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| Fri May 7 22:44:43 2010 Tree-Hugger Me |
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| Mon Oct 12 21:10:41 2009 The 2009-2010 Winter Forecast |
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| Mon Oct 5 23:08:30 2009 My Charitable Giving |
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| Fri May 7 22:44:43 2010 Tree-Hugger Me I'm a die-hard environmentalist in spite of my SUV. |
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| Today I celebrated 6 weeks of commuting to and from work without driving!
This is all because I recently moved (see The Dream Tour), and I can bus to work and walk to almost everywhere I need to shop. I've been mostly commuting by public transit since December, but in March my parking pass ran out so I've been commuting 100% car-free since then. My gasoline consumption has dropped by around 50% or more compared to 2009, even though I often drive into the mountains on the weekends. However, I still drive a large black SUV that gets really crappy gas mileage. So I can't really call myself an environmentalist, can I? Well, actually I can and I do. I was inspired by this story, which pointed out that most people think about environmentally-friendly driving entirely wrong. Most people think that we can help the environment by buying cars with better gas mileage. But as the article noted:
So by moving and driving far less, I've actually reduced my carbon footprint much more than had I stayed where I was and bought a Prius. Don't get me wrong, eventually I'll get a greener car. But it won't be a Prius. It will be an SUV that has cleaner emissions. I need a truck with clearance, room for cargo and gear, and four wheel drive. That's another thing many people (including proclaimed environmentalists) get wrong, by the way. When it comes to the environment, gas mileage isn't important: emissions are important. The two are related, but they don't have to be. Car and truck manufacturers could be held to much stricter emissions than they are now. Paradoxically, better catalytic converters could slightly reduce gas mileage, but that would be overall worth it. So what is the responsible, green future for the planet? It won't be suburbia with hybrids. It will be people living much closer to where they work and shop, driving far less, in cars that have about the same gas mileage as now, but with lower emissions. That's going to be a big demographic shift, but it will be better for the atmosphere, and will also be forced by rising gasoline prices. Comments |
Related: economics science > environment < predictions Unrelated: books energy geopolitics lists mathematics |
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| Mon Oct 12 21:10:41 2009 The 2009-2010 Winter Forecast How much snow will be in the Cascades this winter? |
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| Should I buy a season pass to
Mt Baker this year?
Actually, I probably will. I haven't the past two years, and in each year it was almost worth buying one. I figure if I get a season's pass, I'll go a few more times, and then it will have paid for itself. But the bigger question is: is it stupid to buy a season's pass this year? After all, it is an El Nino winter, which typically means warmer, drier weather in the Pacific Northwest. And that means less snow. So for once, I decided to really research the 2009-2010 winter forecasts. What do the experts predict? Greg Simmon's forecast is dire: "a warmer and somewhat dry weather pattern is expected from the Pacific Northwest..." And he adds:
Well, shoot! I mean, I love hydro sources as much as the next guy, but we need snow! Then, Accuweather released a map of the expected precipitation (at left). Not good! The best resource is probably the National Weather Service, which has very detailed forecast temperature and precipitation maps for each month. The bottom line? We're screwed. Everyone predicts a dry winter. It might get better in April! So look for great spring skiing. Well, that's the prediction. How have they done the past few years? Here's the table I compiled. Mt Baker's average annual snowfall is 647 inches, according to their website. I figured a season was average if it was 600-700 inches of snowfall (which is a lot of snow, by the way...). Of course, as the Mt Baker ski area loves to tell you, they had the world record snowfall of 1140 inches in the 1998-1999 winter. That was the winter I learned to snowboard (not at Mt Baker, sadly), and I have to say: there was a crazy amount of snow that year.
So what does that say? It says that NOAA gets it right more often than a random guess (44% instead of 33%). But more scarily, the past two El Nino winters have been very dry. So, based on that, I'd guess this will be a very poor year, with less than 450 inches of snow! I say that because it has been incredibly dry so far this summer and fall. However, last year there was "only" 548 inches of snow, and I thought it was great. And hey: maybe this means that, during the 2009-2010 Winter Season at Mt Baker, every day will be like spring skiing! Comments |
Related: economics > environment < predictions Unrelated: books energy geopolitics lists mathematics science |
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| Mon Oct 5 23:08:30 2009 My Charitable Giving How I give... |
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| I was catching up on finances last night, and realized I was behind
schedule on my charitable giving (I promised myself to give every
month). Furthermore, I had lost track of who I was giving to so I
had to go back over the past year of donations and see what charity
I was supposed to give to next.
I'd been meaning to reorganize my charitable giving for a while, so now I went ahead and did it. Why reorganize? Because, with these economic times, I've seen more people out on the streets asking for money. You should never give money to pahhandlers, because many are scams, and even for those that aren't, if you give them money you are encouraging them to panhandle instead of working with local charities themselves to get themselves off the street. If you really think someone needs help, give them food instead (I tried that once and was rejected--the panhandler just wanted money!). But not giving money to panhandlers is only acceptable (to me) if I'm sure I am giving money to charities that will help people that really need it. But I realized that all of the charities I was giving to were political, so I wasn't actually giving a dime to charities that were helping people in need. So, as I said, it was time to reorganize. I went through and made sure I was giving to the organizations that I thought deserved or needed the most, and tried to make sure I had a good balance between political causes important to me and just generally helping people in need. When I was done I still felt like I was short-changing one charity, so I decided to give double in December. So here is my new allocation. There are 10 charities that I give to, three of them twice a year. It breaks down as:
How much do I give? Many years ago I started giving just $40 a month (I think that was it), and then every New Year one of my resolutions was to increase how much I was giving. Now I give enough that I watch who I'm giving to pretty carefully. But for a long time I didn't give anything, because I didn't think I could afford to. Now that I can, I feel like I should. I don't think how much is given matters that much--and donating time is usually better than donating money anyway! The important thing is to give. Comments |
Related: economics > environment < Unrelated: books energy geopolitics lists mathematics predictions science |
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