Carbon Neutrality

by Roger Lovejoy

Biomass as a way to combat Global Warming and Plymouth City Council's statement to be Carbon Neutral by 2020 : Fantasies!.

• We may have used 50% of Earth's fossil fuels and economically alone it would be a good time to change.
  Unlike Cuba, forced to give up fossil fuels when the collapse of the Soviet Union meant there was no more cheap oil, we have a few years to learn to live without before the cost of an ever depleting stock causes economic stress.
• That we have the threat of Global Warming to add to our woes, makes it all the more urgent that we make the transiton to a sustainable consumption of solar resources as rapidly as possible.

Carbon Neutrality requires that we only produce as much CO₂ as we can readily absorb. It does not necessarily address the continuing unsustainable use of fossil fuels but through Carbon Trading or Carbon Offseting  tries to mitigate the guilt and transfer the problem to others., When it suits us, we profess to be part of the whole human race of consumers, rather than a local economic and ecological community. Then we argue that as someone else is either producing less CO₂ than their quota or we can convince them to use less that their quota, we'll have it and give them a Bennie Baby or some other token of thanks. This clearly only works for the powerful and rich, dominant and authoritarian bodies.

The ideas of 'Transition City Plymouth' and 'Carbon Rationing' go a bit further.

Ideally Transition City Plymouth would produce all it's own energy, although realistically it would be better to have a Tamar Valley Working Group.

 Carbon Rationing, although primarily a personal respect for a shared resource shows the way to any body, personal or corporate of the commitment needed to attain Carbon Neutrality with proper integrity.

Before we work on the above to local agendas, to make an effective change we must look at Reducing CO₂ emissons to limit and possibly reverse Global warming and

1. What does it have to do with CO₂ emissons?
2. Is it happening? Where's the evidence?
3. What are the predictions? How high Global Warming will become? Will sea levels rise?
4. It maybe that we tolerate a certain increase and do not try to reverse the process.

Reduce fossil fuel consuption as it is a rare resource and cannot be replaced.

• What can we use when it runs out?
• What is it used for now?
  • Fuel for transport
  • Fuel for hetaing
  • Fuel for electricity
  • Fertilsers and Pesticide etc for agriculture
  • Clothing and fabric, plastic sheeting, 
  • Numerous forms of plastic for almost every household item from  toothbrushes to computers.

For either of the above we can study the logic of

The Carbon Cycle, Carbon Sinks, Carbon Sequestration, Biomass for fuels ....

The Carbon Cycle includes

1.  the  absorption of CO₂ for cellular growth via a limited biomass
2.  non-organic absorpants, incorporating the atmosphere

Carbon Footprint : A way of measuing how much CO₂ is used

Carbon Rationing : A scheme of fines to users of excessive CO₂

Carbon Offsets : The scam of trying to get someone else to give you their Carbon Ration

Bio-acre : Quantity of Carbon Dioxide in one acre of biomass. Used to calculate Carbon Rationing and Ecological Footprints etc.

Solar Energy : Energy light, heat and embeded in biomass, wind and waves.