Save our Planet

Source: The Local

It’s exciting to read about federal agencies recommending a healthier lifestyle for ourselves and the planet. After all, they supposedly exist to benefit and look after the well-being of the nation and its people. So, kudos to Germany’s Federal Environmental Agency for being responsible in its job to communicate, provide information, and advise Germans on how to reduce their carbon footprint.

According to an article in The Local published on January 22^nd, Germany’s Federal Agency encourages its citizens to cut back on their meat consumption. The agency suggests the adoption of the Mediterranean diet. And what exactly is the Mediterranean diet? A Mayo Clinic’s article on heart disease states:

The Mediterranean diet traditionally includes fruits, vegetables, pasta and rice. For example, residents of Greece eat very little red meat and average nine servings a day of antioxidant-rich fruits and vegetables. The Mediterranean diet has been associated with a lower level of oxidized low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol - the “bad” cholesterol that’s more likely to build up deposits in your arteries.

Now, even the Germans are confirming the findings published in the United Nation “Livestock’s Long Shadow” report: the raising of livestock is damaging for the planet.

In Germany, fifteen percent of greenhouse gas emissions is from the agriculture sector. The agency further noted that aside from the huge amount of energy it takes to produce meat for human consumption, the gas and dung attributed to cattle also produce methane gas and nitrous oxide, both are more damaging to the climate than carbon dioxide.

We can’t blame the cows. Cattle by themselves are not an issue, but when they’re “produced” in an unnaturally high number, their natural bodily processes become a cause for concerns.

I also did a little research on nitrous oxide and discovered a little scary health fact from the United States Occupational Safety and Health Hazard Administration :

Exposure to nitrous oxide also causes neurotoxic (spinal cord lesions, demyelination, peripheral neuropathy) and hepatotoxic (focal inflammatory lesions) effects in experimental animals.

In exposed pregnant rats, it causes early embryonic death, and if the mother rat manages to give birth, the baby mice were born with abnormalities. Oh my God. This is the stuff that is used in laughing gas, by our dentists, and as an anesthetics!  What effects does it have on us? Human studies didn’t fare any better:

At lower concentrations, exposure causes central nervous system, cardiovascular, hepatic, hematopoietic, and reproductive effects in humans.

Higher dosage causes us to pretty much pass out. Prolonged exposure at different levels of concentration causes bone marrow depression, granulocytopenia (a blood disorder), numbness, and the list goes on.

This is pretty serious. Actually, this is shocking! I knew that, at high concentration, greenhouse gases cause the earth’s climate to destabilize. I didn’t know that in the case of nitrous oxide, it could cause a lot of health problems, and in some cases, deaths due to aplastic anemia. The ramifications for eating less meat is truly worth considering, both for the sake of our well-being and the health of the planet.

Hospitals in the United Kingdom have taken up the cause to help combat climate change. According to an article in The Guardian, “Hospitals will take meat off menus in bid to cut carbon,” the National Health Service is proposing the meat-free diet as one of the ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Last year the NHS published what it believes is the biggest public sector analysis of carbon dioxide, the biggest greenhouse gas, which showed the organisation’s emissions in 2004 were 18.6m tonnes and rising. This accounts for more than 3% of all emissions in England, and if the NHS was a country it would have been ranked as the 81st biggest polluter in the world that year, between Estonia and Bahrain.

One-fifth of the emissions were from transport, one-fifth from buildings, and the remainder from procurement, including drugs, medical equipment and food.

One interesting analogy that the article noted was that the NHS contributed to 3% of greenhouse gas emissions in England, “and if the NHS was a country it would have been ranked as the 81st biggest polluter in the world that year, between Estonia and Bahrain.”

The article also made reference to the call for a vegetarian diet made by the United Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Chairman, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri:

Last year, the United Nations climate chief, Rajendra Pachauri… said having a meat-free day every week was the biggest single contribution people could make to curbing climate change in their personal lives, because of the chemicals sprayed on feed crops and the methane emitted by cattle and sheep.

The National Health Service is also proposing other green activities to cut greenhouse gas emissions which include: using tap water instead of bottled water; turn off unused equipment; use a greener mode of transportation to work, etc.

Source: MailOnline

Source: Kyodo News

We have exciting news from Japan. To get an accurate picture greenhouse gases emissions on a global scale, Japan launched a satellite into space on January 23^rd. The goal is to determine the source of the carbon dioxide and methane emissions in different parts of the planet, and how much of the gases are attributed to absorption by the forests and oceans.The satellite, called “Ibuki” which means “breath”, will circle Earth every 100 minutes. So, instead of the usual 100 images every two weeks with the current system which includes land-based stations and instrumented aircraft flights, scientists will get over a million observations from the newly launched satellite.

“Global warming is one of the most pressing issues facing the international community, and Japan is fully committed to reducing CO2,” said Yasushi Tadami, an official working on the project for Japan’s Environment Ministry. “The advantage of Ibuki is that it can monitor the density of CO2 and methane gas anywhere in the world.”

According to the Associated Press article, “Japan launches orbiter to probe greenhouse gases,” within one year, from 2006 to 2007, carbon dioxide emissions rose 3 percent globally. To us layman, that doesn’t sound like much, but in actual fact, that could cause temperatures to rise by 4 to 11 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s huge! Scientists are worried that if we don’t do something to put a halt to this “global climate destabilization” as coined by Greg Craven, we’re in big trouble.

Next month, the United States will also launch another satellite, the Orbiting Carbon Observatory, to look at only carbon dioxide emissions. This is good news that both governments, Japan and the United States, are taking the issue of climate change seriously. Hopefully, we will get a much clearer picture of what’s going on in the atmosphere of our planet.

P.S. ~ Happy Lunar New Year to everyone - Year of the Ox 2009! May your life be filled with goodness and joy!

Picture by my friend, M.N.

In the past couple of days, quite a few newspapers all over the US, including one in the United Kingdom, BBC, reported on an alarming news - trees are dying faster than usual across western United States and Canada. Two-hundred-year-old forests are dying, becoming more sparse. Based on a study published in the Science journal, the death rate of trees double that of fifty years ago. Moreover, there are not enough new trees to replace the loss. Researchers came to this startling conclusion based on the study of data from 1955 to 2007. ScienceNews reported:

Records from 76 plots of apparently healthy, old-growth temperate forest in the western United States and Canada show that the small number of routine, noncatastrophic tree deaths in a year has doubled since 1955…

Photo by David Zalubowski, from AP

What worries scientists now is that if this continues, there won’t be much of any forests left. Also, the size of the trees will be impacted, becoming skinnier and smaller. Why should that matter? It does matter a great deal, especially when trees help us a great deal in absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, the air we breathe, as a by-product.

Punier forests might store less carbon than they do now, van Mantgem said. Biologists count on these forests as helpful absorbers of carbon dioxide, but van Mantgem cautions that the new finding “raises the possibility that western forests could become sources of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, further speeding up the pace of global warming.”

Not only that, when the old trees die, they also release all the carbon dioxide they’ve been storing. What if we plant more trees? That’s not going to help in terms of absorbing and storing carbon dioxide. According to University of Washington ecology professor Jerry Franklin, as reported by the Associated Press, “Young forests store very little carbon, and it takes hundreds of years to replace old growth”.

Why is this happening? Global warming, once again, is being blamed. The warming of the planet is creating a fertile and beneficial environment for pathogens and diseases to develop. The warmer temperatures are also very conducive to boosting bark beetle population:

Warming has played a role in the massive beetle outbreaks chewing through swaths of forest, so perhaps smaller, everyday infestations are getting more serious too.

According to an article on Bloomberg, this problem poses a higher fire risk due to the rising temperatures. Furthermore, the loss of old-growth forests will have an impact on the supply for what we use every day: wood, paper, and cardboard.

One question that I’ve raised which wasn’t addressed by the study or in any of the articles is: What’s going to happen to all the inhabitants of the forests? Their habitats are dwindling, where will they go? We’re talking about the potential extinction of many species. We haven’t yet addressed the invaluable medicinal contribution that comes from the forests through the centuries.

Image by my friend, C.

It may seem like it’s no big deal that some old trees are dying in the United States and Canada. But it can become a widespread problem, and the chain reaction that can have a huge impact on various sectors including the economy, environment, healthcare, and more.

Image from NASA

It’s good that spring starts two days earlier right? Scientists think otherwise, according to an article published in the Chicago Tribune today. (The same subject was also published by Guardian in the UK .) In fact, they believe that it’s a warning sign that the Antarctica is warming. And it’s not good:

…the planet’s temperatures have shifted significantly in the last half-century, with many of the potential consequences likely to be negative.

This conclusion was based on two research carried out by two teams of scientists from the University of California-Berkeley and Harvard University. The study by UC Berkeley showed that the warming has started since 1954 but the significance was more obvious about 3 decades ago.

The other study, based on satellite data, showed that:

…only the northwestern peninsula of Antarctica has shown significant warming over the last 40 years, while the bulk of the continent appeared to be cooling.

What’s the ramification?

…if warming is occurring across a wider area than previously observed, that could increase the possibility of large ice shelves melting off the continent and changing sea levels around the world.

And why should the melting of the ice be important? The belief is that there won’t be any ice left to reflect the sunlight back into the atmosphere, which then causes the earth to warm even more. Also, the melting of the ice will lead to an increase in sea level and that may spell big trouble for coastal cities and island nations, as we’ve seen what have happened to beaches such as Broad Beach in Malibu, California and other island nations around the world.

Mars

Yesterday I was watching Supreme Master Television via Sopcast and happened to hear something interesting about Mars. This is too interesting not to share.

What happened to the Red Planet? It seems the reason why Mars is the way it is right now was because of climate change. A recent article published by the New York Times reported that a team of researchers at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, USA, revealed that they’ve discovered “plume of methane gas rose from the surface of Mars.” The scientists ruled out subsurface cows and believe it may be caused by bacteria. There may be another explanation, according to Supreme Master Ching Hai when she was asked if the recently discovered methane on Mars may be related to people living underground:

Could be, could be. Yes. Because they have to pump faucet gases from their activities from underground to the surface of Mars so that they can detox and purify the air that they breathe.

Master Ching Hai said that the Martians also sent two messages to the people on earth:

There were two messages. The first one is from the Council of the People. And there are only two words from them, “Be virtuous.” And the second message is from the Chairman of the People. He said, “Save your home before it’s too late.” Save your home before it’s too late, that’s what they said.

This is some pretty interesting and eye-opening information. Whether you believe it or not, it’s still fascinating to listen to. Hoping to catch something more about Mars, I tuned in today, and this was what heard on Supreme Master Television a little while ago during the news segment:

The mass extinction came. They die, not only humans, but the animals also. They die by two main poisonous gases, namely, hydrogen sulfide and nitrous oxide, plus methane as the third course. Sulfide and methane from the livestock begun to warm the climate and then triggered more other gases from the ocean, from permafrost, and glacier around their planet. Just like what is happening to our planet right now.

 The destruction happened too fast and no one can help anyone. Only 0.2% of them escaped, around 2 millions, into the underground caves. And that’s how they survive.

Wow. I heard that before about hydrogen sulfide and nitrous oxide. An article by Science Daily in 2005 mentioned that hydrogen sulfide played a role the mass extinction on earth millions of years ago:

Volcanic eruptions in Siberia 251 million years ago may have started a cascade of events leading to high hydrogen sulfide levels in the oceans and atmosphere and precipitating the largest mass extinction in Earth’s history, according to a Penn State geoscientist.

And just this past December, an article in Oceanus talked about nitrous oxide as “Another Greenhouse Gas to Watch”:

There’s a greenhouse gas whose concentration is on the rise because of human activities. But it’s not the one you’d expect: it’s nitrous oxide (N₂O), also known as laughing gas. It’s been accumulating in the atmosphere since the 1700s, and it’s powerful and persistent. One molecule of N₂O has the same greenhouse warming power of 300 molecules of carbon dioxide. Once that N₂O molecule gets into the upper atmosphere, it can stay there for more than 100 years before it’s destroyed naturally.

Where exactly does nitrous oxide come from? According to the EPA, it’s produced naturally and by humans:

Primary human-related sources of N₂O are agricultural soil management, animal manure management, sewage treatment, mobile and stationary combustion of fossil fuel, adipic acid production, and nitric acid production. Nitrous oxide is also produced naturally from a wide variety of biological sources in soil and water, particularly microbial action in wet tropical forests.

I didn’t know much about greenhouse gases before. I used to not believe in global warming and climate change. But the evidence is too overwhelming to ignore, and it’s coming from all over the world, and now from Mars. Seriously, I really hope and pray that we can save our planet for ourselves and not end up like the Red Planet. Imagine living life underground your entire life!

Image by PiedPiper

A few days ago an article by Bob Ewing on Digital Journal reported that they have now linked a European viral epidemic to global warming.  According to the article, nephropathia epidemica (NE) is:

…a relatively mild hemorrhagic fever that causes flu-like symptoms often with renal complications, sometimes also with pulmonary problems, needing Intensive Care treatment, such as acute dialysis and/or mechanical ventilation. In some rare cases it can, moreover, cause the shock with internal haemorrhaging and death for which these infections are infamous.

The hantavirus is the culprit for the epidemic and the bank voles are the accomplices. Apparently, the hotter summers and milder winters, effects of global warming, may have helped trees such as oak and beech to produce more seeds. As a result of the surplus in so-called food, the vole population increases dramatically, this in turn, creates a higher incidence of contact with humans. It’s not hard to guess what happened next. The infection is transferred from the vole to people who visit the forests more often due to warmer weather.

Currently, the epidemic has spread to Belgium, France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Luxembourg. According to the research carried out at Belgium’s Rega Institute, in the last three years, 2005-2007, there was an increase of 37.6% in cases related to the viral disease.

Image from MSNBC.com

It was amazing to watch the inauguration and the inaugural parade for President Barack Obama, the 44^th President of the United States. His speech was powerful. It touched all lives, crossed all boundaries, and addressed people all over the world, not just Americans alone. What an incredible speech. Wow. (I couldn’t find my tissue box when I needed it during his speech.)

I was really moved when President Obama and the First Lady walked ahead of the motorcade to greet the cheering throngs. They seemed so down-to-earth, so connected with the people. It’s great to see our leader who is not so stand-offish and so loved by the nation. An article on ABCnews.com pointed out that there were “Zero Arrests” during the entire event. That is awesome. That speaks volume about the support that President Obama has from the people.

Image from planetsave.com

My wish? I truly hope that President Obama really tackles the real issue that plagues our country and the planet at the moment. I want positive change that truly impacts the life of ordinary people - national healthcare, social security, the environment, foreign policy, the economy, healthy lunch option, education, and world peace. We have to so much to do to make our country a better place for everyone. Above all, I hope he will address the issue of climate change immediately.

According to the United Nation FAO’s report “Livestock’s Long Shadow,” the raising of livestock is the highest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. The solution? Global warming can be curbed if we can just cut back on greenhouse gases emissions through the raising of livestock. If we don’t save the planet for ourselves right now, all other issues won’t matter if we don’t have much of a planet left to live on. The facts are there. I rather that we prepare for the worse than wait until it’s too late and then too many lives would be lost.

It would be great if President Obama considers trying a plant-based diet for the sake of the planet. Wouldn’t it be great if he lead by example and cut down on his meat consumption? Maybe he can even consider becoming a vegetarian. However, he won’t win the prize for being the first vegetarian president in the world. The former president of Slovenia, Dr. Drnovsek was a vegetarian.

Supreme Master Ching Hai and Former Slovenian President Dr. Drnovsek

I have hopes that President Obama will take our country and the world in the right direction. Check out one of his latest appointments to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. He has chosen Cass Sunstein.

Cass Sunstein

What’s so special about this man?

Sunstein is best known for his balanced views between government regulations and cost-benefit analysis and for his theory of behavioral economics and he is widely considered to be a great choice for the office.

Cass Sunstein is a vegetarian and an animal advocate. A vegetarian in the White House. President Obama has assembled a very diverse cabinet and appointed capable individuals who bear the promise of great things to come.

God bless America.

Image by PSFK

Newton Running, based in Colorado, USA, is doing its part to cut back on its carbon footprint. Environmentally conscious, the company has come up with a revolutionary way of packaging shoes, all made from 100% recycled material. Instead of the traditional way of packaging shoes, their shoe box is shaped just so that the shoes fit snugly, thereby eliminating the need for tissue paper.

How do the shoes retain their shape? Instead of the usual paper stuffing, Newton Running stuffed a pair of socks in one shoe and a reusable shoe bag in the other. Very creative and a very appealing concept. For a pair of shoes, you get a pair of socks, a reusable shoe bag, and the satisfaction of knowing that you’re buying from an eco-friendly company. And the good news is, you get free shipping from now until January 31^st. How good is that? Well, the catch is you have to buy at least $100 worth of shoes.

Kudos to Newton Running for thinking out of the box!

Check out this article that was published about six months ago: National Security At Risk From Global Warming - UN: ‘Climate Refugees’ Are Already Fleeing Natural Disasters. Boy. This sounds pretty bad. And this was six months ago.

Image by Robert A. Rohde

I’ve heard from somewhere that so far about 18 island countries have already been submerged under the sea. I’ll have to look that up. (I don’t like to be one of those people who only talk about doom and gloom things, but this is one of the topics that I feel is very relevant at this point in time.) Global warming is real. Climate change is a reality.

According to the article, and similar to what Greg Craven mentioned in his “How It All Ends” youtube video, global warming might compromise national security all over the world, not just our own country.

“Studies that contribute to the report are not classified, and at least some of them point to real concerns about the future of U.S. security in a warmer world. It wouldn’t be the first time high-level U.S. national security experts have warned that climate change is a real and present danger…”

Why would global warming be a threat to the national security of any nation? When food, water, and our daily needs become scarce, then it’s a huge issue, not to mention the amount of migration from disaster areas to more stable regions.

“Reports such as these look across the globe at volatile regions that might be thrown into turmoil by increasingly scarce natural resources like clean water, new mass migrations of people fleeing unsuitable living conditions or increased frequency or intensity of natural disasters.”

We haven’t yet taken into consideration the human trauma and psychological factors. There are solutions to help fight global warming and stop it in its track. We need to focus more on sustainable energy sources to reduce our carbon footprint. We need to recycle and be more green. And we need to cut back on our daily meat consumption because it’s a fact now that the raising of livestock is the number one contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. We can do it. Save ourselves and our kids by protecting our planet, the only home we have.

Image from http://http://www.ar8.ie

Good news from Tunisia! Magharebia reported this week on Monday that due to its energy campaigns for a more sustainable energy source, Tunisia has become a lot more energy efficient. Last year the country reduced its energy consumption by 9%, saving 800,000 tons of oil. That’s wonderful news. Keep up the great work, Tunisia!

Unfortunately, Malibu, California, USA is not doing so well at one of its more prized beach surrounded by multi-million dollar homes. Broad Beach is going underwater, or most of it already has.

Image by LA Times

According to climatologists and oceanographers, there won’t be any sand left. In other words, Broad Beach will vanish completely due to rising sea levels.  What’s the reason? Climate change. And it’s going to get worse:

A group of scientists this month once again elevated those projections, suggesting that a rise of up to two feet predicted last year by the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) could easily double or more within the next century. The new numbers, outlined in a study commissioned by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, take into account the latest data and observations of glacial and land ice melting, which send torrents of fresh water into the ocean.

“You end up with what’s called a drowned beach,” Guza said. “At low tide, the water comes rushing up the sea wall. At high tide, there’s no beach, just water.”

Homeowners are putting in efforts to come up with solution to save the beach. But the scientists believed it’s a wasted effort. According to climatologist Bill Patzert, “In the end, Mother Nature and global warming will win. No matter how much concrete they pour, all of those sea walls and houses will end up in the ocean.” You can watch a two-minute video from LA Times by clicking here .

But we do have some good and hopeful news from other parts of the world. The 50-year-old monarch of Monaco, Prince Albert, became the first head of state to travel to the North and South Poles on a mission to see for himself the impact of climate change. That’s really impressive. Let’s hope he will bring positive policy change to help preserve our home, planet Earth, when he returns home to Monaco.

Applauds are also in order for vegetarian professional race car driver Leilani Munter. She’s speaking out about the importance of being eco-friendly and addressing the need to tackle environmental issues that’s facing our society.

She’s also talking about putting “together an Eco-Dream Team where the race cars will show a public service message to race fans, promoting greener actions, such as using energy saving light bulbs. She also wants to set up eco-education centers at the racetracks.” Kudos and hats off for your pro-active approach to addressing global warming!

On September 7, 2008 The Observer newspaper in the United Kingdom came out with a very startling news: UN says eat less meat to curb global warming. There’s no ambiguity about it. And the message came from the Chairman of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri. In 2007, the IPCC was co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize with former US Vice President Al Gore who was honored for his Inconvenient Truth presentation.

Dr. Rajendra Pachauri

Dr. Pachauri recommended that everyone should have “one meat-free day a week if they want to make a personal and effective sacrifice that would help tackle climate change…” He reasoned that it is a lot easier and quicker if we change our eating habits than to change the means of transport:

“In terms of immediacy of action and the feasibility of bringing about reductions in a short period of time, it clearly is the most attractive opportunity,” said Pachauri. “Give up meat for one day [a week] initially, and decrease it from there,” said the Indian economist, who is a vegetarian.

At least he walks the talk, since he himself is also a vegetarian. In an interview with Supreme Master Television , Dr. Pachauri shared that he wasn’t always a vegetarian until he realized the detrimental environmental impact of the raising of livestock for human consumption.

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation has estimated that meat production accounts for nearly a fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions. These are generated during the production of animal feeds, for example, while ruminants, particularly cows, emit methane, which is 23 times more effective as a global warming agent than carbon dioxide. The agency has also warned that meat consumption is set to double by the middle of the century.

Image from Climate Change Action

Aside from the dangerously high levels of greenhouse gases released in the atmosphere due to factory farms, there’s also the destruction of habitats and the clearing of forests for grazing. Thousands of acres in the Amazon had been destroyed for this reason.

The Amazon forest.  Source: http://www.rain-tree.com/facts.htm

The clearing of forests also have other ramifications. According to Jocelyn Stock Andy Rochen:

“To understand why deforestation is such a pressing and urgent issue, forests must first be given credit for what they bring to global ecosystems and the quality of life that all species maintain. Tropical Rainforests presently give a place to call home for 50% - 90% of all organisms, 90% of our relatives, the primates, and 50 million creatures that can live no place but the rich rainforests (World Rainforest Movement 16). Not only are other species at risk, but the human race also benefits from what the trees give. From something as minor as the spices that indulge food to life giving medicines, the rainforests amplify and save lives.”

In short, we’re pretty much shooting ourselves in the foot by the way we disregard nature and the environment. 500,000 hectares vanished in a single week. At the rate we’re going, there may not be too many forests left.

Aside from stressing the importance of the vegetarian diet to help curb climate change, Dr. Pachauri also mentioned that we include other lifestyle changes, “That’s what I want to emphasise: we really have to bring about reductions in every sector of the economy.” In fact, this information was already made public in November 2006 by the United Nations:

29 November 2006 - Cattle-rearing generates more global warming greenhouse gases, as measured in CO2 equivalent, than transportation, and smarter production methods, including improved animal diets to reduce enteric fermentation and consequent methane emissions, are urgently needed, according to a new United Nations report released today.

“Livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today’s most serious environmental problems,” senior UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) official Henning Steinfeld said. “Urgent action is required to remedy the situation.”

That was two years ago. The time to act is now.

Photo by Sam Clemens

Another bit of good news this week, this time from Japan. Considering that carbon dioxide emission from all modes of transportation is one of the major contributors to global warming, twenty-two countries got together in Tokyo to address this issue.

Image by AFP

Finally. And it’s a good thing that the United States also attended. Apparently, president-elect Barack Obama is going to action to do something about climate change. Really good news.

Image from Barack Obama Info Center

According to the article “Transport ministers plot climate action in Japan,” this is a huge shift from the Bush administration. During his term, Bush refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol. Furthermore, there were some pretty unconscionable cover ups by the Bush-appointed higher ups at NASA about the reality of climate change.

Japan PM Taro Aso

“Everyone living on the Earth is expected to take responsible actions to protect our planet,” Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso told the session, which also includes UN climate chief Yvo de Boer.

Rightly said, Prime Minister Aso. All of us need to take action. If our government is lethargic and apathetic about addressing the issue of climate change, we should let them know about it. This is our home, we have to clean up our mess that we’ve created all these years.

“I would like each participating country to accelerate its efforts to reduce C02 emissions from the transport sector, as well as to enhance its support for developing countries, utilizing its technologies and experiences,” Aso said.

I think it’s great that Japan is taking the leadership role and encouraging other nations to put more effort into reducing CO2 emissions. It’s also very heartening that he’s also calling for support to assist developing nations. Not every country is equipped financially and technologically to deal with the problems of global warming. It’s a very good thing that the international governments are striving to work together as a team.

Image from Centre for Ecology and Hydrology

What I would like to see also is more governmental action about the number one cause of climate change, the raising of livestock. It would be awesome if more nations follow the example of the European Parliament to make the right policy change. The facts are there. We can’t always avoid the problem until it’s too late.

I wish everyone a happy, peaceful, and fun weekend.

It’s so great to read some good news in other parts of the world. It seems like more and more people are taking climate change seriously and are doing something constructive about it. For example, a massive tree-planting project has been launched by Peru’s Ministry of Agriculture, as reported by Andina.

The goal is to plant 40 million trees by February 20, 2009. It is hoped that it will “capture more than 570,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually”. Wow. This is incredible news! According to the article, climate change plays a key role:

Forest plantations or so-called carbon sinks have played a critical role in the climate change negotiations and constitute a central element in the scheme to limit atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations set out by the Kyoto Protocol.

This campaign was launched in reaction to a scientific report presented in May 2008 to the European Union-Latin American Summit.

The report predicts that economic losses from extreme weather shifts and disasters, including floods, droughts, freezing downpours of hail and landslides, could reach $30 billion by 2025 - the equivalent of 4.5 percent of Andean Community nations’ GDP - potentially blocking development in Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Colombia.

Deforestation and a 30-year temperature rise that is 70 percent higher than the world average along the eastern valleys of the Andes is threatening the ecological collapse and drying out of the Amazon rainforest, the report says.

That’s some pretty dire news for Latin America. I’m glad Peru is taking it seriously and is doing something about it. An immediate benefit? This tree-planting campaign is creating about 130,000 temporary jobs.

Elsewhere in the world, France is taking the plant-based diet seriously as an important solution to combating climate change. Within this week, three major French newspapers published a news story about the importance of a vegetarian diet on health and one linked it to climate change. (Thank God for translations tools on the internet. J)

The Metro’s headline for the article, “To Be Vegetarian without Deficiencies,” explained that our daily nutritional needs can be met through a plant- and fruit-based diet without requiring meat or fish. On the side, the article quoted the Chairman of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, “If you eat less meat, you’ll feel better and the planet also.”

Another French newspaper, Le Figaro , published another article the following day about the health benefits of the vegetarian diet. The article also points out that according to the study by the FAO, 20% of greenhouse gas emission worldwide comes from the production of meat.

Similarly, in today’s edition, Le Monde published an article with the headline “Eating vegetarian is the best for health.” The article quoted Professor Fernand Lamisse, a nutrition specialist at the University de Tours, “The choice of vegetarian food is almost always accompanied by a healthier life.”

Hats off to France’s The Metro, Le Figaro, and Le Monde for reporting on such beneficial information.

Good news has also come from New Zealand. Over $10 million has pretty much been allocated for research on climate change. Wow. The money will be used to develop technology to help reduce methane emissions from livestock and also to measure the impact of climate change on the economy.

Let’s hope more good news will come from all over the world as more countries and governments place human life and thus the preservation of the planet as more important than anything else.

Image from Andina archive

The article Meat-Eaters Aiding Global Warming? came out in April 2006, perhaps before FAO released their comprehensive report Livestock’s Long Shadow that same year. Based on a study by two researchers, Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin at the University of Chicago, the article pointed out the impact of meat on both our health and the planet:

Your personal impact on global warming may be influenced as much by what you eat as by what you drive.

That surprising conclusion comes from a couple of scientists who have taken an unusual look at the production of greenhouse gases from an angle that not many folks have even thought about. Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin, assistant professors of geophysics at the University of Chicago, have found that our consumption of red meat may be as bad for the planet as it is for our bodies.

What can we do to lower our carbon footprint? How can we help the planet to be healthier?

If you want to help lower greenhouse gas emissions, they conclude in a report to be published in the journal Earth Interactions, become a vegetarian.

What’s the basis for this claim that the vegetarian diet has the lowest impact on the planet? The researchers looked at five different diets and examine the level of greenhouse gases production through the amount of fossil-fuel energy it takes to produce each type of diet. Evidently, a vegetarian diet is most gentle on the environment:

When they looked at only carbon dioxide emissions associated directly with energy consumption, they came up with the vegetarian diet far less damaging to the planet than the others.

Though the fish diet ranked fourth in terms of carbon emission, however, switching from a meat diet to fish does not significantly increase the energy efficiency:

“The seafood portion of American diets is heavily skewed toward what is called charismatic predator fish,” Eshel said, which are harder to catch. “Sword, shark and tuna and so on require long-distance ocean journeys, and those efforts are not efficient. They require a lot of labor and a lot of fossil fuel.”

What’s the researchers’ recommendation?

“…eat whatever works for you, but just keep in mind that the less animal-based food you eat, and the more you replace those calories with plant-based food, the better off you are, in terms of your health as well as your contributions to the health of the planet.”

Time’s running out. We’re pretty much at the edge of the tipping point, the point of no return. Let’s do our part to save the planet for ourselves and our kids. Try it today. Go veg a few days a week or even more. There are only benefits.

Image from Be Naturally Well

I was browsing around the internet and came upon this great site - The Grinning Planet. They have this hilarious and whimsical 8-strip comic series about global warming, “The Day the Earth Stood Still” by Marc Roberts. It’s fun humor but very thought provoking. I mean, we got “unique-looking” aliens with advance technology taking the human race to task for what we’ve done to our planet. And global warming is a “communist vegetarian plot”? LOL That cracked me up. And the solution to solving the global warming crisis? Ah, I’m not going to ruin it for you. Interesting ending. Check it out. I hope you like it as much as I do. And thank you, Grinning Planet.