BillJ wrote: 
are we playing the solar system version or the universe version? because I have some hotels in the fornax dwarf galaxy.

 manbirdexperiment wrote: 
No thanks, I'm trying to get rid of mercury

 BillJ wrote: 
go fish

 samiyam wrote: 
I'll trade you two mercurys for one neptune

 exotraxx wrote: 
Admit it... Yer dyin' to move to New York City and date a starlet... 

 exotraxx wrote: 
i was unaware one could over assimilate...oh crap...

 exotraxx wrote: 
Hey!  We were here first!  I dunno how you learned to play "King Of The Mountain" on your playground, but yer supposed to knock the leader off with force...   Comangetus Suckers! 

 samiyam wrote: 

 exotraxx wrote: 
we're #1?!  

 aflanigan wrote: 
i really don' t think i did..qualify it...
one more time...

if humans are responsible for 3% of the CO2 in the atmosphere.
reducing our output is like a drop in the bucket...if we reduce our output
of CO2 by 20%....that would be massively ambitious...
it wouldn't affect the total CO2 in the atmosphere by 1%!!
i am asking the question...its illogical, and graphs of mauna loa..
the site of an active volcano spewing out all kinds of gas is not persuasive to me.

edit..not that i doubt the increase, just the cause.

the focus on CO2 ignores the influence of the sun, and the corresponding global warming on
other planets in our solar system.

 arsenault wrote: 

OK, so now you're qualifying your statement somewhat, which is a step in the right direction.

Pronouncements like "curbing CO2 will have no affect (sic, effect) on the planet's temperature" are best made with some qualification.

As for the "infinitessimal" (sic, infinitesimal) issue, let's do a little quick math and put things in perspective.

As you can see HERE, atmospheric CO2 as measured at Mauna Loa, HI has increased from about 315 ppmv to 385 ppmv since 1958.  That's a 22 percent increase in a half a century.  As the Wiki article I cited points out, it is difficult to pinpoint precisely the effect that profound changes in the atmospheric content of one greenhouse gas (like CO2 or Ozone) will have due to the interrelated nature of absorbtion by the three main culprits.  Clearly, though, profound changes in the concentration of any of the three main greenhouse gases, H2O vapor, CO2, and O3 (Ozone) will have a significant impact on the greenhouse effect, and thus on our climate. And while I'm not able off the top of my head to estimate what change in the greenhouse effect increasing CO2 by 22 percent in 50 years has had, it's undoubtedly significant.  If we simply take the crude 9% figure representing the CO2 contribution to the greenhouse effect for earth and divide by 1/5th (corresponding roughly to the increase in CO2 seen in the last 50 years), you get an answer of slightly less than 2%.  Hardly infinitesimal.

On a universal (or even galactic scale), the magnitude of anthropogenic (human-caused) climate or temperature change from whatever source is certainly insignificant (as are we as a species in the grand scheme of things).  Compared, say, to the sun beginning to turn into a RED GIANT in a few hundred million years (and making the earth uninhabitable long before then), our potential to affect climate is pretty pitiful.

But on our scale, the human scale, even infinitessimal changes in big things like planet climate or temperature can have a profound effect.  For example, a temperature change of less than 1 degree celsius in the Northern Hemisphere the corresponds with the "LITTLE ICE AGE" resulted in very profound impacts on large areas of our planet.  One potential additional worry is that anthropogenic climate change resulting by itself in a rather modest temperature change could trigger a dramatic event that could further affect the global climate.  For example, if this sucker stops working as it has apparently done in the past (due to natural causes), look out:



It's a phenomenon of nature that sometimes small perturbations can be amplified into profound disturbances in systems that exhibit a complex or delicately balanced equilibrium.  Consider the phenomenon of resonance, or more precisely, stochastic resonance.  Such a mechanism has been proposed to explain the Younger Dryas cooling period (the "Big Freeze") several millenia ago. 

As I said previously, you can hope that various feedback mechanisms are able to compensate for the changes in climate caused by man's activities (such as increased generation of CO2), but there's no guarantee that these sorts of mechanisms will completely counteract anthropogenic climate change; that such counterbalancing effects will have an unlimited capacity for counteracting the effects of human activity, or that they will not themselves produce unintended and unanticipated effects of their own that might profoundly affect the habitability of our little blue planet.

Thanks, Welly...yeah, I never thought any of them were biodegradable....just recycled, and not made from totally "new" supplies.
EDIT: And GOT DAMN they use too many, when they bag for ya! I always tell them to be really conservative with them and load 'em up, despite what they've been told to do.

 Alexandra wrote: 

Beware of so-called 'biodegradable plastic bags'. That's greenwashing! Here's why:

A number of degradable plastic products have emerged in the marketplace with claims of being more environmentally responsible than traditional plastic. For the most part, consumers are discovering these new plastics in the form of carrier bags from well-known retail, drug and grocery stores which have made the switch from conventional plastic shopping bags. 

As the use of degradable plastic increases, so does the confusion surrounding the environmental claims put forward by the degradable bag industry. RCBC has created this backgrounder with the hope of better informing the public, elected officials and the media. This document provides an overview of degradable plastics and outlines some of the principal concerns surrounding the use of oxo-biodegradable plastics, a degradable plastic increasingly being used in disposable carrier bags.

What are degradable plastics?

Much of the confusion surrounding degradable plastics centers on terminology and, more specifically, with the seemingly interchangeable use of the terms "degradable" and "biodegradable".  As a start, consumers should be aware that "biodegradable" and "degradable" do not mean the same thing.

The Environment and Plastic Industry Council (EPIC) has carried out considerable research on the use of degradable plastics in Canada. As stated by EPIC, the term ‘degradable' broadly describes a material which breaks down into smaller pieces or particles; also referred to as a process of degradation. On the other hand, the term ‘biodegradable' refers to the process that takes place after degradation. Biodegradation is the consumption of the smaller pieces or particles by micro-organisms, resulting in water, carbon dioxide and organic matter. 

According to EPIC, the degradable plastics available today can be classified into three main categories:

• Compostable: materials that are designed to biodegrade in commercial/industrial composting conditions over a period of 180 days into water, carbon dioxide and humus, and which leave no visible, distinguishable or toxic residue.
• Oxo-biodegradable: materials that use a chemical additive to start the degradation process, with the remnants biodegrading over time. These bags oxidize and become brittle in the environment and degrade under the influence of ultraviolet light and heat.
• Water-soluble: materials that degrade in water, usually within a specific temperature range, and then biodegrade through the action of micro-organisms in the sewage treatment system.

For the most part, the degradable carrier bags that have been introduced in B.C. fall into the category of oxo-biodegradable bags. These bags look, feel, and act like a con-ventional plastic bag since they are similarly composed of petroleum-based plastics such as polyethylene. The difference lies in the chemical additive included in oxo-biodegradable bags which speeds up degradation of the plastic once it comes into contact with oxygen.

A common brand found on these bags is EPI, which claims to be, "the proponent and leader of oxo-biodegradable plastic additive technology" and is the creator of Totally Degradable Plastic Additives technology.  Beyond an EPI logo, oxo-biodegradable bags tend to be identifiable by the claim of "100% degradable" printed on the bottom of the bag.

Issues of Concern:

Questionable Environmental Claims -

 In the past few years, a number of concerns questioning the environmental claims and implications of oxo-biodegradable bags have been voiced. In terms of performance, it has been questioned how long these bags take to biodegrade and if it is possible for the bags to biodegrade in landfill conditions given the lack of aerobic bacteria. More importantly, concerns regarding if toxins remain in the environment after the product has appeared to breakdown continue to arise.    

As EPIC has highlighted in relation to degradable bags, the Canadian Standards Association and Competition Bureau recently released a new set of guidelines to prevent businesses from misleading consumers about the green benefits of their products. The new rules require environmental claims to be clear, specific, verified and substantiated with erroneous or broad statements considered unacceptable.   Terra Choice, the Canadian environmental marketing agency responsible for Canada's

EcoLogo program, has taken the issue a step further by publishing a document entitled the Six Sins of Greenwashing, which some critics may find of relevance to this issue.

Lack of Third-Party Verification -

One way to address and overcome questionable environmental claims is through the development of a certification program that presents third-party verification of a product meeting specified standards. A variety of such certification programs exist for compostable plastics (e.g. ASTM D6400, ISO 17088, BPI, BNQ 9011-911) however, oxo-biodegradable plastics do not meet these standards and as such would require their own branch of certification. Such a program does not exist at this time.   

EPIC is currently in the process of developing a Product Stewardship Guide and Commitment on Degradable Plastics, with plans for release in 2008.  The Guide and Commitment is being drafted based on a similar degradable plastics initiative on which the Australian government and Plastics and Chemicals Industry Association partnered.

Unknown Effect on Plastics Recycling Stream -

Beyond concerns about whether degradable bags break down in a timely and clean manner, is the question of how degradable bags may affect the plastics recycling stream. While few municipalities in B.C. currently accept plastic bags for recycling, the introduction of a province-wide stewardship program for packaging could change this dramatically. The B.C. Ministry of the Environment currently has packaging listed as a products category under their list of New Products Under Consideration. 

In August of 2007, Recyc-Quebec released a study that assessed the potential impact of degradable bags on the recycling of conventional plastic bags. Among the degradable bags evaluated were two types of oxo-biodegradable bags. The study found that while one version was compatible with traditional plastic bag recycling the other was not.

These results suggest that not all oxo-biodegradable bags are created equal and offers additional support for developing clear standards and third-party verification as discussed above. Clearly, more research will be required on the recyclability of oxo-biodgradable bags available in the B.C. marketplace if they are expected to enter the conventional plastic recycling stream.

Use of Non-Renewable Resources without Recovery -

A final concern about oxo-biodegradable bags is that the product is composed of non-renewable, fossil fuel-based inputs and there is little difference in regards to energy- and resource-use when compared with conventional disposable plastic grocery bags.

If oxo-biodegradable bags are meant to break down in a landfill environment, as they are largely promoted as doing , the products will not be recovered through recycling, resulting in a loss of resources in the same way these resources are lost through the currently used disposable plastic bags.

 Welly wrote: 

Absolutely right. It's a matter of semantics, sort of. 'Save The Earth' implies we are the final arbiters of the situation, which is obviously not true. We could couch the issue in more human-centric terms, such as, oh, I don't know, how about 'Don't $hit In Your Food Bowl'.

Again, just sayin'...

c.

 Rod wrote: 

That's next on the list......I need to get about five or six of them, though....because I'm shopping for 2, and things start piling up.

EDIT: I do like the fact that our grocery uses recycled  plastic in their bags...

 Alexandra wrote: 
That's a really good thing to do. Bring your own cup, your own bags to the store, etc. What if we all did that? It does make a difference.

 Alexandra wrote: 
i never ever ever buy bottled water...

i use me that pur filter on the ol' tapster...