Thread: Planetary greening

Ok so Its monday night, Im bored, doing my insomnia thing again and all thats on the brain channels is shows like Ecotech..

now I dont mind it but its got me thinking...


whats going to happen when all the steps that we're taking towards reducing our polution out put to zero and start sucking the stuff out of the atmosphere?

So far in the show theres paint that breaks down oxides of nitrogen, buildings that emit O2 and put power back onto the grid, a guy whose got enough solar to crack water into hydrogen and oxygen to power hydrogen fuel cells for his house and car (and his cars got a mini generation plant in it so that if he needs to he just plugs into the grid over night to get a tank of gas from water)

Imagine 1000 years from now when people are complaing about not being able to have BBQs because theres soooo much O2 in the air that the fat catches fire really easily and burns your house down... what are we going to do, if only there was something we could do to lower the O2 content of the air if only we had some way of messing it all up a bit.........


so whats the gathered thoughts of this place?

will we be able to bring it back into balance

is it too late and we can only ever hope to hold the damage in check where its at now

yep we can reverse it and someones going to over do it.

Originally Posted by Xavie

I can't see how it would be possible to bring the planet in to balance. I think we can only do so much yet with the population constantly increasing and nothing to support it unless we cut down more forest etc... which in turn stuffs us up more we are signing our own death warrant.

Just look at China though and what happens there... It's the easiest example really. They are building coal fired stations almost every day and they ahve no plans on shutting them down or making more effiecent ones. China alone produces enough environmental pollutants to ruin the rold. Then the rest of us just ad on to that.

Legislation doesn't really permit the consumer to make much of a difference either.

I was thinking about how telstra steal all my money earlier and constantly hearing about how much cash they have. If they or a company in a similar positoon whacked billions into say solar electricity we'd be on the right track but it's not going to happen in any foreseeable future.

The big question is what will actually kill the planet in the end.

Pretty much the case - worth noting that if Australia reduced emissions to zero, it would make no perceptible difference to the world. The only countries that matter are China (just passed USA as No.1 emitter), USA, India and EU, roughly in that order. It makes no significant difference what anyone else does.

Nobody is prepared to point a figure at the biggest problem, which as you point out is population, although some commentators did have the courage to go against the Pope's urging Catholics to have more children last week.

Also worth noting that Telstra has been an extensive user of solar power in remote areas for many years, and is probably the owner of more solar energy capability than any other single company in Australia, and possibly the world. (Note - I am not a Telstra supporter! Currently two disputes going)

John