Calculating your carbon footprint - a load of bollocks

[ARWadworth]

Has anyone else filled in one of these besides me?

I just tried out

My report said

1) My home, for heating and hot water is 20% below the national average. And so it should be. My house is well insulated and I do not like it too warm.

2) My appliances create 2 times the national average of CO2 (I doubt that. I have no TV, one computer on 24/7, CCTV on 24/7 and I use the washing machine, dishwasher, cooker when needed)

3) my travel footprint is 3 times the national average. I also doubt that.

The action plan Action CO2 gave me is crap.

a) fit draught-proofing around doors and window.

Why? All my exterior doors and windows are double-glazed.

b) Install underfloor insulation

Nice, but I have concrete floors. ActionCO2 never asked about my floors before suggesting that.

c) Replace your fridge and freezer with a more efficient model

Will that help?

My fridge is 3 years old and is A rated, my freezer is a little older, maybe

6 years old. It is second hand (my Grandad gave it to me) and I think it is B rated. Will rushing out to but a new A+++ rated freezer save on CO2 emissions. I cannot see the total CO2 emissions on the manufacture of a new freezer plus the CO2 costs of disposing of the old recycled freezer will have a pay back of less than 10 years.

d) In dry weather use an outside line rather than your dyer

I did tick the box that said I did that already. I tend to use the drier when it is raining, but then only when needed eg I wash all my work clothes in one wash on a Friday night. 5 Tshirts or jumpers and 3 pairs of trousers. If I need a pair of work clothes for Saturday morning I might need the dryer. Even then I only dry one pair in it.

e) When replacing the car (van in my case) consider choosing the lowest CO2 model in its category

Yes but a 1.7D van is almost certainly a 1.7D van. There is not much to choose from.

f) Whenever possible, walk, bike, car share, or use public transport

I do walk to the local shops if just for fags or beer etc. Even better is the short cut. If I enter the Kings Head by the side door and leave via the front door I save 20 metres by cutting a corner out. It takes a little longer timewise but it is worth it. I do drive to do the weekly shop even though the local supermarket is less than a mile away. Who can pick up a full weekly shopping basket with just two arms? Diet coke and cat food are rather bulky.

I cannot use public transport to get to work and back as I have a large collection of tools, cables etc that I need for work. I think the bus driver would complain if it took me 20 minutes to get on board the bus. And buses do not have roof bars for my ladders.

So all in all, Action CO2 calculator is a pile of crap IMHO.

Adam

[Tim S]

ARWadworth coughed up some electrons that declared:

Just had a "discussion" with SWMBO concerning "the new religion". I hate having crap shoved down my throat by self-righteous zealots as much as the next (wo)man and I really think this is where we are at with green issues. People should be shown what is worthwhile doing with good factual illustrations, not force fed the fad of the day with nothing to back it up.

My daughter is being taught to recycle at school, which, at here age, I aplaude. But I tried a little though experiment on her (she's 4). I showed her a package from Tescos. It was a little cardboard box of pills encased in a plastic "clam shell". I cut off the clam shell and asked her what she thought about it. Reply: "Recycle it Daddy". I said "good", "but how about if it wasn't made in the first place?" "Carboard comes from trees and you can grow new trees, but plastic is made from oil which is a precious resource which cannot readily be regenerated". "Why did they put a nice little cardboard box that worked perfectly well in a silly plastic shell whose sole purpose is to cut my fingers before I chuck it in the bin?"

I suggested we should jointly write a letter to the manufacturers asking them not to be so wasteful. Also suggested she ask her teacher if not making something unnecessary is better that recycling. I'm going to be in trouble if she does ;->

Cheers

Tim

[BlueJohn]

Are you saying that the benefits of recycling are overstated (re. "good factual illustrations"), or that it's better not to produce the stuff in the first place, or both?

I agree that it's better not to spend energy producing unnecessary stuff, but recycling is a pragmatic thing, isn't it? At least, I assume that persuading people to do without stuff is a lot harder than persuading them to dispose of it in a different way.

[Phil L]

It's just told me that I'm producing 25 tonnes of CO2 every year - what a crock of s**te....that's over 68 Kg of CO2 every day

[R D S]

Our 2 person household is 7.41 against a national average of 9.96 tonnes per year. Does that give me the right to walk around with my holier than thou nose in the air?

How the f*ck I am going to get it all into footballs is beyond me though TBH.

[endymion]

I am still trying to work out how we use so much quite frankly according to them. Two of us. I run a dishwasher when full - three times a week. Washing machine once a week. I cook once a week and microwave the rest of it ( dinners that is). One meal a day for two people.

I havent got the heating on right now . I have one computer on about three hours a day. One TV on about two hours a day ( or less week days - just to watch the news). We dont go on holiday. Lights are only on in one room at night . I do have a night light because I suffer from congestion ( post pneumonia) and like to be able to get up without fumbling around in the dark if I need to. The house is so sealed/insulated that it has rampant condensation right now with the weather as it is! So much for insulation.

The only thing I have is a small car to go to work three times a week and shopping on my way home. I cant use public transport, there is none and anyway we dont go out that often.

Yet I am supposed to reduce my water heater ( reduce it anymore and it will be cold!) Dry outside ( I do) put under floor heating in. ( no way that can be achieved here) and run a smaller car ( I run a small car).

I think its fixed. I think they are saying the same for everyone.

[Tim S]

BlueJohn coughed up some electrons that declared:

The latter to a larger extent. Or to put it another way, recycling is a pointless exercise comparatively if you're being totally wasteful to start with. IMHO people should remain aware of the wider picture, and not be blinkered into a limited course of action, which is what I perceive to be happening (maybe wrongly) in a larger part of society.

Not quite - in the case of the plastic clam shell, I can see no reason for it to exist. It's an annoyance to me, the cardboard box it's containing serves the purpose very well anyway *and* I have to dispose of it. Same goes for multiple layers of plastic on foodstuffs (sausages are just fine in a bit of waxed paper, they do NOT require a silly polystyrene tray, cling film and cardboard wrap).

I'd prefer products to be made to last, the antithesis of the consumerist society. I'd prefer to telecommute part time, but my employers historically wouldn't countenance it, despite the job (sysadmin) being eminently suited.

There's lots of things that could be made better for the environment without giving up stuff, but none of it is quite as easy as banning GLS bulbs from the government's POV.

Cheers

Tim

[gazz]

just tried it, we dont drink tea or coffee so never boil a kettle, but i had to tell them that i did, dont have a dishwasher yet told to buy one... because one full load a day is better than loads of bowls of hot water!!! one bowl of hot water does all our plates (16 piece) and the washing up gets done twice a week,

underfloor insulation again, they never heard of concrete floors i guess,

Since we moved in here, we've had no kitchen as i'm re-doing it, so we have no cooker, and are using the microwave for all our meals, yet it tells me to use the microwave more because its more efficiant that a conventional oven... waht conventional oven, we dont have one.

i'm to turn the thermostat down by one degree... havent bloody got one, well, only the one on the combi boiler which senses water temp i believe.

and i'm to walk and use public transport more, it's a mile walk to the bus stop from my house, having arthritis this is a bit far for me to walk, and when i get there it's at least 2 quid to go into town, i can ride the motorbike into town, park for free, and come home for about

30p's worth of petrol.

I'm going to do another carbon calc for my motorhome next, that'll screw things up, got underfloor insulation.. the entire shell is a sandwich of wood, polystyrene and alli, got solar panels (pv) that produce all the power i need to run everything in the van, i get hot water as i drive along from the coolant loop from the engine to the calorifier, The washing machine in there is an A++ rated one, uses 30 litres of water per wash and is fed with warm water using the free hot water from the engine, and the electric to run it comes from the batteries, charged up from the solar panels of the engines alternator when i'm driving. The heating is from a diesel fired eberspacher, which also heats the hot water calorifier up if needed, uses a max of 1 litre an hour, but only runs for about 5 to 7 minutes per 30 minutes to keep the van at 23 degrees C.

I've got a microwave in the van, but using that more means i'd have to run the genny or engine to re-charge the batteries, (can use it for 15 minutes a day without it affecting the power levels from the solar charge the next day)

And i bet it can't handle the fact that whilst i'm producing carbon from driving it, at the same time i'm heating the hot water up for showers and washing up later on, and producing upto 165 amps of power for re-charging the batteries, which means a couple of hours totally re-charges the battery bank, where as it takes almost a day on mains hookup using power station generatored power.

[dennis]

Well you will save a lot more if you have a proper control system. Its bad enough that some systems were not fitted with room stats decades ago, to not have one on a combi system is poor. Are you sure you don't have one?

[Andy Champ]

I'm fairly average. But I did some digging. It doesn't care how much you use the train, your CO2 figure is the same. All those long distance commuters will be pleased. I imagine the rest is as bad. After all, how much difference does that mobile phone charger really make when I forget to unplug it?

Andy

[The Medway Handyman]

The real problem here is that the environmental industry thinks this survey is the mutts nuts. Ergo politicians will accept it as kosher & start making short term vote catching policy & tax changes as a result.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

One reason would be to prevent tampering.

There seems to be a fashion to open up just about anything you can - and then not buy it. Or nick something from it.

[Jeremy Nicoll - news posts]

Or poison it.

[The Medway Handyman]

A few e-mails might get noticed...

If this bollox is going to be accepted as kosher we could at least try to get it accurate.

[Owain]

Take 200 motorhomes, remove the wheels, and stack 'em up, and you have the government's ideal prefabricated environmentally-friendly key worker housing solution.

Not the most generously-proportioned or aesthetic of accommodation though, and not much room for a sizeable collection of power tools.

Owain

[ARWadworth]

I was asked if I had a microwave and nothing else was asked about it. I have not used it once this year, so how does that fit into the calculations?

Adam

[Rod]

Probably follows the manufacturers' fashion of putting things like these (below) on boxes:

Contents may differ from picture Colour White/Grey/Black/Blue/Red

110-120V 60Hz

Indeed, just the other day, we wished to buy a small roll of cheap plastic bags. The box said "small plastic bags" - without any indication of actual size. There were around half a dozen opened and/or resealed boxes on the shelf. :-)

Mor eseriously, I do agree. There do appear to be more (or more active) tamperers/fiddlers/bit nickers.

[Rod]

Only bollox of clean animals can be kosher. :-)

Agreed - it is truly dreadful - I would expect better from a junior science project.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Not surprising when,because of the cost of the packaging, only complete kits of anything are for sale. you cant get spare parts.

See my posts a few months back on trying to get a Sunvic RECEIVER or even a BOARD for it for a wireless stat.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Well that's what they are, most of the year.

Answer is mobile homes. Ideal entry level accomodation actually.