U.S. a source of world frustration on warming

What official US policy doesn't get is the economics. Regardless of Kyoto, beliefs and current fuel economy standards, if you double your efficiency, you double your profit. So whether Kyoto is acceptable or not, whether you accept climate change or not, you double your income by doubling your efficiency. Yes, Bush, et al., are only short-term thinkers.

 

yeah this is kinda sad.... sigh, boo.

 

How do you double your profit?

 

By taking the *total* costs into account.

Simple concept, but quite beyond the shrub.

 

You effectively double your profit by cutting you input costs by one-half or more through efficiency. Rocky Mountain Institute's "Factor Four" (Lovins) and "Natural Capital" (Hawkins) discuss this and models this for industry and governments on a large scale. Critical thinking and engineering are used to advantage, rather than designing systems that continuously work against us.

For example, while natural gas, petroleum, gasoline and utilities are going up in price, our cost of utilities have been 1/30th ($30 per month vs. $300 per month) compared to those around us. We have a Prius. We retrofitted our home to be more energy efficient 10 years ago (R-100 ceiling, triple pane windows, ceramic tile floors, caulking, weatherstripping). The "break even" point was 2.5 years (compared to surrounding homes). We have been reaping the "profit" ever since.

Becoming more efficient means identifying connections between steps, eliminating waste streams, and sustainability.

 

That's not what Europe is discovering...
Kyoto to 'reduce Europe's growth'

 

I would hope growth stops eventually. Unless we can build an extension to our current lump of rock...

 

I would imagine that a lot of the US economic growth and emissions growth in the last 25 years has a lot to do with the US population growth.

The 1980 Census reported a popuation of 248,709,873.

The 2000 Census reported a population of 281,421,906.

The current Census website says today's population estimate is 297,868,385.

So, that's a 19.7% population growth since 1980. And 5.8% population growth in just the last 5 years.

So, as long as the US population continues to grow, our economy had better continue to grow at at least the same rate.

Likewise, when considering the total growth in emissions from the US in the past 25 years, you need to consider the population growth as well.

Since the US birth rate is fairly low, I would imagine that most of the population growth is due to immigration.

 

Hmmm. What is 'profit' really, if it costs us the earth?

 

The stuff I use with which to buy my 2006 Classic Silver Prius, package #6.

 

What some people don't get is that Bush's cronies (including the House of Saud) are oil men, and they make more money when the rest of us burn more oil, not less. They also expect (rightly or wrongly, I won't speculate) that the oil bubble won't burst until after they're dead. Alternative energy and efficiency are good for the country, but bad for the oil barons. The foxes eat the chickens, they don't protect them from being eaten. W may be a moron, but the people behind him know exactly what they're doing when they sabotage any attempt to move the country away from oil.