A Dash of Calabash

Blogs sponsored by the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii (GRIH) include:

This one, A Dash of Calabash. It is our central blog, so to speak. Your thoughts and comments are so important to us that we have put your ability to interact with us as the centerpiece of our website.

Your Voice Matters.

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Akaka Talka. As you might guess this one is focused on the proposed Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act of 2005 (S147 H309) otherwise referred to as the Akaka Bill. It is a part of "Sunshine on the Akaka Bill" on the upper left of this homepage.

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Education Beat Hawaii is a separate website that invites your comments. Click here to get the latest on Education Reform.

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Feature - Projected State Spending Growth

Friday, July 08, 2005

How to solve global warming? Plant a tree.

The difficulty of shifting an entire economy from fossil fuels was demonstrated by the Department of Energy when it found that even if the nation got 140 million cars converted to some alternative fuel by 2020, it would only reduce fossil fuel use of 5.4 percent. The most important thing could be what the mayors agreed to as their World Earth Day measure - planting trees and improving green space.

The United States has been doing that on a massive scale, adding a million acres of forest a year since 1910. This coincides with the mechanization of agriculture. As Clemson economist Robert McCormick has noted, richer nations plant trees rather than destroying them. Developed nations may produce more emissions, but they also take more carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases from the atmosphere than poorer nations do. McCormick predicts with continued economic growth that "the growth rate of net carbon emission per person will soon be negative in the United States."