The Save the Planet thread

[marciero]

This is partially prompted by the make-up remover/wipes thread. I think we can talk about the environmental impact of our practices and the products we use without a) smugness, judging, or shaming of someone who, god forbid, might have used a disposable product, b) calling PC when someone advocates less impactful alternatives, c) drifting into the very concrete political implications.

Two things I’ve thought about are zip ties and nitrile gloves. Used zip ties have got to be much worse than straws, with a barb and sharp edges. In the past I’ve used these for all sorts of bike-related things but am going to make serious effort to eliminate for all but permanent or at least semi-permanent use. Cloth straps, Voile straps, rawhide shoelaces are some alternatives.

Nitrile gloves... These are hard for me to give up. THis can ease some of the guilt but I am dubious-they claim to recycle anything.
https://www.terracycle.com/en-US/zer...posable-gloves
Even if they are in fact recycling the waste products, recycling can have varying degrees of impact.
I think more permanent dishwaser-type gloves are a pretty straightforward solution, though you cant pick a dime...

Convenience items while touring are also troubling (to me anyway) like disposal of bottles and cans at convenience stores, not to mention junk food items and waste. Often (usually?) these stores do not have a recycling receptacle. One would have to carry the empty bottle in their pack until the next opportunity to recycle.

I am doing a short tour this week and may try to keep a record of my practices.

Another thing is air travel. I took one trip this year whose sole purpose was cycling. Maybe one trip per year is okay for me. I’m not sure. Each of us has to decide this type of thing for ourselves.

I’d be interested in people’s thoughts on these; again, without judgement.

[Clancy]

Sorry to be this cynical but....

I cut down my use of electricity by keeping the thermostat high, turn off lights when not in use, in order to minimize my impact on the environment.

Meanwhile, the stores in the local outdoor gigantic mall keep their doors wide open with cold air pouring out to make it more inviting for customers. This is in San Antonio!

(Couple years ago I wrote a letter to the mall owner’s pointing out the insane wastefulness of this practice, they responded by saying they have no control over their tenants. When commenting to a co-worker, she responded how nice it is to go shopping with a baby stroller and not to have to open doors. )

We have long pasted the tipping point.

Protecting rather than modifying capitalism has led to the destruction of our planet.

[peanutgallery]

How many billions of the earth's residents pay absolutely no mind to environmental concerns? What percentage struggles for basic food and clean water? Treehuggers are right but their concern is meaningless, the horse is out of the barn. The sheer number of resources that humans in general, and Americans in particular, suck thru is staggering. Humans are doomed, basically. Dark thought, but true

[oldpotatoe]

Originally Posted by peanutgallery

How many billions of the earth's residents pay absolutely no mind to environmental concerns? What percentage struggles for basic food and clean water? Treehuggers are right but their concern is meaningless, the horse is out of the barn. The sheer number of resources that humans in general, and Americans in particular, suck thru is staggering. Humans are doomed, basically. Dark thought, but true

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCCLqpAVg6Y

[peanutgallery]

I'm looking forward to subterranean living and developing the ability to dodge bullets in slow motion

Originally Posted by oldpotatoe

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCCLqpAVg6Y

[oldpotatoe]

Another thing is air travel. I took one trip this year whose sole purpose was cycling.

I heard yesterday on NPR that ONE flight from LA to NY results in 32 square feet of arctic ice melting...Not sure how they get to that but aircraft are VERY dirty..comparatively.

BUT unless some of these items get scarce, maybe expensive, but scarce..don't expect use to change much. Few people do these things mentioned because 'it's good for the environment'..most use these items because they are cheap and plentiful.

Sorry, pretty cynical about this. Having national leaders poo-poo all this in the name of $ doesn't help.

WE probably aren't screwed(baby boomers) but our kids and most certainly or grand kids are...Watch Soylent Green again...

[peanutgallery]

But those 105 kits from the UK, what a deal...right?

Imagine, just the impact of Amazon prime?

Originally Posted by oldpotatoe

I heard yesterday on NPR that ONE flight from LA to NY results in 32 square feet of arctic ice melting...Not sure how they get to that but aircraft are VERY dirty..comparatively.

BUT unless some of these items get scarce, maybe expensive, but scarce..don't expect use to change much. Few people do these things mentioned because 'it's good for the environment'..most use these items because they are cheap and plentiful.

Sorry, pretty cynical about this. Having national leaders poo-poo all this in the name of $ doesn't help.

WE probably aren't screwed(baby boomers) but our kids and most certainly or grand kids are...Watch Soylent Green again...

[Tickdoc]

Originally Posted by oldpotatoe

I heard yesterday on NPR that ONE flight from LA to NY results in 32 square feet of arctic ice melting...Not sure how they get to that but aircraft are VERY dirty..comparatively.

BUT unless some of these items get scarce, maybe expensive, but scarce..don't expect use to change much. Few people do these things mentioned because 'it's good for the environment'..most use these items because they are cheap and plentiful.

Sorry, pretty cynical about this. Having national leaders poo-poo all this in the name of $ doesn't help.

WE probably aren't screwed(baby boomers) but our kids and most certainly or grand kids are...Watch Soylent Green again...

I heard all trees would vanish from the planet when I was about 10yoa. At the time I loved to draw and I asked for paper for my birthday present because I was so scared of losing all the trees and not having paper. It never occurred to me that the loss of toilet paper would have posed a much greater hardship if that disastrous scenario had occurred.

That galvanized my distrust of scientific reports and data and also led to my disbelief that we are causing any of this warming. The planet is warming because that what it do. We are in that cycle and it will cool and warm and cool and warm again ad infinitum.

I'm going to drink through plastic straws and wear nitrile gloves while wiping myself with the best damn products I can find.

Recycle, reuse (well, not the wipes, and conserve when you can. I love the thought of harnessing power from your best available resources whatever they may be, but I am thoroughly unconvinced that this fear mongering is the proper use of science. The salvation of $100k all electric cars does not help anything. It does nothing to minimize the ecological deficit it provides. You just can't convince me otherwise.

I realize I am in the minority here, but my conscience can't allow me to believe things that are unproven or illogical. I am terrible at maths but this math just doesn't work for me.

[oldpotatoe]

Originally Posted by Tickdoc

I heard all trees would vanish from the planet when I was about 10yoa. At the time I loved to draw and I asked for paper for my birthday present because I was so scared of losing all the trees and not having paper. It never occurred to me that the loss of toilet paper would have posed a much greater hardship if that disastrous scenario had occurred.

That galvanized my distrust of scientific reports and data and also led to my disbelief that we are causing any of this warming. The planet is warming because that what it do. We are in that cycle and it will cool and warm and cool and warm again ad infinitum.

I'm going to drink through plastic straws and wear nitrile gloves while wiping myself with the best damn products I can find.

Recycle, reuse (well, not the wipes, and conserve when you can. I love the thought of harnessing power from your best available resources whatever they may be, but I am thoroughly unconvinced that this fear mongering is the proper use of science. The salvation of $100k all electric cars does not help anything. It does nothing to minimize the ecological deficit it provides. You just can't convince me otherwise.

I realize I am in the minority here, but my conscience can't allow me to believe things that are unproven or illogical. I am terrible at maths but this math just doesn't work for me.

Uh oh.....Ya know gravity is a theory as well, as is evolution...

gonna go get the popcorn.

[marciero]

Originally Posted by oldpotatoe

Uh oh.....Ya know gravity is a theory as well, as is evolution...

gonna go get the popcorn.

Good point. All of physics is theory. Actually, my prior comment notwithstanding, the idea of scientific theory is another thing worth discussing-maybe here, maybe not. It's pretty clear to me that many do not understand what a scientific theory is and is not, and its purpose and limitations.

[Mzilliox]

there is no impact a single person can have that is meaningful. nothing short of massive policy change and cultural change is going to do the job.

this does include shaming poor behavior, as i know no other way to make 30% of the humans on this planet care. the planet is way more important than a few fragile egos to me.

this isnt just about climate change. you guys spend time outdoors, (well most of you do anyway). you see the signs, its pretty obvious we are not taking care of things.

Im very pessimistic, to the point i decided no kids. how can one not be?

[Davist]

One thing that has become apparent, even if you/me are thinking we're doing the right thing (in this case recycling being incinerated) in some cases it is not being done by those whom we trust to do..

https://www.phillymag.com/news/2019/...g-incinerator/

China refusing recycling (known as "foreign garbage" ie not being recycled there either):
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/c...ic-papers.html

Back to the OP, why are you using so many cable ties that you worry about recycling? I view them as semi permanent, like a fender mount for the winter. They (original nylon ty-raps) should be recyclable, and there are re usable options. I also use Velcro (real Velcro brand) tape (double sided loops on one side/hooks on other) from Joann fabrics for most bike things (like when the fake Velcro wears out on saddle bags, or to hold a frame pump, etc)

[Kirk007]

Interesting questions - what to do? does it make a difference? If it doesn't make a difference should I do it anyway?

As someone who walked away from a lucrative career in the private practice of law to pursue the Quixodic quest to do my part to save the nonhuman species on earth, I ask myself these questions frequently.

What to do? What you can. Will it matter or makle a difference? Maybe, but I've been at this a long time and many/most times I go through this mental exercise I conclde no, we're screwed. But then I put that out of mind and carry on. Why?

In my view there are only two fundamental choices: excercise individual responsibility and do what you can in hopes that we find a way out of this mess or essentially say it's hopeless so I'm just gonna live my life without regard. When I look at or think of my son, I choose the former. For me it's that simple.

So I say do what you can and you are comfortable with, whether its fewer airline flights, giving up (or eating less beef), recycling nitrile gloves and not using zip ties. But none of us are perfect and few if any of us will live a life of truly minimal impact. That makes it easy for others to point fingers and cry hypocrite, and factually they're not wrong. But if we let perfect be the enemy of the good then surely we are doomed.

There are now about 7.7 homo sapiens on earth. Two hundred years ago we numbered about 1 million. Each individual eats, craps, uses, consumes. Consumes what? Goods grown, raised or manufactured on this little green orb in space. Are resources disappearing? Google is coming out with an interesting tool that allows one to view time elapsed aerial photos showing landscape level changes over reasonably long periods of time (forgetting the name right now but will look for it) - it's impactful - pictures worth a thousand words - and demonstrates some of the changes we have wrought.

While we've raised the earth's capacity to grow food and accomodate us because we are very clever, if you think about it every conflict on earth can be reduced to issues of control and power that are fundamentally tied to resource scarcity and control, and with a changing climate expect those conflicts to worsen. Why do folks think many people are trying to migrate elsewhere, like to here. When the place that you have lived your life is sinking into the sea or desolately dry and unable to provide, what do you do? When the resources in your country are controlled by a different tribe that believes there's only enough for members of that tribe and no "others" what do you do? If you are powerful and determine there are insufficient resources for your tribe, and your neighbors are weak, what happens?

Unless you believe that homo sapiens are not animals like all the rest of the species on earth, it's not hard to observe populations dynamics, behaivor and what happens when species are confronted by scarcity. And its easy to read books about how we have migrated across continents, laying waste to food sources, like fisheries and other resources., and then looking for the next supply. We have not escaped fundamental ecological and biological realities, and at some point I fear the consequences for all life on earth will be severe.

[fiamme red]

Originally Posted by Kirk007

There are now about 7.7 homo sapiens on earth. Two hundred years ago we numbered about 1 million. Each individual eats, craps, uses, consumes. Consumes what? Goods grown, raised or manufactured on this little green orb in space. Are resources disappearing? Google is coming out with an interesting tool that allows one to view time elapsed aerial photos showing landscape level changes over reasonably long periods of time (forgetting the name right now but will look for it) - it's impactful - pictures worth a thousand words - and demonstrates some of the changes we have wrought.

It was interesting to see the chronological aerial views of Bothwell Ranch in San Fernando Valley from 1947 to 2002: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/11/u...nge-grove.html.

In Orange County, NY, farmland has disappeared quickly during my lifetime, making way for sprawling McMansions with huge lawns. Now that we get cheap food from overseas, local farming is unprofitable.

[daker13]

I took marciero's original post to be asking, what can we cyclists--or let's say, the cyclists who care about such things--do to reduce our carbon footprint?

There's a related problem, though: in asking about the ways we can reduce our footprint on the planet, we inevitably have to deal with the question of whether any of these actions are 'worth it.' And this leaves the door open to anyone who doesn't believe that humans play a role in climate change, doesn't believe in climate change at all, doesn't think we can or should do anything about it, etc.

I'd prefer if the thread set aside the larger questions about climate change and simply focused on material things like the ones marciero mentioned--nitrile gloves, etc. Clearly environmentally friendly products form a distinctly successful market within the cycling community--citrus degreaser, things like that. And cycling itself is obviously an 'environmentally friendly' practice.

Granted, the meta questions are hard to ignore. But I think most of us are familiar with the various arguments for and against belief in climate change.

Here's a meta question, for example: I read recently that 100 companies are responsible for 70% of global warming (though this statistic has been disputed--surprise, surprise). So some argue that it's irresponsible to focus on individual consumer acts, when global warming isn't actually a result of you riding a bike to the post office, rather than taking your car.

Still, I'd be curious to hear people's ideas about what specific things we bike riders can do to reduce waste--assuming that it makes a difference.