Aspies For Freedom

GuessWho Wrote:

I started caring back in 2000

I started caring round about 1988 (the year our family got The Green Consumer Guide), or possibly as far back as 1985, when my dad gave me a "Stop acid rain" poster. GuessWho, where were you the previous 12 years?

Avoid eating foods that cause you gas. If cow flatulence is supposed to contribute to global warming, think how much human flatulence must be doing too. Wink

Oh no, they're actually very funny! Somebody a couple of years ago proposed a flatulence tax on cattle and then some bright spark suggested it also apply to people. A nominal charge of 10 cents per fart was proposed and each person was allowed a certain number per day (10?) before they started getting taxed.

Trouble is, the devil was in the detail. However would such a thing be policed? If it were based on self-assessment, most people would understate the number of farts they did so they didn't have to pay anything.

And who would collect the monies and what about the issue of sending inspectors around to ensure the right amount of tax was paid. It would be an administrative nightmare. I think that was the whole point of the article.

Of course, it caused much hilarity where I worked and I am having a real job not to laugh while I'm typing this post. Smile

I wonder what happened to the acid rain issue. You never hear it mentioned these days.

Don't know about that. The US EPA describes acid rain as "a serious environmental problem that affects large parts of the United States and Canada."
http://www.epa.gov/acidrain/

And China too, according to the South Asia Analysis Group:
http://www.saag.org/%5Cpapers20%5Cpaper1944.html

woman from mars Wrote:

Aeolienne Wrote:

I wonder what happened to the acid rain issue. You never hear it mentioned these days.

We still have it, but to mention it would I think, upset the farmers / landowners.

Why should they be upset in particular?

woman from mars Wrote:

When the acid rain thing was initially an issue, I think (but could be wrong) that hill farmers�(in Wales & Scotland mainly, but the Lake District farmers were also affected) had trouble selling or were banned from selling their sheep until the panic was over & I can't remember in what way it affected the sheep.

You're sure you're not confusing this with the fallout from Chernobyl?

Well, just be careful not to over-tax yourself. It might be a good idea to check with your doctor first before doing anything too strenuous. Even going for a walk of half a dozen or so blocks per day would be a good start.

Oh well that's a good start. Maybe need to check out the diet then to see if there is anything high calorie in it.

Freezing the water bottles should kill off any bacteria but after a while, the bottles can get a bit dented.

Some correspondence I had recently with the Women's Environmental Network (http://www.wen.org.uk):

Aeolienne Wrote:

Sent: 17 July 2007
I believe I once heard about a greener alternative to standard perchloroethane-based dry cleaning, called Ecoclean or Aquatex. Have you any more information?

WEN Wrote:

Received: Tue, 25 Sep 2007 12:38:26 +0100
Thanks for your enquiry, maybe you have already seen the work from the US Environmental Agency. There is a large document, not very new about new technologies, they explain about 'Liquid Carbon Dioxide', 'Ultrasonic Cleaning Process, Rynex Solvent, Biotex Solvent'.

"Chemical solvents have been used for cleaning clothes since the mid-19th century. Perchloroethylene (PCE) has been the solvent of choice for commercial clothes cleaning applications since the 1960s, although the volume used by drycleaners has declined significantly over the last decade. Despite this decline, a variety of health and safety issues associated with PCE use and increased regulation of the chemical have compelled the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA), industry and environmental groups to address concerns about PCE emissions. As part of an effort to explore opportunities for pollution prevention and reduce exposure to traditional drycleaning chemicals, the EPA�s Design for the Environment (DfE) Garment and Textile Care Program has developed the Cleaner Technologies Substitutes Assessment (CTSA): Professional Fabricare Processes."

The document tries to evaluate the tradeoff between efficiency and risks to health and environment. You can find the document at:
http://www.epa.gov/oppt/dfe/pubs/garment...ricare.pdf [WARNING: it's 450 pages long! A.]

About the two products that you mentioned, they have also been studied widely and peer reviewed.

You can find the large studies from the US Enviromental Agency for Aquatex at:
http://www.clu-in.org/download/dryclean/fabrcare.pdf�
and for Ecoclean at: http://www.p2pays.org/ref/13/12846.pdf

I am not sure that any of these products is completely safe to use as they all contain large amounts of chemicals [Doesn't everything?? A.]. Ecover detergents and some dry-cleaners that are advertised as organic (http://www.pressedfourtime.com/) may be your answer. Sorry not to be of more help, but please let us know if there is something else we can help you with and tell us the answer to your question so we can help others like you.

Kind regards,

Iliana

Re ironing: I used to do this thing of switching off the iron for the last item, thus relying on residual heat rather than electricity. Unfortunately I found that the iron tended to drip water from the steam vents after it was switched off, and I didn't like the way it made the garment soggy.

Irons are quite power-hungry, so it may well work out more energy efficient to have your ironing done by the dry cleaner along with lots of other customers' clothes.

Good start. I'm sure if others followed your example, they would be much healthier too and it would be better for the environment. Smile

Well, keep on walking the garbage bags to the dumpster every time and that will be a good start. Smile

Btw, I cannot believe that anybody would drive 500 feet to drop off rubbish into a bin unless the trash bad was very heavy or was leaking.

This last problem can be avoided by wrapping meat scraps and other sloppy items in newspaper and keeping in the freezer until trash day or the night before and then transferring the "parcels" to the trash bag.

If there are several bags, it would be better to make several trips but if your rubbish is collected every week and you recycle, there shouldn't be a lot of trash anyway.

If there is a garden where you are, you could get a small shredder and shred papers for mulch. If the body corporate or the landlord agrees, a compost bin would also be a good idea for all those vegetable scraps. Where possible, buying products that are not blister-packed saves on rubbish generation.

Yeah, cat droppings are really smelly - worse than just about any other kind of droppings so I can well understand few people would want to handle them any more than they had to. Mind you, I saw in a cat magazine a few years ago an additive that you could put in cat and dog food so their droppings wouldn't smell as bad as usual.

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