ENVIRONMENTAL ESSAYS Written pre 1997

[Outline and essays submitted and rejected in 1997]

MYOPIA
( Correcting our environmental vision )



1. ENVIRONMENTAL PERSPECTIVES & COLD FEET,
Introduction to Greybeard's environmental philosophy (social-ecology)

2. ETHICS, MORALITY / ECOLOGY
Relations between ethics / morality & ecology how to return our society & government to a higher level of ethics.

3. COMMUNITIES W/O CARS
Planning communities of many sizes where private cars are not essential.

4. TRANSPORTATION & WORLD TRADE
a. How our subsidized transportation system has distorted world economy.

b. Jobs transferred to lowest wages.

5. SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE / FORESTRY------------------(in progress)

a. Restoring a balance of large & small farms.

b. More staple food crops from trees.

c. Little or no mono-culture.

d. Minimum cultivation and near 0 pesticide.

6. ECOLOGICAL ENERGY-------------------------------------------(in progress)
a. Greatest emphasis on conservation.

b. Solar & wind (4 corners, research opportunity)

c. Convert coal & oil plants to natural gas.

7. RETHINKING RECYCLING
a. Making it profitable.

b. Making it work.

8. BIOREGIONAL PLANNING ---------------------------------------(in process)

a. Basing local economy on natural resources and environment of local area.

b. Greater dependence on local market, less on long distance transportation.


9. POLITICS & GRASSROOTS ---------------------------------------------(in progress)

Political reform has been promised, but not delivered. It will only be delivered when, we at the grassroots demand and accept nothing less.



-------------------- Completed essays follow --------------------------



ENVIRONMENTAL PERSPECTIVES & COLD FEET


About seventeen years ago I heard this proverb, "if your feet are cold, put a hat on". I thought it was about the most ignorant saying I had ever heard. Then I heard the theory; it goes something like this: our bodies by methods we still don't completely understand, protects it's most vital parts by directing the bloodstream to warm it's most essential parts first. Our hands and feet are very important to our everyday lives but they are of the lowest priority when it comes to keeping our bodies alive. Our brain has top priority followed closely by the internal organs. However the brain does not feel cold nor pain; therefore we must listen to our feet to tell if we need a hat. It does work; I have since proved it to myself. I don't mean you can take a hike barefooted in the snow, but instead of buying electric socks, try a warm hat.

Although this little proverb may have an important role to play in energy conservation, the point is that we need to much better understand how this world ecology functions. There are many brilliant scholars who are deeply studying their particular corner of the Earth and it's atmosphere. We need more people to study the broader overall ecological relations of plants, animals, atmosphere, soil, rivers and oceans. Theories can be important tools in predicting the future, but a better understanding of what has happened in the past will be a better guide. There is a history of past weather written in the rings of trees, in the shells of clams and other shell-fish, in the layers of sedimentary rocks, and in the ice of the polar regions and other large glaciers. These histories are not easy reading, but require much study and hard work.

There has been much controversy in recent years about the effects of the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, about the changes in the ozone layer, and the health effects of various pollutants in the air and water. I will not quote any statistics, but will share a point or two about each of these concerns. Levels of carbon dioxide have been monitored carefully for several years on the large island of Hawaii where there is little influence from local pollutants. The levels have steadily and significantly increased over the years. Volcanoes and forest fires have temporary influences, but these average out over the years; the steadily growing cause is our use of fossil fuel. Mr. Ozone is a newer cause for alarm, it is even less well understood and much harder to measure. Ozone is unique in that it is both good and bad depending on it's location. Near ground
level it is a serious health hazard; at it's natural level high in the stratosphere it forms a shield to protect us and all living things near the Earth's and ocean surface. Patterns of ozone depletion look more like a weather map. The radiation shield effect is pretty well understood, and the concern for increases in skin cancer is widespread. But most of us seem to think that we can put on sunscreen or a wide brimmed hat to protect us from the
extra radiation. And perhaps that would work well for us, but think of the rest of our ecological system. Our total ecosystem depends not only on the " Spotted Owl, the Snail Darter, the Timber Wolf" and other symbols of our mismanagement of nature, but even more on tiny plants and insects and micro organisms, many of which we have not even discovered yet. WHO is going to put sunscreen on these tiny creatures..????

I do not have any new scientific evidence or medical statistics about health risks caused by air pollution; but I do have some recent personal observations about how widespread air pollution has become. Around six years ago I moved to Las Vegas, Nevada; I soon
discovered, as I hiked in the desert, a smell I thought was of sulfur. At this time I thought this smell was caused by the intense heat on the minerals in the desert soil and rocks. Later I realized that it was ozone; I had not smelled ozone so strongly since I was a ten year old child when lightning had struck a large pine tree on my father's farm. After finding several other areas in the desert where the smell was regularly strong; I eventually determined that it was usually found at the altitude where the bowl of Vegas Valley spilled over the surrounding mountain passes.

I had not been to Albuquerque, New Mexico in 10 or 12 years until late June '92; I was shocked to find a cloud of smog over a city I remembered as clean. To keep chronology correct, I will return to Albuquerque later. On Labor Day weekend in September of '92, I hiked to the peak of Mt. Charleston near Las Vegas. The trail guide listed the many points of interest one could see on a clear day from the peak; Telescope Peak in Death Valley is 85 miles to the northwest, and Mt. Whitney beyond. The part I couldn't
understand was the listing of the hazy cloud of smog coming out of greater Los Angeles to the south. I knew LA to be toward the southwest, not south. Then as I observed the yellow/brown cloud, their direction became clear. It originated in the southwest as I
thought, but then it stretched completely across the southern sky and disappeared as far as I could see into Arizona, far beyond Lake Mead. ________ Although the day was very nearly cloudless and I could locate Telescope Peak in Death Valley, I was unable to see Mt. Whitney (the highest mountain in the lower 48 states). I would like to make a point here about perspective. If you are in the midst of a cloud, you cannot see it. Also the sense of smell looses it's sensitivity rather quickly. Have you ever smelled something that worried you, tried to locate it's source then lost the ability to smell it? Because you can no longer smell it does not mean that it is gone, nor that it may still pose a danger. I remember many years ago, asking a man how he could tolerate living
in a very bad smelling paper mill town that I frequently traveled through, holding my nose for half an hour? He replied that you don't smell it after a while.

Early December '92 I return to Albuquerque, this time I spend more time here and have an opportunity to drive to the crest of the Sandia Mountains. From there you can see the city nearby and the desert farther to the west. The haze over the city could be seen
below. Then far beyond the city could be seen another yellow/brown cloud coming across the desert. Where was it's source?? Perhaps Phoenix?? Or further??

During the past four years I have spent much time in the desert southwest. As I traveled I have always observed the distant mountains to see if the haze was always present; it rarely failed to appear. Only once after a severe storm, looking east near Tombstone, Arizona, could I see no haze. To get a clear indication of how deep this haze is, one needs to observe it from an elevation near the height of the distant mountains. This I have done several times, mostly in southeastern Arizona. The peaks of Mt. Wrightson
and Mt. Lemmon near Tucson, AZ are good observation points; they are about 60 miles apart and are almost directly north/south from each other and are both approximately the same height, about 9500ft One can drive to near the peak of Mt. Lemmon and several other not quite as good vantage points. However the 360 degree unobstructed view from Mt. Wrightson is only accessible after a good hike. Having made observations from these and several other points, the conclusion was always similar, the blanket of haze was always higher than the tallest peaks. It usually appeared to be approximately one and a half times the height from the base to the peak of these mountains. We have all heard horror stories about people who have had allergic reactions to something in their own house and are forced to take drastic measures to ease their misery. I often wonder how many patients have been labeled as hypochondriac by their doctors who simply cannot find a cause for their illness. How many of these symptoms are related to bad air? - bad water?

Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, we are no longer so threatened by the probability of a nuclear World War; but unless we change the escalation of high energy use, and continued pollution of our environment with rapid population growth multiplying it's effect, we will surely destroy our own species. How soon this will
happen, no man on Earth can tell.

What can we do? We must reduce the pollutants each of us put into the air and streams of our Earth. How? Energy conservation is the first and most important step we can take as individuals. We can save a very significant amount of energy by simply changing our energy use habits; we already proved that we can during the decade of the '70s. Then after the energy crisis ended most of us returned to our heavy energy habits. More effective use and expansion of mass transit systems is another way of saving great amounts of energy. Present mass transit systems are often under utilized for a number of reasons; we need clean comfortable safe coordinated systems that can take us from our
homes or neighborhoods to our work locations and a good inner city system so that having a car to run errands to the bank, the dentist, etc. is not a necessity. Greater use of car pooling is another step that does not require any new capital investment. Improved technology is another step to be taken, but we often expect too much from this; it is rare that any advancement in technology saves significant energy. It is usually small savings
and almost always requires new capital.

There has been much research in development of electric cars for many years. The greatest stumbling block is battery development. If we had a battery with good weight / capacity ratio and reasonable cost without toxic waste problems, then we could start
production of practical electric cars immediately. We have been working on this for more than thirty years, while world population and energy use has continued to grow. My own opinion is that battery development alone will never be a complete solution for the electric car. There are other options. There are in limited production today hybrid cars with combined smaller internal combustion engines and electric drive systems. Hybrid cars can be designed to operate in several different modes, including; battery
only, combined battery and engine with regenerative breaking, and a stationary mode in which the engine recharges the batteries at the most efficient engine speed. While no one design can satisfy all needs, the hybrid car can satisfy many needs today with little
change in transportation habits. Let me point out that while the electric car is thought of as non polluting, this is not the total picture. It does not pollute at the point of use, but wherever the power to charge it's batteries was produced is the point of pollution. No power plant, including solar, wind, geothermal, or nuclear is completely pollution free.
But control and pollution management are much easier at a central location than at every automobile.

Also hydrogen has been proposed as a non polluting fuel; but that is only true if pure oxygen is used instead of normal air mixture. And like electric cars there is pollution produced at the fuel production site.

There is no single simple solution to Earth's ecological troubles.

We cannot isolate nature and ecology from our economic systems,--- our political systems,---our ethical and moral values.

All these divisions are connected in relations that I think of as social-ecology.

Working together we can solve this environmental crisis. We need help and coordinated cooperation from many different fields; chemist, physicist, biologist, sociologist, anthropologist, geologist, educators, politicians, doctors, lawyers, diplomats, and many other fields can do their part in this effort.

Even if we could eliminate all excessive pollution of our air water and soil, and do nothing about population growth, we will still soon be in serious trouble. Nature herself will, in her own time control excess population. She is doing so already in various
ways.

Nature's methods of population control are very cruel by most human standards. They include disease, starvation, murder, and even war can be seen as one of nature's methods of population control.


One more time let me emphasize that the most productive step in reduction of pollution in our environment is the reduction in energy use that each of us can make ourselves as individuals.

I have a few suggestions some of you may not have heard from other sources.


1.Consider working at home. Many if not most office workers today could do the greater part of their work at home with a word processor or PC and fax or modem to connect with their office. [ This is one area where presently developing high technology can provide significant improvements in efficiency.]

2. If you must commute to work, consider living closer to your job or a rapid transit terminal. Carpool.

3. If you live in an arid climate, use desert landscaping which will require little or no irrigation.

4. Use native plants which require little maintenance after they are well established.

5. Consider using a four legged lawn mower.

6.Visit your local library. They have several books for all ages with many energy saving ideas, some of which will be applicable to you.

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ETHICS, MORALITY / ECOLOGY

Today I think of myself as an ecologist (concerned with connections between all living things and their environment). Twenty years ago I probably would have called myself an environmentalist (concerned mainly with the increasingly polluted environment of man). Forty years ago I would have referred to myself as a conservationist (wishing to preserve eroding soil on farmland and natural areas for the pleasure many of us find in them).

The environment of the Earth has always been changing. Scientist tell us that in the early days that no life could have survived on land because of the ultraviolet radiation without an ozone shield and besides the early atmosphere was poisonous to us.
Since life began there have been many species that have become widespread and dominant only to disappear from the face of the Earth. Some of the earliest changes were caused by extensive volcanic activity and cooling of the Earth.

More recent modifications were primarily caused by dominate forms of living things, such as early plant life which produced atmospheric oxygen which allowed the ozone shield to form and the possibility of life on the dry land. Long before man arrived on the scene, the many diverse life forms created a very complex ecological system that was not severely affected by any one species including man, until about seven or eight thousand years ago when man developed agriculture, then the much more recent industrial revolution and modern medicine which have made man by far the most potentially destructive element of the ecological system.

There is no doubt that present levels of population growth can not continue indefinitely, but whether men make wise decisions to control it and the destruction of our air and water, or if we wait too long, or make wrong decisions, then nature will take over the
task from us.

Before we can hope to determine what the correct steps are to preserve our ecological system, we need to take steps to heal our social ills. Our jails and prisons are overflowing with social misfits, and many of them are returned to our midst with very
little or no rehabilitation. The cost of keeping one person in prison cost as much or more than the average man earns. If we collect taxes at the rate of 25% of earnings, that means it takes four workers to support one prisoner. So for every person in prison, we subtract five from the potential productive work force of our economy. It soon becomes obvious that we can't continue to build more jail cells as crime continues to increase. We have had murderers with us from the earliest recorded history. The first born of Eve murdered the second born in the fourth chapter of Genesis.

Restoring the death penalty has done nothing to slow crime; the only significant effect it has shown is in making more rich criminal lawyers. The phrase (rich criminal lawyers) can be read two different ways; I read it both ways. The huge profit motive involved in drug production and distribution easily counteract all efforts to stop it. As much as I abhor the idea of decriminalizing drug use, I believe removing the criminal profit
motive may be possible without following the same formula as the alcoholic beverage control system. We could leave stiff penalties on illegal distribution, but make the drugs cheap or free to any person in a drug treatment program. Legal farmers could provide
the government the raw materials for treatment at a reasonable profit; and many addicts can return to productive lives; and illegal producers would have little market left.

But what are the real root causes of our social ills?

1.Greed. ( love of money is the root of all evil )

2. Injustice ( greed of others or society itself )

3. Hunger ( greed, unwillingness to share )

4. Unequal opportunity ( racial or cultural intolerance )

5. I am sure you can name others.

We think of our country as one with a heritage of high morals and ethics, and I do believe that the founders had started out in that direction. However greed and corruption have become common in our government. I think none of us deliberately vote for a corrupt politician, but we feel powerless when they do not keep their campaign promises. We must not only expect integrity from our elected representatives;

we must demand it!!!!


There are many parts of our society that desperately need reform or revision including, government, the economic system, the justice system (the letter of the law killeth, but the spirit of law giveth life), and others. I know the saying 'opinions are like anuses, everybody has one'. If that got your attention it served it's purpose. I have a very strong opinion that the root of many problems today is the severe erosion of ethics and morals in our country. In the name of freedom of speech, all sorts of violence and pornography have invaded our entertainment industry, our art, our publications, our public speech, and much of it has crept into the core of our families.

Freedoms without limits is no freedom at all. Any individual's freedom must end where it begins to interfere with the rights of others. Those who defend trash TV say that the channel changer and the off button are your censors; this may be practical for some adults, but it is very impractical if not impossible to screen every program your children have access to.

I will not attempt, nor do I have the wisdom, to solve all of our social and environmental illnesses........ But I do have one proposal that I wish you all to give some thought and
consideration.

I propose that we add to our public schools curriculum, a subject called
ETHICS & MORALITY

I can hear all the objections now; these are values to be taught at home and in churches, synagogues, mosques or other such places, and never by the state. I would agree completely, the ideal place for these values to be taught is in the home; however, how many of us, as parents, feel adequate for this task?, how many children have parents who do not care?, how many have never seen the inside of a church or other religious institution?

Although ethics and morality are closely related, they are not the same. I think ethical values are very much universal; truthfulness, honesty, respect, responsibility, etc. Morality is a more personal or religious set of values. Although I see them as separate values, I believe that ethics without morals are nearly impossible.

The state should not act alone in this endeavor but in cooperation with churches, synagogues, parents, and other interested organizations. There should be options to state developed curriculum that could be taught by local volunteer ministers, priest, etc. Parents or guardians would choose which program their children attend. Wards of the state should be allowed their own choice. I am certain there will be problems
that I have not even thought of, but I see no reason we can not work them out.

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COMMUNITIES WITHOUT CARS

Just try to imagine a place where everything necessary for a good standard of living is within easy walking distance. Certainly not the typical suburban neighborhood. Let us try to plan such a place. Sounds difficult doesn't it; but let's first decide what is most important to have nearest to our doorstep. A safe place for our children to play might be most important for many of us. Other things most of us would want to have close by are somewhere to buy food, a place to work, schools, medical offices, libraries, a place
where we could enjoy nature, a place to worship, athletic fields, and of course somewhere to buy clothing and furniture, hardware, etc. We will need to prioritize locations of each facility according to frequency of use and economy of scale. If we
eliminate the space needed for roads, parking and garages, and we share common space, we can design very livable communities with all of these facilities within a 15 minute walk or 5 minute bike ride.

There could be many basic designs for such compact communities and several levels of density. Some could be planned for retirement and the handicapped with wider pathways to accommodate small electric vehicles. My idea of an efficient community is
based on a cluster of mixed apartments, town-houses, condos etc built in a circle with a large common courtyard with access only to residents. Each home would have back door access to the common courtyard and front door to the outside of cluster. The courtyard would have a diameter of about 200 - 300 feet with playgrounds for small children and picnic areas for adults and families. Access and exit directly from outside to courtyard could be by two or three gates that would be opened by unique codes or even computer recognition of each resident's hand print. A courtyard of this size is large enough to accommodate all residents and small enough that parents could know all the children near their own children's ages. Mothers or fathers could keep watch from their kitchen or home office window.

A community of such clusters with an area about one mile square could easily accommodate from 10 to 20 thousand people, including places of employment, entertainment, sports facilities, schools and shopping. This density can be achieved with no high rise towers; two and three story homes and apartments are all that is required.

A simple sketch I have drawn looks like a tic-tac-toe grid with residential clusters in the corners, a commercial / light industrial area in the center, the top and bottom squares with schools athletic fields and garden plots, the left and right squares contain parks and churches.

The residential squares need not all be of the same design; some clusters could have taller apartments, more suited to singles and childless families, and many other variations. Probably most squares should have a convenience store and a child care center; and possibly a small office complex, and a self storage facility which could also serve as shops for small businesses.

Most people could find work within the community in the schools, parks, churches, the commercial and industrial center. Working out of our own home is rapidly becoming an option for more people than ever before. Most office work, design engineering,
computer programming, and other similar work can be done on home computers and much of the necessary communication with other associates can be done by phone, fax, email or teleconferencing

For those who must work in other communities and for other travel needs we need to develop a transit system. For local community service, there is no more practical mode than busses. To provide frequent convenient service for compact communities, we
would need one forty passenger bus operating about 16 hours a day for approximately every four or five hundred people. Today's sprawling communities would use more than one hundred private automobiles to serve the same population. No subsidies are needed
for an efficient transit system serving such compact medium to high density community. The extent and complexity of such systems would depend upon how many of such communities are close enough to be served by the same system. And the locations of industrial parks, airports, rail terminals, and if traditional suburban developments will also be served.

While every town or community's needs may be somewhat different because of many variables, from size and density to terrain and prevailing weather; ideal systems for a retirement community in central Nevada would not serve well in the diverse
communities of the Puget Sound in Washington with it's much more frequent wet weather. However most local communities in both areas would probably be best served by a system of busses of a variety of sizes from mini-vans up to the largest needed on the most heavily traveled routes. Rush hour schedules may be best served by two or,
in extreme cases more busses, running the same time. With this scheme, only the leading bus would stop at the next stop allowing the following bus to leapfrog past to take the following stop unless someone needed to get off at the previous stop. This
leapfrogging should allow the schedule to be completed in normal time even during periods of heavier than normal traffic. Schedules can be kept much simpler and by far less confusing if they run at the same time all day. Changing the size of busses to fit capacity needs can easily improve overall system efficiency. In a relatively large system this could easily be done by scheduling maintenance on larger busses during slower periods of traffic.

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TRANSPORTATION and WORLD TRADE

Our transportation system is subsidized in many ways. First and probably most important is our artificially low price of fuel which discourages conservation practices. No other modern industrial nation has lower taxes on fuel used for transportation. The pollution caused diseases, is another unpaid subsidy of transportation. Highway maintenance is one more area that is not sufficiently funded and there are too many contractors who do substandard work. Some time, I think it was back in the eighties, our government deregulated almost everything. Prices of goods, I believe, or rates for services probably should not be regulated; it would discourage competition. Except during national emergency to prevent price gouging such as has happened after hurricanes. Safety and security of airplanes, trucks and rail equipment and private vehicles are not areas to be completely unregulated.

If we can only inspect a very small percentage of containers in our ocean ports, this is another subsidy to transportation and to world trade. Security is also compromised by the, so called; flags of convenience, allowing ships to be registered in countries where the owner is not a citizen and well may not be the rightful owner. This flags of convenience subject, is of course a matter for international law to deal with. My own opinion is that no person should be allowed to register a ship anywhere besides his own country. And that country should be accountable for his legitimacy. It should be obvious in these recent years, that corporate accounting should be closely regulated.
These regulations could be simplified enough that the CEO or the CFO could not use complications as an excuse for innocent errors. Any deviation from these simple rules could be approved on an as needed basis for unusual situations.

Transportation subsidies are detrimental to local markets. Small farmers, who would like to sell to locals, are disadvantaged by factory farms who can market to the world. Potatoes are grown in Maine, Florida, Washington, Oregon and Idaho; most supermarkets sell potatoes shipped from three or more or these areas in the same seasons. We both import and export beef with countries halfway around the Earth. All this unnecessary transportation is contributing heavily to the pollution of our atmosphere.

Cheap labor is luring almost all manufacturing jobs to far away shores. There is only one category, that I can think of, manufacturing that is still mostly made in the USA. Defense hardware is mostly still made here, but only because of security and lots of lobbying from the defense industry.

All this is contributing greatly to the widening gap between the rich and the poor. The poor have little or nothing after paying for shelter, food, clothing and transportation. The rich have very much remaining after living expenses. They can then invest that excess to earn more; therefore widening the gap even further. CEOs of our major corporations receive outrageous earnings, often several hundreds of times the earnings of their average workers. Our tax system is not helping much either.

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RETHINKING RECYCLING
(Disposing of our disposable habits)

What are the main goals of recycling?

1. To conserve natural resources.
2. To reduce pollution.
3. To reduce cost.
This list could be very lengthy, but I think most will fit under one of these headings.

What products are recyclable? . . . . ?

Almost any product could be recycled, however for various reasons most are not. First it must be cost effective to recycle; if it cost less to use all virgin materials, than to recover previously used materials, there is no economic incentive to recycle. Let us look at cost of recycling. There is cost of collecting, sorting, storing, transporting, processing, marketing reprocessed material, and cost of developing and building reprocessing facilities. All of these steps must be figured in the cost of recycling. Some of the more valuable materials have been recycled probably from before there was civilization. But until recent times it was only because such materials were rare; there was in early times no high cost of disposal and little or no cause for concern about polluting the air or water.

The population explosion and our "energy wasteful - throw away economy" has changed all that. Americans use more energy per capita and consume more throw away products than any other people on Earth. If all citizens of the Earth consumed energy and other resources at the American rate, I believe that NATURE would probably eliminate us all within a pretty short time. Hopefully the greedy CEOs and financial advisors, with their short term gains, and vested interest, of our major corporations can be prevented from expanding our bad habits world wide.

REDUCE WASTE:

( waste reduction obviously reduces the volume of needed recycling). This applies to all aforementioned goals; reduces cost, reduces pollution, and conserves resources.

1. Durable products: Almost every product on the market today has a relatively short useful life expectancy. Why? Useful life is short primarily because most products are designed to be thrown away and replaced with a new item after a short period. To
make a durable plastic plate that can be reused many times probably would require about two or three times as much material as a one use throw away plate, at a cost of only pennies and perhaps a 2% increase in labor.

2. Repairable products: Very few products are designed today with repair in mind. Most are so difficult to gain access to repairable parts and troubleshooting points, that it is not economically feasible to make any but the very simplest of repairs. Repair-ability must begin on the drawing board, not in the repair shop. There are some products that will never be economically repairable simply because of their small size such as wrist watches and pocket calculators, but they too should be designed with durability and conservation in mind. The following category of standardization has much to do with repair-ability.

3. Standardization: Many of the products we use are not economically repairable simply because there is such a wide variety of similar but not interchangeable parts used in their manufacture. Potential local repair facilities can not afford to stock the enormous variety of parts to repair such products. In almost all cases manufacturers price repair parts far above their cost for one of two or more reasons; one is to protect their own repair shops from fair competition, another is that many would rather sell you
another new product instead of having the old one repaired.

Certainly every product should not be standardized, but almost everything that is considered a necessity or is produced in very high volume would benefit society by standardization.

Standardization will not happen without incentives for industry to do it. These incentives must come from demand of consumers and from government action. There is little other reason for manufacturers to standardize except where it has already been
done because of the nature of some industries.

4. Reusable products: Instead of throw away items, we need to encourage development of more things suitable for many repeated uses. Glass food containers could be easily designed for many repeated uses, they are easily cleaned and sterilized. If we standardized sizes and shape of food containers, they would not
have to be used the next time for the same product or even be returned to the same company. With each use they would be relabeled with the current product. Storage space for reusable containers can be a problem unless they are shaped for convenient
stacking. If we designed them as tapered cylinders, they will stack like paper dixie cups; very compactly. Plastic food containers may not be as easily cleaned as glass, but they may be designed to be useful for other purposes such as hardware storage or other uses where their resistance to breakage is an asset.

RECYCLE:

Effective recycling must begin at product design, not in the trash heap. The trash heap is the place we should look to determine where our priorities should be, in getting
started.

1. Food packaging: Paper or other biodegradable material should be used in any application where it is not practical to reuse container or directly recover material. Aluminum foil could also replace much of our present plastic wrap use. Plastic
certainly will remain the most practical material for some applications. Here is another spot where standardization can be helpful; there must be a million formulas for making plastics, each needing a slightly different process for recycling back to its original usefulness. Therefore almost all plastic being recycled today is going to low value products such as park benches and boardwalk lumber.

2. Material selection: Almost every product that is today made of plastic, was in the not too distant past, made from wood, leather, clay, glass, metal, etc. Every material has properties that give it advantages and disadvantages, in durability, in cost of production, in cost of transportation, cost of marketing, and the environmental cost of disposal. Plastic wins!!!!; if we ignore one category ( environmental cost of disposal ) and we have, then the overall score will be, advantage plastic. Marketing cost have gone up slightly because of the bad image plastic has received in recent years. Have you noticed the industry has began a public relations campaign aimed at the public in defense of plastic? I have no doubt that plastic has no equal in many applications; there are many components of durable products and reusable items that no other material can perform as well. However in the area of throw away products and packaging we need to eliminate as much plastic as possible.

3. Disassembly by design: Some European automobile makers have already began designing their new cars to be easily disassembled for recycling. All durable products need to be designed with their eventual disposal in mind, nothing last forever, except,
perhaps trash. Plastic components should all be marked with an identification of their chemical formula. Certain metals should also be identified as to their content.
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COMMON HAZARDOUS MATERIALS

1. Batteries: There are literally hundreds of sizes and shapes of small batteries on the market today. This makes it very impractical to design equipment to recycle them. And they nearly all contain hazardous substances such as mercury, lead, or other heavy metals, and acids and alkalies. While there is a definite need for a wide range of sizes and capacities of batteries, there is no real reason for so many intermediate sizes and shapes. We could and should develop incentives for all new products to be designed to use a limited number of standard sizes of batteries.

2. Household, automotive & shop cleaning products:
We usually think of these items as relatively harmless, but they often contain dangerous chemicals. When properly used they may cause little environmental damage, but there are frequently leftover portions that end up in the trash where they can cause
considerable harm. These items need to be clearly labeled for proper disposable and possible recovery. Again almost any item can be recycled if easily identified and collected in sufficient quantity.

3. Insecticides and chemical fertilizers:
The most important precautions in fertilizer use is not to over apply and to prevent runoff into streams and excess leaching into groundwater. We must do more to reduce our dependence on poisonous pesticides. Several years ago we stopped using DDT and other related persistent poisons, and we probably did prevent the almost certain extinction of the bald eagle and the osprey, but we did much too little to reduce our overall dependence on chemical pesticides. There are many known agricultural practices that can greatly reduce our dependence on pest control chemicals, but that
subject could be an enormous volume by itself.

Pest control chemical leftovers are often dumped on the ground or poured down the sewer. This must be stopped. The chemical producers must be held responsible for developing and operating proper disposal facilities or recycling these products.
If recycling nor benign disposal is possible for any of these products, then we must rethink our dependence on them. After all, a hundred years ago we got along without all of them.
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While every goal of recycling is important, from my perspective, by far the most important is preservation of clean air and water. It may seem that air and water are very abundant, but it has become quite clear that our civilization has seriously contaminated both the air we breath and water we drink. It has already become common and very profitable to provide bottled water in the market place. Even if it becomes economically possible to filter the air we all breath, it would be difficult to imagine how nature herself could survive the pollutants we continue to pour into the air.

As individual ordinary citizens, there is little change one can make in reducing the destruction of our environment, but as a group of dedicated concerned citizens we can preserve an inheritance for our children and grandchildren.

GREYBEARD