Plastic Bags

Holding yourself accountable for your environmental impact is easier if you chose something local, or something that you deal with on a regular basis. Something that I deal with daily is plastic grocery bags. Working at Kroger, I see them all of the time. Plastic bags are everywhere. You find them almost anywhere you can buy something. Many of them make their way, either to a land fill or to the ocean.  I think that we all know that plastic bags are bad for the environment, but I would like to show you just how harmful they really are.

I would like to share a few, not so fun facts, about plastic bags.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. goes through 100 billion plastic shopping bags annually.

Only 1-3% of plastic bags are recycled worldwide.

Industry figures show 90% of all grocery bags are plastic.

Plastic bags are made of polyethylene which is a petroleum product.  Production contributes to air pollution and energy consumption.

It takes 1000 years for polyethylene bags to break down.

The amount of petroleum used to make 1 plastic bag would drive a car about 11 meters.

Plastic bags don’t biodegrade, they photodegrade- breaking down into smaller and smaller toxic bits contaminating soil and waterways.  They then enter the foodweb when animals accidently ingest them.

86% of all known species of sea turtles have had reported problems of entanglement or ingestion of marine debris.

This is a problem because most sea turtles have a diet that consist almost completely of jellyfish. It is very easy to mistake a plastic bag for a jellyfish, floating in the water, the resemblance is striking. Some ocean life, like the sea turtles, try to eat the bags. They slowly starve because the bags cause blockages in the intestines. Others get caught in the bags and drown.   

Approximately 1 billion seabirds and mammals die each year by ingesting plastic bags.  Not only that, these poor animals suffer a painful death.  The plastic wraps around their intestines or they choke to death.

Less than 5 percent of US shoppers use canvas, cotton, or mesh bags. 

http://www.postconsumers.com/education/plastic-bag-environmental-facts/

It is estimated world wide that 1 trillion bags are used and discarded every year. Australians use 3.92 billion plastic bags a year, that's over 10 million new bags being used every day. An estimated 3.76 billion bags or 20,700 tonnes of plastic are disposed of in landfill sites throughout Australia every year. This is a massive number. Just imagine how much less trash there would be in landfills. www.cleanup.org.au/au/Campaigns/plastic-bag-facts.html

In 2010, eight million tons of plastic trash ended up in the ocean from coastal countries—far more than the total that has been measured floating on the surface in the ocean's "garbage patches." Plastic bags are only a percentage of this figure but regardless this is also a huge amount of plastic trash in the oceans, and this figure was calculated in 2010. I’m sure it is much higher now.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/02/150212-ocean-debris-plastic-garbage-patches-science/

Plastic bags not only take up space in landfills and not biodegrade, but they also make their way to the oceans and effect the wildlife. Plastic bags are not some commodity that is essential to life as we know it. Kroger, like most places, offer paper bags free of charge. You simply have to ask for them. Also, there are reusable cloth bags for sale. Personally, this seems like the way to go. The bags are sturdy and inexpensive considering all of the different thig they can be used as.  All hope is not lost. there are some measures being taken to cut back on the amount of plastic bags being used.

One of the most effective measures being taken is making consumers pay for their bags. “In 2002, Ireland started charging shoppers 15 eurocents a plastic bag. The result: bag use plummeted 90 percent. That’s a billion bags a year.” People are motivate by money. If they are suddenly being charged for something that they think they should be getting free, even if it is a few odd cents, they are very likely to no longer wat to use that product. Granted the price of having plastic bag pollution is arguably much high than a few cents here and there, it is a start.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gernot-wagner/follow-the-plastic-bag-ex_b_3227194.html

For those of us that think something a little harsher is on order, some place around the world have banned plastic bags all together.  In the US, several cities in California have banned plastic bags. And if things go accordingly then the ban could be implemented state wide. England, Mexico, India, Burma, Bangladesh, Rwanda, and Australia all have bans in at least, a city, but some bans are for the entire country.   http://people.howstuffworks.com/how-many-cities-have-a-ban-on-plastic-bags.htm

Knowing how harmful plastic bags are, I don’t understand why there are not more bans on them. It seems, to me, that plastic bags should be one of the problems with the simplest solution. They are not essential to life in any way. There are more environmentally friendly options.  I will admit that I frequently forget my reusable bags at home when I go shopping, but if I didn’t have plastic bags to rely on you can bet that I would remember my reusable ones.
870 words

It is solved by biking

How would you say that in Latin, solvitur ambulando _____?

	Chris Hamilton (@ChrisRHamilton)
11/29/16, 8:51 AM Our Amazon Addiction is Clogging Up Our Cities—Bikes Are the Best Solution qz.com/843182/online-… Is your city making room for bikes? pic.twitter.com/lWhH3NwXKM

     For my first installment, I will be discussing the idea of an eco-friendly burial, known as Capsula Mundi. After reading the section in Ecotopia discussing their fatalistic yet simplistic regard for death, and the idea of returning or being recycled by the earth reminded me of this concept.
There is a pleasant sense of fulfillment in the idea of coming full circle, returning to the earth from whence we have come. This concept is well-embodied in the creation of an environmentally sound burial method created by two Italian designers, a project affectionately called Capsula Mundi. Not only does this burial method address the spiritual aspect of death, but it is also practical and environmentally beneficial.

     Many highly populated urban areas face similar issues when it comes to the lack of space and sky-rocketing costs of city-dwelling. All over the world, people are confronted with the predicament of living in tightly packed micro-apartments that cost seemingly unreasonable amounts in order to be ensured a place to call home. And unfortunately, this issue does not disappear when we die. There is a rather finite amount of land available for cemeteries and other burial sites which causes the price for acquiring burial plots of increase dramatically. This of course makes funeral industry a very lucrative business, however it means that cities are limited on space to place their dead.
     Globally, over 50 million people die each year. It is predicted that by 2050, a majority of the Baby Boomers generation will dwindle down from 80 million to a mere 16 million, their deaths adding to the ever-present issue of limited burial space. In addition to the lack of space, the process of burial and all the effects that go with it accounts for tremendous amounts of carbon emissions and environmental hazards, including the cutting of trees to create caskets, embalming fluids that provide toxins, and the shipping of bodies across the country or even the globe.
And while cremation would seem to be a more inexpensive, and land conserving burial method, one cremation produces on average 540 pounds of carbon dioxide.

     In order to solve this rapidly rising issue, Italian designers Anna Citelli and Raoul Bretzel devised a new burial method that is not only practical and spiritually fulfilling, but also environmentally beneficial.
     The word Capsula Mundi comes from a Latin construction that reminds us that our bodies came from the earth and the transformations of our body between mineral, plant, and animal worlds.
Capsula Mundi substitutes the use of coffins with a biodegradable burial pod formed in the shape of an egg, a form that is related to perfection and life. The bodies of the deceased are arranged in the fetal position within the burial pods, while ashes are held in smaller pods. The biodegradable pod in then buried within the earth similarly to a large seed while a tree of the departed individual's choice is planted over it. As the pod degrades, the sapling will absorb the nutrients and will grow. As a result of this project, plots of burial ground becomes a lush forest, affectionately dubbed the Memory Forest, instead of a flat stretch of land filled with somber tombstones and weeping angels.
While these memory forests serve as a much more pleasant memorial for the deceased, they also allow humans to decrease our carbon footprint and create a more ecologically appropriate setting for wildlife.

     Death and burial rituals are very sensitive and difficult though death itself is so incredibly simplistic. The whole concept is centered around the preservation and remembrance of an individual. It is tempting to believe that in order to remember a deceased loved, they must endure the traditional means of burial, however, it is essential that we consider greener, more environmentally conscious methods of burial is order to not only preserve our dead but also our earth and embrace the idea presented in Ecotopia of being returned to the earth.

1st Installment Bioreactors Morgan

This is my first installment about bioreactors.

Bioreactors work by using a natural process that is as old as life itself. For life to survive, it must have an energy source and water. How we can use these needs to remove pollutants from contaminated air streams will be the focus of my 2 part report.

In regards to air pollution, bio reaction is simply the use of microorganisms to consume and remove pollutants from a contaminated air stream. Almost any substance, with the help of microbes, will decompose given the proper environment. This is especially true for organic compounds. But certain microbes can also consume inorganic compounds such as hydrogen sulfide and nitrogen oxides.  

The major benefit of bioreactors is cost. The capital cost of a bioreactor is usually just a fraction of the cost of a traditional control device. Operating costs are usually considerably less than the costs of traditional technology, too. Thermal and catalytic control units consume large volumes of expensive fuel. Bioreactors only use small amounts of electrical power to drive two or three small motors. Normally, bioreactors do not require full-time labor and the only operating supplies needed are small quantities of macro nutrients. Bio filters, the most common type of bioreactor, use beds (media where microbes live) made from naturally occurring organic materials such as: yard cuttings, peat, bark, wood chips, etc. These are slowly consumed by the microbes. These organic beds usually can supply most of the macro nutrients needed to sustain the biomass. The beds must be replaced every 2 to 5 years, depending on the choice of bed material. Bio reaction is a "green" process, whereas the traditional approaches are not. The combustion of any fuel will generate oxides of nitrogen, particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, and carbon monoxide. Bioreactors usually do not generate any hazardous pollutants. Products of a bio reaction are water and carbon dioxide. Bioreactors do work, but microbes are finicky in what they will eat. Microbes need the right pollutant concentration, temperature, humidity and pH. There are many opportunities to make mistakes in design and operations of a bio reaction system. Anyone thinking about building one should discuss their situation with a manufacturer or an expert in the field. If a particular air pollution control situation qualifies, the cost benefits can be substantial.

Microbes have inhabited the Earth since the time that the Earth cooled sufficiently to allow any form of life to exist. Microbes have a simple life cycle; they are born, eat, grow, reproduce and die. Their diet is based primarily on carbon-based compounds, water, oxygen and macro nutrients. Bioreactors use microbes to remove pollutants from emissions by consuming the pollutants. The concept is simple, but the execution can be quite complicated. Bioreactors have been used for hundreds of years to treat sewage and other odoriferous, water-borne waste. About sixty years ago, Europeans began using bioreactors to treat contaminated air, particularly emissions from sewage treatment plants and rendering plants. The initial process used a device called a "bio filter." A bio filter is usually a rectangular box that contains an enclosed plenum on the bottom, a support rack above the plenum, and several feet of bed on top of the support rack. A large number of materials are used for bed media such as peat, composted yard waste, bark, coarse soil, gravel or plastic shapes. Sometimes oyster shells used for neutralizing acid c Compounds not soluble in water are not good candidates for this technology.  Build-up and fertilizer for macro nutrients are mixed with bed media. The support rack is perforated to allow air from the plenum to move into the bed media to contact microbes that live in the bed. The perforations also permit excess, condensed moisture to drain out of the bed to the plenum.

A fan is used to collect contaminated air from a building or process. If the air is too hot, too cold, too dry, or too dirty, it may be necessary to pretreat the contaminated air stream to obtain optimum conditions before introducing it into a bioreactor. Contaminated air is duct to a plenum. As the emissions flow through the bed media, the pollutants are absorbed by moisture on the bed media and come into contact with microbes.  Microbes reduce pollutant concentrations by consuming and metabolizing pollutants. During the digestion process, enzymes in the microbes convert compounds into energy, CO2 and water. Material that is indigestible is left over and becomes residue. This is a very simple and brief explanation on how a bioreactor functions. In real-life, things get a bit complicated. Variables that affect the operation and efficiency of a bioreactor include: temperature, pH, moisture, pollutant mix, pollutant concentration, macro nutrient feeding, residence time, compacted bed media, and gas channeling. These are crucial variables for which optimum conditions must be determined, controlled and maintained. In the body of this report, a complete explanation of these processes is given. Is a bioreactor right for your situation? This is not an easy question to answer. The purpose of this report is to provide tools that you can use to determine if a specific contaminated air stream is a good candidate for bio reaction treatment. Bioreactors are far less expensive than traditional control technologies to install and operate and, in many cases, bioreactors approach efficiencies achieved by traditional control technologies.

Because bioreactors use living cultures, they are affected by many variables in their environment. Below are variables and limitations that affect the performance of all bioreactors, regardless of process type. All variables discussed here are important. However, probably the most important variable affecting bioreactor operations is temperature. A blast of hot air can totally kill a biomass faster than any other accident. Most microbes can survive and flourish in a temperature range of 60 to 105 /F (30 to 41/C). It is important to monitor bed temperature at least daily, but every eight hours would be safer. A high temperature alarm on the emissions inlet is also a good safety precaution.

When emissions from a process are too hot, operators often pass hot emissions through a humidifier that cools gases down by evaporative cooling. This is the most economical method available for cooling emissions from 200 to 300 /F (93 to 149 /C) to below 105 /F (41/C). Besides the cooling effect, this process also increases the moisture content (humidifies emission stream), a desirable side effect. Although a blast of really hot air is the most lethal variable for microbes, cold air also stops, but does not kill, microbes. Cold air can reduce microbe activity to the point that they stop consuming pollutants and go into a state of suspended animation. Even freezing does not kill microbes. After thawing, they can be re-acclimated in a relatively short period. For optimum efficiency during winter months, it may be necessary to heat emissions using direct or indirect methods. If heating is required, first look for a waste heat source such as excess steam, boiler blow down, or product cooling waste heat. As with cooling emissions, analyze your source carefully to assure nothing is being added to the emission stream that will harm microbes in the bioreactor, or will add to the overall pollution load. Additionally, some operators, especially in northern states, insulate the bioreactor's exterior to reduce heat loss. 

The Carbon Tax

            We have considered many options of attempting to slow down and eventually stop all carbon emission for the sake of our planet Earth. The main reason for anthropogenic climate change is the greenhouse gases (GHGs) that we leave behind after burning fossil fuels and digging for natural gas to keep our homes warm in the winter. GHGs are gases that absorb and emit radiation into our atmosphere like carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide that are considered “heat trapping gases”. In order for the human race to coexist with our planet, we will need to take drastic steps to accompany this transaction. There has been talk of action for many years but not enough put into practice. A carbon tax would be a good step for America since we are one of the largest fossil fuel burning countries in the world. This tax would internalize externalities and help companies consider the costs of our future generations and the destruction of our home. As of now oil companies are running rampant and transforming beautiful sacred landscapes into tar sands and digging into oceanic crust while polluting our own water while we sit back and let it happen.

            Attempts have been made to implement a carbon tax into legislation in the United States but have failed in their design. When proposing a carbon tax, it has been learned that three central issues are needed to be addressed in order to have an adequate design. The three issues are: the tax rate, the tax base, and the international trade concerns. The one thing that is understood by climate scientists and anyone who believes in climate change is that a proposed carbon tax rate should reflect the marginal detriment from emissions. The ultimate approach we can make on a good design for carbon tax is to ensure the rate changes over time when new evidence becomes presented about the pros and cons of reducing emissions. Utilizing a crude estimate of the best rate and amending the rate when new information develops is an ideal option. A commission or partial commission should be appointed to have the tax rate reexamined sporadically and give expert feedback on the relevant limitations for setting a rate. Intermediate managements would be encouraged if delegation isn’t possible given the size of the tax.

            The tax base would need to be large to increase collection costs. In order to successfully do this according to “The Design of a Carbon Tax” by Gilbert E. Metcalf and David Weisbach, “we show that collecting the tax upstream would make it possible to accurately and cheaply cover 80% (share of U.S. CO₂ emissions consisting of CO₂ from fossil fuel combustion) of U.S. emissions by collecting the tax at fewer than 3000 points, and that it would be possible to cover close to 90% of U.S. emissions at a modest additional cost.”(FN1) The substantial problem that lies with upstream collection is for the fossil fuel industries that are using product into non combusted material are being overly taxed.

            The design of trade in carbon-intensive goods is flawed because of one simple method that is lacking. “A system of border tax adjustments to prevent so-called carbon “leakage,” the shifting of production to countries without a carbon pricing mechanism.” (FN1) To achieve this problem of border tax adjustment there would have to be information on how the item was produced and what how much energy went into its production. This information may be challenging to acquire for a carbon tax. In summary, the recommended route for border tax adjustments would be to give favor to companies who export/import less carbon intensive goods.

            There has been little to zero talk about climate change during the election this year, but there could still be hope right here in the United States. The state of Washington is amongst a dispute for imposing a tax on carbon emissions. Initiative 732 is a proposal that has started by Yoram Bauman an economist who has gained support for a campaign to put a tax on petroleum, gas and coal industries. The tax would also gradually increase to motivate these industries to invest in solar and wind renewable power. “The tax would start at $15 per metric ton next year, increase to $25 a ton in 2018 and then rise gradually over a few decades until it hits $100 a ton in 2016 dollars.”(FN2) To put this in perspective, 5 metric tons of C0₂ are emitted from an average car each year. It has been long known by climate scientists and economists that greenhouse gas emissions should be taxed upon a gradient to motivate producers to transition their companies out of the fossil fuel industry. British Columbia’s carbon tax that was set into motion in 2008 has been the model for initiative 732. Taxes have been implemented into legislature in Sweden and Ireland already. If Washington can beat the system, it would be the first in the country and would be a great influence on other parts of the country. Initiative 732 will also increase taxes for the average person such as gasoline for your car and the heat in your home. “At $25 per ton, the proposed Washington tax would increase the price of gasoline by about 25 cents a gallon and increase the cost of coal-fired power by 2.5 cents per kilowatt-hour.”(FN2)

            Washington is looking forward to having taxation more progressive by reducing the state sales tax according to Carbon Washington, the campaign responsible for Initiative 732. Meanwhile, initiative 732 is confronted with disagreement from many angles such as fossil fuel industries and manufacturers, but shockingly enough some of the environmental crowds have opposed the campaign as well. Groups such as the Sierra Club and the Washington Environmental Council have said they believe the direction of the initiative is reasonable but that it would not help the production and investment of renewable energy, mass transit and other projects that are in need rather than simply cutting the sales tax. It seems to be a pretty close call for the polls to favor the initiative. “A recent poll showed that 42 percent of voters in Washington support Initiative 732, 37 percent oppose it and 21 percent are undecided(FN2).” The majority of politicians are against the voting for a carbon tax such as Gov. Jay Inslee, who is a Democrat attempting re-election with a vision for cap-and-trade taxation. Hopefully enough people will vote this initiative into action and the Gov. Jay Inslee will not get votes for re-election.

            In order to understand why we need a carbon tax in our country we need to look closer at the seven billion metric tons of C0₂ emitted in the U.S. every year. This number is equivalent to about 20% of emissions from the whole world. That amount of C0₂ is also referring to other gases that give off emissions such as methane and nitrous oxide that trap heat in the atmosphere. Climate scientists use global warming potentials (GWPs) as a factor of determining how much each emission equals by means of affecting the climate. Methane is a much more potent greenhouse gas and is twenty-one times more potent than C0₂ so they give it a twenty-one.

"Earth Isn’t Doomed Yet. The Climate Could Survive Trump Policies"

Is the battle to contain global warming now lost?

With the election of Donald Trump, it certainly looked that way to many of the shellshocked diplomats gathered in Morocco earlier this month at the first climate summit following the breakthrough agreement in Paris last year to contain greenhouse gas emissions.

During the campaign, the president-elect of the world’s second largest polluter claimed that climate change is a hoax, threatened to drop the Paris accord, committed to kill the Clean Power Plan at the center of President Obama’s emissions reduction strategy, and promised a new dawn for the fossil fuel industry.

Don’t give up just yet. True, international diplomacy will become more difficult as China and India weigh their own energy policy commitments in the light of the possibility that the United States will walk away from its promises. But President Trump’s climate policy — or his lack of one — could work out in surprising ways.

Ted Nordhaus and Jessica Lovering, in a report published on Tuesday by the Breakthrough Institute, pointed out that real progress on reducing carbon in the atmosphere has been driven so far by specific domestic energy, industrial and innovation policies, “not emissions targets and timetables or international agreements intended to legally constrain national emissions.”

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part 1:final post Plastic Pollution

In today’s ever changing world we are becoming more and more acquainted with the environmental problems in which we are facing. The problems range from climate change to ocean acidification to Arctic sea ice loss. With this class showing us various types of environmental issues we must address, especially if we wish to achieve our own Americanized version of Ecotopia. In this post I will discuss the problem of plastic pollution and the dangers and repercussions that arise from if. The issue is one that encompasses a variety of environmental issues and isn’t due solely to a single issue. When thinking about plastic pollution causes, one must think of all the causes, from solid waste management practices, to lack of knowledge from citizens around the world, to lack of recycling facilities to handle or make consumer products to turn a profit on. Most of the problem lies with the developing world as you would expect but even the developed countries are having issues with it from China to the United States.Most of these countries are countries that are developing and/or third world, and most do not have an efficient waste disposal means, if any at all.

            The issue at hand is plastic pollution and what causes it and what we can do to stop it. Mainly the problem boils down to the lack of efficient or available solid waste disposal. In developing and third world countries, most have poor solid waste disposal, if any at all. So many of the countries are forced to pile it up as high as possible in dumps, or they just throw it in the rivers or lakes. Even in developed countries, plastic is contributing to litter, filling up vast space in landfills, and even still getting thrown in the lakes and rivers eventually making their way to the oceans. What drives all of the pollution in the first place is our consumer habits in which plastic has become a major industrial use of nearly every consumer product.

            So you may be wondering, just how much plastic is out there? Well let’s put it like this, it takes between 500-1000 years to degrade and every single piece of plastic that has ever been made is still here regardless of whether it’s been recycled, broken down, or discarded. Even with this in mind we continue to create more of it every year with 2012 numbers around 598 billion pounds. Then the question comes to why is it a problem and why should we care. To start, plastic has been found everywhere on earth even in the deep sea and Arctic ice. Oceans, rivers, lakes, land, all are polluted by plastics. In the 192 coastal countries bordering the oceans and black and Mediterranean seas, 9.6 to 25.4 billion pounds of plastic have flowed into the oceans per year. The problems aren’t just with the pollution itself, it also concerns the amount of money spent because of it. In Los Angeles alone, they pollute 10 metric tons of plastic into the ocean every day. This leads to the staggering sum of 500 million dollars a year from California, Oregon, and Washington to clean the waste from the Pacific Ocean. Researchers in a 2012 study for the first time put a price tag on the environmental damage done by the plastic floating in the world’s oceans at 13 billion dollars a year. So as you can these are some very significant amounts spent on the issue. But this isn’t even the end of why should we care. Plastic has been found to be ingested by some 700 different species in the wild. Around a million sea birds as well as 100,000 mammals are killed annually from plastic in our oceans.These animals ingest the micro-plastics, and sometimes, larger plastics, thinking they are food, then the body doesn't break down them down so they get trapped in the stomach tricking them into thinking that they are full when in reality they are just full of plastics. Eventually they will die because of this and the picture below will show you this in action. The problem is so bad that the broken down products of a single one liter bottle could end up on every mile of beach throughout the world.

           

While not all plastic ends up in the oceans, most does, but plastic also is a major problem causing landfills to fill up at extremely high rates. It also ends up being littered throughout the land system eventually going to lakes, rivers and streams. A small percentage however is recycled, which is great but it hardly makes an impact. So by now I’m sure you are wondering where does all of this plastic come from. Well a majority of the plastic in the oceans at least, come from Asian countries with main contributors being China, Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia. Most of this is due to no waste disposal systems or systems that are mismanaged and not well very efficient. But even the richer developed, land rich countries still appear on the plastic offenders list.

            So, to the good part of the paper. What can we do about this issue? Well first off we need to shift our consumer habits to make better choices with our buying habits as a way to help the problem as well as encourage it solutions. Spending a few more cents on products that use easier recyclable products or even biodegradable plastics are a huge first step. We must support governmental regulation and support and advocate for policy changes to force manufacturers to begin reducing their needless packaging and overuse of plastics to start a movement towards zero waste. We also must begin to educate the world about the problem at hand and make recycling easier to understand and to force manufacturers to clearly state the methods of their disposal for the consumer. We must also help the rest of the world and countries less fortunate and knowledgeable as us to find waste disposal methods that work for them and are feasible to implement for their society. We must do what we can to start cleaning our oceans as well.  We must get away from using plastic bags and water bottles and storage containers and switch to using reusable products whenever we can. Stop using diapers, switch to cloth, and don’t use plastic utensils. For policy change to reduce packaging to make it compatible for the available recycling systems and make products as uniform as possible. But the main obstacle we must overcome is the use of plastic itself, we have to find a way to stop using so much plastic and creating more each year. Through making recyclable materials more competitive we could use this as a means to clean the pollution as well as reduce the amount of new plastics we use every year. With new products that could be sold at a profit it would be better for companies to encourage recycling as well as the world to reduce their waste streams.

            It may seem to be a daunting task to curb and solve our plastic pollution issue but it is one that is definitely feasible. It starts with a dual top down and bottom up approach. We must work together through all parts of society throughout the world in order to reduce our one use plastic levels as well as encourage better waste management solutions throughout the world. We must invest in new ideas that will replace plastic as well quit making more new plastic every year. We need to start to clean the oceans and mine the landfills to eliminate plastics so that they can be recycled. In turn we must develop and innovate ways to recycle plastic cheaper and sell recycled materials for a profit through development of usable attractive consumer goods for all classes of societies from the rich to the poor. The possibilities are endless in this aspect in that we can change the world with the products. We can build cheap houses for the poor. We can clean up our environment and provide healthier ecosystems for wildlife. We can create countless new jobs as well as new consumer products. All we have to do is dream it and turn it into reality, which is very easy to do as we have seen countless times throughout history, all we have to do is put our minds to it and a lot of effort and better world in this aspect will be right around a couple of corners.

In part 2 I will just go a little deeper into the effects form the animals to the landfills etc. Discuss more means of using recyclable materials to form new products and ways to make recycling and reuse and cleanup cost competitive so it can turn a profit for the manufacturer because without profits nothing is going to work.

African Initiatives in Clean Energy Advancement

As we venture into a time where an ecotopia is no longer an idea, but a necessity, we cannot help but to be led by the spirit of Hope such as Tim. We cannot listen to the economist that predict "financial ruin for nations that switched to clean energy." We know that "solar power allows individuals to generate their own electricity and so removes demand from the market." The power is in common people coming together and making this thing work. There is no real way for the solar power to work on a large scale, it must be done by communities coming together and identifying their needs. If we wait for the government to assist, it would ultimately be too late to save much of nature that we see going into ruins today. What happens when we use the last drop of oil? Does the earth need this and how will it be replaced? If we do not seek these questions we will continue to do things blindly. Many great initiatives have been mentioned throughout the course. I believe that more are continuing to grow. When we look on a world scale, other nations are running to solar technology and understand the benefit and need to adopt its path.

            The time for using coal, natural gas, and other unrenewable energy sources is quickly coming to an end in today’s time. Many would say it is because we are running out of these fuels, which is true. I would say it is because the money is starting to point in the direction of solar technology. History shows that the big businesses could care less about the carbon emissions, fracking, burning of unrenewable fossil fuels, and let along what it does to us as a people. If we are to fix our environment, we must create initiatives. However, studies have shown that the bigger issue is not running out of the fuels, but what will happen to our climate by the time we have used all of these fuels. We have an overabundance of carbon in our solar system right now. There have been many innovations over the past years to help people not rely on the old grid and start moving toward cleaner energy technology. One of the leading nations in this is Africa. Many places in Africa were off the grid beforehand. With the prices of solar panels dropping it has led major initiatives in Africa allowing millions of its people to receive power where they once didn’t have it. I think it is important to note the power we have as a community to do the same things for impoverished areas in our cities and communities. I believe the biggest factor in making this transition is how we treat each other. We have plenty of people with resources that can lead some of those same initiatives here in America. The question is will they? Will We?

            One of the best initiatives I saw based in Africa is Azuri. On their website they give you a detailed description of what their system is. It states, “Azuri’s entry-level PayGo solar home system provides 8 hours of clean lighting each day and the opportunity to charge mobile phones at home. After paying a small one-time installation fee for their Azuri system, the user then uses an integrated mobile money service to top-up their unit. Importantly, this top-up is priced to cost less than their current weekly spend on kerosene and phone charging, so customers start making savings right away. A customer purchases credit through a mobile money service either once a week or once a month, and tops up their unit from a T-Code received via text message. This keeps the Azuri system fully functional and in-credit, preventing the unit from shutting off. Over the course of typically 18 months, the purchase of top-ups allows the system to be paid off and the customer can choose to either unlock their Azuri system forever or upgrade to a larger model.”http://www.azuri-technologies.com/what-we-do#how-it-works

            This means that people who can’t even afford the system are getting them in their homes anyway. They set them up and pay on it weekly or monthly. Imagine if we had available in America, solar homes that we can buy off credit rather than regular homes. Imagine if the standard for living and building was that of energy efficiency. We use credit for many things so why not shift our credit system towards something that is beneficial.

When we look at civilization and who we would expect to lead initiatives in solar improvement, you would think of nations such as America or Europe. However, we will see that some of the most ambitions innovators are coming out of Africa. As Garth noted in his article in Quartz, “We’re putting together a product that’s got the latest LED lights, it’s got lithium iron phosphate batteries which are similar to the batteries you get in Tesla supercars, we’ve got adaptive smart metering inside the product, and we’ve got artificial intelligence in the product,” he told Quartz. It is important to note this because you see a system of value. It is not just about making money but putting the latest most efficient technology out that we have. This allows for more proficiency in what we do. If you look at what telsa is doing, you see top of the line innovation. The batteries that they are mass producing are the first of its kind and give us the hope of being able to store solar energy. The fact that these pay as you go solar systems have batteries similar to Telsa show a high level of innovation within Africa’s energy programs. He then goes on to say “And these are in $50 solar home systems that are sitting in rural Africa. And I compare that to the room I’m sitting in right now [in England], where light is controlled by two bits of wire and a mechanical switch, and has been for 150 years.”http://qz.com/604232/the-worlds-most-cutting-edge-renewable-tech-is-powering-rural-africa/

This company is a partner with the above mentioned company who gives people solar panels to light home and etc on credit. The fact the third world places are getting this shows how radical solar power is. It creates a situation where everybody can have access to power. The sun is not a capitalist and lights the entire sky. With these technologies we have the ability to harness this power with direct or indirect sunlight. Just look at what we have outside of the active solar grid. We can almost entirely run a home off passive solar methods. Taking into account the orientation of the sun, wind rose, degree days in your area, you can build your home to naturally heat, cool, and ventilate itself. When we take into account these designs, we see that we have the ability to use cheap material and still get full solar capabilities. One of the biggest factors to it is our need to cut back. We must be willing to let go of many of the materialistic ways we have picked up. As Tom Flannery would put it we must realize our power as an individual and champion one of the many causes on the battle field or start our own. We must be in this spirit of hope to create the atmosphere that resembles it. 

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