The paper ones. Theres nothing that cant be recycled in the materials but apparently its thickness means that it needs a different method to recycle it and seemingly many centres have difficulty seperating the straws. I just want to add as somebody who doesnt drive it is really hard to recycle a LOT of things in Southampton. So much wont be taken by the blue bins and requires you to go to a very out of the way place.
the original plastic straws were one material. Easy to recycle. The paper ones are at least two, maybe three. Harder to recycle. for the record, I don’t like straws anyway, but as I said it is about the real problem not the materials. On your last point, this is a great example of why we need a single system, available to all.
Some examples of reuse. https://www.springwise.com/repurposed-plastic-waste-creates-reusable-building-bricks/ interesting site I just had a quick look. Some online photos, seems to me Europe/UK is lagging behind. please log in to view this image please log in to view this image
I recently became a Patron of the Youtube channel Just Have A Think because of Dave Borlace's no nonsense videos that are extremely well produced and well presented by himself. All he makes are videos that concern us regarding the environment, so I'll bore you all by posting them here every time he makes one, which is usually once a week, or fortnight if he is extremely busy at his main job. This week's video is called Greenwashing and is about industries which tell you they are taking measures to care for the environment while destroying it in the main course of their business. And Dave gives us examples which I'm sure we're all familiar with in one form or another:
Good to see a thread about environmental issues. Just a small tip, if you ever want to eat a chicken Kiev, don't go for the Iceland ones. For some reason they are contained within a plastic bag inside the box. Neither lidl or morrisons ones are (they're loose within the box). I actually complained to them over twitter but didn't get any reply. Seems a bit hypocritical for a company that prides itself over not using palm oil.
There's a call for homes to not be built on river floodplain - not for the first time. Ever since I first 2 and 2 together, it feels like, I thought "don't build on floodplain": BBC News - Environment Agency chief: Avoid building new homes on flood plains https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51620992 So, if the latest advice is ignored, may I suggest that you just don't buy a home on river floodplain. Then they'll stop building them.
As soon as I see the address of a prospective home as being “xxxx meadows”, “green pond lane”, “riverside” or similar I’ve walked away. Always worked for me - now I live at the top of a fairly high hill, so, when global warming comes, I should be one of the last ones going for a dip ..... You’re right though, TSS, supply and demand and all that .....
I went to a Flood Prevention seminar a few years ago, held at Yeovil Town’s ground interestingly, and learnt quite a bit. It seems there are 2 main types of inland flooding, both ultimately caused by rainfall of course. Pluvial flooding is when you have a rainstorm and the surface runoff from hillsides exceeds the drainage capacity and you end up with water going through homes. This is made worse by building houses on hillsides, as obviously putting tarmac and concrete down decreases the ability of rainfall to soak away. Builders are often told nowadays to install attenuation tanks in new estates on hills, with capacity to contain rain from “100 year storm + 40%” weather events. As the people in Calderdale in Yorkshire will tell you, however, they have just had their third 100 year storm in the last 10 years. The other type, fluvial flooding, is when you have heavy rain over a long period, and rivers burst their banks. This obviously affects houses built on flood plains most. So the simplistic answer is: don’t build houses anywhere, or at least, let’s reduce our carbon footprint to zero and halt climate change first!
You identified "runoff" and a land's capacity to temporarily absorb or hold up water. It's a large subject that most people are unaware of. I've often wondered whether city planners also understand runoff. There is the soil/rural aspect and then there are the urban/suburban areas, built onto ex-rural land. Land that previously held up the water and slowly released it, and now is concreted and tarmaced over with drainage. And the runoff from this system is fast and seems often to be badly understood or implemented. Btw, I got the Yeovil FC reference.
Build them on stilts, or as the bbc article mentions, build them with the garage underneath so that the living accommodation is well away from the ground. Could certainly make flooding events less traumatic and costly.
I’m involved, at the lowest level of local government, with considering planning applications and surface water runoff has become a major factor in the last few years. As you say, there is an inverse ratio between the number of houses or roads built and the drainage capacity of the land. Most of the flooding issues in my mostly hillside village are pluvial, but lower down the watercourse in Midsomer Norton the flood defences on the River Somer were built in the early 1970’s and are struggling. The picture is repeated, of course, across the whole country, the whole world indeed. Until the world wakes up it can only get worse.
Question - if you are flooded do the electricity board turn off the supply to the area or do you turn it off?
I was flooded out 4 years ago and the power tripped out at the fuse box. We managed to get it back on again so presumably Western Power weren’t involved in any decision making!
I am surprised that we don't hear anything about this as surely if for instance you are in 2 foot of water and it hasn't tripped, it is quite dangerous? I suppose it should always trip, but a real worry.
As I suspected. The Apple engineer wasn't paying attention to the road at all. Turns out he playing a video game on his smartphone. The automakers tell people NOT to allow driving aids to take over, but to be vigilant. Regulators will not allow FSD until these things are proven to be safe, and they instruct automakers to disable FSD. Makers like Tesla actually have a feature-complete FSD package. And it is already more reliable than human drivers on highways (motorways). But it isn't perfect, and never will be. But within 5-10 years FSD will be better than any driver in practically any situation. "Tesla driver in fatal autopilot crash was playing video game, inquiry finds" https://twitter.com/i/events/1232404650587910144
So an over hyped self-driving Tesla kills the poor guy sat in it. Does this point towards the fact that self-driving cars are actually driver-assist vehicles? Is this yet another case of Silicon Valley technology looking for a purpose? And what has this to do with the environment or pollution? For those interested in technology and electric cars perhaps it will be a good idea to have a separate thread along the lines of: Electric Cars, Technology and Other Mad **** No One Needs
I take your point, but it might be worth also considering the number of people killed by non-self-driven cars, which in 2016 (latest figures available) was estimated at 1,350,000 worldwide.
..... and the answer is reliable, affordable and regular public transport to get people out of cars, not to create millions of more cars rammed full of technology.