this century there were about 50,000 tigers in India, but there are now less than 2000!
*Sri Lanka is a classic example, which can be cited while mentioning a place where the tusker population has been reduced to zero!
*95% of the elephants that were killed in India were tuskers whose existence has been endangered due to poaching for ivory. According to the estimate provided by Airport, Bangalore Asian Elephant Conservation Center, on an average 250 tuskers are killed every year in India.
*In a period of about 400 years, on an average, every year a species has become extinct. By 1985 this rate had increased to one species per day!
*According to a study of World Watch Institute minimum of 140 plant and animal species are condemned to extinction each day.
*There was a time when 40% of the land on earth was covered with forests. Unfortunately, only 1/3rd part of the land is now covered with forests and the rate of decreasing green cover is increasing day by day.
*A 50 year old tree generates oxygen worth 5.3 lakh rupees and 5.3 lakh rupees of shelter for birds and animals. Hence, destruction of one tree is worth loss of more than 32 lakh rupees!

National Forest Killing

Wildlife such as the aak bird of northern polar region, moa bird of New Zealand, dodo bird of Mauritius, thylacine of Tasmania, Indian tiger, Indian rhino, pink-headed duck, black-necked crane, bustard, barking deer, monitor lizard, panda, black panther, jaguar, lions, Indian wildass, muskdeer, etc are examples which are already or are about to become extinct. Animals facing the threat of extinction are Gila trout, Houston toad, gharial, Californian condor, javan rhinoceros, puma, polar bear, antelope, humpback whale, Kashmir stag (hangul), etc. Among plant species monkey orchid, alpine catchfly, snakes head fritillary, etc are endangered.

The way in which man exploits and destroys nature may definitely bring some short-term reward or profit but it harms him in the long run. The survival of the human race is possible only with the survival of our environment as a whole. A person may think that killing animal or a bird wont matter much. But what is worth considering is the fact that there are millions of people out there having such attitude, thereby killing just one animal or bird every now and then! It is this threat to wildlife that makes it mandatory for every person to understand the relation between organisms and their environment.

We have to make serious efforts toward wildlife conservation campaign. This credit goes to America because the first conservation area of the world- Yellow Stone National Park- was set up there in 1872. Today there are about 1200 such national parks and reserves in the world. The Himachal Wildlife Project, which was launched in the early 1980s, was the first serious attempt made by Indian conservationists in this direction. International Union for Conservation of Nature and natural resources (IUCN) was set up in 1948 in Switzerland and has done great work for the cause of healthy environment. WWF was set up in 1962 to provide funds for the conservation and preservation of wildlife. About 70% of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) projects have achieved their targets. India has taken the lead in rescuing a vital and charismatic predator- the snow leopard. Also, the Indian branch of the World Pheasant Association had started publication of a quarterly journal called the India News. IWLA was passed in 1972 to protect habitats and endangered species. The government of J&K State had raised a trained force called as the Forest Protection Force to tackle the illegal activities going in the forests in the state.

Something has been done, a lot more needs to be done. We have to develop harmony with nature as against conflict. Environmental issues should not only be discussed and talked about, but efforts should be made to do something at all possible levels. This issue needs to be a part of the public agenda. The concerned authorities should safeguard forests. Poaching and illegal hunting should be stopped. The export and sale of animal products should be completely banned. Habitats of the wildlife should be conserved like forests, wetlands, etc. Massive afforestation programs have to be set in motion. Eco-friendly stationery can save hundreds of bamboo or eucalyptus trees. Recycled paper use should be encouraged. Forest fires need to be prevented. Our political and legal systems alone can accomplish much. To prevent the inhuman slaughter and hunting of these animals and birds, voluntary organizations should come forward and fight for this cause. We should protest if trees are being illegally cut down. We should support and participate in the programs of environmental groups and agencies.

It is true that man has caused these problems; it is equally true that the solutions are also to be provided and implemented by man himself! If we sincerely want that Hangul should not become history for the future generations, we have to make serious efforts toward its conservation. The future generations should be given the opportunity of witnessing the unique and beautiful Planet earth of ours and not read about the green planet in the books of fiction! We have no option but to conserve nature or its bankruptcy will extinguish us all!

Dangers of Smoking

2009-10-03T10:36:00.000-07:00

Why Smoking Is Bad For You!

The fact that smoking is bad for you is no secret. We'll all seen the pictures of charcoal black lungs displayed in schools and in hospital and doctors waiting rooms. Despite these scare tactics people continue to smoke and new smokers adopt the habit every single day. Amazingly smoking can still be viewed as an adult thing to do and children continue to be influenced by this. Their parents or guardians smoke therefore they should smoke too if they want to be really grown up - or at least that's their perception. All smokers wish they had never smoked that first lousy cigarette and shake their heads in disbelief when they see their own kids or teenagers starting to smoke.

Tobacco can be "ingested" in more than one way. Some people chew it, others inhale it as snuff but the majority smoke it in the form of cigars and cigarettes - which is the habit we've all come to know and hate as smokers. Regardless of how you take tobacco it's dangerous. Smoking is the most popular method for people to use tobacco and as such has received massive coverage in both the media and from the medical profession.

Why Smoking Makes You Happy

When a smoker inhales a single "shot" of nicotine from a cigarette the lungs allow the nicotine to pass into the blood stream almost instantly. The smoker then feels the "hit" from the nicotine in their bloodstream and this is the sensation that they crave later on. Don't just assume that you're inhaling "pure" tobacco smoke either. That cigarette you're smoking contains up to 4,000 separate chemicals - many of which are extremely toxic. That smoke you inhale from a cigarette contains 43 carcinogenic substances. These are substances which have been clinically proven to cause various types of cancer. Cigarette smoke also contains 400 other toxins that can be found in rat poison, nail polish remover and various types of wood varnish. Would you willingly eat any of these products? Of course not because you know that they're incredibly bad for you. As these carcinogens and toxins gather in the body they begin to cause serious problems for the heart and lungs. Of all the diseases associated with smoking cancer is the most common. Cancer is a relatively new disease that has really only become prevalent since the beginning of the industrial revolution. In effect cancer is a manmade disease for which there is, as of yet, no cure

Some facts:

90% of lung cancer cases are caused by smoking.

30% of all cancer fatalities are caused by smoking.

Lung cancer is the most common cancer associated with cigarette smoking but you can also get cancer of the mouth, bladder, kidney, stomach, esophagus, larynx and pancreas. Some of these cancers can be treated and others are 100% fatal.

Cancer isn't the only disease that smoking causes - either directly or indirectly. 75% of all fatal cases of emphysema and bronchitis are linked to smoking. Both of these diseases cause extreme breathing difficulties and emphysema in particular is an extremely nasty disease as your ability to breathe on your own slowly vanishes.

Smokers have dramatically shorter lives than non-smokers. On average a smoker will die 15 - 20 years before a non-smoker. This is truly shocking when you think about it. That's 7,300 days deducted from your lifespan. Look at what you can achieve in a single day and then imagine what you might be able to achieve in over 7,000 days.

This is proof that continued exposure to the toxic substances found in cigarettes and cigars simply isn't good for you - no matter what tobacco companies might say. Smoking will kill you younger.

The Effects of Secondary Smoke

The risk from smoking isn't just limited to the smoker however. The serious effects of secondary smoking are now very well known. Smoking near your loved ones puts their health at risk also. Second-hand smoke is still as loaded with chemicals and toxins as it was when you inhaled it.

Numerous health problems are directly caused by secondary smoking and children are in the highest risk group because their internal organs and immune systems are still developing. Children exposed to secondary smoke are far more vulnerable to asthma, sudden infant death syndrome (cot death), bronchitis, pneumonia, and ear infections amongst other things.

If you love and respect your family do them a favour and don't smoke anywhere near them. Go outside. Nothing gives you the right to affect their health. Better again why not quit smoking altogether and spend the money you save on a family holiday? Or a new car? Get the ultimate revenge on the tobacco companies by reducing their profits and living a healthier lifestyle.

An Inconvenient Truth - Al Gore

2009-10-03T00:48:00.000-07:00

Everything are changing! The Earth is getting worse. Human life are damaged.

Global Warming

2009-10-03T00:31:00.000-07:00

WHAT IS GLOBAL WARMING?

Carbon dioxide and other gases warm the surface of the planet naturally by trapping solar heat in the atmosphere. This is a good thing because it keeps our planet habitable. However, by burning fossil fuels such as coal, gas and oil and clearing forests we have dramatically increased the amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere and temperatures are rising.

The vast majority of scientists agree that global warming is real, it’s already happening and that it is the result of our activities and not a natural occurrence.1 The evidence is overwhelming and undeniable.

We’re already seeing changes. Glaciers are melting, plants and animals are being forced from their habitat, and the number of severe storms and droughts is increasing.

The number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled in the last 30 years.2

Malaria has spread to higher altitudes in places like the Colombian Andes, 7,000 feet above sea level.3

The flow of ice from glaciers in Greenland has more than doubled over the past decade.4

At least 279 species of plants and animals are already responding to global warming, moving closer to the poles.5

If the warming continues, we can expect catastrophic consequences.

Deaths from global warming will double in just 25 years -- to 300,000 people a year.6

Global sea levels could rise by more than 20 feet with the loss of shelf ice in Greenland and Antarctica, devastating coastal areas worldwide.7

Heat waves will be more frequent and more intense.

Droughts and wildfires will occur more often.

The Arctic Ocean could be ice free in summer by 2050.8

More than a million species worldwide could be driven to extinction by 2050.9

There is no doubt we can solve this problem. In fact, we have a moral obligation to do so. Small changes to your daily routine can add up to big differences in helping to stop global warming. The time to come together to solve this problem is now – TAKE ACTION

1 According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), this era of global warming "is unlikely to be entirely natural in origin" and "the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence of the global climate."
2 Emanuel, K. 2005. Increasing destructiveness of tropical cyclones over the past 30 years. Nature 436: 686-688.
3 World Health Organization
4 Krabill, W., E. Hanna, P. Huybrechts, W. Abdalati, J. Cappelen, B. Csatho, E. Frefick, S. Manizade, C. Martin, J, Sonntag, R. Swift, R. Thomas and J. Yungel. 2004. Greenland Ice Sheet: Increased coastal thinning. Geophysical Research Letters 31.
5 Nature.
6 World Health Organization
7 Washington Post, "Debate on Climate Shifts to Issue of Irreparable Change," Juliet Eilperin, January 29, 2006, Page A1.
8 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment. 2004. Impacts of a Warming Arctic. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Also quoted in Time Magazine, Vicious Cycles, Missy Adams, March 26, 2006.
9 Time Magazine, Feeling the Heat, David Bjerklie, March 26, 2006.

Save Earth, Save Life

2009-10-03T00:28:00.000-07:00

We've got to Save Our Planet Earth!

2009-10-02T04:52:00.000-07:00

Oh, No! Our earth is in trouble, and we've got to save it!
Oh, No!: Bad Facts about our earth

* If you throw away 2 aluminum cans, you waste more energy than 1,000,000,000 (one billion) of the world's poorest people use a day.
* Making a new can from scratch uses the uses the energy equal to half a can of gasoline.
* About one third of what an average American throws out is packaging.
* More than 1,000,000,000 (one billion) trees are used to make disposable diapers every year.
* In one minute, 50 acres of rain forest are destroyed.
* Some rain has a pH of 3 or 4. (which is pretty acidic, considering 7 is neutral, not acidic, and battery acid has a pH of 1). Some fish, such as lake trout and small mouth bass, have trouble reproducing at a pH of 6, which is only slightly acidic. Some clams and snails can't survive at all. Most crayfish are dead at a pH of 5. You can see how bad this is for the environment.
* On average, a person in the US uses energy two times more than a person in Japan or West Germany does, and 50 times more than a person in India.
* About 90% of the energy used in lighting a standard (incandescent) light bulb is lost as heat.
* Air conditioning uses 10 times more energy than a fan, therefore, it creates 10 times the pollutants.
* It takes half the output of the Alaskan pipeline to heat the air that escapes from all the homes in the US during a year.
* Cars and pick-up trucks are responsible for about 20% of the carbon dioxide released into the air.
* There are about 500 million automobiles on the planet, burning an average of 2 gallons of fuel a day. Each gallon releases 20 pounds of carbon dioxide into the air.
* About 80% of our trash goes to landfills, 10% is incinerated, and 10% is recycled.
* Since there is little oxygen underground, where we bury our garbage, to help bacteria eat the garbage, almost nothing happens to it. Scientists have dug into landfills and found ears of corn still intact after 20 years, and newspapers still readable after 30.
* The average American makes about 3.5 pounds of trash a day.
* In a year, the average American uses as much wood in the form of paper as the average resident of the developing world burns as fuel.

26 things we can do to help:

   1. Turn off lights.
   2. Turn off other electric things, like TVs, stereos, and radios when not in use.
   3. Use rechargeable batteries.
   4. Do things manually instead of electrically, like open cans by hand.
   5. Use fans instead of air conditioners.
   6. In winter, wear a sweater instead of turning up your thermostat.
   7. Insulate your home so you won't be cold in winter.
   8. Use less hot water.
   9. Whenever possible, use a bus or subway, or ride your bike or walk.
10. Try to buy organic fruits and vegetables if you're concerned about pesticides. (Organic food is grown without man-made fertilizers and/or pesticides).
11. Don't waste products made from forest materials.
12. Use recycled paper and/or recycle it. Reuse old papers.
13. Don't buy products that may have been made at the expense of the rain forest.
14. Support products that are harvested from the rain forest but have not cut down trees to get it.
15. Plant trees, especially if you have cut one down.
16. Get other people to help you in your cause. Make and/or join an organization.
17. Avoid products that are used once, then thrown away.
18. Buy products with little or no packaging.
19. Encourage your grocery store sell environmentally friendly cloth bags for people to use when they shop, or bring your own.
20. REDUCE, REUSE, & RECYCLE.
21. Compost.
22. Buy recycled products.
23. Don't buy pets taken from the wild.
24. If you have a good zoo nearby, (if the animals are healthy and the zoo takes care of them), support it! Espessially if they help breed endangered animals.
25. Don't buy products if animals were killed to make it.
26. Cut up your six-pack rings before throwing them out.