Miscellaneous Environment Issues
There is increasing “green” information on news channels. The following collection caught my fancy tonight.
• One third of the water use in the Murray Darling system is used by the dairy and cattle industry. This was followed up by discussions of what crops should be grown. It was stated that farmers should be free to make a business decision about what crops should be grown. My take is that this is fine in high rainfall years and if the cost of water taken into account.
• Another question is whether carbon trading is a tax grab by Government or a legitimate and sensible method of reducing greenhouse emission. The take home message is that carbon trading needs to be applied across the board.
• Amazing! Someone is finally saying that people need to think and train people to cope with changing circumstances instead of only dreaming up expensive engineering solutions.
• Climate change and drought have already forced around 10,000 farming families off the land. We do need farmers and we need to be growing food.
• Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFL) are very energy efficient and really reduce greenhouse emissions. There is a problem however in disposing of them and education about how to safely dispose of them. There needs to be a collection/recycle method. CFLs must never go to landfill and this is banned in New Zealand and the European Union. The lamps contain mercury and if this changes in landfill to a much more toxic form. There is only one mercury recycling plant in Australia in Melbourne.
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