Posted on July 30, 2008 by Gerald Pugliese
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"We need to reaffirm the principle of predictability," George David, chairman of United Technologies Corp, told the House of Representatives Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming.
"We need to say to our world that we are going to have a cost of carbon, whether it's cap-and-trade or a carbon tax," he told a hearing in Hartford, Connecticut, where United Tech, the world's largest maker of elevators and air conditioners, is headquartered. "There's got to be an understanding that the cost of energy is going to be high for a long time."
While oil prices have quadrupled in the last four years, he noted past price spikes have been followed by sharp declines.
David declined to back a particular approach for assigning a cost to emissions of carbon dioxide, the primary greenhouse gas associated with global climate change.
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Solar heat absorbed through windows and roofs can increase your air conditioner use. Incorporating shading concepts into your landscape design can help reduce this solar heat gain, reducing your cooling costs.
Shading and evapotranspiration (the process by which a plant actively moves and releases water vapor) from trees can reduce surrounding air temperatures as much as 9° F (5°C). Because cool air settles near the ground, air temperatures directly under trees can be as much as 25°F (14°C) cooler than air temperatures above nearby blacktop.
Using shade effectively requires you to know the size, shape, and location of the moving shadow that your shading device casts. Also, homes in cool regions may never overheat and may not require shading. Therefore, you need to know what landscape shading strategies will work best in your regional climate and your microclimate.
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If you cannot get a recycle bin from the sanitation department, you may be able to purchase one from your local health food store or by visiting a recycling center in your area. Making sure that everyone in your family participates will help to do wonders for conserving natural resources not only in your city, but also around the world.
When trash is picked up from your home or business, it is taken to a landfill, where it is sometimes sorted so that sanitation workers can bring the 'good trash' back to factories. This process is rather tedious and sometimes empty glass bottles or paper plates and cups that should have been recycled go unnoticed. When you use your recycle bin, you are already separating the products that can be used again to make recycled grocery bags, coffee cups and glass products.
Getting your family or co-workers involved in recycling is a great way to reduce global warming as well. When trash is taken from your home and needs to be disposed of, it is often burned in order to be easier to work with. The gases that are given off during this process negatively affect the ozone layer, and make the layer weaker. This means that over time, humans could be even more exposed to the hazardous rays of the sun. This exposure causes more incidences of skin cancer and affects our produce crops, so learning to reuse products can eventually help preserve our world.
