Twice-worn socks and vertical farming
Posted 04.04.2007 at 3:13 pm
8 Comments
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| Vertical farm design by Chris Jacobs |
Truth time: The weekend has come and gone, and I’ve yet to make good on last week’s promises to swap out my incandescent bulbs for compact fluorescents. I still can’t find CF bulbs that work with dimmer switches. (Hit me with suggestions, folks.) As an alternative, I’m skimping on electricity, keeping the lights on low or off altogether. Let it be known that I enjoy reading in bed with a camouflage Petzel LED headlamp in lieu of bedside lighting. The white light is easier on the eyes, and the whole effect is rather cozy. It feels like camping, except without the funky tent smell.
Speaking of funky smells, last week’s carbon-reducing efforts also included wearing a pair of socks twice—the average washing machine consumes about 40 gallons of water per load, the energy equivalent of leaving the fridge door open for an entire day—and I reduced the number of times I ran the dishwasher from four to two times during the week. Humble measures, to be sure, but like MegaCarbon Emitter says, it’s about making sustainable lifestyle changes. On that score, I applaud MCE’s efforts to ease off the meats. We all know that raising livestock is tough on the planet. But sadly, so is raising sweet little crunchy vegetables. Industrial farming is particularly brutal, using 939 million pounds of pesticides each year and consuming 70 percent of our annual freshwater supply. (You can learn more about the hazards of agriculture at oxfamamerica.org.) For those reasons among others, I’m particularly intrigued by a concept recently featured in New York magazine known as vertical farming: basically, a giant skyscraping hothouse. Its chief proponent, Columbia University microbiologist Dickson Despommier, says that a 58-floor “farm” building with eight million square feet of growing area built on 140,000 square feet of land, can produce the same amount of food as 1.6 square miles of traditional farmland—enough to feed 35,000 people year-round. If these statistics hold true, vertical farms may be all but mandatory come 2050, when the number of humans roaming the planet will increase by three billion and more than 90 percent of the world’s population will reside in cities. Imagine the resources saved if the majority of those people ate local produce? Which brings me to this week’s carbon-reducing goal: to eat locally. And by that I don’t mean ordering from Bo Bo’s Chinese takeout two blocks from my apartment, as tempting as that is. No, it means shopping for produce grown within 250 miles of me. Or, more likely, skipping the vegetables altogether. —Nicole Dyer
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This GE page says they have a CFL that can be dimmed. http://www.gelighting.com/na/home_lighting/ask_us/faq_compact.htm#dimmer
Other problem areas for CFLs are appliances (stove, freezer), rough-service and small form factors (2-3 inches).
If I hear one more person talk about carbon offsets I am going to puke. This is the biggest farce I have ever heard of. This is a way for rich people to feel better about using way more that their fair share of energy. Why not have the government subsidize solar energy and make it affordable. It would cost me $70,000 to retrofit my house for solar, if it was only $20,000 to $30,000 I would take out a second and do it. That is Green, not paying money cause you are to lazy to change your ways and feel guilty.
RE: to Ted P
"Why not have the government subsidize solar energy and make it affordable."
Ted, the last thing America needs is the government to subsidize more. May I use a current events example of Ethanol. The government is subsidizing $0.50 per gallon of Ethanol. The last gas station I was at that had ethanol (a week ago), the price was $2.49/gal which was $0.17 less than the "lowest grade" gasoline. However, take off the $0.50/gal the government is shelling out and ethanol costs more than regular gasoline. So who would buy ethanol if it costs more than gasoline? Answer: no one. On top of that, what about someone like me that doesn't have a flex fuel car? Where do you think the government is getting the funding for subsidizing the price of ethanol? Why, yes, of course! From tax payers!! So, in essence, I am paying for something that I can not benefit from, and in the end, those individuals that are buying ethanol are paying the $$$ in taxes for their "cheaper" fuel.
...Don't get me started on the push for using corn (corn being one of the lowest yielding products that could be used to create ethanol).
Chris, the government isn't doing a very good job of subsidising ethanol considering their $.54 a gallon tarrif on brazillian ethanol. It would be way cheaper to buy ethanol than it would to buy gas if they didn't do that. They're just trying to impress corn farmers.
Why there was no mention of organic farming in here I do not know as it is much healthier for people and the planet as far as resource demands and can have as good if not better crop yields when done properly.
As for subsidizing, the government could subsidize our entire country into a majority of wind, solar, micro hydro, tilde energy production (lets not forget about the most important one, CONSERVATION!!!). But first it/we would need to stop sending half of our energy=money on new nifty ways to kill each other, just take a look at all the revenue from taxes and then the pentagons budget.
RE: Brad
I know the US isn't doing us any favors with subsidizing ethanol. It's all a big gimmick.
I know that this is completely Random and away from where you are talking, yes i agree with changing bulbs to help reduce the amount of electricity used and etc. But i think the real problem is getting people to join the fad, Since the US' whole culture works on fads, we as a group of people concerned about the future of the earth need to rub off on others. The other thing that i think needs to be done is to hit higher up in the commercial and political channels. Getting you and me to do something is so small that it really does not make a difference where as, if we get a politician to get involved and say, we can only make LED Light bulbs, or getting a commercial business involved with a return on the investment they would be more interested.
Two Big scale ideas that i had, which you may or may not like were Installing Solar Panels on Major Sports Stadiums. For many reasons this can provide a valuable return. These stadiums do not operate in a constant fashion like other buildings. They also do not consume large amounts of energy all week or even all day long. If we were to have solar power on a stadium, it would generate more then it would be using. Feed this energy back into the main grid, and you have taken that much off of the Natural gas or coal plants. The large surface of the roof provides great quantities of room to be able to put a lot of solar panels and with them being installed on the roof they are way out of the publics eye. so it does not prove to be such an eye sore. In Washington DC, they are constructing a new stadium in which i emailed the Mayor of DC about this issue. He has not replied to my concerns and i am hoping that other people will want to catch onto this idea. You get one city to do this to their stadium, and other cities will want to follow the fad.
SO i guess i only had one idea. I tried.
Much Respect
Shaun
Exotic Ho Chi Minh City, still referred to as 'Saigon' by many, has preserved its distinctly Asian feel and ancient culture, where monks pray in the numerous pagodas, temples and mosques. The capital Hanoi, is a pleasant and charming city of lakes, shaded boulevards and public parks. The old quarter, built around the Hoan Kiem Lake, is an architectural museum-piece characterised by its narrow streets. Ha Long Bay, with its 3000-plus islands rising from the clear, emerald waters, dotted with beaches and grottoes created by waves, is one of Vietnam's natural marvels.