hedonologist

Making your own paper? Is that recycling old paper or creating new from scratch. Paper certainly seems to be one of the more unusual things to make yourself but I would certainly be itnerested in trying. I've actually tried to recycle paper before by simply waterlogging it, smushing it about and then trying to dry it but the result was poor.

You must remember that the Romans are responible for the deforestation of most of Europe, so it wouldn't suprise me if the other main ancient civilisation did the same to northern africa. Having said that though the deforestation in Europe didn't lead to desertification so there must be other factors in play.

Does anyone else have any updates on the situation. For some reason this has recieved very little coverage in the UK. Has the water supply been restored yet or are people still dependant upon bottle water? I hope all is resolved as soon as possible.

Hoepfully once the US sees the positive effect that this will ahve on bee colonies in Europe, they will follow suit. Indeed as Lacey stated if something is not done soon, the US will start to see some serious problems with their agriculture of the coming years.

Has anyone else seen about the West Virginia chemical spill? It seems to be affecting a very large number of people. It's certainly concerning how easily this got into the water supply and how many people may be feeling the health effects of it. Anyone here from West Virginia able to comment?

I must admit I have very little knowledge about sustainable design. Is it merely desiging a house in a way as to use as least water and energy as possible? There is a project near me and the house looks very unusual. It's made of wood as well which is suprising.

I know this is an old topic but I thought better to bump this than create a new one. I am a prepper and have been for a number of years now. I don't have a significant stash to my name but I would certainly consider myself much more prepared than average joe.

I certainly believe that if more people produced just some of their own food there would be significantly less food wasteage. When I started growing my own food I was very reluctant to throw it away, because I knew I had a vested interest in the food. I think that when people see it as merely a price, they are happy to discard some like 30 pence, but much less likely to want to throw their own hard work away. Does anyone else agree with this?

I would say that overpopulation is, because if it wasn;t for overpopulation then overconsumption wouldn't be a problem. If the population was halved then the amount of agricultural land/individal would double. The average amount of each fossil fuel per person would double. Also you have to remember that countries like Japan and England only produce about 60% of the food that they consume, so if the population in both these countries was halved then they would both be self sufficient with regards to food at least.

Vertical farming may have a place in urban areas for sure. But if you think about it, by vertical farming you are just creating extra shade. As there is only so much light you cannot realistically increase the growth area on a large scale. Indeed in cities this make work to some extent, but I don't forsee it making a serious impact in the food supply chain.

I'm not a regualr cycler, but I cycle enough to get a puncture now and again. Puncture repair is the only thing I know how to do however. Where did you learn other repairs like chains coming off and other stuff? I assume a lot of people just ask others when a problem arises, although I'd rather not wait until it's too late to learn.

The Politically Incorrect fact is that unmanaged and unplanned humanitarian aid is causing an artifical population rise in the developing world. SImply handing out food alone is only going to raise the fertility of the recipients. Without proper education and contraception food aid alone will merely raise the population and cause unnessecery suffering in the long term.

I'm sure amongst us there must be a hypermiler or two? I'm managing to average ardoun 55-57mpg on my combined rural/urban trips in a 2.0 Diesel car. The cost savings are already becoming noticeable. I've known about this for a few years but only recently been getting seriously into it.

Do you know exactly how much energy this turbine will produce? I think this is a positive step as people would generally tolerate 2-3 very large turbines rather than 40-50 dotting the landscape. Anything that will increase public approval is good. If only a few of these are needed, then the land area covered will be less also.

Previously people would never say 'this storm was caused by climate cahnge' but recently I've noticed people are starting to say more and more that when we have extreme weather it may be either caused or worsens by climate change. Even David Cameron today said today that he suspects that the recent Unusual UK flood was connected to climate change. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-25656426