Balance of waste and useage of the environment

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Just like a dollar today can buy you a cold can of soda, where, ten years ago it was .50, then 10 years before it was a quarter. Approximately, of course.

I am wondering what is best for the planet Earth.....which includes all of us, the animals, the trees, the air the water and the food....and so on.

Sure we could just run an engine into the ground and not 'waste' gallons of oil maintaining it, but then we get stranded, ruin alot of machined parts made of metal and make someone labor over it.

Versus

Changing a gallon of oil every 1000 miles or each month and never having any problems.





Kind of how are we doing? Like do you eat just the meat of the apple... Or do you inhale the skin, the (i cannot think of the name of the piece of bark that sits atop the apple from where it was pulled), the seeds, the core all of it. Do you just eat the muffin tops that taste better or the whole muffin. Do you just eat the best part of the steak or gnaw the bone and try to digest the fat and grizzle?



I am kind of getting that this question has no answer as we are all different and may invest more in areas where others invest less. So....



Barring rusted out hoopties from the salt belt, will you name some items (auto, shop, home, health, food) that you value.

Like I. I use a family size tea bag to brew about 1.5-2 gallons of sweet tea. Direction say two bags for two quarts. Am I missing out on some health benefits or some essential nutrition by doing so. Tea is not really something you buy on price, so lets leave dollars and cents out of this and just think of the goodness of the Earth and all of its inhabitants.


Just how being underfed, overworked, under appreciated, etc, etc can demoralise a person. So can using cheap safety glasses. They may have sharp corners that actually cut your eyes, blur your vision, offgas toxicicty, and other such things it is not rare to actually suffer and spend more money by trying to save a dollar. I think sometimes that I am too poor to be cheap.




Instead of going on and on forever, this is for beautifying, purifying and increasing the quality of life. Simple as that. The trees, the human beings, the ants, the pond scum, algae plankton, all of that. Is the EPA the only sector of the government that cares of this? Kind of like the 'not my job' photo that circulated on the net of a guy painting lines on the highway right over some roadkill because it wasnt his job to bury the animal, or even move it out of the way.


Like electricity. They say coal is polluting. But what about hydro? Damming up the rivers, trapping fish, preventing barges from passing, among other things we may not even know about to nuclear. What is burying that spent plutonium in the ground going to do? Do we not care since it will probably take hundreds of years to surface as a problem?



Like a lowflow toilet. It saves water until it clogs.....or cfls, they use less power but have toxic chemicals, cost more and is using less electric even a good thing? Dont they burn the same amount of coal at a power plant day to day? What about all of these street lights, stores leaving a few 1000w metal halides going all night for 'security'. What about light pollution? You have to kind of get on out there to see the night sky anymore........



So here is my contribution to the thread:

30,000 mile air filter
30,000 mile fuel filter
5000 mile/annually oil filter with premium conventional
3 month furnace filters
50000 mile cabin filter



I have derailed....



What is your goal? Enjoy your time or live as long as possible? 100 miserable years or 50 fun ones.....of course 100 good years may be possible.



I guess the point of this thread is asking how do I become a dirt farmer. I would like to oppose what happened to the dirt in the 1930s Dust Bowl.

Not only is it nice to NOT pollute, litter or damage the Earth or any fellow life, but how can I amend the soil to make it livlier to make the grass grow greener so the cows can enjoy the feeling of good taste and better nutrition and that they be happier, all the way down to somehow cleaning the water to not only help rid it of chemicals and waste, but to somehow enrich it with oxygen so the plankton, algae, fish, whales and even the rain and underground aquifers be healthier and provide better tasting water that puts a skip in your step....air that can make you feel your lungs work and food that can help you get over the flu, old age, brittle bones and even sleep better at night!
 
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All good questions from a person who is thinking of the future and big picture. I drive old 6 cylinder cars, 18 and 20 years old and take care of them. They get not great mileage, 22-28. My overall environmental foot print is small for owning the same machines for 18-20 years. I do the following:
50k airfilter changes
50k fuel filter changes
100k all fluid changes (rear diff, front diff, transmission, brake fluid and clutch fluid, coolant).
10-12k OCI's

I have 194k on one and 276k on the other. Original clutch and rear brakes.
 
Originally Posted By: mjoekingz28

can demoralise a person. So can using cheap safety glasses. They may have sharp corners that actually cut your eyes,




Or so dark they won't even know your name.
 
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If you do a rolling stop and avoid a wreck, there's no victim. Sure, the brake shoe people and exxon mobil lose a little revenue, but that just means they'll be open longer.

Taking a picture with a junky camera lense ruins it vs being able to use quality optics. Just a little sharper. If only!
 
Auto Spellcheck. We all could be more aware of our footprint in this world. I want my children to enjoy the natural world as I have. Future thinking.
 
I want to use less/buy less, and become less materialistic.

Our culture has been trying to get us to want and buy more than we need for a long time now.
 
We live in a 1000 sq foot house and use half the electric of most of the houses around us. We live comfortably and cool in the summer.

For two people, we fill up a garbage bin of recyclables every two weeks, that is pretty good.
 
Originally Posted By: ET16
I want to use less/buy less, and become less materialistic.

Our culture has been trying to get us to want and buy more than we need for a long time now.


I agree.

Just 'buying stuff' dose't make me happy anymore.
 
Originally Posted By: ET16
I want to use less/buy less, and become less materialistic.

Our culture has been trying to get us to want and buy more than we need for a long time now.



I think wanting it all has made the spare tire go away. Didnt yall have threads a year or two ago on the spare tire and jack being replaced with a can of goo? It seems not having to implement a tire and jack into a vehicle can off set the price of some doodads. Maybe that is why it went away from some cars? Also, I feel for the technicians who have to scrape knuckles and talk a part into being removed. I have a relatively easy auto to work on and some basic parts didnt let go easily. I can only imagine having to do major work on an aerodynamic FWD V8!
 
We recycle plastic, paper, and green waste consumables, yellow can stick around but brown flush it down,
minimize irrigation and mitigate swimming pool evaporation, maintain our cars on top condition to help minimize tailpipe emissions,
use ‘solar’ for drying laundry on the clothesline and even minimize time enjoyed at WOT. The last one has proven exceptionally difficult.
My carbon footprint took a hit by specifying centerlock PCCBs on the GT3.

If we could somehow influence other countries to eliminate the burning of dung for heating purposes the earth's atmosphere would likely be much healthier.
 
This analysis is spot on.. This idea of keeping up with the Joneses" or planned obsolescence. The "need" to buy/consume more and more because what you already have that works just fine is no longer "good enough". The advertising departments of many large companies have successfully imported this idea to many of the American people.

This idea started rolling more and more from the 1960s on forward. It gained great momentum in the 1980s because the American people started spending more than they actually saved from that decade going forward. Credit card debt sky rocketed from this time frame going forward. Which also coincided with the national debt going from 1 trillion dollars to 3 trillion in the 80s. As much as we complain about the public debt... Private debt is FAR greater than that. Which doesn't bode well for this nation going forward. The government is and has been broke... Good,bad or indifferent... The American people are that way too. 73-77% of our economy is based upon consumer spending. Which is our problem. Our economy is way out of balance... Our nation used to PRODUCERS of material goods for our nation and the world. Since the 1960s going forward we have been losing production ability and spending more and more and more, incurring more and more and more debt. This imbalance is the real heart of the problem. But its other effects are the lack of ability to be or content with what we have, buy and consume more and more and more even though not necessary and turning our nation into a throw away nation which has impacts upon our natural environment.

There is more to be said about all this... I am trying to not allow myself to be sucked into planned obsolescence, being content with what I already have, have more time with family and friends not having to work all the time paying for my "things". This really is an issue that cuts across ideological lines in some ways.
 
We as Americans are pretty bad stewards of the planet. And its not our planet.

The first thing we should do it to stop using coal for power plants.

Next is to fund at a higher rate fusion research. Its the best long term answer.

The solar cells that I see many people installing might do the whole house minus heat. It take a lot of energy to heat 50 or 100 million homes in the US.
 
If you buy less the economy will suffer because it's base of manufacturing and producing wealth has been diminished and in some cases destroyed. In the current system you must continue to be a consumer and let the chips fall later.

If you eat less, put down your smart phone and start exercising, give up smoking or the excessive consumption of alcohol the healthcare system will suffer.

If enough of you that work for a living and pay taxes, obey the laws and then vote the political system may suffer a temporary setback because of your input.

The independent growth of the economy without government control would threaten the current political system and must not be allowed to happen if the current system is to continue.

As long as you accept, believe in, tolerate and trust the current political system you are part of it.
 
Bbhero, I hear you. Why fix or upkeep what we have when something new is only a few bucks more.

The thing is, our perception that is, is that newer is better. Maybe sometimes, sometimes maybe.

I guess newer cars and houses do look and feel better. For homes, some folks on the HGTV really turn dumps into palaces in SoCal. It is really sad how bad some properties get. I guess we could all be there if we lost the will and energy to keep up our residences.


I guess the new is better mentality has cost us some jobs. Maybe our own got tired of seeing their own craftsmanship get disposed of over a couple dollar part and the need to upgrade! We have gotten into being disposable. I do wonder where all that garbage goes! Does the Earth eat it when it is buried?
 
Easy OneEye.....do not attempt to write or predict the future...just state "IMO or it seems to me that in the future it will be like this......


I think We need to keep:

Fact,


Fiction and


Opinion all separate
 
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