I have never been a person who enjoys reading. For more than 30 years I have spend my spare time playing sports, watching movies, hanging around with friends. I am person who likes learning from observing and from other people’s experience. I’m a absolutely “hands-on” type of person, the one who says and “let’s do it and let’s do it now”! Yes, I am an ESTJ (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, for those who are familiar with that)….
But since December 2008 I have started reading and I’m currently reading a lot, maybe because I have more spare time, maybe because I have been reading books that were really interesting. Or maybe because I have realized that they are indeed a source of culture…what a late realization! Well, “prima mai che tardi”, as the Italian saying points out. One of the interesting books I have read is “The Weather Makers” by Tim Flannery. The author has published over a dozen books, spent a year teaching at Harvard and was named Australian of the year in 2007. The book is about the history and future impact of climate change.
There are so many interesting points that I want to share with you, my dear readers, that I won’t be able to do in only one post. I will try to do it in a soft and not scaring way (although the subject itself is really scaring). In this particular post I want to share that, from a climate change perspective, there’s a big difference between using gas or coal to power an economy. The next 2 paragraphs were extracted from the book…
“Because carbon causes climate change, the more carbon-rich a fuel is, the more danger it presents to humanity’s future. Black coal, for example, is almost pure carbon. Fuels derived from oil are less carbon rich, containing 2 hydrogen atoms for every one of carbon in their structure. Because hydrogen is a source of energy, which produces more heat when burned than carbon, burning oil releases less CO2 per unit than coal.
The efficiency with which power is generated by burning a fuel is also an important factor in determining how much CO2 is produced. Even using the most advanced methods (and most coal-fired power plants come nowhere near this), burning anthracite to generate electricity results in 67 more CO2 emissions thank does methane, while brown coal produces 130 per cent more.“
Getting things worse, Australia is the world’s largest exporter of coal and has the highest per capita greenhouse emissions of any industrialized country (25 per cent higher than U.S.).
Despite these sad facts, I’m still in love with this lovely country, just the way it is. Every country has room for improvement, am I right? And the title of this post refers to a song called “Spaceman” by 4 Non Blonds. It’s an old song that I’m learning to play. Hopefully, we won’t have to move to the space…
