Please Do Not Tap On the Glass

One of my Christmas presents from an old friend is a copy of Al Gore’s film, “An Inconvenient Truth.” Yesterday, I made time to sit down and watch it and really pay attention and all I can say is that if you haven’t seen it I will happily lend you my copy! This is the most important issue facing us right now. I’m not kidding. Nothing else we’re trying to do will matter at all if we do not act NOW to reverse the effects of global warming pollution.

It’s a big problem, so big that it seems there’s nothing we ordinary citizens can do, but there’s a lot we can do! Look at the news headlines recently: U.S. Wants Polar Bears Listed as Threatened – what’s the threat? Habitat Loss! the water in the Arctic is warming so quickly and so sharply that the ice fields the polar bears rely on to hunt seals are disappearing. Polar bears are drowning in great numbers while attempting to swim 40 miles or more to find food. Birth rates are dropping. We are going to lose an important species because of our own selfish disregard for our own planet!

Here’s one from today’s Washington Post: Ancient Ice Shelf Snaps, Breaks Free from Canadian Arctic. Why is that important to you? Because it indicates the rapid and sharp rise in water temperatures in the Arctic ice cap. This one is pretty simple, really. If the Arctic ice cap melts, where does the water go?

WATCH THE MOVIE

CHANGE YOUR HABITS TO REDUCE YOUR ENVIRONMENTAL FOOTPRINT

• Change a Light
  Replacing one regular light bulb with a compact fluorescent light will save 150 pounds of carbon dioxide per year.
• Drive Less
  Walk, bike, carpool or take metro transit more often. You’ll save one pound of carbon dioxide for every mile you don’t drive!
• Recycle More
  You can save 2,400 pounds of carbon dioxide per year by recycling just half of your household waste.
• Check Your Tires
  Keeping your tires inflated properly can imiprove gas mileage by more than 3 percent. Every gallon of gasoline saved keeps 20 pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere!
• Use Less Hot Water
  It takes a lot of energy to heat water: use less hot water by installing a low-flow showerhead (350 pounds of CO2 saved per year) and washing your clothes in cold or warm water (500 pounds saved per year).
• Avoid Products With a Lot of Packaging
  You can save 1,200 pounds of carbon dioxide if you cut down your garbage by 10 percent.
• Adjust Your Thermostat
  Moving your thermostat down just 2 degrees in winter and up 2 degres in summer could save about 2,000 pounds of carbon dioxide per year.
• Plant a Tree
  A single tree will absorb one ton of carbon dioxide over its lifetime.
• Turn Off Electronic Devices
  Simply turning off your television, DVD player, stereo, and computer when you’re not using them will save thousands of pounds of carbon dioxide per year.
• Be a Part of the Solution
  Learn more and get active at ClimateCrisis.net.

NATIVE ENERGY
I found the information about Native Energy while exploring ClimateCrisis.net. There’s a calculator to figure out your impact on global warming. Just enter a few simple numbers to get your personal impact number. My number is 9.75, which is higher than the national average of 7.5. I’m guilty of driving my 2005 Honda Civic EX more than the national average for miles driven per year and, until recently, I haven’t been recycling.

What am I going to do to offset my impact?

1. Drive less. I’m rededicating myself to mass trans for my daily commute into the District.
2. Changing my light bulbs.
3. Turning off my electronic devices, even when it means unplugging them to do so.
4. Recycle. I found out yesterday that the apartment complex I live in does have recycling bins for paper, plastic, and glass.
5. Join the Native Energy plan. After you calculate your global warming pollution impact, there’s a link to follow that leads you to the Native Energy Web site. They ask you to fill in your ClimateCrisis Calculator Number and then give you options to offset your carbon dioxide impact. This is SO COOL! My impact on the environment can be further offset by giving $9 per month to Windbuilders, a windmill energy company, or to a methane farm using “Remooable Energy” methods to produce energy from methane. I chose a 50-50 split for my contribution. Read about it. DO IT! Consider it part of your energy bill each month.
6. This blog. If I can convince my friends to get involved in reducing global warming pollution then I’ve accomplished a little something with my life. Don’t let me down.

Wait, wait, there’s more. In the new issue of “Sierra” magazine is a list of former climate change skeptics, men (ahem) who used to call it “voodoo” and now believe it’s scientific fact. Attend:

• Representative Bob Inglis (R-S.C.), (former) chair of the Research Subcommittee of the Science Committee, says he “pooh-poohed” global warming until he visited Antarctica last January: “Now I think we should be concerned. There are more and more Republicans willing to stop laughing at climate change who are ready to get serious about reclaiming their heritage as conservationists.” (April 2006)
• Gregg Easterbrook, author of A Moment on the Earth (in which he wrote that rising temperatures “might be an omen or might mean nothing”) and The Progress Paradox and contributing editor to the Atlantic Monthly and the New Republic: “I have a long record of opposing alarmism. but based on the data, I’m now switching sides regarding global warming, from skeptic to convert.” (May 2006)
• Frank Luntz, Republic pollster. In 2003, he advised GOP policymakers to make the lack of absulute scientific certainty “a primary issue in the debate” over global warming. He’s since changed his tune: “It’s now 2006. I thnk most people would conclude that there is global warming taking place and that the behavior of humans is affecting the climate.” (June 2006)
• Pat Robertson, founder and chair of the Christian Broadcasting Network and host of The 700 Club: “I have not been one who believed in the global warming. But I tell you, they are making a convert out of me … It is getting hotter, and the ice caps are meltiing, and there is a buildup of carbon dioxide in the air. We really need to address the burning of fossil fuels.” (August 2006)
• Sir Richard Branson, founder of theVirgin Group who announced las September that he would devote all the profits frm his five airlines and train company to developing clean energy sources: “I used to be skeptical of global warming, but now I’m absolutely convinced that the world is spriraling out of control. CO2 is like a bushfire that gets bigger and bigger every year.” (October 2006)

WATCH THE MOVIE.

s.

Filed under: global climate change