Reduce, Reuse, Recycle?

[Fargin_Bastige]

Originally Posted by jim schmidt

How can you tell the difference. Each topic gets plugged into the exact same show, basically. Other than the occasional tit or ass, I can't tell the difference in any of them.

I think they've cast a great cynical eye on some topics.

I thought their shows on conspiracy theorists, Baby Einstein/ Parent scaring and holistic medicines episodes presented well thought out arguments for their point of view.

I've also met Penn Gillette and he definitely has a unique point of view. Far more skeptical than I could ever hope to be.

[bush]

Check out the episode on the war on drugs. It's on google video.

[dreesemonkey]

I was watching an episode of Modern Marvels (great show) about energy and if every household would change one lightbulb to the energysaving bulbs (LED or otherwise low power flourecent) that the energy savings would be like removing 800,000 vehicles from the road. Pretty cool stuff. One of our lights just burnt out, too.

[R1oldguy]

I don't know if many of you know this, but I'll bore the hell out of you anyway.
I work for a Heavy Highway & Infrastructure Construction company.
The Paving Industry has been recycling old asphalt for a while now.
We mill all the roads we are going to re-pave and reuse the old asphalt (up to 30%) when we resurface.
Almost all asphalt that is layed down nowadays has up to 30% recycled "millings" or ground up roof shingles in it.

Yes, we are "GREEN"

[scatterbrained]

Originally Posted by R1oldguy

I don't know if many of you know this, but I'll bore the hell out of you anyway.
I work for a Heavy Highway & Infrastructure Construction company.
The Paving Industry has been recycling old asphalt for a while now.
We mill all the roads we are going to re-pave and reuse the old asphalt (up to 30%) when we resurface.
Almost all asphalt that is layed down nowadays has up to 30% recycled "millings" or ground up roof shingles in it.

Yes, we are "GREEN"

Very true. There's lots of industrial recycling going on. The parts solvent company that handles our solvent tanks recycles the used cleaner to make roofing tar. Makes good sense and saves cash.

[bzbatl]

I don't recycle for three reasons:

1. Most of my biodegradable (includes paper, dryer lint, and food scraps) go into my compost bin to be used in my landscaping and garden.

2. Georgia's recycling companies charge you to pick it up. Then they sell it to manufacturing companies and make money off it.

3. That episode of Bullshit! pretty much solidified my rationalization.

[L8 Braker]

I redo plastic, aluminum, oil, paper, and whatever else I can...

Jim makes an excellent point about listening to only one point of a topic...

Personally, I don't need a show to tell me that it takes trees to create paper, and that if we recycle not as many trees get chopped down...Trees are important for breathing...I kind of like being able to do it...

[Ershank]

Yeah, it's also important to realize that the tree's being harvested are from forests specifically grown for paper, and that new forests are being planted afterwards.

In otherwords, "save the trees" is bullshit.

[bzbatl]

Originally Posted by L8 Braker

I redo plastic, aluminum, oil, paper, and whatever else I can...

Jim makes an excellent point about listening to only one point of a topic...

Personally, I don't need a show to tell me that it takes trees to create paper, and that if we recycle not as many trees get chopped down...Trees are important for breathing...I kind of like being able to do it...

Hi, this is mother nature. I'd just like you to know that trees grow. They are what you would call a "renewable resource" with your fancy science and all that.

You can only recycle paper a few times before the cellulose breaks down. Eventually, you have to add virgin pulp. You get virgin pulp from... trees.

You live in Lakeland. Haven't you ever seen a tree farm? Or been near a paper factory? Those lands are used to produce trees, to make paper, at the quickest and most efficient manner possible.

Maybe the trees that are growing make nice air (debatable) but the factories that recycle paper put out a lot of waste product, themselves.

[Spike]

My wife was much more environmentally friendly before I met her, but she has brought me over to her ways.

We recycle glass, metal, paper, almost every bulb in our house is a compact flourescent. We unplug appliances while not in use (microwave, toaster oven, cell phone charger etc) as they draw power even while you're not "using" them. At our old apartment we wouldn't flush everytime we took a piss, since it never smelled funny, and you could pee in there like 3 times before flushing. Sometimes I just go pee in my backyard to keep from flushing lol.

The result of all this? Our electric company's website lets you graph the power, water, gas, and sewer usage from the last 12 months. We use approximately ONE FIFTH of the energy (overall) that the previous owners of our house used!!! While looking at that graph, in comparison to the people who lived here before us, it looks like there's no one even living here lol

Oh yeah, and it also lets you look at the electric bills for anyone in their system, and when looking at all the other houses in our neighborhood, we have the lowest bill of every property we looked at.

[bzbatl]

Snooping on your neighbors. Ugh, you disgust me.

[jim schmidt]

Changing to florescents wherever they work as well cut our electric bill by one-fourth. This is in a house where the heat is electric and my 14 yo doesn't know that anything has an off switch.

[Maichena]

I've changed all bulbs that I use regularly to energy saving bulbs. My friends can't believe that my electric bill for my house is lower than theirs in their apartment. I also keep my AC at 65F and wear sweaters around the house. I only use regular bulbs if I want instant bright light, instead of waiting for the bulb to achieve its max brightness like those energy saving bulbs. Those lights aren't used often or aren't used for more than 15 mins at a time (e.g. light bulb attached to the garage door opener).

[Spike]

Yeah compact flourescent bulbs are expensive, but they are supposed to last a REALLY long time. If you do a room at a time, the cost isn't so bad. Let's see, how many bulbs do we have that are CF... 12 I think. There are still a couple others that we haven't changed to CF yet because we want those lights super bright and we don't use them often.

Another good idea is to change the thermostat before you leave, no sense in heating/cooling the house to a comfortable level when you're not in it. Just change it whenever you get home.