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<channel><generator>iloblog 1.0</generator><title>The quest for decreased CO2 footprint Feed</title><link>http://aia.qe-x.com/</link><description>&lt;p&gt;There is a difference between an apple and an apple. 365 days of concious choices and sacrifices in everyday life that should ake a difference. Or, so you would think ...&lt;/p&gt;</description><item><title>Day 12: Chinese interpretation</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=21</link><description><![CDATA[  OK, Sunday School again and here's some learning from a cold, windy, and snowing Brussels. 
 China’s position on the Kyoto Protocol is that it is the developed countries that have to take the lead on decreasing GHG emissions. 
 It is not obligatory for developing countries to agree to decreased emissions according to the Protocol. 
 USA has not ratified the Protocol because, inter alia, the Protocol does not put sufficient pressure and responsibility on China and India. 
 The 2004 per capita CO2 emissions in China was 4 tons, Sweden was 6 tons and USA was a staggering 20 tons. 
 But, damn, there are a lot of Chinese ... 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 23 Nov 2008 19:08:10 +0100</pubDate><category>Facts</category></item><item><title>Day 11: It’s all in the delta</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=20</link><description><![CDATA[  As the custom is on Friday evenings, I went to the local market to do some shopping. I stopped by the plant merchant – a decent chap called Benoit the Belly. I’m not sure why he’s called that, but I suspect that his whopping 170 kilos has something to do with it. I’ve never really had the courage to enquire further about his nick-name. 
   
 Under a thermal lamp in a corner of Benoit the Belly’s tent stood a couple of plants. On closer examination, it turned out to be avocado plants. The fruits on the plant were a big give-away and the sign that said “Avocado plants – 50% off”. Benoit the Belly explained to me that avocado is really a tree that can grow up to 20 metres and although considered by many to be a drupe that it is, botanically, classified as a berry. How about that – the avocado is a berry that grows on a tree. You live and learn. 
   
   
   
 So here I was, going about my everyday life, in a merchant’s tent on a Friday evening when a fantastic opportunity materialised. I’m on a mission to decrease my CO2 footprint. Right? And it struck me that there are two sides to the coin – the production of CO2 and the consumption of CO2. Right? And trees breathe in CO2 and breathe out O2. Right? So, if I was to plant a few trees in my backyard, my CO2 footprint will decrease. Right? It’s all in the delta. Right? 
   
 Right! 
   
 So I bought all six avocado trees from Benoit the Belly and have planted them in the backyard this morning. I’m sure my wife will be utterly happy to see the arrangement when she returns from Sweden. 
   
 And another benefit is when I harvest the berries, it will be sooooooo local produce. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 22 Nov 2008 13:45:12 +0100</pubDate><category>Local produce</category></item><item><title>Day 10: Aftermath 2 - The Blues</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=19</link><description><![CDATA[  The police visited me earlier today inquiring about the blog. They were all nice and pleasant, but informed me about some anti-spamming law that is in force in Belgium. They explained that the e-mail submission I did yesterday was a typical case where the law was enforced to its fullest extent.  
 They caught me because I had used my own e-mail address as the reply-to address and not, as the the list provider system suggested, an anonymous / random sender. And that I was kind enough to confess to the act. 
 I am now looking towards a 1,500 EUR fine. They also took my computer. 
 Fortunately, I have a spare one. But my wife will be furious. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 21 Nov 2008 17:34:10 +0100</pubDate><category>Thoughts</category></item><item><title>Day 10: Aftermath 1 - Bad characters</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=18</link><description><![CDATA[  None of the e-mails on the Arabic e-mail list went through. I got a bloody error message for evey single one of them. Solid. 
 I must have installed a bad character set. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 21 Nov 2008 15:50:51 +0100</pubDate><category>Thoughts</category></item><item><title>Day 10: The more the merrier</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=17</link><description><![CDATA[  I was quite appalled by Hallis comment. But he really has a valid point. I need to invite these emitters to the blog so that they can learn from my lead and contribute to the decrease of CO2 footprint. 
 I spent most of yesterday trying to find relevant e-mail addresses. I struck gold on LinkedIn where I found a guy named Hassan al Fahrez. He’s an IT technician at the administration of Prince Abdulla Omar Abdull Abdulla Ahmad of Saudi Arabia. He’s a really nice and sensible guy. It only took me $1,000 to convince him to send me an e-mail list. The list was in Arabic, buy hey, who am I to judge? 
   
 Well, as I am on a mission here, I wanted to spread the word even further. Just the prince’s e-mail list is not enough. So I bought one of those mega e-mail lists from a company online. Well, actually, I bought three of them. One list had over seven million email addresses on it and the other two had just over four million names. Fifteen million e-mail addresses. Cool … innit’. 
 I spent the evening getting the invitations out. The mega lsits were no problem as it was managed through the company’s server. All I had to do was to specify the message and the reply address. The Arabic list was a bit more cumbersome. I had to do it manually and, therefore, I had to install Arabic characters-set on my computer. if only one of the names on the list turn up on the blog, it will have been worth the effort. 
 So, yesterday was defiantly another success on the quest of decreasing the CO2 footprint. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 21 Nov 2008 12:36:00 +0100</pubDate><category>Thoughts</category></item><item><title>Day 9: Thoughts</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=16</link><description><![CDATA[  Dear all followers, 
 I really do appreciate all your encouraging comments and wise suggestions. It keeps me determined. I am obviously moved by the fact that you want to share my success in decreasing the CO2 footprint and am happy to be the guy who's example you follow. 
 So, please do continue to comment the posts and feel free to invite your friends to the blog. 
 //David 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 19 Nov 2008 10:28:46 +0100</pubDate><category>Thoughts</category></item><item><title>Day 9: Low hanging fruit</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=15</link><description><![CDATA[  My wife had a flight to Sweden this morning. She asked me if I would drive here to the airport and, voila, an easy opportunity presented itself to decrease the CO2 footprint. I explained, again, that my quest kind of limited my willingness to use the car and suggested that she take the bus. Public transportation is so obviously much better than driving your own car. 
 She took a cab. I didn't get a good-bye kiss. 
 So, it's not even 10 a.m. and I've already had yet another successful day on my quest. It really feels as if I'm ahead of the game now. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 19 Nov 2008 09:30:35 +0100</pubDate><category>Travel</category></item><item><title>Day 8: Gone for the wind</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=14</link><description><![CDATA[  Apparently, it is now possible to request wind energy supply in Sweden (as Mattias has kindly pointed out in his “External project review” and comment to “Know your enemy”). I think that it is absolutely fabulous. I’m not sure if that is the case in Belgium yet, but I’m sure they will follow suit once the six levels of federal and local government have understood and accepted what EU has stipulated. 
   
 I am obviously very keen on embracing this new technology to decrease my CO2 footprint and have therefore been looking for wind powered heating systems and appliances on-line. I haven’t really found anything that could help me on my CO2 footprint decrease quest. This could possibly be because leading appliance manufactures have not yet launched a consumer line based on this new platform. I have therefore contacted customer care representatives from Philips, Siemens, and GE, asking about wind powered appliances. 

 
 Philips did not reply.  
 Siemens claimed that it was possible to use wind power with their entire appliance range and that no additional investments were needed. They gave me the address to a local Siemens appliance outlet.  
 The GE customer representative explained that it would require installing a GE’s WindSCADA system on the premises and connect to the power supply. Approximate investment was a bit difficult to estimate, but could be in the range of 1.5 million – not including any new appliances I chose to add to the household equipment park.  
 

 I guess I'll wait a bit before I convert to this promising new technology. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 18 Nov 2008 10:37:06 +0100</pubDate><category>Innovations</category></item><item><title>Day 7: Learnings</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=13</link><description><![CDATA[  The Kyoto Protocol is essentially a legal agreement between some countries embarked on a similar quest as I am. That is to decrease CO2. Well, actually, their quest is decreasing GHG (Green House Gases) of which CO2 form a part. The origin dates back to the Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro 1992. The agreement was negotiated in Kyoto in 1997, opened for signature in 1998, and closed in 1999. The agreement came into force in 2005. That’s 13 years in total. 
 According to an article, the agreement was to come into force when 55 parties accounting for a combined total of at least 55% of the carbon dioxide emissions in 1990 had ratified the agreement. The "55 parties" clause was reached in May 2002 when Iceland ratified the agreement and the ratification by Russia in November 2004 satisfied the "55%" clause and brought the treaty into force. The agreement stipulates that most, but not all, countries are supposed to decrease their GHG by more then 5% by 2010 compared to the 1990 figures. 

 
 USA, the biggest emitter in the world, has not ratifited the Kyoto Protocol.  
 Russia’s target is 0%.  
 Iceland is allowed to increase their GHG by 10%.  
 

 Laaaaaaaaaaame ... 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 18 Nov 2008 08:13:52 +0100</pubDate><category>Facts</category></item><item><title>Day 6: Know your enemy</title><link>http://iloapp.qe-x.com/blog/aia?Home&amp;post=12</link><description><![CDATA[  I have had some subtle hints – particularly from Andri, Bella Björk, and reading between the lines from Mattias’ external project review – that it could possibly have a greater impact if I focused more on smaller projects instead of the ones that have larger impact on decreasing the CO2 footprint. I am sensing that they may be questioning the overall success rate of the quest to date. 
 Not allowing myself to be discouraged, I decided that I need to better understand the CO2 footprint a man leaves and what possible actions one can take to decrease it. It’s really about educating yourself, to know your enemy. I have therefore decided to use Sundays to enhance my knowledge of the subject matter and report my finding here. 
 I thought that a good starting point would be to better my understanding of the fundamental issue at hand – to understand what the hell the fuss was all about. In other words, I had to have better understanding of what Al Gore was going on about and what the Kyoto Protocol was. The source of such vital information would obviously be with the government, so I drove down to the Ministry of Economy, SMEs, Self-Employed and Energy FPS. The ministry is well hidden away on Rue du Progrès 50 and it took me a bit of driving about before I finally found it. 
 It was closed. 
 Didn’t really matter! The Kyoto protocol is a supra-governmental initiative and the information would surely be found at the European Institutions. So I got back into my car and drove off to the European Environmental Agency, which I thought ought to be in the EU district. Not being able to find if after driving around the EU quarters, I went to the parliament and asked for directions. 
 The agency is in Copenhagen, Denmark. 
 Slightly discouraged, I drove back home. I had to do some serious explanation to my wife as to why I had been gone for the better part of the Sunday. A day normally devoted to quality family time. She pointed out that I could probably find the information on-line. 
 I did … on wikipedia.org and unfccc.int. 
 So, day six ends with another roaring success now that I have access to a wealth of information about the subject. 
 ]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 16 Nov 2008 20:13:22 +0100</pubDate><category>Facts</category></item></channel>
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