Prepare for Change

 https://www.ukraineoversight.gov/Funding/   As of September 30, 2024, the U.S. Ukraine response funding totals nearly $183 billion, with $130.1 billion obligated and $86.7 billion disbursed. * * * * * Consider the cost of war.  The US has not spilled a drop of blood in this war, yet it is costing us quite a bit.  Russia has had over 750,000 casualties since they invaded Ukraine (killed or wounded).  It's estimated that Russia spends about $750 million per DAY on the war.  And why?  It should be obvious by now that Ukrainians don't want to become Russians.  They want to be left alone, not taken over.  Putin started a war for his own benefit, not for Ukraine's, nor even for Russia's.  And he can't back out now without losing face. Those who start unnecessary wars are the worst people on earth. 

 

  https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/dec/18/if-a-million-germans-have-them-there-must-be-something-in-it-how-balcony-solar-is-taking-off   With solar balconies, no such consent is required unless the facade is listed as of historic interest or there is a specific prohibition from the residents’ association or the local authority. Furthermore, as long as the installation does not exceed 800 watts it doesn’t require certification, which can cost from €100 to €400, depending on the area. “The beauty of the solar balconies is they are flexible, cheap and plug straight into the domestic network via a converter, so you don’t have to pay for the installation,” says Santiago Vernetta, CEO of Tornasol Energy , one of Spain’s main suppliers. * * * * * This looks like an obvious solution.  You don't need a system huge enough to run your house. You need one that is cheap and easy, and will save you $.  

  https://www.mossy.earth/   To be suitable, the project must aim to achieve one or more of these objectives that are central to rewilding: Restore biodiversity and/or abundance of native species Restore key ecosystem processes (e.g., flooding, migration, herbivory, predation) Improve habitat integrity and connectivity Protect unique and threatened ecosystems and species  * * * * * I don't know much about these guys but it looks like a good group.

  https://youtu.be/4x8ZT-M2Dok?si=h80VeueqS6CoHgNU   Did you know that 40% of what goes into our landfills is from construction projects?  Companies are springing up to recycle much of the old construction material.

  Why don't people in power talk about the obvious most important things? during the 2024 presidential campaign, both Kamala Harris and Donald Trump seemed to struggle to find topics that would sway voters to them. Harris promised to provide $25,000 toward first-home purchases, alluding to the shortage of housing. Trump, sticking to his anti-immigration theme, worried that that immigrants to the US are “eating the dogs, they're eating the cats” in a small town in Ohio. Both candidates steered clear of the most obvious and important topics. I'd like to shine a light on what they should have been focusing on. The writers of the US Constitution stated their goal was “in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” Housing and illegal immigration do fit in there, but I submit that there are more clear ...

  https://youtu.be/J1GIF6VNipE?si=hW-sXpIfptB09WOi   192 malls in the US plan to include housing sections.  

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/nov/24/world-unable-cope-10-years-talks-un-global-treaty-to-end-plastic-waste   This year, various researchers found microplastics in every sample of placenta they tested ; in human arteries, where plastics are linked to heart attacks and strokes; in human testes and semen, adding to evidence of the ubiquity of plastics and concern over health risks. The plastics crisis is widely recognised as a threat to human health, biodiversity and the climate.  Two years after a historic agreement by 175 countries to adopt a mandate on negotiations for a global, legally binding treaty to address the whole life cycle of plastics, delegates remain widely divided on what to do – and a deadline is looming. Progress has stalled over a row about the need for cuts to the $712bn plastics industry . The last talks , in April, failed to get an agreement to put production targets – seen as key to curbing plastic waste – at the treaty’s centre. *...

  https://www.yahoo.com/news/york-judge-rejects-state-efforts-202606195.html   A coalition of environmental groups, meanwhile, allege Greenidge is pumping millions of pounds of carbon dioxide into the air, while contaminating the nearby Seneca Lake with daily discharges of heated water required to run the plant. “The Finger Lakes community has been sounding the alarm on the disastrous impacts of this facility on their water, air, and climate,” said Mandy DeRoche, a deputy managing attorney in the Clean Energy Program at Earthjustice. “We will continue our fight until Greenidge shuts down for good,” * * * * * I remember to shut off the lights when I leave a room I won't be going back to for a while.  Meanwhile, Bitcoin roars through enough electricity to run several small countries.  The timing couldn't have been worse.  And you can't forget AI starting to suck up electricity so we can make funny videos.  Or the Cloud storage instead of just keeping c...

  https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2024/09/23/california-sues-exxonmobil-plastics-recycling/   “For decades, ExxonMobil has been deceiving the public to convince us that plastic recycling could solve the plastic waste and pollution crisis when they clearly knew this wasn’t possible,” Bonta said in a statement. “ExxonMobil lied to further its [record]-breaking profits at the expense of our planet and possibly jeopardizing our health.”  * * * * * Just like there's a geological layer that shows the meteorite hit that killed the dinosaurs, so there will be a geological layer full of plastic that shows how we drowned ourselves in waste.

  https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cg64pwxzln4o  "Sustainable fuels are synthetic alternatives to fossil fuels, made from renewable sources. These can include waste cooking oils, vegetable fats and agricultural waste, as well as captured carbon dioxide. The advantage of burning fuels like these is that it does not add to the overall load of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere." * * * * * The only stickler seems to be difficulty ramping up production.  But once the economic fundamentals are figured out, that should not be a problem.  

  https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/29/world/video/denver-basic-income-project-duerson-digvid   "The Denver Basic Income Project gave over 800 unhoused Coloradans up to $12,000 over the past year with no strings attached. 12 months later, with a funding proposal up for renewal, CNN’s Meena Duerson examines the pilot’s impact and what may happen to the participants if funding runs out."   Another success!  People don't want to be poor. Many are poor just because they are barely under what they need to survive in our society.  A little nudge makes a huge difference in most cases.

Plastic is in our bodies now.  It's in the Arctic.  It's everywhere.  And it hardly breaks down.  We need an alternative.  

  This seems entirely possible in any country.

  https://www.newscenter1.tv/news/black-hills-tiny-homes/article_e643a0f6-0700-11ef-9e19-87718a560000.html   "When she originally got her tiny house, it was decorated farmhouse/ranch style. Being an interior decorator by degree, Kira revamped her tiny house to fit her style – modern and colorful with a yellow ceiling. She says tiny homes can range from $50,000 to $100,000 with hers being on the ‘tinier’ end of the spectrum. As far as winter preparation, Kira says her tiny house came insulated, but she had to get creative with snow solutions. One technique she used was spray foam to seal the cervices on the exterior metal sheeting. She’s still working on making it more aesthetically pleasing, she says. Her tiny home is also snow-load appropriate as it was inspected by a private contractor for her own peace of mind and local compliance. It is the landowner, her mother, who took care of the local ordinance compliance with Pennington County for the WeeCasa resort and t...

“If one can convince a population that they are rightfully exceptional, that they are destined by nature or by religious fate to rule other populations, one has already convinced them of a monstrous lie.” [How Fascism Works, by Jason Stanley, p. 13]   “Allowing every opinion into the public sphere and giving it serious time for considerations, far from resulting in a process that is conducive to knowledge formation via deliberation, destroys its very possibility. Responsible media in a liberal democracy must, in the face of this threat, try to report the truth, and resist the temptation to report on every possible theory, no matter how fantastical, as long as someone advances it. What happens when conspiracy theories become the coin of politics, and mainstream media and educational institutions are discredited, is that citizens no longer have a common reality that can serve as background for democratic deliberation.” [How Fascism Works, by Jason Stanley, pp. 70-7...

  https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/19/california-toxic-gas-sulfuryl-fluoride   "About 85% of US emissions of sulfuryl fluoride were traced by a recent peer-reviewed study to southern California, where the state’s $4.2bn pest-control industry uses it for drywood termite control. Sulfuryl fluoride is estimated to be up to 7,500 times more potent than carbon dioxide in terms of its greenhouse-gas potential."   Oh boy, yet another climate-warming chemical to worry about.

  https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/20/pennsylvania-young-farmers-00147753   "With millions of acres of American farmland set to change hands in the next 20 years , state legislators and agricultural policymakers are warning of a crisis for domestic food production and fading vibrancy in rural communities. The U.S. has lost over half a million farms since the 1980s and the average age of the American farmer has ticked up to 58. Without reliable domestic food production, they say, America’s ability to feed itself and address global food security could be in jeopardy."  * * * * * I spent summers on my grandfather's farm.  I think if he would have taught me how to be a farmer instead of just using me as temporary help, I would have taken over his farm when he retired.  It's not an easy life and requires skill in lots of different areas, from mechanics to crop rotation.  Hopefully we can make it appealing to the upcoming generations.

  https://youtu.be/79VUAFq2rbg?si=V-Uy6jK89nug5QT_   A community in India spent many years building a water-catchment system that keeps the monsoon waters in their area.  Wouldn't turning desert and dry land into fertile fields help cool the planet?

  One way to fight global warming is to replace desert land with agricultural land.  And it's working!

  https://www.yahoo.com/news/great-compression-151806242.html   A decade ago, Jesse Russell was a former reality TV producer looking to get started in real estate. He had just moved back to Bend (his hometown) from Los Angeles, and began with a plot of two dozen 500-square-foot cottages sprinkled around a pond and common gardens. When he pitched it at community meetings, “the overwhelming sentiment was, ‘Nobody is going to live in a house that small,’” he said. Then the units sold out, and his investors nearly doubled their money in two years. Russell’s company, Hiatus Homes, has since built about three dozen more homes that range from 400 square feet to 900 square feet, and he has 100 more in development — a thriving business. * * * * * I lived 2 summers in a 400 square foot cabin with an outhouse.  It was fine, but I did need to rent storage space for stuff I had accumulated living in a regular sized house. My home today is 864 square feet with a garage and for ...

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/15/recycling-plastics-producers-report   Plastic, which is made from oil and gas, is notoriously difficult to recycle. Doing so requires meticulous sorting, since most of the thousands of chemically distinct varieties of plastic cannot be recycled together. That renders an already pricey process even more expensive. Another challenge: the material degrades each time it is reused, meaning it can generally only be reused once or twice. The industry has known for decades about these existential challenges, but obscured that information in its marketing campaigns, the report shows . The research draws on previous investigations as well as newly revealed internal documents illustrating the extent of this decades-long campaign. * * * * * Every living thing on earth is affected by the lies of an industry that would rather make money than worry about the health of the planet.  

  https://youtu.be/TX9tN7yFhcE?si=fdXSxYQNp5jzc8NC  Blades on an oval racetrack instead of blades on top of a tower?  Check it out.  

  https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240122-from-london-to-new-york-can-quitting-cars-be-popular   Moreover, reforms elsewhere suggest that, despite initial resistance, car reduction plans steadily gain public acceptance in the long run. When the city of Ljubljana in Slovenia pedestrianised its city centre in 2007, opposition was considerable , with residents fearing restricted access to their homes – yet a little over decade later, roughly 90% said they were against reintroducing cars . * * * * * Yeah, more public transit!  I like monorails myself.