Eco Lesbo Vego

Weekly Round-up #4

January 31, 2009 at 4:02 pm Leave a comment

So what did we talk about this week? What has been happening in the world?

Eco Lesbo Vego

We discussed:

• How and why local travel can dramatically reduce climate change – and why local travel is more fun than it’s often cracked up to be.
• Decreasing your environmental footprint and reducing your tissue usage by investing in some hankies.
• Second-hand furniture – why you should (re)use it and where you can source it.
• Why everyone is up in arms about using ethical metal, and actions you can take to use recycled metals and also recycle your own.

I also posted a vegan recipe – Apricot and Cashew Stir-fry. This stir-fry is a fruity, savoury combo that is cooked quickly at a high heat. It’ll take you back to the 90s, vegan-style!

Environmental News from Australia and Around the World

British hospitals are removing meat from the menu in an effort to reduce climate change. [hat tip: Yankee Elv!] As discussed in my Spotlight on the eco-impact of meat, the production of meat releases far more carbon, nitrogen and methane emissions not only from the animals themselves, but from the massive amounts of plant food required to feed them and the transportation needed to move them from place to place (including to the slaughter-house). This is a bold move by the health system and while I’m sure they’ll receive quite a bit of flak because of it, they get nothing but applause from me! Significant steps like these are the kind we must take if we want to have any meaningful impact on global warming.

In light of the Antarctic warming that was apparent news in last week’s round-up, this week the news is that the same warming, and subsequent melting of the sea ice in Antarctica could wipe out the emporer penguin population in less than one hundred years. Declining sea ice in the 70s already halved the population then, but it’s been stable since. Not anymore. The penguins need flat sea ice to hatch their eggs, and the food they eat in turn feeds off the organisms living underneath the sea ice. Antarctic warming = sea ice melting = penguins dying = bad. Bad!

Growing certain crops could help reduce global warming by more than 1°C each year as particular kinds of plants reflect sunlight better than others. Choosing certain species of the same food crops we already grow could be the answer. The article says that crops actually reflect sunlight better than natural vegetation… but I wonder, do they absorb carbon as well? And what about the impact of clearing the land to grow the crops? That being said, if we can replace what we already grow with species that are more eco-friendly, I’m all for it.

Competition for water could be coming sooner than we think, according to the World Economic Forum report released this week. Although only 3 percent of fresh water is consumed, much larger percentages are used in energy and food production. With the melting of the Himalayan and Tibetan glaciers, which provide drinking water for more than 2 billion people, expected to be complete in less than a hundred years, we are facing a global water scarcity which will likely force fierce competition amongst nations and neighbours. Doom and gloom? Maybe. But that seems to be what the news looks like this week. Are we too late to save the human race? The CEO of PepsiCo (hahahaha!) doesn’t think so – apparently collaboration between goverments and corporations could prevent all out war. Hmm. I sense a little bias there. I’ll keep getting my water from the tap, and saving it wherever possible. The state government also better get it’s arse into gear on the production of the desalination plant on the Gold Coast that was due to open last year.

Al Gore is set to talk with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about climate change and what can be done to minimise it. Read his prepared remarks here.

Scientists suggest that the carbon emissions we’ve made and will make in the future, even as we struggle to reduce and eliminate them, may have caused irreversible climate change. The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colorado says that even if we eliminate our carbon emissions by 2050 (that’s within my lifetime), there will still be so much carbon in the atmosphere that sea levels will rise by one metre, glaciers will melt and average global temperatures will cool by only tenths of a degree. This is more of the doom and gloom I was talking about earlier – the news this week is full of it – and it’s got me wondering. Can we do anything to save the planet? (Or rather, the human race – the planet will be fine). I think every little bit counts, so I’m still going to do my part – maybe those tenths of a degree will be important in the future. I may start making more effort to learn how to be self-sufficient though, just in case. No, I’m not going to go move to the boonies and become an eco-hermit (although if I could afford it, the moving to the not-far-from-the-city boonies is quite appealing… not so much into the hermit thing though). But I might try growing some herbs again. I also might try using our home-grown chilies to make my sweet chili sauce rather than buying a new bottle when this one runs out – which will be a while as we have a massive bottle that Mr Teeny-bop got as a Secret Santa present at school last year. Yeah, it was weird.

Of course, there’s lots of other news, but that’s all I have time for today! Did I miss anything particularly important? Leave a comment and let me know.

Entry filed under: Weekly Round-up. Tags: environmental news.