Al Gore - Kill The Messenger

The message is finally starting to take hold with the average American; global warming is real and is a serious threat. Yet conservative groups continue to try to discredit the message and are now trying to discredit the messenger. The Tennessee Center for Policy Research is putting Al Gore under fire for owning a mansion while educating the public on global warming.
The “hypocrisy” in owning a mansion is that large homes consume more energy than small homes. They call him a hypocrite for having a large house while preaching environmental responsibility.
Al Gore not only can afford a mansion, he can afford to invest in offsetting amounts of renewable energy, and he does. The Gore family maintains a zero net effect on the environment in terms of energy consumed. Few people have achieved that. Few people bother to try.
It is vital the message of global warming reaches the masses quickly. One of the reasons Al Gore is able to reach many more people than other messengers is that he makes helping the cause seem “doable” to the average person.
I saw a clip on television of Ed Begley Jr. riding a stationary bicycle to create electricity to run a toaster to make toast. I’m not willing to do that. Are you? Ed Begley Jr. represents what the voice of environmentalism has traditionally looked like to many Americans. Very fringe. Very difficult. It’s a voice that will not move enough people to action before it’s too late.
Al Gore, as messenger, shows us that you can have your “American dream” and be green too.
This is what the Tennessee Center for Policy Research is really attacking. By attacking Al Gore’s use of power at his mansion, they are saying that you cannot live well by traditional standards AND be green. This makes, in the eyes of most Americans, the “American dream” incompatible with the green movement. That means that Al Gore cannot be listened to as a voice for the green movement. That leaves us back with the Ed Begley Jr. types as the voice of environmentalism, which means most people will not listen.

Do not be distracted by this political slight-of-hand.

Global warming is real and the threat is immediate. The masses must move to action. Send a postcard to your representatives in D.C. at http://www.algore.com/cards.html . Use fluorescent light bulbs. Plant a tree. You too can be part of the solution to global warming……….. even if you own a Texas-sized home.

A Shining Example

An excellent example of capitalism and science saving the environment is the Citizenrē REnU program.

What is the science part of this example? Good 'ol solar energy! It's clean and renewable!

What's the capitalism part? They have a new approach to make solar energy accessible to and easy for the average home owner....all while being a profitible business!

Citizenrē REnU will lease solar panel systems to its customers. You can go solar with no upfront costs! You can have the current electrical rate locked in for 25 years! You WILL save money. You will also have electricity during power outages. They even deal with all of the permits, set-up, maintenance and other headaches FOR you!!!!

What's the drawback? Long term, you pay more than buying the system outright. But with the upfront price of going solar so high, most people will just not buy it. So you won't be green and in a few years you will be paying even more for electricity. If you aren't going to run out NOW and buy a solar system, then go with Citizenrē REnU. It's a thousand times better than doing nothing.

http://renu.citizenre.com/

Global Warming - Take it easy and GET SERIOUS

Did you see Al Gore on Oprah? Have you already see or read "An Inconvenient Truth"? If not, you may still be trying to ignore the global warming crisis.

Do not dismiss the importance of what is happening!

We are still in time to fix things relatively easily before great disaster occurs. Soon it will be very difficult to recover. Lets do this thing while it's easy!

You don't want massive devastation and suffering to occur. I know you don't. But you might want to just blow this off because you think it is just too hard to do anything.

Well, it's easy to help and vastly important.

Here are Al Gore's 5 easy things you can do now:

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Compact fluorescent light bulbs: These energy-efficient bulbs cost less than $4 and are produced by major corporations like GE. If every household in America switched five regular light bulbs for five fluorescent bulbs, it would be the equivalent of taking 1 million cars off the highways for a full year.

Outdoor solar lighting: These yard or patio lights cost less than $20, and they don't burn any electricity or produce any CO2.

Programmable thermostats: Though these thermostats cost from $50 to $100, they can actually cut your heating and cooling costs. Set the setting so it's a little bit cooler in the winter and warmer in the summer when you're not in the house. A difference of 2 degrees can reduce a home's CO2 emissions by up to 9 percent over the course of a year.

Air filters: Changing the air filters in your heating and cooling systems regularly can knock 2 percent off of your CO2 output each year.

Electric hot water heater blanket: Hot water heaters use a lot of energy and generate a lot of CO2. A blanket costs less than $18 and can cut your home's CO2 emissions by almost 4 1/2 percent.

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Now see, that's not like I'm asking you to drive a car that fits you like a wet suit.

If you want to find out more and maybe even go carbon nuetral, check out www.climatecrisis.net

Ethanol - Why aren't we doing more?

So it used to be that Ethanol made gas a little more expensive. Well, not anymore. Even with the recent lowering of gas prices, it's still pretty darn expensive. And President Bush's solution? .... Let's rape are protected lands for more oil!!!!

Hold on a minute! What about ethanol? Not only is it fuel made from PLANTS (renewable) but it actually reduces pollution! The more we make of this stuff, the less oil we need and the cleaner the air will be. What's the hold-up?

I think it's the oil industry. Deep pockets, you know. And our own resistance to change. Some people see "ethanol blend" on the gas pump and they think that it's a problem. It's not a problem! Ethanol is the best part of that fuel!

There are evidently a few old studies that say it takes more energy to create ethanol than the fuel provides, but that is not so. With modern production processes, ethanol creates at least 77% more energy as a fuel than it takes to creat it.

Ethanol plants are good for the local economies where they are located. Also, new technology will allow ethanol to be made from "cellulosic" fieldstocks like corn stalks, grain straw, paper pulp, municipal solid waste and others. Isn't that exciting?

Help for our environment and and our oil dependence is SOOOO close, if only we would just put the necessary resources behind it. It won't fix everything that needs fixing, but sure will bring us a long way forward.

The oil industry should stop spending money on bribing our politicians to rape our protected lands and start spending money on developing ethanol and other alternative fuels. We WILL move beyond oil some day. There is no reason for the oil companies to get left out in the cold if they are willing to help us create this brighter future.

To read more about ethanol, check out http://www.ethanol.org/index.htm

You can write to Congress at http://capwiz.com/ethanol/home/

Phytoremediation

Phytoremediation is an example of how science can help heal what science has harmed. This term refers to the use of plants to clean the environment around them, both soil and air.

Part of this science is using the existing properties of plants and a great deal of it envolves engineering plants to effectively clean certain elements out of soil and air. So let me be clear. I am pro genetic engineering. I think it is necessary to our survival with our current and future population levels.

I do believe it can go wrong and we need to be very careful. Our scientists need to have an attititude that they are trying to engineer helpful plants that will not throw nature out of balance, but work with nature's balance.

Genetic engineering is currently the focus of phytoremediation for soil cleanup. We are currently limited in the types of elements that can be scrubbed from the soil using plants. Hopefully this is an area that will see great growth.

There are currently lists of existing houseplants that can help clean the air indoors of things such as benzene, formaldehyde, CO and nitrogen oxides.

But here is a way to bring capitalism into the picture. What if someone were to develope a "super" air scrubbing plant for households and commercial buildings. That would make a lot money, clean the air around us, and reduce our need for electrical appliances such as air purifiers.

Seems like a "green" idea to me and a couple senses of the word.

(check out http://www.mobot.org/jwcross/phytoremediation/ for more information on phytoremediation)

The Green Realist

On no! The environment is going to pot and it's all our fault!

I don't want pollution. Do you want pollution? I don't want the elimination of the few remaining pristine areas of nature. Do you? I want something done about this. Don't you?

But I tell you what.......I would rather face the end of the world than face the end of indoor plumbing.

See, that's the problem I have with a lot of "green" folks. Many seem to be anti science and anti mondern conveniences. I sure am PRO modern conveniences.

So far capitalism and science have been the main source of the destruction of our planet. But I don't think that either is inherently bad. I think we need to embrace both with a different mindset.

We need to create a new culture in which people want to make money in a way that is benefitial to the planet. We need a culture where scientists always are looking for ways to create better technologies that also improve the planet and never harm it.

This is our only way out of this mess. Abandoning these capitalism or science will never be embraced by enough people, and it wouldn't work anyways with current population levels.

The power is with us non-radical "green realists" to save the world.