Tring in Transition blog: 20.7.09
We're shortly off on holiday to the South Coast – by car.
By car as we have to take so much stuff with us as we are renting a caravan.
At first I felt guilty as we should have been going by train, but then less so after finding some information that pointed out the following:
Where there is a CO2 figure for transport, it assumes that the transport is full.
So train at rush hour with many passengers standing will have less than 10% of the CO2 production per passenger of a train running only 10% full – as many do at times.
So a car full of people (4 or 5) is probably producing less CO2 per passenger than a train only a quarter full.
It is very muddling!
I still think we should travel by public transport wherever possible as overall cars will produce more CO2 per head than using a bus or train.
The UN is trying to get us to have meatless Mondays.
Apparently meat production produces more CO2 world wide than all transport does.
So reducing our meat eating has a quicker effect than cutting down on transport.
In addition cows produce massive amounts of methane which is more damaging than CO2.
If you are not vegetarian, then probably the biggest contribution you can make to slowing down global warming is to eat less meat (of any kind) and less dairy products.
In addition buying seasonal local vegetables will also cut down on CO2 production.
This week I bought cheap onions only to find they were from New Zealand!
What madness is that!
We have onions from the UK available now, and we are transporting them all the way from New Zealand.
In June at the height of the asparagus season I found a market stall in Suffolk selling asparagus from Chile.
Always check where fruit and vegetables come from, and only buy UK or EU sourced if you possibly can.
I make an exception for FairTrade products as they are supporting local farmers in poverty areas.
If everyone tried hard, we could make a real difference to global warming.
All official bodies from the EU to the UN and the US Government now agree that global warming has increased due to man's activities.
There are some individual scientists who deny this, but they are a tiny minority and no official scientific body backs them up.
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Weather for Tring
Thursday 09 February 2012
Today
Cloudy
Temperature: -0 C to 2 C
Wind Speed: 6 mph
Wind direction: South west
Tomorrow
Cloudy
Temperature: -4 C to 2 C
Wind Speed: 14 mph
Wind direction: South east
