Happy New Year...

To begin off the New Year. At first I was pondering whether or not I should comment on what happened last year, but last year has gone and to me there isn’t much of a point to tell you all of the bad things that happened last year. All I will say is that 2011 was bad hopefully 2012 wont be.

Well to begin off the New Year, let me just say it is a wonderful start, we once again have a few massive specie deaths. I really wish that this year didn’t start so depressingly. It hasn’t even been a week since New Years and I am already shaking my head at what is happening. It is sad how it happens so frequently at one point I feel like it is becoming expected that something will go wrong, and unfortunately it does. Well then now that the depressing part of the New Year is over I really want to see how can it improve because at this point anything is better than what it is now.

So what I will give you instead of apocalyptic warnings, how about some green architecture because there needs to be some break in between the numerous crises that wait the world.

Animal Spotlight

So this week I am going to share some animal pictures just because they are so awesome and need some recognition. The reason why I chose these specifically is that they are each being encroached upon, either by a diminishing habitat or just because humans think they are too dangerous.

1. Grey Wolf

After being off of the Endangered Species list for a short while, the grey wolf was put back on in August 5, 2010. Despite being on the list, grey wolves are still hunted because they disrupt farms.

2. Polar Bear

Polar Bears are slowly becoming extinct. Not only are the ice caps melting away, therefore causing the bears to drown and starve, but their genes are being lost in the Brown Bear genome.

3. Snow Leopard

There are about 6,000 Snow Leopards in the wild, although their numbers are difficult to count, and are under threatened status. Their numbers are low due to scarce food and poaching.

4. Arctic Fox

Although the arctic fox fairs better than the others on this list, two arctic fox population are at a critical state because the market of furs and the result of canine diseases originating from dogs.

7 Billion and Counting

Did you know that you are one out of seven billion people and counting living on Earth?

The babies dubbed the seventh billion are symbolic, symbolic of destruction or symbolic of prosperity. Even so, nothing is being done so humanity will not reach their population maximum. China has restricted the number of children you can have, but what about Europe or America, where babies are still unregulated. Soon there will be eight billion and it wont stop there. What will happen when humanity reaches its max because there are already signs of strain on the planet?

With these seven billion people on Earth, hundreds of million are advocating for more tax on the wealthy 1%, a few others are trying to stop fracking and a smaller percent is protesting the Keystone pipeline in the US. What has seven billion plus all of the people that have died accomplished?

Well the boomer generation has created the largest carbon footprint compared to any other generation. They created the giant trash vortex that is now the size of two Texases. Each American family has at least two cars and buys a new car at least every 5 years. Life has become a game to utilize all of the people and make a profit at the lowest expense possible.

At the same time, humans have initiated some of 905 species and 784 from 2006 extinctions and cut down the Amazon rain forest at 25 to 50 acres a minute to accommodate the massive market of seven billion and counting.

At the rate that humanity is expanding what will happen? It seems unrealistic that seven billion of any organism, especially if it the size and expenditure of a human, can exist without destroying the environment. The Earth is already suffering from Global Warming, specie extinction and natural disasters. What do you think?

So Far

Hello and welcome to my assessment of my blogs so far.

1. Choose and analyze the strongest and the weakest post

Personally I think my strongest post on my blog was Tips to be Eco-Friendly. One of the reasons why is because I know from experience what works and what doesn’t. I think my weakest is Climate Change Part 1 because there was just too much information to tell and I tried to condense it, but it didn’t work.

2. What is working?

I think what makes a post well written is if it is spontaneous and comes from your passion. When I write like this it seems like people are being affected by what is said, or at least I hope.

3. What isn’t working?

What is not working is trying to define current environmental issues.

4. What do you want to improve in the next 6 weeks?

I think I will start writing about what has influenced me to becoming an environmentalist because if I can say how I became one maybe other people will see what I see and change. I also think I need to make sure that all my information is right and there are no grammatical errors in the post

5. what steps will you take to make that happen?

I will research more and take notes about what has affected me that week. I will also spend a little more time proofreading my posts.

Climate Change: Video

Here is a video that might be interesting. It pretty much sums up what is happening, but in more scientific colloquial.

Clicky the Links

http://www.kqed.org/quest/television/web-extra-at-the-core-of-climate-change

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKPNcQyljds

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/08/bill-nye-battles-fox-news-climate.php?campaign=th_rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+treehuggersite+%28Treehugger%29

Climate Change Part 1: Greenhouse Gases

I realized that if you are reading this blog you probably understand that something is happening, but few people know what specifically is happening, and most don’t “believe” it is happening at all. So here is how much I understand (including some graphs).

My first question would be, do you think global warming is happening? If it is happening, then what do you think is the cause? So to clear up your misunderstandings, if you have any, here is greenhouse gases. (This explanation will be separated because it is a complicated problem, where you have to know everything to understand what is happening)

Here are some misconceptions of Global Warming Climate Change. ( And yes, it is Climate Change, this difference will be addressed later)

As you see this is a pollution pie chart. Do you see what is wrong with it? I didn’t at first, but it is lacking a lot of information.

First, this includes pollution created through manufacturing and transportation, and that is probably the main source of pollution you are familiar with. I applaud everyone who is not surprised by the following statistics. This type of pollution accounts for _____ (this is left blank because there is no consistency in percent of carbon dioxide made by humans in websites I visited) towards trapping heat in the atmosphere. The other pollution comes from cows, particularly from cows farting. Humanity bred cows, then we decided to feed cows corn which causes to fart, a lot. Did I forget to mention that methane, which is a gas in farts, traps 20 times more heat than carbon dioxide? There are about 100 other gases from livestock that pollutes the world, including 2/3 of ammonia--ammonia is one of the main causes of acid rain. I also forgot to say that it is not only that cows’ fart, but the entire process to raise, slaughter and transport, which contributes to pollution.

I think that this explains a little better, but it still does not account for everything such as the factors which affect carbon levels in the atmosphere. For instance, trees remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. By cutting down trees, humanity increases the amount of carbon dioxide in the air because it is not being used at an efficient rate. The oceans also clean the air, but when there is too much carbon dioxide, the ocean cannot absorb enough carbon dioxide.

Maybe this will explain a little better. Just remember the graph above--think about how much carbon dioxide emissions you see daily and the carbon that you don’t see because your actions--be it driving, or just eating food--cause natural carbon dioxide to magnify. This graph is also incomplete because it focuses only on methane.

As you can see information is scattered, that is one of the reasons why it is difficult for most people to accept what is happening. Even in this blog, I focused primarily on carbon dioxide because it is familiar and is one of the major greenhouse gases addressed in the argument for and against Climate Change. This is only one part, the next post will start to get confusing.

Tips to be Eco-Friendly

So I have gotten requests to write about tips about how to be environmentally friendly. Well I could tell you some new ones, but first lets go over the ones you hear the most.

• Use mass transit
• Turn off the lights when you leave a room
• Throw away trash and recycle recyclables
• Reuse rather than throw away

I could tell you more, but you already now this. Why do I need to reinforce something that has been told to you so many times? Is there a special authority about writing in a blog that makes you listen to me?

This is the real advice, if you want to be environmentally friendly, you see something wrong why not do something--anything is good. I have some problems with even following the tips I posted. Some things are just not reachable because it is not available. It also takes time to get these as a habit, and I don’t expect people to change immediately. But when it is there, when there is recycling, walking a meter will not hurt you, it will not make you late for class, but it will save some trees or prevent the plastic from blocking waterways.

Now for the more realistic tips.

• Don’t settle because it is easier
• Make the most of what is offered to you
• Just buying eco-friendly product doesn’t mean that it counteracts how much you buy
• Get more people to change because one person doesn’t make a difference but many get noticed

I might include more tips, but the best tip I could give you would be to follow your own conscience because I can't tell you anything, except what I think.