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Location: New Albany, Indiana (Greater Louisville)
11,974 posts, read 25,464,896 times
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American public opinion determines what will happen with the environment. Most Republican voters I know don't want the Smoky Mountains to be deforested and strip mined. The worst case senario is some air/ water quality standards are rolled back slightly.
Not even close... I pay about $100 for a cord of wood (that is, for what I don't pull off my 41 acres, when I am too lazy to do it myself)... about 25M BTU per cord...
I have a ground-sourced heat pump (two deep wells), and at least in this case, don't waste your time and money. Fortunately, this house is mostly solar, so I can keep it at 80 degrees when it is 10 degrees out, with no energy consumption.
Dry cleaners are regulated by the EPA, which is reducing the use of volatile organic compounds in their process. Just because you haven't heard doesn't mean it isn't happening.
Used to work for Government before rules were promulgated. Very weak for this industry.
It is just woods. I only take the dead trees (I am getting too old to do this stuff, so 90% of what wood I have, I buy.
Of course when others come in and 'borrow' trees on my property, I could say I am a little less than 'kind'.
Thank you for sharing the photos, Grandpa. I was 14, in Michigan, when the EPA was formed, and Detroit, Flint, and the Ohio River had starring roles in the theater of pollution that called the policy to law.
This is another more in depth description of Why the EPA that your readers may find interesting, particularly in that we've regressed in some ways. (It's like watching a war for life: People v Earth, and if we win -- we lose.)
Excerpts:
"For years, raw sewage, industrial and feedlot wastes had been discharged into rivers and lakes without regard for the cumulative effect that made our waters unfit for drinking, swimming, and boating. Smokestack omissions and automobile exhausts made air pollution so bad in certain communities that some people died and many were hospitalized. The land itself was being polluted by indiscriminate dumping of municipal and industrial wastes and some very toxic chemicals that would later come to the fore when their steel drum containers would rust and leak hazardous materials into soil and aquifers."
...
"The U.S. experienced a vast increase in throw-away packaging: cans, bottles, plastics, and paper products--and the introduction into the marketplace of thousands of new synthetic organic chemicals. As a result of this deluge of waste land toxic materials, the earth's automatic, self-cleansing, life support systems became increasingly threatened."
note the LACK of trees.. There are more trees now than there were before EPA took over management! Maybe we should return it to the indeginous population?
that's a picture of dodge city. kansas has never exactly been famous for their forests
I don't disagree with all environmental legislation but we need accept the fact in a modern society there is going to be environmental damage. We could make laws that would elimante all pollution but that's not very sensible if you can no longer turn the lights on in your home, use transportation or even have enough food on the table.
As far as the images in the article at least in this one the photographer took some artistic liberties, certainly there is some dust but most of the sinister look to this image is derived from the how and when the image was taken.
It's the same situation with this image that someone tried to use in a discussion about coal plant emissions I was involved in. Ironically they suggested "that's not clouds" which is exactly what they are, the only stacks in this picture that emit pollution are the taller skinny ones in the background and in the case of those the visible "smoke" is just water vapor from pollution controls called wet scrubbers. After tracking down the source it came to my attention the photographer used HDR processing which will expand the contrast between colors hence the reason the clouds from the cooling stacks in the foreground that produce nothing but water vapor are much darker than they would appear naturally.
The question is: How much environmental damage? In a modern society, we actually have the knowledge and the tools to have significantly less environmental damange for a very low marginal cost. The problem is, just as people want the cheapest "made in china" items sold at Wal-Mart instead of something of substantially better quality for slightly more cost, our society doesn't seem to want to take on those costs. The desire to have the cheapest is going to set us back decades, over time.
I don't know about dry cleaners but I know they have been after paint shops the last decade. I have 92 Buick Regal with very low miles. Hit a deer but not a huge amount of damage and it cost me $1200..... parts were about $400 and the rest of it was paint and not a whole lot either. I was debating scrapping a car with 60K miles on it or selling it to someone for cheap.
How environmentally friendly is scrapping a whole car with 150 potential miles left on it?
I've painted 1/3 of my car for less than $800. if $400 were parts, how many hours of labor were you charged? Sounds like you got royally ripped off.
I'm mechanically inclined and I'm basing the three hours on what I would expect it to take. I used to have trucks and had to do lot of my own body work so I'm not completely unfamiliar with what is involved.
I'm referring to the paint booths, air filtering and other costs involved with running a paint shop. Perhaps I'm wrong and it's state regulations? I know a decade back DEP (our state environmental agency) was all over these paint places.
paint booths are just closed, controlled environments to do paint work in. with temp and humidity controls, it allows a car to be painted more quickly. the ventilation aspect is a nice health feature for the guys doing the work. any body shop that didn't have a paint booth once they were affordable is nuts. i have no idea if it's an EPA/DEP requirement, but I cannot imagine going to a body shop, as a customer, who didn't have one.
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