Blog Reflection 3, Selection 15

The following is my take on a selection from Environmental Studies, by Thomas Easton. This is it in a nutshell, tried to get the just of what the author was saying. Please leave a comment of your take on these issues.

Selection 15

This reading focuses on four main points; Efficiency and how we are moving towards a more efficient world, vehicles as an opportunity to save as opposed to a problem, Renewable energies and how they are gaining strength, and the idea that Climate change is cheaper to fix then it is to do nothing.

The idea that to be good for the environment has meant to widen your pocket book couldn’t have been more wrong. The fact is that if you are more efficient with your resources then you use less of them, requiring less money to operate and more money in your pocket. Companies such as DuPont, IBM, and Bayer have realised this potential to be more efficient in order to cut operating costs and greater their profits. DuPont has effectively managed to boost production by 30%, while lowering energy and greenhouse gas emissions[1]. So in fact being more efficient is better for the environment and the company.

The reason efficiency isn’t accepted widely is because of two reasons, people relate efficiency with having less, doing less, as opposed to doing more with less, the other reason is because people aren’t aware of how much they could be saving in the big picture, they don’t see how saving a few bucks here or there will add up to a lot over the course of a year, a decade, or over a lifetime.

The Efficiency Revolution¹

With advances in production and technology, energy efficient products have gone from expensive to cheap, now costing no more than in efficient products. Take Compact fluorescent light bulbs, twenty years ago they sold for twenty dollars apiece, today are now selling for two to five dollars ¹ . These compact fluorescent light bulbs now compete with less efficient bulbs, using 80% less energy, and lasting ten times as long¹ .

When looking at efficiency, often you compare the cost of adding these efficient features, to the amount of energy they actually save you over time. They lack the savings that are added because of these efficient features, like say the need for a heat source. Lovins compares his 1984 Colorado house; by adding extra insulation, efficient windows and proper air ventilation, he’s eliminated the need for a furnace altogether, saving him the expense of buying a furnace.

So now instead of looking at a building and saying it can be more efficient here, here and here, you look at it as being efficient as a whole.

Vehicles of Opportunity¹

Transportation is a major consumer of oil resources and green house gas emissions, accounting for a third of the U.S carbon emissions¹. It’s obvious that if we are to reduce are carbon foot print that we have to reduce emissions, therefore improve transportation. A study sponsored by the Pentagon, revealed that if we reduce the weight of the vehicle, while improving the engines and drive trains, and making the vehicles more aerodynamic, that we can cut a substantial chunk of the emissions they emit.

The reason they are so inefficient is because the engines we use are just not getting enough power to the wheels. In essence they only deliver about one tenth the energy to the movement of the car, the other ninety percent is wasted¹. To improve emissions, we must lower the weight of the vehicle, and improve the amount of energy input to the energy output, making are cars and trucks go farther, while using less resources.

Reduction in vehicle weight, and improved energy inputs to outputs will not be the only improvement we need. If we are to implement these efficient design features we also need a more efficient fuel source for these vehicles to run on. Now while we are starting to see electric and hydrogen fuelled cars, the chapter focuses on home grown bio fuels, derived from food stocks, woody plants, and corn, and another type of fuel that sees the switch to cleaner burning fuels like natural gas, that emit less carbon¹.

The switch to these more efficient vehicles and modes of transportation will mean a less oil dependant world. Not only will we see the benefit of cleaner air, we will have a smaller carbon foot print, less resources spent on oil, less conflict over these scarce resources, and also an improved economy, where jobs are created to grow these new fuels, and make these new efficient vehicles.

Cheaper To Fix¹

We are starting to see these new technologies that are more efficient and at the same time are saving us money, while costing us just as much as inefficient technologies; we are seeing a rise in the popularity of these products. Because this is a profitable market, we are seeing a rise in the amount of businesses and individuals using these efficient technologies, altering and reducing are impact on the environment. As we see a rise in this field we will start to see a decline in our global carbon footprint. We will also see the advance to even more efficient technologies as time goes on, ending up with a world of less dependent and more efficient societies.

---

[1] Environmental Studies, Thomas Easton (Selection 15, Amort B. Lovins)

What future would you like to see for the Alberta Tar Sands project?

Ideally, even though im canadian and would love to see all this extra profit comming into our country, I want this project shut down. I think that man made greenhouse gasses are way to high, and need to be reduced to sustainable levels. I care deeplyabout the environment, and love being apart of it, but the fact is that we are destroying our environment through the use of burning fossil fuels. Since this project is aimed at harnessing all this oil that is mixed in the alberta "oil sands" and using it to keep cars running, burning up more gas, emitting more co2 into the atmosphere, I think it needs to be stopped. Canada should stop wasting time, money, and ruining our landscape and start moving towards clean, renewable energy. We need a future where we emit few if any co2 into the atmosphere if we plan on saving the environment for future generations. Canada can invest in these clean energies and still make profits from these new resources instead of digging up landscapes to harness this harmfull oil.

1. Review and reflect on the art work of Andy Goldsworthy

After viewing his photography (http://www.goldsworthy.cc.gla.ac.uk/), I feel as if something is out of place. Like in this picture http://www.goldsworthy.cc.gla.ac.uk/image/?id=ag_01811 , you have this nature scene but with some sort of man made creation, and although it looks like something natural, say a boulder, it just doesnt seem right, like its out of place. Trying to fit in with nature but not succeeding.

Its seen again in this photo http://www.goldsworthy.cc.gla.ac.uk/image/?id=ag_05392 . you have this human trying to fit in with his surroundings, but for some reason it just isnt working, its like its trying to fit in with nature, its surroundings, but its not quite right.

After viewing this work i just cant help but feel that human kind has come along way since its roots, major advances, new technology, but with all these new great things, we somehow now seem out of place. Its like were aliens on our own planet. If you look at where we live (houses, towns, cities) compared to where the rest of the species lives, its like we dont belong anymore. Weve lost our connection, our sense of place on our planet.

Where do my Environmental ethics lie?

Biocentrism. Id have to say that i'm a team player as they say. I care deeply about the environment, and try and reduce my footprint on mother nature as much as I can. I Know that my impacts will affect other systems around the world. If you look at global warming for example, our increased burning of fossil fuels is having a effect on the planet. We burn fossil fuels to make our human lifes easier, but it is having a negative effect on other species and organisms, that share our environment.

What gives us the right to cut down forests to build homes, when in fact that same forest already was a home, home to wildlife, organisms, an entire ecosystem.

Selection 7

Selection 7

This selection starts off by explaining that overpopulation cannot have a simple solution. Where you cannot just hope that technology, fishing the oceans, coming up with new “super productive” grains will solve our problems1.

He goes on to talk about how humans have a need for such things like food. If a man wants more cattle to eat, he has to let them graze on pastures. At the same time the pastures can only support a number of cattle, before they must re-grow to feed the next batch. With the addition of these extra cattle, the pasture doesn’t have as much time to re-grow and is now in a deficit. This continues, and sooner or later you have too many cattle, and not enough pasture to grow them on. The same theory can be said about our forests, parks, oceans, and other systems that we depend or utilize.

Pollution is another part of the tragedy of the commons, one man’s waste is cheaper to dispose into the “commons” than it is to clean before disposing of his wastes. However this is true to every man, and with all men thinking like this, we end up with a polluted world. What once took a short time for nature to purify, is taking longer and longer, as we continue to pollute.

1. Environmental Studies, Thomas Easton ( Selection 7, Hardin)

Selection 6

Selection 6

The reading goes on to say that science and technology, began in the middle ages with Islamic scientists, but today has a western civilization name to it. Going as far back as 1000 A.D, science has began to have this western image to it [1].

In the midst of the middle ages, farmers started to use new technology for agriculture, in the form of a vertical knife plow, this however more effective, started to see the rise in over plowing, and for the first time families taking not just what they needed, but all that the land would provide.

The reading then turns to religion and its influence on the way humans interact with the environment. With such passages from the bible saying that man had the right to exploit the land, was the start of this attitude that we were at the top of the food chain, and had the right to manipulate the environment in the way we wanted. Although it says man should have the right to do as he pleases, it also goes on to say that this might have been misinterpreted, really meaning that we be in charge of the land, but not in a bad way, but to look out for the environment, to manage not exploit it.

---

[1] Environmental Studies, Thomas Easton (selection 6, White)

Is a deeper connection to nature likely to influence our decisions?

management?

resourse use?

waste generation?

values?

Please refer to my earlier submission that explains my opinions to this question.