Recycling is bad for the environment, especially paper:
* not environmentally viable - The majority (+75%) of new pulp that goes into paper manufacturing comes from tree farms. The tree farmers adjust the size of their crop based on the demand from the previous season. When we inject recylced pulp into the cycle, we reduce the demand and thus the size of the tree crop. If the demand for new pulp is beyond the projected size of the crop, the gov't will subsidize more land and money for the farmer to plant even more trees. The process to remake the old paper into new paper utilizes toxic bleaches and other chemicals which end-up in the dump.
*not energy efficient - it takes 50 times or more energy to recycle paper, than it does to just throw it away. The sorting machines, electricity for the entire facitlity and the vehicles that have to pick up the recylcing bins from everyone's house, which also pollute more than any other vehicle on the road, all use gas or electricity.
*not economically viable - the gov't spends upwars of $80 billion a year on these recycling centers, and the only money we ever see back from that is from the cans we bring in, a whopping 5 cents each. Cans, by the way, are the only recyclable material that actually costs less to remake into new items.
*not landfill friendly - the U.S. could fit enough trash for the next 1,000 years in a square 35 mile area, rising no more than 200 feet. it could be in the middle of the desert, and nobody would ever have to see it. When properly utilized, the methane gas from a landfill dump can be used to power millions of homes, as is done at the largest dump in the U.S. just outside of L.A., which is also deemed a natural wildlife reserve; Dirt is piled over the compost and becomes a fertilizer, giving life to new trees.
Dumps are built using 3 ft of impermeable clay as well as layers of limestone and other minerals.. as well, most dumps also have a 2 inch rubber diaper that is installed directly below the first layer. When dirt is eventually placed over the garbage, the methane release and decomp below provide excellent fertilization for trees and some dumps are designated wildlife reserves.
*CANS - cans were the ONLY recyclable we found that beat the cost/benefit analysis. It costs less to remake old cans into new ones, and it's the only recycleable that pays back some of the $8 billion the gov't stole from us to commit this atrocity.
Please stop being fooled, recycling started in the 80's when an EPA asst. director put out an insanely inaccurate memo, claiming that we are running out of landfill space. It was entirely untrue, but it spawned an 80 billion dollar budget that simply causes more environmental destruction. When "Waste Management" claims that they saved "40 Million trees", what that actually means is that they prevented the planting of 40 million new trees, by reducing demand for new pulp. I am concerned about our Earth, but concern is just the first step, we need more understanding; by far the most disturbing part of this whole debacle, is the sheer number of people who think they are helping, when they are actually hurting.
Corn-based Ethanol is bad:
In 2007, 115 US plants produced 7 billion gallons of Corn Ethanol - the energy equivalent of 132 million barrels of oil using about 15% of corn production. While this sounds large, it is tiny in the context of the US economy. This is equal to only 1.6% of the energy from from oil in 2007 used in the US. But the situation is worse than this because it takes 1 unit of fossil fuel to produce 1.3 units of corn ethanol. The net energy produced was only 0.5% of the energy from from oil - while consuming 15% of the US corn crop!
Now, since corn is generating the greatest profit, because we are now using food to generate fuel, farmers are converting wheat crops to corn, and we have had to import wheat for the first time since 1780. Also, it has caused food prices to shoot through the roof. It has also not had ANY effect on the price of foriegn-obtained, or domestically refined oil. In fact, according to the numbers, it has had an adverse effect, if any. Oil and gas continue to fluxuate, oil has actually hit it's highest price ever, since the start of ethanol production. When will these tree-hugging liberals wake-up and listen to the scientists and experts who know what they're talking about. these extremists are blinded by their political motivations, and they will end-up starving people who can't afford to double their grocery bill. We are burning food to make an inefficiant fuel, while we are at the same time, shorting the third-world countries who rely on our surplus of wheat and corn for humanitarian aid, seems so charitable. meanwhile a liberal drives down the highway in a ford flexfuel SUV on a full tank of corn that could have fed someone in Darfur. The saddest part about this scenario, is that person thinks they're HELPING the planet.
Global Warming is not real:
Temperatures have increased by about 0.5° C over the last 100 years. Most of these increases occurred in the first 50 years of this time period.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) has also increased over the last 100 years-- from about 300 ppm to 370 ppm. Interestingly, the majority of these additions have occurred in the last 50 years, when temperature increases have been slowest.
Independent data from orbiting satelites have been continuosly measuring global temperatures since the 1970's and indicate that over the last 25 years there has actually been a slight decrease in overall global temperatures.
Assuming that at least part of the CO2 additions in the last 50 years is anthropogenic (man-made), the likely scenario is (at the level of additions involved) that CO2 concentrations in our atmosphere are an effect of temperature-- not the other way around. The perturbation of CO2 equilibrium has not had the proportional effect on temperature that greenhouse activists predict. Oops i guess humans aren't warming the Earth, rather the Earth is doing what it's done for the past 4.5 billion years, fluxuate temperature and climate. 70 parts per million increased CO2, and .5 degrees celcius and we would have a big enough ego to think that we caused it?
References:
Historical Isotopic Temperature Record from the Vostok Ice Core
The data available from CDIAC represent a major effort by researchers from France, Russia, and the U.S.A.
1) Vostok ice core: a continuous isotope temperature record over the last climatic cycle (160,00 years).
Jouzel, J., C. Lorius, J.R. Petit, C. Genthon, N.I. Barkov,
V.M. Kotlyakov, and V.M. Petrov. 1987.
Nature 329:403-8.
2) Extending the Vostok ice-core record of palaeoclimate to the penultimate glacial period.
Jouzel, J., N.I. Barkov, J.M. Barnola, M. Bender, J. Chappellaz, C. Genthon, V.M. Kotlyakov, V. Lipenkov, C. Lorius, J.R. Petit, D. Raynaud, G. Raisbeck, C. Ritz, T. Sowers, M. Stievenard, F. Yiou, and P. Yiou. 1993.
Nature 364:407-12.
3) Climatic interpretation of the recently extended Vostok ice records.
Jouzel, J., C. Waelbroeck, B. Malaize, M. Bender, J.R. Petit, M. Stievenard, N.I. Barkov, J.M. Barnola, T. King, V.M. Kotlyakov, V. Lipenkov, C. Lorius, D. Raynaud, C. Ritz, and T. Sowers. 1996.
Climate Dynamics 12:513-521.
4) Climate and atmospheric history of the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core, Antarctica.
Petit, J.R., J. Jouzel, D. Raynaud, N.I. Barkov, J.-M. Barnola, I. Basile, M. Bender, J. Chappellaz, M. Davis, G. Delayque, M. Delmotte, V.M. Kotlyakov, M. Legrand, V.Y. Lipenkov, C. Lorius, L. Pepin, C. Ritz, E. Saltzman, and M. Stievenard. 1999.
Nature 399: 429-436.
NOTE: All charts were plotted directly from composite data sets using Lotus 1-2-3.
CO2 Graph Sources:
Temperature Graph Sources:
2001-1958: South Pole Air Flask Data
1958-1220 B.P.: Law Dome, Antarctica
1220 B.P.- 2302 B.P.: Taylor Dome, Antarctica
2302 B.P.- 414k B.P.: Vostok Ice Core Data 2000-1979: Satellite stratospheric data
1979-1871: S. Hemisphere ground temp. data
1871- 422k B.P.: Vostok Ice Core Data
