Getting off the oil hook

COOLTRIKERCHICK

As consumers then to make our oil go further, and to save money, the best thing to do is allways buy secondhand or 'make do and mend' to make sure that you get the maximum out of a product..

shop local, and buy as much locally produced food, and products in general...try and not buy pre-packed fruit and veg etc...... and dont use a plastic bag to weigh your bananas in:mad: ( now that really annoys me...lol...)

As some one pointed out in their post..... its the products that are produced using oil etc will also have a premium price on them...

I think we should all turn into wombles:rotfl: as lets face it, the wombles were 'cutting edge' when they first came on our screans.... well before their time.

I know what i have just said is easier enough said, as we are under advertising/ media pressure to buy and own the latest gasgets, and if we dont use a certain type cleaning product our house cant be clean etc....and using disposable items are so good for today's modern living...

so hopefully eventually more and more people will come round to this..

I must admit i do get confused with climate change, and automatically think of the weather etc... but i should imagine i am in the majority with this confusion, and maybe this is what the government or certain groups of people want us to think...

PeterZ_2

Consumers is a great word - thats the world we live in today, based on consumers. Big business needs people to consume for them to make bigger profits.

Eventually we willhave consumed all of our planets resources, not just oil but various minerals and metals are becoming harder to extract. At some point soon we will be forced to move to a sustainable way of life.

The challenge is to move to a sustainable way of life without decreasing our standard of living.

tbourner

Everyone should read "Time to Eat the Dog?", I'm about half way through and it's really interesting.

darkpool

"Scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal."- Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

I don't think the IPCC based their conclusion on evidence they found on google.

keith_r59

darkpool wrote: »

"Scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal."- Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

I don't think the IPCC based their conclusion on evidence they found on google.

No, but they did get some of their evidence from reports published by environmental groups and not from peer-reviewed literature.

Ben84

I think we're struggling with the benefits of personal behaviour and gain vs. group behaviour and gain. If the majority in a group, such as all the people in the UK or even the world make changes to help the environment we'll all gain, but as individuals consuming lots of resources and fossil fuels is very beneficial. There's no point in me being super green and spending more money on everything and time too, as well as missing out on the freedom of having a car and cheap air travel if I'm going to be one of very few people doing this. There will be no significant group gain and I'll personally lose out and have less than everyone else in the group too. However, individuals who consume as much as they can will benefit from this consumption and possibly also get a group gain too if large numbers of other people make different choices. We may not have reasoned it quite so clearly, but this is the root of why we're all waiting for others to make the first move, it's just a good strategy in many choices. Whole countries are behaving the same about environmental issues like cutting greenhouse gas emissions, at Copenhagen many would have been willing to commit to bigger cuts if a few others had made the commitment first.

I wonder if we're ever going to break out of this and how it might be possible to do this? We don't have infinite time to negotiate a group environmental gain, the damage is accumulating and most people are still playing consume all they can. We're going to have to find a way to make reduction in consumption pay for individuals. For example households that consume say 20% less gas/electric than average get a reduction in the cost per unit that they have consumed, and perhaps cutting VAT on greener products like insulation and train tickets. Whatever happens we need to encourage people to make changes now with immediate benefits added to the behaviour, not continue with the so far minimally effective attempts to make everyone as a group change behaviour and pay high prices (in time/money/whatever) now with only long term group benefits that depend on many others doing the same.

stoozey

zeupater wrote: »

... source, the 'informed and highly educated scientists' at NASA whose 'opinion on scientific matters' are to be believed (Ref:GISTEMP - http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/ ) ....

Z

Hope these are not the same ones who faked the moon landings..

PeterZ_2

Ben84 wrote: »

I think we're struggling with the benefits of personal behaviour and gain vs. group behaviour and gain. If the majority in a group, such as all the people in the UK or even the world make changes to help the environment we'll all gain, but as individuals consuming lots of resources and fossil fuels is very beneficial. There's no point in me being super green and spending more money on everything and time too, as well as missing out on the freedom of having a car and cheap air travel if I'm going to be one of very few people doing this. There will be no significant group gain and I'll personally lose out and have less than everyone else in the group too. However, individuals who consume as much as they can will benefit from this consumption and possibly also get a group gain too if large numbers of other people make different choices. We may not have reasoned it quite so clearly, but this is the root of why we're all waiting for others to make the first move, it's just a good strategy in many choices. Whole countries are behaving the same about environmental issues like cutting greenhouse gas emissions, at Copenhagen many would have been willing to commit to bigger cuts if a few others had made the commitment first.

I wonder if we're ever going to break out of this and how it might be possible to do this? We don't have infinite time to negotiate a group environmental gain, the damage is accumulating and most people are still playing consume all they can. We're going to have to find a way to make reduction in consumption pay for individuals. For example households that consume say 20% less gas/electric than average get a reduction in the cost per unit that they have consumed, and perhaps cutting VAT on greener products like insulation and train tickets. Whatever happens we need to encourage people to make changes now with immediate benefits added to the behaviour, not continue with the so far minimally effective attempts to make everyone as a group change behaviour and pay high prices (in time/money/whatever) now with only long term group benefits that depend on many others doing the same.

Another great post Ben84.

At the moment people have freedom of choice to either consume or be sustainable. And you are very correct in that many people will put their own interests first and look for personal gain.

At some point we will lose that freedom of choice. It may be forced upon us by government and law, or forced by pricing. If petrol costs £5 a litre then you still have the choice to drive, but most people are then going to use the bus/train/walk.

The problem with the latter scenario is that it hits the poor hardest while the rich can still afford to consume.

The question is in the future who will be rich and who will be poor? It may be that China is the rich guy and buys up all the resources leaving the poor UK priced out of the market.

The price of oil is still rising!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business/market_data/commodities/143908/twelve_month.stm

zeupater

stoozey wrote: »

Hope these are not the same ones who faked the moon landings..

:rotfl::rotfl: ......

No, just the same ones who others have referenced earlier in the thread to support the existance of climate change ..... the problem is that when posts have been made referring to the 2010 being the warmest on record and therefore proof of climate change, information from NASA which explains this particular anomaly is conveniently ignored .......

The real question which would need to be asked is how many years of temperature (weather) stability or reduction data would be required to counter climate change predictions ...... it seems that a period of acceleration of temperature increase starting in the 90's is conveyed as being 'unequivocal proof' of climate change, however, a period of cooling this century is classified as only being 'weather' & nothing to do with climate ........

Z

Cardew

So, at some time in the future, we should reach a consensus on where we stand on 'climate change'.

We then move on to attempting to quantify how much of that effect(if any) is 'Man made'