How to Stop Global Warming

Currently the world is starting to show the effects of global warming and it is simply because the resident Human Population is outputting more greenhouse gasses than the planet can deal with naturally. If nothing is done natural disasters like tsunamis and hurricanes will become the norm. Wet areas of the world will become dry and dry areas of the world will become wet. Global Warming will probably not kill off humanity and certainly not spell the end of the planet as planet will survive any disaster that would cause the extinction of the Human race, but the worse global warming becomes the more people will suffer. So I have put together a simple list of things that should halt global warming.

1. Home Insulation
By insulating a home it will be warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. Insulation represents the biggest energy saving of anything that consumers can do to their home and unlike today's solar panels, insulation will easily pay for itself.

2. Lighting
CFLs (Compact Fluorescent Light-bulbs) will save 80% power per lightbulb changed. To think of that differently five CFLs will use up the same amount of power as just one Incandescent Light-bulb. Scale that up to the 24 million homes in the UK and we as a nation are looking at a very significant energy saving. Plus although CFLs might cost a little more, they also last six times longer than traditional incandescent lightbulbs.

3. Electrical Appliances
When buying new appliances make sure you take into consideration the appliance's Energy Performance Certificate as a refrigerator with a D rating might be cheaper to buy, but a refrigerator with an A rating will be cheaper to run.

Simply turning appliances off when they are not in use is an excellent way of saving energy. And if for example you turn your computer off, make sure you also turn off any peripherals connected to it, like screens or speakers too.

Cooking food with a microwave is more energy efficient than useing an oven. Plus using timers and thermostats on appliances can cut energy usage quite dramatically in some cases.

4. Energy Supplier
You can now in the UK buy energy from any energy company you like as opposed to water where there is still a fixed supplier model in place. This means that you can signup to energy suppliers like Ecotricity that only produces power by renewable means.

5. Vehicle Fuel
The use of petrol is an unnecessary resource that we currently use to fuel our vehicles with. This resource will run-out so moving from a dependence on petrol is good for the environment and for future sustainability for when it does run out. Buying a Hybrid car will reduce the amount of petrol you use for transportation, but a better solution is to send a message to manufacturers by refusing to buy any gas guzzling cars. As this will make them take fuel efficiency as a priority without a two tear car consumer model being created.

Alternatives to petrol sound good, but There is an issue with many alternative fuels, Hydrogen is energy costly to produce and Vegetable Oil as well as Ethanol requires large areas of land to grow. So the future for fuels this clearly a purely electric one. Vehicles like the car currently being produced by Tesla Motors is the future because using power from the mains is more environmentally friendly than using petrol and with renewable sources used to produce that power, is CO2 neutral.



6. Recycling
Recycling is a better way of disposing of waist than burying it in the ground as it saves natural resources.

7. Carbon Offsets
Carbon offsets are an excellent way of reducing CO2. When a new cleaner coal fire power planet is built, a forest can be planted next to the power plant so that the carbon the power plant produces is absorbed by the forest. This offset can make a new development carbon neutral or even carbon negative.

8. Political
And finally politicians are quite willing to get behind green issues if it means more votes. This should be encouraged because politicians can really make a difference to the environment by putting forwards new environmental standards, new policies and they are the ones who choose where public money is spent.

Final Thoughts
Some global warming is quite natural, but the levels we are seeing at the moment means we will all suffer. Poorer countries will suffer more than the rich and it will get worse before it becomes better, but even if you are one of those people who believe God will come and save everybody at the last minuet like Superman did by flying around the earth backwards; or that Aliens will make contact and give us some newkind of technology to produce free energy (I say 2:1 odds against). You should still take energy conservation to heart because it saves money.