Expensive Eve

Warming and Climate Change: causes, consequences, analysis ... Debate on CO2 and other greenhouse gas.
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elephant
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Expensive Eve




by elephant » 08/02/07, 19:23

I deliver to you in the raw state a text that a friend has just sent me by email:

Pierre OZER Researcher at the Department of Environmental Sciences and Management, University of Liège. Dominique PERRIN Researcher at the University Faculty of Agronomic Sciences of Gembloux
The place of global warming in the media, in citizens' concerns and in political debate is constantly increasing, as is the concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere.
The week before Christmas, I dissected the advertisements for my nearest hypermarket to prepare the long-awaited family meal. And here is what I was able to concoct for eight people with, in brackets, the kilometers traveled between the country of production and Belgium as well as the kilograms of CO2 emitted only for the intercontinental air transport of these purchased products. The analysis focuses on transport by air since it emits, on average, 60 times more CO2 than transport by sea.
First, to make things pretty, I have a magnificent bouquet of twenty roses enthroned in the center of the special day table. The origin of these magnificent flowers is Kenyan and the mode of transport is air (6 km, 550 kg of CO5,2).
With the decorum well established, let's start with an asparagus soup with langoustines. The green vegetable comes directly from Peru by plane (10 km, 500 kg of CO12,5) and the langoustines were transported, once peeled and frozen, by boat from Indonesia (2 km). Note that from a CO14 perspective it is still better to buy scampi farmed in South East Asia rather than that same crustacean caught in Scotland - what a paradox! Indeed, the latter, once caught in European waters, will make an extraordinary journey by boat to Thailand from where, once shelled, it will return to the European market (000 km). A relocation due to the fact that I prefer, on this Christmas Eve just like the other 2 days of the year, to buy shelled shellfish. And since 22 pc of consumers have opted for this time saving ...
After two good bottles of Chilean Sauvignon Blanc (11 km) with a pale yellow color, we tackle the dish of consistency. Determined to offer an exotic dish to my dear guests, I hesitated for a long time between the springbok - this beautiful antelope - from Namibia (900 km), the Australian kangaroo (8 km), the South African ostrich. (300 km), the New Zealand doe (16 km) and the Canadian bison (700 km). A little lost, I finally committed to making a simple steak-fries-salad from home. Under the perhaps funny title "we have for its Argentinian", my hypermarket offers me an Argentinian beef steak come by plane (8 km, 900 kg of CO18) at a price 700 pc lower than the White- Bleu-Belge ... How can you resist? For home-made fries, I buy potatoes labeled "organic" which come from the South of France by truck. As for the salad, it comes from Spain. So, for a moment, I wonder ... Why do we say that it is the traditional Belgian dish par excellence? But this futile questioning quickly dissipates because I have to quickly open the bottles of Californian Cabernet Sauvignon (5 km), a real wonder with a round and full-bodied attack on the palate.
And it is my wife who takes care of the long-awaited dessert. A fruit salad made exclusively with the fresh fruit on promotion found at the store. Hold on tight, these are nashi pears from South Korea, mangoes, papayas, figs and Charentais melons from Brazil, passion fruit from Colombia, pomegranates from the United States, strawberries from Israel, pineapple from Central America, cherries from Argentina and starfruit from Malaysia. We decide to add two kiwis from New Zealand, an orange from South Africa and a Belgian apple so that all the continents are represented in the same container. Obviously, as we approach twelve strokes of midnight, it's still 10 ° C outside and my three-year-old son keeps telling me that it's not Christmas since there hasn't been any snow yet, such a dessert has a cost: a cumulative distance of 126 kilometers and an approximate bill of 000 kg of CO9 emitted. With that, I uncork a bottle of white sparkling wine from Tasmania, an island in southern Australia (2 km).
Ultimately, flowers and wines included, the total distance traveled by all these products is 209 kilometers, more than five round-the-world trips, with emissions of 000 kg of CO41,3. This is equivalent to the CO2 emissions of an ordinary vehicle traveling the distance of 2 kilometers, or approximately 258 liters of gasoline for less than six kilograms of food!
However, with a nice bouquet of holly in the center of the table, a delicious pumpkin soup as a starter, followed by the same steak-fries-salad made from local products, a fruit salad without strawberries, cherries ... come by plane and French wines would allow us to reduce CO80 emissions due to transport by more than 2 pc.
Ensuring what we put on our plate is one of the many small civic acts we can take to reduce our ecological footprint. The transport of goods by air was 2 billion tonnes / km transported (1) in 1960. In 2006, this figure rose to 150 billion. And the share of CO2 emissions due to air transport is increasing every year.
A supermarket chants "Live as you want", another proclaims "And everything becomes possible". We are deeply convinced of this. And if we consumers no longer buy cherries from Argentina, strawberries from Israel or blueberries from Chile in winter, they will no longer offer them. Together we can force change. And all this without really losing our comfortable quality of life.
But in order for consumers to find their way around, they must be helped to make an informed choice. We therefore call on politicians to legislate in this area and impose on distributors the application of logos (a red plane and a blue boat, for example) systematically and clearly indicating the mode of transport used for the intercontinental transport of these merchandise.
(1) Load carried expressed in tonnes multiplied by the distance expressed in kilometers.
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elephant Supreme Honorary éconologue PCQ ..... I'm too cautious, not rich enough and too lazy to really save the CO2! http://www.caroloo.be
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by Christophe » 08/02/07, 19:28

Layout ... Source?
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antoinet111
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by antoinet111 » 08/02/07, 21:45

thin, and again the cost in CO²,
* for the operation of tractors,
* greenhouse heating,
* the CO² released into the atmosphere to synthesize nitrogen,
* electric and fuel energy to keep the rooms cold,
* the need for ground and tunnel plastic sheeting, non-biodegradable and derived from petroleum,
* we could go even further I'm sure.

example: my friend
lived 15 years in Romania, 10 years in Germany, in France today,
to visit many countries and North America this spring.
even together less than a fruit salad.
It's crazy.
find the mistake :?: :?: :?: :?: :?:
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Down the talkers and ceiling fans!
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by bolton069 » 08/02/07, 21:45

Hello,

I seem to have already seen these 2 names somewhere. :D

They are members of the collective avion rouge les 2 cités: I found this link on their site.

http://www.lalibre.be/article.phtml?id=11&subid=118&art_id=329054

"Opinion published in La Libre Belgique of Tuesday, January 30, 2007 "
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by jean63 » 09/02/07, 01:36

that is the result of excessive globalization.

Above that, I think Bové has an idea .........
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Only when he has brought down the last tree, the last river contaminated, the last fish caught that man will realize that money is not edible (Indian MOHAWK).
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by Targol » 09/02/07, 10:57

This debauchery of transport and CO2 is all the more revolting since we still live in countries where many products are available locally in all seasons.

For example, my New Year's Eve this year offered:
- Homemade duck foie gras with ducks raised (not in intensive : Evil:) in the southwest.
- garden salad
- haunch of deer bought from the village hunting society (since they kill them anyway, you might as well eat them)
- Sarladaise potatoes (duck fat, garlic, coarse salt).
- mushrooms picked from the nearby woods.
- cheeses (there, we are sure that it does not come too far :D )
- homemade tea cream log (well, ok, the tea does not come from next door but it is only a few grams)
- all washed down with a Grave AOC bought directly from the producer 500m from my home.

Well, we all had a great time and the atmosphere didn't get too hot (like what is possible).
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by Christophe » 09/02/07, 10:58

EAT OYSTERS (and MUSSELS) !!

They fix marine carbon!
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by sam17 » 09/02/07, 19:53

A small issue of France Inter on unnecessary transport, in the particular case of the Mont Blanc Tunnel.

It is the choice, in the format mp3 or ogg, it starts at the 11eme minute.

http://media.la-bas.org/mp3/070206/070206.ogg
http://media.la-bas.org/mp3/070206/070206.mp3
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by jean63 » 09/02/07, 19:59

Well done Targol ==>

This debauchery of transport and CO2 is all the more revolting as we still live in countries where many products are available locally in all seasons.

We'll get there ! This morning, while shopping at Intermarché, I took a good look at the provenance of the fruits I bought:

1 - clementines : could not do better than Spain => bought anyway .. :? but I will not do it again (indeed kiwis contain much more vitamin C than clementines and are perhaps less processed ..?).
2 - Apples : come from a local market gardener (3 kms away !!!), I noticed it for several years and I found it great for an "average surface"; bravo to them :D
3 - kiwis : France. well done. and at 20 cents each !!!
4 - bananas : Colombia => I did not buy any; you have to buy those from Martinique although "by plane : Evil: "(not sure, maybe by boat .. ??) but there it does not grow in France
5 - Lawyer : Israel !!! : Evil: !!!! and why not New Zealand .... this is the case for some kiwis I believe. ==> not bought.
For the other races, I would have to look precisely: in terms of dairy products, it's fine.
On the other hand, I buy grapefruit juice "without added sugar" for young people from the Paquito brand (we can? No CSA here?). I don't see any provenance, but I suspect it is from Florida. : Evil:

When I think that when I was little (50s), we only had oranges for Christmas at the foot of the tree !!! I lived in Cantal in Haute Auvergne, so transport ..... there were some who did not reach that far !!!
.... I will eat ... without avocados ..... : Mrgreen:
Last edited by jean63 the 09 / 02 / 07, 20: 20, 1 edited once.
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by delnoram » 09/02/07, 20:19

jean63 wrote:4 - bananas : Colombia => I did not buy any; you have to buy those from Martinique although "by plane : Evil: "(not sure, maybe by boat .. ??) but there it does not grow in France metropolitan


By adding that : Arrowu: it's better not to hurt or encourage anyone. 8)
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