Take a COOL Guess – the Clean Energy Quiz and Global Warming Remedy — Answers in Chronological Order by Date Posted
| January 1, 2011 | Posted by Craig Shields under Renewables - Science |
January 11, 2011: 7.6 billion chickens, producing 2 trillion tons of manure annually
January 12, 2011: About 14 million tons of C&D (construction and demolition) waste annually is shipped through a transfer station in Staten Island, almost all of which is taken by rail to land fills in Kentucky and Ohio.
January 13, 2011: 60 Minutes (October 4, 2009). See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vf5AFyE6cw0. 130 million tons annually.
January 19, 2011: There are approximately 1 billion 2’ X 2’ fluorescent lighting fixtures in the ceilings of US office buildings, and approximately 34 million lamps lighting US streets.
January 20, 2011: Approximately 60% — far more than most people guess.
January 30, 2011: Babassu is a palm tree that grows in the Amazon region of South America. It produces a clear, light yellow, non-drying oil used in food, cleaners and skin products. This oil has properties similar to coconut oil and is used in much the same context. In addition, the fruit iself has a very attractive energy density, and thus the trees are beginning to be cultivated as a biomass feedstock.
February 3, 2011: About 15 terawatts, or 15,000 gigawatts, or 15,000,000 megawatts. That’s the equivalent of 150 billion 100-watt light bulbs, which equates to 20 100-watt light bulbs for every man, woman and child. In the US, we use about 8 times the international average, or 160 100-watt light bulbs per person.
February 7, 2011: It’s free; they’re happy to get rid of it. This provides a huge cost advantage for Canefields, providing the business with some incredibly attractive operating margins.
October 12, 2011: The city of San Pedro Sula, Honduras, which hosts “Expo Energía.” The expo has had an unprecedented success with over 100 exhibiting companies and over 700 visitors from 16 countries that have participated in the event. Many Latin American and European companies have held pre-arranged business meetings that are finalized as new business ventures.
November 17, 2011: some plastic bottles last 1000 years in landfills. 500 billion – 1 trillion plastic bags used year year world-wide.
November 18, 2011: Approximately one million trees are ground up each year to make junk mail.
November 21, 2011: The average American generates 4.6 pounds of trash daily. About half that goes into landfills; the other half in recycled or incinerated.
December 9, 2011: The cost of generating electricity from coal with no scrubbers is about $0.03 / kWh.
January 26, 2012: It is estimated that the Amazon rainforest alone is vanishing at a rate of 20,000 square miles a year, or 1.5 acres a second.
April 9, 2012: 65,000 industrial chemicals are in regular commercial use.
April 10, 2012: There are TONS of cases in human history in which changes made in environmental regulation have made a dramatic and measurable positive difference. Between 1976 and 1986, the concentration of lead in the bloodstreams of Belgian adults and the level of DDT in the milk of Japanese mothers fell by a factor of two, while the level of the insecticide dieldrin in the adipose tissue of Dutch citizens fell by a factor of three.
April 11, 2012: PCBs are known as “biologic timebombs.” Of all the PCBs ever produced, 70% of them are still in use, stored in aging electronics, and will require significant amounts of time to work their way through our environment.
