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Average Member
 
Group: Banned Members
Last Login: 6/14/2009 6:27:31 PM
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| What is a carbon footprint?????? I'd like to ask that anyone respond with some real text and not a link. I'm able to just google the question myself.
And if Carbon is an element in the pereodic table..how can it be banned, restricted and taxed?
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Starting Member
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Last Login: 6/1/2009 6:18:19 PM
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| My take on it is all our fossil-fuels were once living creatures etc so mainly made up of carbon, and when burned give off nasty emissions that pollute the environment and destroy the ozone (in a nutshell). So a carbon-footprint is the size of impact a certain activity produces when using fossil fuels. Eg, grapes from Chile. Apart from whatever fuel were used with the machinery to grow, harvest, etc, they then have to be trucked to wherever, then flown (I'm guessing they don't go by boat!) to wherever in the states, then trucked to the various places before it reaches your shelf. So the carbon footprint for Chilean grapes is huge vs. California grapes vs. (depending where you live) the Concord grapes that could grow in your backyard. But of course as mentioned before I am a proponent of eating locally as much as possible.
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Average Member
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part 2..
If we are live'n things.. and carbon is a main part of all living things, how can carbon be bad?
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Junior Member
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| IMHO, "carbon footprint" is just the latest catch phrase/scare tactic so that certain people can make money. Just another pyramid scheme. Promoted by people like Al Gore with his theories about global warming, trying to frighten people into spending money and putting it into his pocket. In an attempt to reduce our carbon footprint, he promoted a one hour "turn off all electrical items" hour a few weeks back. It got out that, during that hour, nearly every light was on in his McMansion. I have no trust in someone who talks the talk, but doesn't walk the walk. Sorry for not answering your question and just going off on a rant...
Karen
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Average Member
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I agree most respectfuly. I beleave that people with a passion should not be used by those who use them as one would use animals.
(thats a comparison, not calling anyone A sheep)I just found out that my power company has had the ability to shut off my hot water tank when ever they wish. They talked the old timers into this program long ago. It's sorta ok, but they shut me off in the middle of the day with out warning. Unlike the old days when farmers took a shower or washed dishes at a given time of day, our worlds today do not allow for this.
In trying to get my kids and I in the tub before an important mid day event. I found that I had no Hot water. The girl at the power company told us that we save a whole 5 bucks a month for this inconvenyence. The same amount on the contract writen up in the late 60's WOW. 5 bucks...what will I do with all that money???
FOr anyone who thinks this smart grid is a good idea.. it's NOT!
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Junior Member
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Last Login: Today @ 7:20:04 PM
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| Meadow, Carbon is not bad it is the using of it that should be minimised. I am sorry but I dont remember the name of the other poster earlier that explains about the grapes and the amount of fossil fuels that are required to stock your supermarket shelves. Carbon is in all of us but if I gave you a bucket of carbon and a couple of ballons full of Oxygen, hydrogen and Nitrogen you will not be able to make a fossil fuel, the point is the fossil fuels take millions of years to become usable and concentrated enough to be usable. Monitoring your "carbon footprint" is a means of having the average consumer keep check on the amount of FF's being used. Personally I dont particularly like the interference of an organization keep preaching to me but in this case the consumer should know there impact on the worlds energy reserves. Also on a personal note I very much would like to eliminate the transfer of money to unstable, unreliable and unreasonable countries. The US and my country have the reserves to be self sufficient on energy mining and then these middle east terrorists would be running at our soldiers with sticks rather than rocket launchers.
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Average Member
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I think think carborn is bull,
I'm for that, so let's drill here in PA... oh wait, we have oil here in PA. And if you realy want to see something cool. The burning off of all the natural gas wells here in my area is now like a thousand points of light every night. And soon those gas wells could be put to use powering cars and trucks all over this fruited plain. 
So why do they tax gas production it so much? oh yea, becouse it's still moveing.
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Junior Member
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Last Login: 6/3/2009 7:22:53 PM
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I wasn't going to touch this thread, since it took a political turn (again). But I just have to say that it makes me so incredibly sad  Scientists have known about global warming (and started warning us about it) since the early 90s. The last administration did everything in their power to spread misinformation about and deny global climate change, despite 100s of scientific studies showing that yes, it's happening, and yes, it's probably human-caused. Kudos to Al Gore for doing everything he can to bring attention to it, even though there's a good chance it's too late, especially with so many people out there who still deny it's happening (do they still think the Earth is flat, I wonder?) And even if he IS a hypocrite (and aren't we all, in some ways?) -- so what? That doesn't change the facts. Global climate change is happening now, and profoundly changing the world we live in, and the scientists can predict some results, but definitely not all. I've seen it in action with my own eyes, up in the mountains here, down in the cloud forest of Costa Rica, and on my own farm. Every time I hear someone who doesn't believe in climate change complaining about the crazy weather, I'm like "hello?" And if I hear one more person say "So much for global warming" when they've had an ice storm, or a bunch of snow, I'm going to have a melt-down. That's why I prefer "climate change" to "global warming," because yeah, the atmosphere is heating up, but that has really unpredictable real-world results because of how it affects ocean currents, rainfall, hurricane strength, etc.
(taking a deep breath here). OK, in a nutshell, burning of anything with carbon in it (oil, gas, wood, zombies, whatever) releases carbon into the atmosphere in gas form. If it just went off into space, no problem. But our atmosphere keeps it in just like greenhouse glass. All this carbon in the atmosphere soaks up the sun's light, warming the earth (other greenhouse gases like methane do this too). Plants and trees take in carbon, which helped balance things out for quite a long time, but we've been burning such enormous amounts of carbon they can't even begin to keep up. Carbon footprint simply refers to how much carbon our activities produce -- there are some on-line carbon footprint calculators that can figure out what your footprint is, because they know how many pounds of carbon are produced by driving an SUV for a year vs. taking the bus, or whatever.
Sorry about the rant. Actually, no I'm not sorry. I feel a little better now.
Cherie
PS. I majored in zoology, not chemistry or climatology, so forgive me if my nutshell description of global warming isn't exactly accurate. There are plenty of great on-line sources (legitimate ones) that explain it very well. Now, back to work.
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Average Member
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I think the last administration did to much to help push the idea of global warming.
it's not politics, it's business. I know that many who push the concept are paid by gov. So I already disstrust them if they aquire there money from a larger body that...in the words of The Godfather,
" may come to you for a favor later".
The very term, Green is political in it's self. As a matter of fact many groups recently changed names due to the stigma... or the lack of effect the word was having today.
No disrespect, But Didn't Al Gore have all his lights on the night of Earth Day?
Didn't he buy tons of stock in some carbon credit company? I men if you are forced to buy credits, you buy them from him?
Isn't that other fellows home in Crawford Texas off the grid?
not that I worship him, but I read enough construction mags to know what his house is like.
I think it's total Bull! The gov is putting up tons and tons of wind farms here. they have clear cut the mountain, killing trees and sent in bullies to tell us hicks how it's going to be. As soon as they had some land owners signed on, they skipped out of paying the agreed amount, fired the local spokesmen and brought in this big goon.. I'm not being bitter or make'n this up..
The man is 6-4, and looks like red beard the pirate.
The funding is GONE. they have NO MONEY.. but they are still just take'n the land... And what are we going to fight it with? The local papers are all about how great the wind farm are, but they don't own any land..those men and women live in apartments in town. all they know is the stuff sent to them by the state spokesmen. The local college students who are little more than sheep get free shirts with catchy icons. But that's the way college students are.
I'm going to ask you this directly, but respectfully. If you think that your farm is your land and you don't want anyone hunting on it or crossing it....how would you feel if you worked your whole life, knowing you'd only get the family farm and then
Some dirt ball from the government comes in and starts putting in massive wind farms..not paying you,..threating you, putting is finger in your face and telling you how it's going to be? sticking a finger in your face...in your front yard, in front of your family?
oh but it's all in the name of green.
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Senior Member
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I think having a low carbon footprint does not necessarily mean a higher cost, or life changing burden. But here is the kicker. I don't buy into low-carbon footprint ideology just because. It has got to serve a purpose and be more inexpensive then its carbon counterpart, or excel in its performance. In short it really should stand on its own.
I recently designed a sheep shed that was unconventional in every way but yet gave the sheep everything they could wish for. The reason I designed it was because I wanted a truly low cost sheep barn that the sheep would really use. In the end I realized what I had designed was a low carbon footprint sheep barn. Cool, it was practical and could stand on its own...financially speaking...no Al Gore needed!
I think that is where we are today. We need to start looking at different aspects of our farms and trying to improve them based on what we are raising/growing and not what is convenient for us. This may, or may not be, a low carbon-footprint solution, but I think if we look hard enough a practical solution of some sort will present itself.
Eat lamb...because 50,000 coyotes CAN'T be wrong!
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