For several years, Ford has been working to reduce waste, energy use and emissions generated by its manufacturing facilities around the world. Its latest step has been to join to the Climate Registry, a non-profit group that is developing standards for reporting greenhouse gas emissions. The idea is that emissions reporting is useless unless everyone uses the same criteria to determine and record the output. Most of the U.S. states, Canadian provinces and Mexican states have adopted these standards. Companies reporting their emissions can use the same methodology in all the regions that have adopted the TCR regime. To be a member of TCR, Ford (and all other member companies and agencies) will have to measure, independently audit and publicly report greenhouse gas emissions.

[Source: Ford]

Many people are blissfully unaware of what it takes to make their everyday lives possible. Whether it be in how or what we drive, where or how we live; many facets of modern life have an environmental impact that the masses just don't know about. That's why the results of a survey conducted by Johns Manville regarding the consumption of energy and the creation of greenhouse gases are not all that surprising. First, the statistics:

• 44 percent said that road transportation ranked as the largest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions
• 35 percent said road transportation ranked as the single largest consumer of energy in the U.S.
• 12 percent said that residential buildings ranked as the single largest consumer of energy in the U.S.
• 4 percent said that residential buildings ranked as the largest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions
• 6 percent said that commercial buildings ranked as the largest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions

The reality is quite different from that perception. According to our source article, the U.S. residential sector ranks as the single largest energy consumer in the world, and homes worldwide account for 25 percent of total energy use. "Many homeowners don't realize that a typical house releases almost twice as much carbon dioxide annually as a typical car," said Kateri Callahan, president of the Alliance to Save Energy.

So, while it is certainly very important to be sure your car is as energy efficient as it can be, you should try and be sure that your home's up to snuff too.

[Source: Johns Manville via Environmental Leader]

It seems that if you are interested in checking air quailty, the mountains in Norway make an excellent choice. Sensors there can detect the carbon readings from a single fox, according to this article. This sensitive detection also allows scientists to tell where certain pollutants are coming from, including those emitted as greenhouse gases from our cars. With the rapid industrialization of China, more greenhouse gases are present in Arctic Norway than ever before. One particular interesting piece from the article is that researchers can tell where automotive exhaust came from due to differences in the formulation of fuel made standard in a particular country.

Also discussed in the article, but unrelated to automobiles, were mercury from the burning of fillings in dead people's teeth, which can be traced to certain Asian countries, and a suggested smoking ban. Pretty interesting stuff fills the air we breathe, wouldn't you say?

[Source: Reuters]

This story goes to show that the debate on global warming is still raging. Crucial to the debate in many people's minds is not whether the earth is warming, but whether or not man is causing it. That is the notion that four Australian governing party lawmakers are rejecting. Also up for debate is whether or not the lawmakers opinions are molded by the fact that Australia is the world's largest exporter of coal, and that the nation is rather dependent on coal as a natural resource. With the abundance of sunlight, wind and the possibility of tapping into the ocean's waves as potential power sources is not lost on all of Australia's inhabitants. The topic of climate change and coal power is expected to play a role in the upcoming elections.

Specifically, the lawmakers are against the idea of setting up "at least one" carbon sequestration systems at one of their coal-fired power plants. Not even just one? Sheesh.

[Source: Physorg]

According to Michael Abberton, a scientist at the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research in the U.K., "there are approaches within plant breeding that can lead to reduced emissions." How is that, you might be wondering? Are we talking about a new plant-based fuel source? Not exactly, at least, not for your car. We are talking about cows. Besides being a favorite statistic to quote for those who would rather not buy an efficient car, cows really do emit greenhouse gases as they digest food. "It is actually through belching rather than the other end," said Abberton. So, in an effort to make plant matter easier for cows to digest, Abberton and his fellow researchers are trying to develop new varieties of the foods which cows choose to eat. This article says that "the average dairy cow belches out about 100 to 200 litres of methane each day", which "makes up 37% of methane and 67% of nitrous oxide emissions in the U.K." That's obviously plenty to be worried about, so there definitely is more to consider than just cars when it comes to greenhouse gases. Perhaps it'll be easier to change our driving habits versus the cow's eating habits! Maybe we should just sprinkle some Beano on the ground?

[Source: USA Today]

We don't have much history covering the debate between being a vegetarian versus eating meat, and for good reason: we are first and foremost an automotive blog. From time to time, we do branch off and cover other green issues, as we believe that our readership is broad and enjoys those occasional forrays as much as we do. This here is a topic that we can sink our teeth into (HA HA), because it concerns both green issues and cars.

Any takers on this one? The question is whether a vegan driving a Hummer is greener than a meat-eating carnivore driving a Prius? I'm not touching this one... I have no problem admitting to eating and enjoying meat, though. I would prefer knowing that all the meat I eat comes from sustainable sources, but I an not naive enough to say that I am sure it does.

As a side point, ever notice that stories like this love to pick on the Hummer brand and the Toyota Prius? How many debates have you witnessed regarding these two vehicles and brands in particular? I am positive that a Prius owner must hate hearing that they are dirtier than a Hummer owner. I don't buy the argument myself, but what do I know? I'm no expert when it comes to the greenhouse gases emitted from a cow's tailpipe. Natural gas!

[Source: Treehugger forums]

Ah yes, the media. The media loves their scandals, debates and tragedies. That would be because the public loves them too. Or, am I wrong? And Global Warming could fall under all three of those categories. It could be a scandal and a tragedy at the same time, in fact, depending on who is doing the research and reporting. Of course, it always turns into a debate. What better to editorialize, then? I really mean that, too. The whole point of an editorial is to get people thinking and talking. You make a point, or pose a question and wait for people to voice their own opinions, in favor or not. And, that is exactly what is happening over at The Truth About Cars right as you read this. If you want to check it out, click here. The subject: the automotive influence on climate change.

[Source: The Truth About Cars]

• www.drivecongress.com
• www.drivingamericasfuture.com
• www.grabdemocracybythehorns.com (password protected at this time)

What do all of the above internet sites all have in common? They are all designed to encourage consumers to contact Congress. What shall consumers say to Congress? To "Oppose Unrealistic Fuel Economy Increases," according to one of the sites. The other sites have similar goals, although Chrysler is only targeting their dealerships at this time with their "Grab Democracy by the Horns" site. Drive Congress was created by The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, an organization made up of nine manufacturers, or ten if you count Daimler separate from Chrysler already.

The sites all suggest that there are better ways to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions than focusing on better fuel economy for our automobiles. Will this sentiment be rejected in the face of record high gasoline prices, or will consumers agree that fuel economy and harmful emissions should be kept separate from one another in legislation? Perhaps you should do what they are suggesting and contact Congress. Let them know what you think, one way or the other.

[Source: Detroit News]

This is a pretty compelling picture as far as I am concerned. According to this site, which is where I got the information I'm relaying to you from, says that this balloon, which is attached to the tailpipe of a car in China, is filled with the exhaust from one day's worth of driving. That does not look like a very large displacement car, either, but I have to be honest and admit that I'm not familiar with that car.

If you get a chance to visit the site that was behind the picture, click here. I was interested in some of what they were promoting there, especially the idea of driving a vehicle with a smaller displacement engine. Americans have long been known to always purchase the largest engine available in any particular vehicle, whether they needed the extra power (and subsequent fuel mileage penalty) or not. What are the chances that will change any time soon?

P.S. Sometimes we can have fun with our categories... notice I labeled this one "Carbon Capture"... get it?

[Source: www.20to20.org via Frederik Samuel via Hugg]

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - a group of hundreds of scientists and representatives of 113 governments, formed by the United Nations in 1988, has released their first of four reports on global warming this year. The last set of reports was concluded in 2001. This group of scientists is generally considered "the voice of the world" on global warming. Scientists from the U.S. are included in the group. According to their own web site, the report was "produced by some 600 authors from 40 countries. Over 620 expert reviewers and a large number of government reviewers also participated". Here is a direct quote from the report, courtesy of the AP, which I found on Yahoo:

"The observed widespread warming of the atmosphere and ocean, together with ice-mass loss, support the conclusion that it is extremely unlikely that global climate change of the past 50 years can be explained without external forcing, and very likely that is not due to known natural causes alone." According to the report, "very likely" means "over 90% sure".

The report, which is to be made available today, and can be read here (via pdf) is the strongest language that the scientific group has ever used, and it points to the burning of fossil fuels as a main culprit. Before you dismiss this report, be aware that this group is said to be rather skeptical. According to Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria, "There's no question that the powerful language is intimately linked to the more powerful science. It's very conservative. Scientists by their nature are skeptics."

Apparently, all of the scientists quickly agreed that "attributing global warming to man-made burning of fossil fuels and connecting it to a recent increase in stronger hurricanes" was a no-brainer, as this was not a point of contention among any of them. China had the loudest resistance to including fossil-fuel burning in the report. The U.S. scientists were not said to have any problem with that.

Please, add your comments. I know that this is controversial, try to be reasonable whichever side you choose to believe. Remember how important of an issue this is to the entire world.

Related:

• Is Washington pressing scientists to downplay global warming? Congress to investigate
• Editorial: So, since "global climate change" is official now...

[Source The I.P.C.C. via Yahoo]

The Ayles Ice Shelf, a 41-square mile floating sheet of ice, recently broke free from the coast of Ellesmere Island 500 miles south of the North Pole in Canada. Scientists cite climate change as a major reason for the breakage. According to Warwick Vincent of Laval University, who traveled to the island to view the conditions himself, "This is a dramatic and disturbing event. It shows that we are losing remarkable features of the Canadian North that have been in place for many thousands of years. We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of accelerated change ahead."

Six such ice shelfs exist in the Canadian arctic, and are roughly 90 percent smaller than when first discovered in 1906. The breakage of the ice shelf was seen on seismic data machines 155 miles away.

As mentioned, scientists say that the breakage is consistent with climate change, of which the greenhouse gases exhausted by our automobiles has an effect. The Kyoto protocol, often mentioned on this site, is a pact that 165 nations currently have ratified since its introduction at the 1997 U.N. conference in Kyoto, Japan, and was created to reduce greenhouse gases emitted by developed countries. Carbon dioxide is the largest greenhouse gas contributing to global warming, if you believe that it exists (many don't). As many are aware, the main source of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere is the burning of fossil fuels. In the United States, emissions have gone up 16 pecent since 1990.

This news came shortly after the Indian Mountaineering Service indicated that "The melting of the ice sheets and the glaciers is a crisis in the Himalayas," according to H.P.S. Ahluwalia, who runs the service. Expeditions are on their way to investigate the source of flooding in the Himalayas, believed to be caused by the melting of the ice sheets due to global warming. The Himalayan glaciers are almost all retreating, due in part to the large scale burning of coal in China and India, where the populations are huge and the economies are growing fast.

[Source: msnbc.com]

Sen. Barbara Boxer of California will soon take over as chairwoman of the U.S. Senate Environmental Public Works Committee. Major policy shifts on global warming, air quality and toxic waste are expected as she is one of the most liberal members of the Senate. And she's replacing one of the most conservative Republicans, James Inhofe of Oklahoma. He had blocked bills seeking to cut greenhouse gases, calling global warming a "hoax." Environmentalists are cheering the change. Boxer is likely to model her approach after California laws that cap greenhouse gases and seek to cut CA emissions by 25 percent. She's also a proponent of alternative-fuel programs.

[Source: Samantha Young/Associated Press via Fort Worth Star-Telegram]

Joel Schwartz is a visiting fellow for the conservative think tank the American Enterprise Institute. In a recent column titled "Environmental Activists Just Don't Get It," he circles a fleet of Hummers around personal liberty, protecting our freedom of choice from efforts to legislate reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The premise, as so often stated by environmental critics, is that if automakers are required to decrease GHG, which is basically forcing them to improve fuel economy, then American consumers will lose their freedom of choice.

I doubt if the major automakers would drop such a lucrative segment as fullsize SUVs or any large vehicle if stringent fuel economy improvements were imposed. They will find a way to meet both consumer demand and environmental needs. And to fair, that technologically advanced vehicle might not come right away. There was a time when automotive enthusiasts did lose their freedom of vehicle choice in deference to solving a significant environmental problem. And yet we all survived as a country and society, and we cleaned up a major environmental mess.

I loved '60s muscle cars. I wanted a Boss 429 and an LS6 Chevelle and Hemi Road Runner in my driveway. Detroit would have kept building those cars had it not been for legislation to clean up emissions. They were literally defiant in implementing pollution controls and developing technology to produce cleaner engines.

I first moved to Los Angeles when most cars had only PCV valves and just started to get catalytic converters. I rarely saw the Hollywood sign from the South Bay, which is about 20 miles away. Now I'm surprised when I don't see it. Would I have loved to have seen how much horsepower and fun automakers could have developed in the '70s had they not been restricted by emissions regulations? Sure. Did I miss anything by not having the freedom to buy a 450-horsepower Mustang in 1980 instead of the 4-cylinder slug that I had for six years? No, there were no tears on my pillow at night. But the improvements in air quality in a region that was gagging every afternoon turned out to be spectacular and life-saving.

Detroit got fat and lazy in the '60s and didn't know how to respond quickly when society needed help. A similar scenario is developing today in that the cars are getting fat. When SUVs started becoming popular, automakers didn't look for efficient ways to build larger vehicles. They didn't have to. Just put an SUV body on a truck frame and the public will buy every one. And every year they got heavier as engineers strived for quieter ride and improved handling. As more mass was piled on by the NVH and chassis-dynamics engineers, the powertrain engineers had to come up with more horsepower and bigger engines. Today's vehicles are just too heavy.

Now is the time to give the powertrain engineers a break. They won't have to build such gas-guzzling engines if engineers in the other departments will get off their addiction to weight. Consumers may have to adjust for a few years but in the end they won't lose their choice. Guess what? 500-horsepower muscle cars did return. The new Z06 Corvette pollutes about 99 percent less than the ZL1 Corvette, gets twice the gas mileage and still runs quicker and faster. Even if automakers are dragged kicking and screaming into helping solve another environmental crisis, they will respond. And consumers will be patient if the wait results in healthier living conditions and a better vehicle.

[Source: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research]

The Golden State is certainly living up to its reputation as the world's environmental watchdog this week. In addition to the state's attorney general suing automakers over greenhouse gases and the recently passed law capping all emissions that contribute to global warming, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will have until the end of the month to decide whether or not he's going to sign two new bills aimed at reducing greenhouse gases. The state's Democratic-controlled Senate and Assembly have already approved both.

The first, authored by Assemblyman Joe Nation, would require cleaner emissions from new cars sold in California by 2010 and mandate that 50 percent of them run on alternative fuels by 2020.

The second, by Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, would require that power imported from power plants outside of the state comply with the same greenhouse gas standards that power plants in California meet. Environmentalists say this bill may expose "California's dirty secret," that while power plants within the state lines tend to be relatively clean, California imports a significant amount of electricity from high-polluting plants in the neighboring region.

Governor Schwarzenegger has not yet indicated whether or not he will sign either bill into law.

[Source: San Francisco Chronicle]

This issue is extremely complex; however, a few recent articles are worth reading if interested.

Massachusetts is leading a coalition of 12 states, a few cities (including San Francisco and Aspen) and environmental groups in a lawsuit against the EPA. While under President Clinton, the EPA said it had the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. But under the Bush administration the EPA reversed itself. Hence, the lawsuit that is now before the Supreme Court. A decision won't come until next year but both sides are gearing up for the showdown.

A Q&A story found at nature.com gives an excellent background on the issue, including notes on similar actions in other countries. Read it before taking in some stories on both sides.

Urging a victory for the EPA is Marlo Lewis Jr. In his essay for RenewAmerica you'll find the familiar conservative buzz words: consumer choice, less competition, more expensive, government authority and hopeless cause.

I couldn't find such an engaging point of view from a single source in support of the lawsuit, so here are stories about the amicus briefs filed on behalf of the National Wildlife Federation and marine conservation advocates.

Don't feel you have to read all at once. This story is going to be around for a long time.

[Source: nature.com]