Will Poland become green?

The day before yesterday (Dec 21 2007) (Red) Ken Livingston, the Mayor of London, announced on BBC World Sevice (programme Outlook), that he is aiming to reduce carbon emissions in the UK's capitol by 20%. Already he has impossed some messures, some are unpopular, (congestion charge) and others more popular, (improved public transport with green low emisson buses).

So my question is. What can Poland do to improve the worlds atmosphere?

This is something that concerns us all. We will pass the point of no return in the next decade!

Poland is already green. Question is whether the west will ever reach Polish level of forests per square kilometer?

True! This is very good, but, LOTS of coal burning going on and not too much recycling!

i would have thought the question is how long will poland take to reach the west's level of forest per square kilometer

We have coal, so we burn coal. These countries without coal alway complain the most. Recycling indeed could be improved.

There is more to being green than just forests. There is a program in North America - Reduce (the amount of "Stuff" we use - including useless packaging), Re-use (use something for it's intended purpose and then use it again as the same thing or something else) and Recycle (can be anything from paper, plastics, metal, food scraps etcetera). My mother in law spent several years here in Canada, and when she finally went back (so sad for me, I really miss her :-( ), she was upset at how far behind her home town of Bialystok was in implementing the 3R's. All trash goes into a big bin outside her block, regardless of it's recylability.

There was a discussion on another thread about Polish drinking water, and how so many Poles use bottled water. The plastic those bottles are made of take a heap of oil and lots of processing to make. Once used, they go to a landfill site, they will take decades to break down, and leach all those nasty chemicals into the environment.

News papers rely on forests - chop down a tree, mulch it up (add some nasty chemicals to bleach it etc...) and then print the paper and throw in the trash. Shame. By recycling paper, it reduces the number of trees that have to be chopped down. Same concept applies with metal tins and glass bottles. A tremendous amount of energy is used (and pollutants emitted) in order make these food containers.

Ever bought something really small, but it came in a huge package with all sorts of plastic, staples, cardboard? Where is the sense in that?

We do have recycling in major centers, but there is a long way to go here in Canada to reduce the footprint we leave on our little planet.

I will say that from my limited experience in Europe, there are better public transit systems (better use of energy resources) than in Canada. Here, everybody is helpless without their gas guzzling SUV's to go to the corner store :-(

according to wikipedia:

1946 - 20,8% of forests
1970 - 27% thanks to communist goverment program
Currently - 28,7%

So it looks stable.

I think lesser's right. There's no problem with amount of forrest in Poland. It's a bit sh1t they want to build a road through Rospuda though! This is the oldest forrest in Europe!

it does - lets hope it stays that way

as Shawn says, theres a lot more to being green than a few forests

ive seen a number of wind farms up on te baltic coast - do you know what else poland is doing to make use of renewable energy?

Poland should become a cleaner country as their industrial base has fallen. Coal is no longer popular and is no longer used in Poland for moving trains. It is the mentality of the Poles that needs educating. After all, two stroke Syrenka motor cars is not really the way forward in my book at least!

I come from Newcastle in England. We used to have an idium in England that went... "It's like sending coal to Newcastle".... an equivelent would be... "It's like selling sand to the Arabs".... My point was maybe it's time to stop burning coal just because you have it.

It hasn't been proven that carbon emissions cause global warming, the whole thing was rather turned into a kind of new religion and politicians (like Gore) just join to get support from people, who believe in that. Climate has been changing often even in modern times. Anyway I don't think that reduction of carbon emissions must be a bad thing but It should be rather seen as an opportunity to create new more effictive technologies and find new sources of energy, so the world wouldn't be anymore depended on usually irresponsible countries, which owns oil and gas. In Poland the problem is not coal itself but the way It is burnt, with new technologies It can be much "cleaner", other things are nuclear energy, geothermal sources and biomass.

- it was supposed to be viaduct above forest
- I doubt that current goverment will do this anyway
- We have older in Poland, by the way.


This is question of profitability, other technologies are more expensive. How democratic goverment should behave? I think announce referendum and honestly describe situation. Ask people whether they agree to reduce use of coal and accept properly higher energy bills.

Still this is true that these countries without coal protest the most. In the same time they build more oil pipelines? They don't sound honest.

It's time to wake up Grerorz! ALL SCIENTISTS now agree (30 years too late) that MAN is the cause of global warming and i'm affraid Al Gore is right! Poland didn't have a winter last year! Remember?

exactly.all this sh1t about reducing carbon emissions is just silly.there was a program some time ago that proved that we produce just 4% of all co2 and the rest is produced by the sun's activity.some researchers say that we may soon have more cold weather not the hotter one.pictures of cracking icebergs,floods ect on tv only worsen our feelings and soften us up so that we can fork out more money on some stupid taxes(eg green aeroplane ticket taxes).none of this money are going to any projects but directly to goverment's chests.i can agree with recycling,planting new trees,helping africans and poorer countries by diverting some food production over there,training buying tools and scrapping all stupid subsidies for the eu farmers but not paying a lot of money in the name of "global warming"

Try to search in Google and you will find plenty of scientists whom says that there is no evidence. In Poland for example professor Mastalerz published even some book on this issue.

Actually Al Gore write utter nonsense about Poland. Ask any Pole to confirm below quote.

"We learned, for example, that in some areas of Poland, children are regularly taken underground into deep mines to gain some respite from the buildup of gases and pollution of all sorts in the air. One can almost imagine their teachers emerging tentatively from the mine, carrying canaries to warn the children when it's no longer safe for them to stay above the ground."

I've got nothing to say to this di7k head!

is that all you can come up with?
i told you about some facts and you call me a dick head?
does it mean that if i don't join the mainstream thinking i'm a dickhead?
dude.you are one of these greenies who would care more about foxes than dying children in africa.actually i love nature and so on but we are being riped off by the goverments who introduce more taxes but don't even try to find better solutions,greener energy and still subsidy the eu farmers insted of importing cheaper food from poorer countries.these poorer countries cut down or burn their forests ect.you start a thread and expect everyone to please yourself.cool

Were you here 2 years ago ? We had -20C for almost 3 weeks. Last summer wasn't really hot and this winter is going to exist. Besides the point is not that the climate is not changing, the point is that It probably isn't caused by humans. In 10th and 11th century there was wine commonly produced in Poland and instead of Hel there were 3 islands, on the other hand in 17th century the whole Baltic used to freeze in the winter.

FACTS? Take your head out of your ar.... You didn't quote any facts mate!


Yes i'm very green! I carefully recycle ALL my rubish. I don't drive a car, I walk or I use public transport if I can't hitch hike. AND I LOBBIED THE G8 TO WIPE OUT DEBT IN AFRICA A$$hole. What did you do for dying children in Africa? BURN MORE ELECTRIC?

Some people try to earn some money on global warming. Here is voice from the past (Newsweek, April 28, 1975) about threat of global cooling.

denisdutton.com/newsweek_coolingworld.pdf

The greenest city in Poland is Wroclaw. That will change in the future as more buildings go up. There are moves to address this [green] issue, but they are being ignored.


Thousands of tons of Polish coal are sent to the UK and burnt there.


But the one before that was the coldest in living memory. And this year it's bloody cold.
We still have four seasons here. Meaning... last year was just a mild winter....it happens sometimes.


I'm not going to trawl through the article. Is the above quote in relation to the hospital in Wieliczka

That is the normal temp for winter in Poland in Winter....Did you go to Antartica in the summer? It got to +40 in Warsaw and here in Żywiec where I am for more than three weeks! Is that Normal?

- Polish children are not taken regularly underground
- teachers don't "emerging tentatively from the mine, carrying canaries to warn the children when it's no longer safe for them to stay above the ground."

- Wieliczka have sanatorium
- Wieliczka is not really polluted, and absolutely safe for children

You're trying to be funny ? Average temperature in winter in Poland is something like -1C.

I know this. I was wondering if the article had something to do with children who have asthma. There are or were children who spent time underground at the mine, to improve their health.

I know this has nothing to do with heavily poluted air above ground.

In other words. Did someone latch on to the story of Wieliczka and turn it around.

canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm there is a link.you can find dozens if not hundreds of them on the internet
and a part of the text
Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide (CO2). This in fact is the greatest deception in the history of science. We are wasting time, energy and trillions of dollars while creating unnecessary fear and consternation over an issue with no scientific justification. For example, Environment Canada brags about spending $3.7 billion in the last five years dealing with climate change almost all on propaganda trying to defend an indefensible scientific position while at the same time closing weather stations and failing to meet legislated pollution targets.


i'd rather you did it


wearing green jactets and having long hair doesn't make you an expert


we have free choice in our modern society.don't try to make others do the same.instead of picking on ordinary people try to press your government on some more important issuses.people have to travel fast and cheap otherwise we will come back to stone age.why not to make sure that our goverments use our money to,say, construct an engine that uses 0.001l/petrol/100km?that would change a lot.building nuclear powerstation is something else,closing down mines ect.


how?by shouting,burning cars,breaking windows?
it's not everything.they will go in debt again very shortly after.subsidies and taxes on the outside eu products are the biggest problems.also lack of training and their own mentality


whatever...


nothing big yet but you never know.i'm just an average joe.nothing like you.i don't fight against other people or goverments.just turn off the light if i don't need it,turn off the tap when i see that someone left water running,use cups to brush my teeth,use as little plastic bags,cups bottles as possible and so on.


what about you?your computer uses a lot of energy..?it looks like you are one of these people who love to punish themselves for being human and try to impose it on others

38, 39, 40 degrees is not unusual for one or two days days.

The other extreme is Winter. It can drop below 10 degrees, but not for long periods.

This is book that Gore published being vice-president of the US. Nothing more about Poland in this book. He just describe short examples from different countries how polluted is environment all over the world.


Perhaps, however turned it around so seriously that his credibility is doubtful.

this is nothing unusuall.hot summers and cold winers have happened in the past too.

The lowest temperatures ever recorded in Poland were -41*C in Siedlce (in 1940) and -40.6 *C in the Zywiec Basin (in 1929). The highest temperature, +40.2*C, was recorded in Pruszkow near Opole in 1921.

this is from official govs site.