4 ms·
One thing I learned on a trip to Kerala is that most people in the region actually burn their garbage - the government doesn't provide disposal service. While
by Pxtl 9y ago
One thing I learned on a trip to Kerala is that most people in the region actually burn their garbage - the government doesn't provide disposal service. While I'm sure the particulate and chemical emissions of this practice are awful, I'm curious about this carbon implications.
- lacampbell 9y agoRural people in the first world often do this as well. It's very common.
- Pxtl 9y agoWhile carbon is carbon wherever, I'm not talking about rural. Trash fires were a regular sight on the streets of Thiruvananthapuram.
- zem 9y agoyou should find this interesting: http://www.caravanmagazine.in/reportage/people-power-waste-management-revolution-kerala http://www.caravanmagazine.in/reportage/people-power-waste-m...
- vkou 9y agoThe carbon implications of burning your garbage are... Secondary to the air quality implications. You are mostly burning products that were made using renewable sources of carbon. Burning plastic is an exception, but the carbon footprint of plastic is small, compared to coal and oil used for heating, electricity, and transportation.
- esturk 9y ago"Burning garbage emits 1.5 times as much carbon dioxide per kilowatt-hour generated as coal and three times as much as natural gas." Source: https://www.wsj.com/articles/does-burning-garbage-for-electricity-make-sense-1447643515 https://www.wsj.com/articles/does-burning-garbage-for-electr...
- matt4077 9y agoCO_2 emissions are the same if it goes up in big black smokes of clouds next to some school, or if it's burned in the best incinerator money can buy, or even if it's thrown in the ocean and slowly degraded by organic means. The only thing that makes a difference is recycling.
- rsync 9y ago"CO_2 emissions are the same if it goes up in big black smokes of clouds next to some school, or if it's burned in the best incinerator money can buy" Is that really true ? I was under the impression that the very best incinerators (what nordic countries use for garbage disposal as well as cities like Zurich, etc.) had carbon capture mechanisms ... Is that not true ?
- SophosQ 9y agoI believe carbon capture is a newer innovation whose development had been stalled due to its prohibitive costs. The first carbon capture experiments were scheduled to be conducted in 2016. Albeit I'm not aware of their results.
- likelynew 9y agoIt's done everywhere in India. But it's far from truth that government doesn't provide waste disposal service. Nevertheless, you might not like to see huge government waste grounds.