Re: Energy alternatives for the UK.

John Beardmore <wookie@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> In message <1gzlvzl.185innatygizgN%usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, sarah
> <usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes
> >John Beardmore <wookie@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> >I can understand why people don't want to spend time and energy at it.
> >Cheaper, easier and much more fun to spend that time and energy buying
> >more stuff, or coming up with neat solution to some fascinating problem.
> >Perhaps we should devise a way of making recycling Fun for adults. Gold
> >stars and stickers won't work -- try other rewards for setting and
> >attaining targets? What carrot will lure your donkeys?
>
> Well - the best one is getting them to come up with neat solution to
> some fascinating problems. Waste doesn't fascinate. Second best is
> money.

I can see that, but it's a shame. Perhaps we need a more scintillatingly
attractive carrot, such as money. Is there a relatively cheap/efficient
way to quantify waste/establishment? Set a baseline, then reward (Cash
prizes! Lower business rates! Gold stars!) those that most significantly
reduce their output.... but wait, there's fly-tipping, and local tips.
This entire system should be re-thought.


> >> Question is where should we draw the line ? At work we could probably
> >> justify about 15 recycling bins for separable wastes, but the volumes
> >> will be very low and the turnover slow.
> >
> >There's nothing wrong with that if you've got the space to store it
> >until you've accumulated a volume worth disposing of. I reckon I'll have
> >to organise a trip past the tip that deals with household batteries
> >about once a year.
>
> Yes. Problem is we're paying rent on that space. There really is a
> financial cost.

That tears it. Same result as the search for carrots: the system of
waste disposal should be re-thought. Perhaps groups of business should
be working together on this sort of thing -- if you had communal bins
shared with x neighbouring businesses/households, they'd fill sooner and
be more cost-effective. Back to the neighbourhood waste coordinator...
something like neighbourhood watch, but proactive.
>
>
> >> Maybe the answer is to get everybody to do it at lease crudely, rather
> >> than to get 1% of people doing it brilliantly ?
> >
> >I suspect so. Get the bulk, easy stuff out of landfill, because we're
> >running out of holes in the ground
>
> Are we actually ?
>
> I suspect most of the EU directives were motivated by countries like
> Greece that were never very good with holes in the ground, and tendered
> to prefer the 'festering mountain' approach ?

I thought they were surrounded by the 'wine-dark sea'? What's good
enough for Homer...

I think we are running out of holes, at least in some parts of the UK.
'Landfill' in this region seems to be creating festering mountains that
are capped and covered with soil to become ski facilities; there's a
limit to how many tiny Alps we can justify. I think in the past a fair
amount of it was stuffed into any available hole, but now we worry about
groundwater contamination (which I'd guess rules out some quarries even
when lined with membrane and clay). London used to just dump theirs at
sea; now the barges take it to Essex, probably to landfill. Perhaps
limited dumping of 'appropriate' refuse at sea could compensate for
shifts in plankton abundance due to global warming? ;-)


> > -- and simply stuffing everything
> >into holes 'out of sight, out of mind' cultivates the wrong mental
> >attitude.
>
> Not sure this a 'write / wrong' thing so much as a matter of survival
> strategy ?

It is, for those who take the long view. By the 'wrong mental attitude',
I meant encouraging people to ignore the problem. If it's sitting in
front of us, festering in the summer heat and rusting in winter rain (I
wish), we *all* have to think about it.

[-]

> >but we
> >live in the real world. Where all my efforts to reduce our CO2 output
> >are wiped off the board by his one business trip to the US each year :-(
>
> Yes - just as we drive around to install renewable energy equipment.
>
> It's frustrating, but you can't carry that sort of stuff on a bike !

Perhaps the fact that we've thought about it and suffer mental anguish
over it will count in our favour if we are ever weighed in a balance
somewhere :-)

regards
sarah



--
Think of it as evolution in action.
.

Relevant Pages

  • David Brower quotes, population/nukes/conservation/enviro
    ... Executive Director of Sierra Club ... Apollo 13, as you remember, gave us a reactor that's bubbling ... Energy said rather quietly, 'You know, we're having a little ... problem with waste these days.' ...
    (sci.econ)
  • Re: OT Gas Prices and the Blame Game
    ... We could buy more time by being more sensible and cutting down on profligate waste but instead there is a huge campaign by US carmakers and oil interests to keep on wasting energy. ... have an entire load of recyclables, and take the trash can along. ... I am no fan of Tony B Liars government he was the British pathological liar that took us into Iraq with Dubya's demented Neocons. ...
    (sci.electronics.design)
  • Re: OT: BP - The tip of the iceberg
    ... constant source of energy. ... fuel cycles which don't create high-level waste with long half-lives. ... Store it as a salt, per our environmental laws these are hazardous waste and must be treated as such. ... For every 12 ton of carbon burned, 44 tons of CO2 will be produced, or if captured as a salt, for every 12 tons of carbon burned over 100 tons of salts will be produced ...
    (rec.woodworking)
  • Re: Nuclear waste
    ... with the waste will be found. ... waste is radioactive mean that it is capable of providing energy - ... Language will be changed, wars ... presented by a few parcels of buried nuclear waste will be irrelevant. ...
    (uk.legal)
  • Re: Esp. for Piper and Adam: 10 Dimensions
    ... But by the same token if energy can be 'generated' then presumably it ... If Matter and Energy ... then possibly being spewed out of White Holes, ... they might well be doing the actual transit through ...
    (soc.culture.scottish)