Arguments
Climate Solutions by Daniel Bailey
Posted on 30 November 2011 by Daniel Bailey
After writing the blog post Throwing Down the Gauntlet, 'Actually Thoughtful' suggested SkS authors/contributors write about what personal measures they've taken in regard to climate change, and what steps readers could take. Previous, personal, iterations of this theme were explored earlier by dana1981 and Rob Painting. This is my response.
Me, me, me... 
Given the enormity of the task we as a civilization face in the changing climate we are the cause of, what is one person to do? After all, I live in a temperate northern clime, my job requires me to travel up to several hundred miles per day via car (necessarily a 4-wheel drive SUV due to the snow & ice in the winter) and I live in a downtown area, not in the countryside. Given that, it would be easy to throw my hands up in despair.
But giving up is not in my nature (when someone mentioned to one of my coaches that I didn't know the meaning of giving up, Coach cracked, "I've seen his grades...there's a lot of words he don't know the meaning of." Funny guy, that Coach). Well, the words of Lao-tzu come to mind:
"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."
What To Do...
Well, for starters, the obvious stuff comes to mind:
- Changing out incandescent light bulbs to CFL's
- Insulating wall cavities in the house
- Insulating above-grade foundation walls in the basement
- Injecting foam insulation into electrical outlet boxes on exterior walls
- Replacing leaky single glazed woodframe windows/storm window combination units with high-efficiency double-glazed vinyl windows
- Replacing inefficient wooden exterior doors with modern thermal exterior doors and modern thermal storm doors
- Turn off all lights in rooms not in use
- Installing light timers in rooms staying lit while out
- When appliances fail, replacing them with more energy efficient models
- When replacing personal vehicles, choosing ones with better efficiencies (my commuting radius exceeds the capabilities of all-electric models & the winter snowfall levels here entail vehicles with 4-wheel drive capabilities)
- Recycling all paper and cardboard products (all that our local recycling center takes, unfortunately)
- Installing a gas insert into our fireplace to improve efficiencies
A good start, but clearly not enough.
The Road of Barnabas
Given the talents I was endowed with, the knowledge I've learned and the experiences which have shaped me throughout my life, I have decided that the best use of my time remaining to me was to build up a new generation of those who can make a difference amongst those around them. And by my participation here at Skeptical Science I can do that with individuals worldwide.
So I work mostly behind the scenes here at SkS, sometimes writing blog posts, moderating (a very thankless task I find, but someone must do it) and by performing in an outreach capacity with the climate science community (scientists, bloggers and talented individuals alike). With the hope that, in my own small way, I am making a difference.
So What Can You Do?
Once upon a time there was a wise man who used to go to the ocean to do his writing. He had a habit of walking on the beach before he began his work.
One day he was walking along the shore. As he looked down the beach, he saw a human figure moving like a dancer. He smiled to himself to think of someone who would dance to the day. So he began to walk faster to catch up.As he got closer, he saw that it was a young man and the young man wasn't dancing, but instead he was reaching down to the shore, picking up something and very gently throwing it into the ocean.
As he got closer he called out, "Good morning! What are you doing?"
The young man paused, looked up and replied, "Throwing starfish in the ocean."
"I guess I should have asked, why are you throwing starfish in the ocean?"
"The sun is up and the tide is going out. And if I don't throw them in they'll die."
"But, young man, don't you realize that there are miles and miles of beach and starfish all along it. You can't possibly make a difference!"
The young man listened politely. Then bent down, picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea, past the breaking waves and said, "It made a difference for that one."
There is something very special in each and every one of us. We have all been gifted with the ability to make a difference. And if we can become aware of that gift, we gain through the strength of our visions the power to shape the future.
We must each find our starfish. And if we throw our stars wisely and well, the world will be blessed.
So go find your starfish...and do likewise. For we will be judged by those who come after us both by what we did do...and what we didn't do...in the time given to us.
Of course everyone has a good excuse why they are different or it can't be done for their job, and very occasionally it is believable! Perhaps in your case it really is true considering what you are prepared to endure!
Sorry for sounding like a record, as you probably know I have been over this before with someone.
I assume you drive something more fuel efficient than a 4x4 outside the winter season?
Contrary to Daniel, I tend to think that small acts produce small effects… Of course, it’s better than nothing but often, I observe my friends imagine that we can ‘save the climate’ with just such small gestures. It’ll be much more complicated, orders of magnitude are welcome! Interesting considerations about that in David MacKay
‘without the hot air’
[DB] "Contrary to Daniel, I tend to think that small acts produce small effects"
In isolation, perhaps. But one point of this post is to model for others so they can later emulate.
The other, much larger, point of this post is that if everyone does nothing, nothing gets done. And that if enough do enough of the little things often enough, then attitudes can change on a large enough scale so that larger, more significant and meaningful change can be implemented. Hence the Lao Tsu quote.
'Nuff said. ;)
Consider "offsetting" natural gas and electricity consumption with wind power, for example.
Phantom power draw is also quite a biggy.
Daniel is quite far north, but a solar water heater might be an option. And rain barrels to collect water in the warm season.
The car is tricky, there are 4x4 hybrids out there but they are expensive.
I wish there were a magic wand for transportation. Use mass transit as much as possible.
[DB] Tire chains are problematic in Michigan:
(Emphasis added)
That last requirement effectively nullifies their usage except in extremis.
Thanks for all your effort moderating the scene here at Skeptical Science. The tone of the discussion is what sets this site apart.
Surprising. This is why math is superior to guessing.
This assumes you drive 100 miles/day (250 days/year), the 4x4 gets 17MPG and that gas is $3/gallon. Taxes and insurance are not factored in.
[DB] "Daniel could actually benefit from a 2nd car."
Actually, we do have 2 vehicles (my wife also works fulltime). Unfortunately both are classified as SUVs. As soon as we can afford it we plan on getting a "riceburner" or hybrid for non-winter usage and park the larger of the two.
I had neglected to hilite it in the OP (didn't survive my final edits), but we just had moved back into town last winter. Thus we are able to park both vehicles after work so we can walk & ride bicycles (um, in the NON-winter months), especially on the weekends. And we do have a moped for just running errands around town when the weather permits (67 mpg).
Kudos to you! This "skeptic" can tick off the same accomplishments as pertains to my house. We even close off a large room that is rarely used and have shunted heating/cooling duct output from areas that don't them as much to areas that do.
I also have shade trees that are maturing and help keep the house cooler in the summer.
My wife just traded cars and is getting 50% better gas mileage for her commute. Like you, I am forced to drive a 4WD SUV for job purposes, but I drive a smaller one with better gas mileage, and I ride a bike or run to the gym when time and weather permit.
Regardless of my view on the AGW theory, I do these things because they are right. Along with recycling all glass, paper, and aluminum/metal products, composting, and using a mulching mower.
It is not clear to me that Daniel thinks that. Some things he suggested were small, but using the numbers in MacKay's book, house heat/cooling and transportation are big items. The effect is only small if only a few people make those changes. I crunched MacKay's numbers for NZers ( see here though this version has cost of insulation out by order of magnitude) and found you make big difference with flying and transportation.
[DB] "There has to be a plan that gets everyone on board to make a real difference."
To train up a legion to effect change: part of the long-term strategy I have.
Meh. But more positive than this.
My list of personal efforts is mainly similar to yours with a couple of exeptions. Living in a much warmer climate and having far less distance to travel for work purposes, I drive an energy efficient vehicle and am hunting for something even less thirsty to replace it with. Unfortunately, public transport is not an option for me as no services run from where I work to where I live.
I find that any perceptions of me being some kind of do gooder who wants to save the world (a bad thing to many people)can be avoided by simply explaining that I'm a cheap skinflint. I don't use airconditioning because it is expensive. I use room heating only on the coldest of evennings. It seems cheapskates are more socially acceptable.
Regarding several posts about small improvements not making any difference: don't forget to include the multiplier from application of cheap fixes by large numbers of people. See the left end of this graph.
https://solutions.mckinsey.com/ClimateDesk/default.aspx
http://i1225.photobucket.com/albums/ee395/Jim264/mckinsey-ghg-abatement-curve.png.
Don't know why the link in the original post contains an extraneous 'current='
LOL Stevo. This is a point I often make myself. Yes I'm a "do-gooder" who wants to cut his CO2 emissions, but I'm also trying to cut my costs & save money, & what better way to do it than to cut my energy & fuel consumption?
In fact anyone living in a region with reasonable solar incentives / FIT could justify installation as simply an investment option rather than a save-the-world choice. The cash return for capital outlaid can be much better than normal investment. With a very nice backup that the returns are stable, increasing and near permanent even when the bonus FIT reduces, a reassuring alternative for those worried about their savings, shares or superannuation. And for those concerned about 'over-capitalising' their house, solar PV is a much, much better option than a granite benchtop in the kitchen.
My 'back of the envelope calculation' shows that $3.00/gallon gas translates to about 80c per litre, a price most of the developed world has not seen in a long time. Here in Alberta for example, the average price per litre for regular gas is $1.09. A simple, but politically impossible task that might encourage the use of more fuel efficient cars would be to bring the price of U.S. gas more in line with the rest of the developed world.
(personally, I find all those mercury switch central heating thermostats used in some cold climates to be a far greater risk)
LEDs are great - I replaced the halogen downlights in our kitchen with LEDs a few years back. Being early model LED downlights, they're not quite equivalent to a 50w halogen in light output, but they're more than bright enough (how bright does your house really need to be at night?)
Cost-wise - they cost me, each, about 50 times the halogen bulbs I replaced. Based on the price I paid, I would have to run them for 4 hours a day for 7 years to make up the $$ cost difference. That's ignoring the fact that the halogens were burning out at the rate of 1 every 6-9 months, and I also had to replace one transformer that died (and another was clearly on it's last legs when I pulled it out to install the LED transformer).
I will say, though, that costs have come down at least 50-60% since then, so the payback period is now only 3-4 years (or less!), for about 4 hrs per day of usage. We've had them for maybe 3 years so far, and I'm planning on replacing a few other light fittings with LEDs.
One disadvantage - the halogens used to throw an enormous amount of light up in the ceiling space. Wasted energy, generally, but it was quite handy on the rare occasions that I was working up there... Now I have to carry an LED worklight up with me. :-)
One suggestion - diesel vehicles are generally far more fuel-efficient than gasoline / petrol engined vehicles. I used to fill up my previous car every 10-12 days, but the diesel I bought to replace it a few years ago only gets filled about once per month!
Combine that with the high price of petrol/gasoline, and you can see why diesel cars are so popular in Europe (and are becoming more so here in Australia - I was the third person in my 40-employee office to get one).
They've placed a mirror about 4ft long, 18in wide on the ceiling - basically it's directly above the area where customers stand to order/pay. It means they need very little lighting apart from the windows.
All I have to do is line it up with the not very large window and keep it away from steam etc. Means I won't have to worry about lighting for new positions for oven and other appliances. Nifty! (Thankfully this house has conventional ceiling heights, not the 11ft+ monsters in our old (very old) house. Wouldn't have been anoption there.)
But you can actually make a bigger difference by reviewing your not so obvious uses of energy. For example, the energy required to produce a couple of kilos of beef is substantially greater than that for the equivalent vegetables, so becoming a vegetarian is actually an excellent way to save energy (if you want to become a vegetarian). A less drastic solution would be to cut down your meat intake, or to stop eating fast food.
A large part of the problem is over consumption and wastefulness. How about you ask yourself if you really need all the material good you possess, or whether you need to replace things so quickly. Have a look in the mirror. Do you eat too much? Do you waste food?
It will be wonderful when all our energy comes from non-polluting sources. But the problem of too many people consuming more than they realy need will remain, unless we substantially change our approach to life.
But it is an investment. Now that the 4m by 1m heap of potato crop (in straw and other goodies) is nearing maturity, even if the potatoes aren't that impressive, we'll also have a good crop of earthworms. (I'm not that desperate for protein, so they're going to keep on improving the soil for further crops.)
I expect we won't be vegetarian but more like potatomatocapsicarian looking at what the garden's doing. And of course, there's what to do with zucchinis. Buying a freezer to store a chocolate-zucchini-cake mountain doesn't seem very sensible - but there are limits to how many zucchinis family and neighbours are willing to take on after weeks of gritting their teeth and smiling at you. The obvious solution is chooks. But they'll have to wait until sheds and tanks are done.
As for people who don't grow their own, I think council waste collection systems that provide separate containers for food waste along with other compostables might get a few people rethinking their food purchases. They can actually see the volume of their 'waste' and maybe even compare it to the volume of their shopping. And reframing sell-by and use-by dating on many products would also cut down a lot of unnecessary discarding of perfectly good food.
LED's prices have been plummeting. From one specimen two years ago, I see 10-15 types at hardware stores.
From my "quotes" file (to which I've added your "we will be judged...") -
===
As Bill McKibben says:
“The number one thing is to organize politically; number two, do some political organizing; number three, get together with your neighbors and organize; and then if you have energy left over from all of that, change the light bulb.”
===
"You do:
everything you can to
increase public demand for
significant and immediate policy action to
combat global climate change.
(Here’s the part where you get creative)"
The report, “State of the World’s Land and Water Resources for Food and Agriculture” notes that while the last 50 years witnessed a notable increase in food production, “in too many places, achievements have been associated with management practices that have degraded the land and water systems upon which food production depends.”
Source: “Scarcity and degradation of land and water: growing threat to food security” Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations news release, Nov 28, 2011
To access the entire news release, click here.
1. Build infrastructure that puts businesses closer to homes. Build communities where it is natural to walk and cycle etc. and the car is not seen as being essential.
2. Legislate for all new homes to be built to use the minimum amount of energy. This would depend on the location globally, but passive home design is a proven idea that works.
I drive a Scion xA and routinely get 40 mpg, which is above the EPA rating for that model (when it was still in production).
We certainly need to change the nouns and verbs in our lives (what we buy and what we do with it), but we also need to change the adjective and adverbs (how we do things).
[DB] I have found that I improved my gas mileage by 6 mpg by reducing my average speed from 5 mph above the speed limit (yes, I was one of the masses who routinely flouted the speed limits) to 1 mph under the speed limit. Much better mileage and no chance of speeding tickets. And lower blood pressure.
'it would be really useful for carrying a lawnmower to the repair company, or for picking up some timber from the DIY store'.
Yet they often only ever do this once or twice a year or even never! So the reality is they could have got the store to deliver for a fraction of the cost of the the fuel and materials needed to build and use the bigger vehicle. Yeah a few people 'need' them, but most vehicles are driven with just the driver at the wheel 90% of the time. Plus of course cars need a lot of parking space at various places to cope with the probability of someone needing a parking space.
My little mini that I treasured in the early 70s could take massive things - lawnmowers, compressors, food for 40 people for a weekend. Made the proud owners of large cars weep.
How? Just remove the front passenger seat. Much easier access than in the largest boot.
It's all about design. And spanners. (But not modern safety standards, unfortunately.)
California at least is a lot more liberal on that. For those afflulent enough to afford 4 wheel drive who live in snow country, it is hard to resist the feeling that you have to have it. For those who can't afford it, take comfort that you are helping your own bottom line as well as the planet every time you get your fingers icy cold and your clothes wet by putting on the chains or taking them off.
I always thought the narrow streets you find in most European cities were designed on purpose to keep gross vehicles out. Imagine trying to drive something like a typical American SUV in a (French, Italian, Spanish, English) village - or trying to park it.
A little less tongue in cheek - a lot of US drivers buy what amount to tanks for simple self-protection. There are an awful lot of idiots here who run a stop sign or a red light because of chatting it up on a cellphone, or whatever.
Small cars lose in confrontation with one of those.
Adelady #40: The mini is still a nice car - and I bet you could get a sheet of plywood on the roof if you wanted to move it. Why can't they make these small cars (I have a Fit) so you can get an 8 ft long piece of lumber inside?
We are typical for Japanese, but that automatically implies that we have about half the environmental impact of a typical American. And you know what - the quality life here is completely comparible to the quality of life in America, all across the income spectrum. In fact, I would argue it is quite a bit better for the bottom third. But that is another subject entirely. Either way, this country proves that there is no substantial trade-off between the good life and drastically cutting one's emissions.
good job, we all should do the best we can. Only a narrow mind may think it isn't worth doing our own part.
I recently heard a meteorologist tell a story when asked what we could personally do about climate change, the story of the great fire in the forest. While all the animals were running away the lion saw a tiny humming bird flying toward the fire. The lion stopped and shouted "what the hell are you doing!?" and the hummingbird bird, with a littly drop of water in his mounth, "I'm doing my part".
I heard different versions of this story and unfortunately I can't trace it back to the original.
Daniel, no matter what other peolple do, do the rigth thing.
Hot water bottle.