vtsnowedin wrote:Moving beyond the question of "Is climate change caused by human activity?" the real question becomes what if anything can the human population do to correct the problem? Good answers there are few and far between.
There are plenty of things that we can do, VT.
1 Localise food production and grow organically.
2 Eat much less meat and eat meat produced from pasture.
3 Produce charcoal from agricultural wastes and sequester this in the soil (as in Terra Preta)
4 Eat seasonal foods.
The first three items will start to recarbonise soils depleted of carbon by industrial agriculture, sequestering large quantities of carbon in the soil and reduce the transport of food over thousands of miles.
5 Reduce car sizes.
6 Reduce engine sizes.
7 Drive/travel less.
8 Use public transport.
9 Electrify transport.
10 Walk and cycle more.
11 Tax air travel to reduce usage and eventually out of existence if still using fossil fuels.
12 Make use of aircraft engines on the ground illegal up to actual takeoff and after landing. Electric tug vehicles can be used instead.
13 Make unassisted takeoff illegal. Use some sort of electrical power assisted takeoff as on Ford class aircraft carriers.
The above will massively reduce fossil fuel use especially in the US. Much of Europe has already made the savings on engine and vehicle size although even there savings can still be made on expensive, manhood enhancing cars.
14 Business should be encouraged to allow people to work from home.
15 More flexible working should be encouraged to reduce rush hour congestion
16 Meetings should be on video link.
17 Conferences should be on video link.
18 Production should go from mass production of cheap, short lived, throwaway crap to batch production of long lived, repairable, recyclable, useful goods.
It should be noted that much of the above is in the ability of individuals to accomplish either through their own actions or by influencing the actions of their own business or the one that they work for.
There's a start and I know there is much else that can be added but I'll let others add things on. I'm sure that many of you would like to contribute. Number sequentially please so that we can comment by number.
