For the last four days we have been experiencing a heat wave in Central Alberta. For four days we have had temperatures in the 30 - 32 C (88 - 92 F) range. That is hot for this area. Now I know that some people would scoff at me saying this is hot and a heat wave! I've been watching heat waves in other parts of the continent and they are brutal. You have my sympathy. My daughter keeps me informed about the heat in Chicago.
Our usual summer day time highs are about 20 C ( 70 F). A few days each summer we may have a 26 C ( 80 F) temperature and once every five years or so we get what we're getting now.
Now very few houses here have air conditioning. It just wouldn't make economic sense to install air conditioning. Our houses have a high insulation value to keep heat in in the winter. Most commercial buildings will have air conditioning.
However, life goes on here heat wave or no heat wave. Outdoor workers continue the regular routine. Plants, crops and wildlife suffer from the heat . Farm crops suffer some damage as yields could be less. I remember when I lived on my Dad's farm and we had a heat wave how it would bother my Dad. He knew that he was losing income as long as the heat wave continued.
So I have fans running in my house hoping to keep the temperature down. I stay in my house from noon to 3:00 pm to try to stay out of the heat.
I hope that all heat waves end now and that we go back to normal temperatures. Then I can stop being grouchy.
Showing posts with label green house gases. Show all posts
Showing posts with label green house gases. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Copenhagen Climate Disasters #3
For my last post on Hiawatha House I dealt with what individuals can do to help fight gobal warming and climate change. Individuals do have a very vital part in climate change.
For this post I will deal with the broader picture. The Copenhagen Conference was a group of nations who supposedly met to bring about some solutions to climate change. It is important for treaties to be made as governments set up rules, regulations and policies which hopefully would lead to a decrease in the productions of green house gases which contribute to global warming. The citizens and industries of each country would be forced to reduce their contributions to green house gases.
Industries produce most of our green house gases. One culprit which produces highly is the power industry and coal fired power plants. In Alberta, the oil sands contribute not only an enormous volume of green house gases, but also destroy natural areas and our water. For large industries the monetary implications are huge. Investment and competition complicates things. We as individuals want more power. So we're all in this together. As consumers we are going to have to pay more for energy and products we purchase so that costs to reduce green house gases can be covered.
So all people on this earth are going to have to be prepared to contribute more to reduce green house gas. The key word is reduce. Our Canadian government wants us and the world to think that they are doing wonderful things to reduce green house gases.Unfortunately for us, our Govt. is only spouting words and playing shell games. It's a complicated issue and for the ordinary citizen it's difficult to know what is going on.
All of us have to take global warming seeriously and work together to begin reducing it. We can't just look at the other guy and expect him to do the job while we do nothing.
Let me know what you think we could do to bring about some solutions to this issue.
For this post I will deal with the broader picture. The Copenhagen Conference was a group of nations who supposedly met to bring about some solutions to climate change. It is important for treaties to be made as governments set up rules, regulations and policies which hopefully would lead to a decrease in the productions of green house gases which contribute to global warming. The citizens and industries of each country would be forced to reduce their contributions to green house gases.
Industries produce most of our green house gases. One culprit which produces highly is the power industry and coal fired power plants. In Alberta, the oil sands contribute not only an enormous volume of green house gases, but also destroy natural areas and our water. For large industries the monetary implications are huge. Investment and competition complicates things. We as individuals want more power. So we're all in this together. As consumers we are going to have to pay more for energy and products we purchase so that costs to reduce green house gases can be covered.
So all people on this earth are going to have to be prepared to contribute more to reduce green house gas. The key word is reduce. Our Canadian government wants us and the world to think that they are doing wonderful things to reduce green house gases.Unfortunately for us, our Govt. is only spouting words and playing shell games. It's a complicated issue and for the ordinary citizen it's difficult to know what is going on.
All of us have to take global warming seeriously and work together to begin reducing it. We can't just look at the other guy and expect him to do the job while we do nothing.
Let me know what you think we could do to bring about some solutions to this issue.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
More Disasters Than Copenhagen
As a world conference the Copenhagen fiasco was a failure in a class of its own. There was much to be gained by success in this conference, and such an enormous loss if the conference failed. The governments of the world achieved both in this case. They lost out in achieving any gains and they lost by not finding any solutions.
Canada sent the wrong people to Copenhagen. We chose the wrong government and we didn't influence Prime Minister Harper and his government to take a positive, proactive stand. Absolutely nothing was achieved at the Copenhagen conference except to lose time - precious time, which we have already frittered away by intentional inaction.
As individuals we will have to do more than wring our hands in useless gestures. Although the big picture is where it's at to reduce the production of green house gases, there is much an individual can do. Each person can alter their lifestyle to do their part in the reduction of green house gases. We can all drive less, buy cars which produce fewer greenhouse gases, and buy products which take less energy to produce. As consumers we have the power to choose products which leave a smaller mark on the climate.
The biggest thing we can do is become proactive in as many ways as possible. We have to influence our politicians and leaders. We can all write to the authorities and express our support for climate change. One letter at a time on a constant basis mounts up, and will bring about change. We will have to inform and educate ourselves about the policies that political parties stand for . We must make political parties act upon what they say their policies are. Bums like we have in power now have to be voted out.
We must also become more informed and better educated about the science of climate change . It's not rocket science. It's looking at the evidence we have. Two years ago a very large ice shelf broke off in the Arctic . An ice shelf is ice which has become solidly attached and hasn't moved, like a land mass. The ice shelf in the Arctic warmed and detached. Some of this ice is hundreds, even thousands of years old . Now it's gone. Fortunately scientists took many core samples which can be used to study the earth's climate going many years back.
Start today, this year, and do something each week to make a difference in climate change. We will then push governments and businesses along to make changes.
Canada sent the wrong people to Copenhagen. We chose the wrong government and we didn't influence Prime Minister Harper and his government to take a positive, proactive stand. Absolutely nothing was achieved at the Copenhagen conference except to lose time - precious time, which we have already frittered away by intentional inaction.
As individuals we will have to do more than wring our hands in useless gestures. Although the big picture is where it's at to reduce the production of green house gases, there is much an individual can do. Each person can alter their lifestyle to do their part in the reduction of green house gases. We can all drive less, buy cars which produce fewer greenhouse gases, and buy products which take less energy to produce. As consumers we have the power to choose products which leave a smaller mark on the climate.
The biggest thing we can do is become proactive in as many ways as possible. We have to influence our politicians and leaders. We can all write to the authorities and express our support for climate change. One letter at a time on a constant basis mounts up, and will bring about change. We will have to inform and educate ourselves about the policies that political parties stand for . We must make political parties act upon what they say their policies are. Bums like we have in power now have to be voted out.
We must also become more informed and better educated about the science of climate change . It's not rocket science. It's looking at the evidence we have. Two years ago a very large ice shelf broke off in the Arctic . An ice shelf is ice which has become solidly attached and hasn't moved, like a land mass. The ice shelf in the Arctic warmed and detached. Some of this ice is hundreds, even thousands of years old . Now it's gone. Fortunately scientists took many core samples which can be used to study the earth's climate going many years back.
Start today, this year, and do something each week to make a difference in climate change. We will then push governments and businesses along to make changes.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Copenhagen Disaster
As you can see from some of my former posts I am somewhat passionate about the natural places on this planet. So I have written about birds, animals, plants and weather. The blogs I follow have a relationship to similar topics.
So it was to my great dismay and disgust that I observed the pathetic performance of the planet's governments at the Copenhagen conference. Governments from various blocs sought to snooker other blocs into a corner to squeeze out their own agendas. For example, countries which are less developed wanted more money out of wealthier groups of nations. Top economic countries wanted the others to make similar contributions to lessen green house gas production.
All countries at the Copenhagen conference completely forgot about the earth and any responsiblity they have to curb global warming. Our Canadian government was absolutely disgraceful in its performance and position. Our government made no effort to move forward on reducing green house gases. Since our government is rather secretive, one might suspect that they were not in any way working to reduce green house gases.
Much debate takes place on climate science. Extremely skillful manipulators attempt to distract the agenda and confuse issues so that doubt arises as to the validity of climate warming. We don't have to look very far to see monstrous examples of global warming. The Arctic shows some very obvious and extensive examples. I spent 5 years in the Arctic in the 1960's. We would fly from Inuvik to Sach's Harbor on Banks Island, which is a distance of about 450km. In July and August there was open water about 15 to 25 km from shore. The rest of the way was loose ice, and some years there would be large areas of solid ice. Today all of the ice in the Beaufort Sea melts in the summer. Small boats will cross from Cape Bathurst or Cape Parry. To me this is an appalling change. This is all the evidence I need to become alarmed about the dangers of climate change caused by man. Seals and polar bears use the ice as habitat and are in great peril as a result.
This year, Hiawatha House is going to run a number of posts on global warming. We have to push our governments to take action on reducing green house gases.
So it was to my great dismay and disgust that I observed the pathetic performance of the planet's governments at the Copenhagen conference. Governments from various blocs sought to snooker other blocs into a corner to squeeze out their own agendas. For example, countries which are less developed wanted more money out of wealthier groups of nations. Top economic countries wanted the others to make similar contributions to lessen green house gas production.
All countries at the Copenhagen conference completely forgot about the earth and any responsiblity they have to curb global warming. Our Canadian government was absolutely disgraceful in its performance and position. Our government made no effort to move forward on reducing green house gases. Since our government is rather secretive, one might suspect that they were not in any way working to reduce green house gases.
Much debate takes place on climate science. Extremely skillful manipulators attempt to distract the agenda and confuse issues so that doubt arises as to the validity of climate warming. We don't have to look very far to see monstrous examples of global warming. The Arctic shows some very obvious and extensive examples. I spent 5 years in the Arctic in the 1960's. We would fly from Inuvik to Sach's Harbor on Banks Island, which is a distance of about 450km. In July and August there was open water about 15 to 25 km from shore. The rest of the way was loose ice, and some years there would be large areas of solid ice. Today all of the ice in the Beaufort Sea melts in the summer. Small boats will cross from Cape Bathurst or Cape Parry. To me this is an appalling change. This is all the evidence I need to become alarmed about the dangers of climate change caused by man. Seals and polar bears use the ice as habitat and are in great peril as a result.
This year, Hiawatha House is going to run a number of posts on global warming. We have to push our governments to take action on reducing green house gases.
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