Plastic pollution in our seas

[Hardhead]

Originally Posted by tarian

Always like the Punctuation police, there like the environmental police holy than holy until you scrutinise them as well

As your one use plastic may take less oil to make to your life plastic bag there is always a compromise, how about your lithium batteries that need material dredged from the seabed destroying habitat and polluting with those massive dredgers with all that diesel it burns and the crew being fed steak from beef from the Amazon rain forest that has been cut down to accommodate all those cows.
My point is single use plastic is just another Bandwagon gimmick made up by those that think there Green but use a coffee pod in the morning , by far worse pollution out there which ALL needs addressing, but will not happen over night nor with our obsession with China and its exports of cheap goods and the Wests obsession with consumerism
including the I phone 11 what was wrong with the I phone 10

You've made a good point here. Details matter.

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by tarian

Have to agree here , too many windbags giving us their outlook of the world and preaching the preach , we have just spent over 300 years in the industrial revolution using hydrocarbons to maximise our lives, oil is not just used for driving your 4x4, plastics , oils, lubricants , etc etc etc, to stop using hyrdo carbons in the time frame people are bleating on about will send us back to the bronze age.
All those on your boats have a good rummage around and start listing what hydrocarbons were used to built your boat, including the energy used

Petroleum products include transportation fuels, fuel oils for heating and electricity generation, asphalt and road oil, and feedstocks for making the chemicals, plastics, and synthetic materials that are in nearly everything we
use.

No such think as a carbon neutral person , unless you live in a rainforest and not seen civilisation EVERY.

Love it. I wonder how carbon neutral their computer is?

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by cyan

The so-called California High Speed Rail is a really good example of a huge government failure that has caused many people to be truly skeptical of a governmen't ability to do something large and green. The fine people who created the Japanese bullet trains and the London-Paris Eurostar are a breed apart from the horribly inept folks that tried to do a similar good thing in California, from Los Angeles to San Francisco. THIS version fails on all promises, as it will be much slower, much less green, and many times the original cost after so many lies and wasted money already. This is without even reaching the two cities in question.

This debacle might sound surprising to outsiders, after all California is THE place where tons of high-technology comes from that the world enjoys. This paradox highlights the stark difference between the ability of private industry and that of big government, at least here in the Golden State.

Perhaps this helps some of the non-US members to understand the disdain that many of us have for big government solutions to our environmental problems...

It's not hard to agree that that project was a failure, but it's a pretty unique project, and I don't know that it's representative of all US government projects or undertakings.

(the least biased summary I could find is here)

I'm always open to hearing new approaches and ideas about how to address our environmental problems. I haven't seen many that don't require government involvement, whether that's through legislation or by partnering with industry.

[cyan]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

It's not hard to agree that that project was a failure, but it's a pretty unique project, and I don't know that it's representative of all US government projects or undertakings.

(the least biased summary I could find is here)

I'm always open to hearing new approaches and ideas about how to address our environmental problems. I haven't seen many that don't require government involvement, whether that's through legislation or by partnering with industry.

Yes, I suppose it would be unfair to assume that the US government is as awful as the California government on the topic of managing large "green" projects. However, the inevitable next question around these parts will be: "Hey where did all that revenue-neutral carbon tax money go?"

[Hardhead]

Originally Posted by cyan

Yes, I suppose it would be unfair to assume that the US government is as awful as the California government on the topic of managing large "green" projects. However, the inevitable next question around these parts will be: "Hey where did all that revenue-neutral carbon tax money go?"

That's a good dang question. I'd bet the answer is contractor fraud, and under bidding, under performing, of private sector contractors. The answer might be something like the Army Corp Engineers and Seabees - rather than this private sector approach, which always eventually turns into a major over-budget tax-payer funded boondoggle. Allow some real accountability, with the means to achieve it.

[transmitterdan]

There is a long list of projects that only government could and should do.

A few examples:

The atomic bomb was a successful project by the US government. Probably that’s a controversial opinion in today’s “safe space” world. Would have been nice if their security had been better. The Russians knew about the details almost as fast as the US did. But it has been argued that balance of power allowed the world to avoid nuclear war for all these years.

The CERN super-collider was a big success.

Nuclear subs were pioneered by US Navy. That was a wildly successful government program even to this day. Although diesel electrics are getting closer to parity with nuclear.

The Federal Reserve is a really good economic stabilizer. The Fed is more powerful than the heads of all the G7 countries combined. Yet they have not become evil or corrupt in defiance of the well known law about absolute power corrupting absolutely.

Government social engineering programs don’t have a great track record. So-called “affordable housing” projects have wasted many billions and subjected poor citizens to horrific living conditions. It still goes on today with the most recent cases of NYC exporting it’s homeless to slums in other cities. Habitat for Humanity has done a lot of good in the housing space.

I believe the government is a poor performer when it tries to adjust the behavior of citizens without the ability to make the offending behavior illegal. It usually tries that via excise taxes which have lots of unintended consequences and loopholes.

The best way to adjust behavior outside the justice system is through peer pressure. Educate everyone about what is best in an honest and simple way. Paraphrasing Peggy’s sig, if you can’t explain it to a 6 year old you don’t understand it yourself. The old saw, “you’re too stupid to understand the complexity and nuance of the issue”, won’t carry the day.

Plastic in the ocean is a problem. But how “big” is the problem? I don’t think we know the answer to that yet. Some will say that any plastic is too much. But if you tell people that half of the oil that leaks into the ocean each year does so naturally they would perhaps not believe you. Which is worse, plastic or crude oil? Both are bad but how bad?

[Hardhead]

If you read the studies involving the ever-growing microplastic contamination of the Earth - it's a serious issue. We're driving blind with the kids in the car.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by transmitterdan

The best way to adjust behavior outside the justice system is through peer pressure. Educate everyone about what is best in an honest and simple way.

When has that ever worked, especially for a large, serious problem that certain powerful groups have a vested interest in not recognizing?

[RaymondR]

The feed stock for the petrochemical industries, the predominate source of plastics, is natural gas which is predominately methane. Methane is a much more active global warming gas than CO2. Cows produce a lot of methane in their digestive processes.

The simplest answer to the problem is to close the cycle by teaching cows to digest plastics and catch the methane at their backside and use it to feed stock the petrochemical plants. A side benefit is that we could all eat as much beef as we wanted, another per hate of the AGW/CC zealots.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by RaymondR

The simplest answer to the problem is to close the cycle by teaching cows to digest plastics and catch the methane at their backside and use it to feed stock the petrochemical plants. A side benefit is that we could all eat as much beef as we wanted, another per hate of the AGW/CC zealots.

It was tried on babies. Didn't go so well. But anyone who can figure out how to change plastic waste into livestock feed will make a fortune.

[Hardhead]

Originally Posted by transmitterdan


The best way to adjust behavior outside the justice system is through peer pressure. Educate everyone about what is best in an honest and simple way.

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

When has that ever worked, especially for a large, serious problem that certain powerful groups have a vested interest in not recognizing?

IMO, that's exactly why are - where we are. And it gets worse with every single dollar donated to any political candidate.

Streamline the campaign finance system - so that each voter is allowed a set annual and equal limit on financial speech (through political campaign donations) of say, $5,000 - in total, for all candidates in a calendar period. Declare PACs & Super PACs null and void, and only allow living human voters the right to contribute to political campaigns. I wonder what would happen.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by Hardhead

Originally Posted by transmitterdan
The best way to adjust behavior outside the justice system is through peer pressure. Educate everyone about what is best in an honest and simple way.



IMO, that's exactly why are - where we are. And it gets worse with every single dollar donated to any political candidate.

Streamline the campaign finance system - so that each voter is allowed a set annual limit on financial speech (through political campaign donations) of say, $5,000 - in total, for all candidates in a calendar period. Declare PACs & Super PACs null and void, and only allow living human voters the right to contribute to political campaigns. I wonder what would happen.

A violation of the 1st Amendment. (hey, you asked)

[Hardhead]

Big companies could specifically give a 5k bonus to their employees, and encourage them to donate it to a political campaign, of the corporation's choosing. I wonder what would happen there.

[Hardhead]

Originally Posted by Exile

A violation of the 1st Amendment. (hey, you asked)

Good point - I thought of that as well, but my thinking being that it's not a "limit" on financial speech - since it's absolutely equal for every citizen. All are equal in that regard.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by Hardhead

Good point - I thought of that as well, but my thinking being that it's not a "limit" on financial speech - since it's absolutely equal for every citizen. All are equal in that regard.

If you mean limits on how much individuals can contribute to a candidate, that's already in place. I was commenting more about your proposal to eliminate PACs, etc. Not that it may not be a good idea from a policy standpoint, but that it would likely violate rights of free speech & association as defined by the US Sup. Ct.