I guess it all comes down to our choices in the supermarket aisle.

If I'm choosing plastic, the ocean suffers, if I choose cardboard or paper, a tree dies, if I choose glass, my recycled glass will end up stuck in a giant storage shed or end up in landfill.

Also, I will now have to purchase bin liners - which is what I used the highly biodegradable plastic carry bags for.

I guess cardboard and paper is the best choice, as sustainable forests are common.

But sometimes I don't have a choice.

This is why I like to have the butcher cut or slice the meats I want, then wrap them in butcher paper.  It's recyclable and biodegradable both, even though it's not quite as convenient for most people as those plastic-wrapped cuts of meat, fish or poultry.

And I use heavy cotton-canvas grocery bags, which I can throw in the laundry once every week or two, depending on what's happened to them from the foods I carried them home in.

This is interesting...

Would the concept of waste become obsolete if our garbage had value?

Imagine if you could get paid for the things you put in your rubbish, and countries competed to import waste.

Waste is an environmental issue as well as a resource issue, and as Australia approaches 2050 and a population of 40 million, resources will be more valuable than ever.

Will we look back on single-use products as 21st century madness?

That depends on the policy decisions we put in place today, and whether we can transition to a circular economy.

Burn baby burn?

The idea of countries importing and even competing for waste seems like a huge paradigm shift, but in some places it is already the norm.

It has been a decade since Sweden all but banned rubbish going to landfill. Now the Swedes claim to recycle as much as 98 per cent of their waste.

Half of that is turned back into materials such as plastics and aluminium for reuse, and the rest is used to feed sophisticated incineration systems that have been developed to provide electricity and heating to Swedish households.

The incinerators are strictly monitored to adhere to Sweden's rigid emissions standards, according to Ali Abbas from the University of Sydney (USyd).

"The incineration plants are in the middle of the cities. And they have no smell and no emissions," Professor Abbas said.

According to the 2016 Avfall Sverige (Swedish Waste Management) Report, the Swedes recovered three megawatt-hours of energy per tonne of waste burnt. That is enough to power about 900 Australian homes for an hour, according to the Clean Energy Authority.

While the average Australian sends more than one tonne of waste to landfill each year, the average Swedish household sends around three kilograms.

In 2015, Sweden imported 2.3 million tonnes of waste from Norway, the UK, Ireland and elsewhere to fuel its incinerators.

In short, it has created a system that is reliant on waste as a fuel source.

If Australia was to follow Sweden's lead, by 2050 we would be sending virtually no waste to landfill. We may even be mining landfill for fuel to feed our own incinerators.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-17/waste-could-become-fuel-source-in-big-australias-future/9550082

No. Ever go soaring?

I flew around in gliders a bit back in the mid-seventies, and let me tell you there are few things in life more beautiful. Never went for a pilot's license, but I did do a fair amount of co-piloting larger craft.

So what?
Anyone who's done it knows about thermals: There's a column of warm air over towns and cities, constantly rising because hot air rises etc., and that column, called a "thermal" gives the glider its lift.
And it wams any colder air moving through it. The lee of a thermal has been measured as being up to three degrees  warmer than the windward side. This effect is apparently more pronounced as it moves towards the poles.

Now it's true that  volcanos, forest fires etc., are natural ways to warm the atmosphere, but there are a lot more towns and cities north or south of the 45th parallels, each one creating its own thermal 24/7 than there are volcanoes.  And each town is man-made, which makes it quite reasonable to say that  if there are 1,000,000 towns and cities on this planet,  there are a million  places where the air is warmer than the "natural" air surrounding them. Add their surface area up, and no doubt you'll have a big enough percentage of the land masses covered by habitation to call it "global".
You have  natural warming and cooling, but the heat added by mankind's buildings accelerates the warming part just a teensy  bit at a time, and  cumulatively you get what could be referred to as significant change.

-Oomp

So much for "To think that man can actually change/effect global weather is beyond preposterous."

-Oomp
 

Very cute, and not unexpected from someone of your ilk.

-Oomp  (storytelling mothman)
 

Hate wasting my time with such nonsense.

Aggravating and meaningless.

I've long advocated more intelligent use of our waste stream, as El Dotarto will affirm if you ask him.

I've also long advocated for far more energy-efficient buildings, lighting, vehicles, and other things to which we become accustomed.  And I've incorporated many of those things I've said into my little house in the Mojave Desert.

My house looks just like many others out here, but consumes less than half the energy.  Mostly that's accomplished through the use of triple-paned windows, good insulation in walls and ceiling, a solar farm to drive my evaporative air cooler during daylight hours, and the use of LED lamps throughout the house, placed for maximum use.  That all works quite well.

Oomp!  Great post!!

This is a very interesting set of scientific facts.

I fear they may be lost on those on the opposite side of the debate.

I imagine some pointless memes are coming your way.

Are gliders used in Climate science research?

Which part of it was nonsense?

Where is your evidence to back up that claim?

Aggravating and meaningless?

You're describing yourself, John.

Are you so incapable of seeing another person's point of view that you would rather look like an ass before exhibiting any sign of cognitive ability - or "weakness"?