Energy prices are increasing due to both environmental lobbyists and the limited supply of fossil fuels. Both the prices of electricity and fossil fuels are expected to rise dramatically. The burning of fossil fuels emits carbon dioxide into the Earth's atmosphere creating the greenhouse effect where the Sun's heat gets trapped within the Earth's atmosphere. There is now greenhouse gas emission restrictions in place to try and minimise the impact of global warming. Hopefully the USA the leading cause of the greenhouse effect acts to help reduce the greenhouse effect and slow down the melting of the Polar ice caps and stop Greenland from melting away.

By the end of this century with all the ice around the polars melted away and Greenland gone, sea levels are expected to rise by around about 1 meter. This would result in many captal cities and some countries wiped off the map. 

Please add your thoughts on this issue. 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=440049&in_page_id=1965

Apparently global warming is unavoidable as it's not caused by us.

We can all play our part by recycling, turning the taps off while you brush your teeth, turn electrical goods off when not in use, etc.

 Have you seen the great global warming swindle? It belongs with the likes of 911 conspiracy and lunar landing hoax videos. It's a complete scam of a program that was even sued by several of the scientists involved because their words were purposely taken out of context to try and prove a point that was the exact opposite of what they said.

With all the real environmental issues in the world, it really doesnt help when people spread nonsense about carbon dioxide being evil and taking focus off serious problems.

My heart is bleeding.

The thing that many people don't understand about minimizing your carbon footprint is that its not that hard and usually involves choosing option B instead of option A (such as Compact fluorescent light bulbs, buy biodegradable goods) or altering your lifestyle in a very minor way (recycling, keeping your home at a lower temperature in winter (wear a sweater) and a little hotter in the summer, fixing air and water leaks, driving less and carpooling and eating less meat).

This way people get to CHOOSE (freedom) to adopt environmentally friendly behavior when and as they want to. If too many people wait to make these changes, then they might have to be imposed by governments in order to contain the possibility of major disasters.

Indeed MrBubbles. The idea that Carbon Dioxide is a pollutant is rather absurd. I mean HUMANS and ANIMALS exhale carbon dioxide. THEN plants "inhale" that and "exhale" oxygen. By saying that we need to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the air, we are condemning the plants to death. [slight /sarcasm]

But seriously, the end result of even eliminating the carbon dioxide emissions from engines and such will not solve anything. Once the population doubles a few more times (about 40 years from now... supposedly) it will probably emit more carbon dioxide than most of America's factories... Will we then propose that we kill certain people with certain "defects" just to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide we emit?

Not only that but right now China is just about to eclipse America and the worlds largest "contributor to global warming due to carbon dioxide".

I am all for clean outdoors and not polluting and such, but seriously, this whole Global Warming scare is just that, a scare. It isn't really a problem, it just an avenue for anti-capitalists to attack the capitalist nations of the world.

I'm making an effort, but I could do more. We've moved to compact flourescents, I've shortened my showers to around 4 minutes, I'm cutting down on my driving (of course it's a god damned suv...), a green bin composting program for garbage pick up just started in our region and just last week we figured out a way fit everything in the one freezer allowing us to unplug our large stand alone unit in the basement. I also put in dual flush toilets a while ago that use 4 or 6 litres depending on what you do.

I'm also trying to eat less meat.

Well, gasoline is mostly hydrocarbons derived from fossils fuels. Fossil fuels are the result of the decaying of animals and plants. So the atmospheric carbon that plants converted millions of years ago into organic material (leaves and bark) that died or was eaten by animals (also carbon based) is in large part the carbon side of the hydro-carbons we now use today.

When you burn fossil fuels, you essentially release into the atmosphere the carbon that had been stored underground for millions of years and that was never intended to ever see the light of day. Obviously doing this will change the amount of carbon that now lies in our current day atmosphere.

This is why wood, while being a high source of carbon when burned and therefore a "dirty" means of heating your home, its not as harmful in the long term because the carbon you are burning in the wood (since trees are a carbon life-form) was absorbed by the tree probably during your lifetime, so the amount of new carbon in the atmosphere during your lifetime is negligible. As opposed to burning fossil fuels where, again, the carbon has been out of the atmospheric equation for millions of years.