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> Yes, we should definitely grow plants, but even more so, we need to consume way waaaay less. Wouldn't it be the best when these two are actually the same? Wh

> Yes, we should definitely grow plants, but even more so, we need to consume way waaaay less. Wouldn't it be the best when these two are actually the same? When growing more enables you to consume less? I didn't account for the savings you would do with consuming less in my simple calculation.

k_sze 6y ago
A large part of our consumption is not food. You can’t grow iPhones on a tree. You’re not going to consume less iPhones because you planted hundreds of tomato trees. You could argue that you can offset the total lifecycle energy for owning an iPhone (mining, purification, synthesis of raw materials, manufacture, packaging, transportation, recycling), by planting enough plants, but how many plants is that going to take?
- roboben 6y ago
  That's a great idea for another calculation! You want to do this together? hello at permapeople org :)
  - k_sze 6y ago
    Unfortunately I don't really know where to start. I mean, I'm a software engineer by training. Back in university, we had a courses on engineering ethics, environmental responsibility, stuff like that. That's where I learned the concept of lifecycle energy assessment. I know it's a thing, but I never learned how to actually do the assessment (e.g. where to pull figures, the kind of ballpark calculations you do). It might be interesting to make the methodology of lifecycle energy assessment more accessible to the general populace. I think everybody can benefit from a new perspective.
    - roboben 6y ago
      Look what I’ve found of a bit googling: https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/iphone/iPhone_11_PER_sept2019.pdf https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/iphone/iPhone... While it is made by Apple itself it gives a rough idea of how much an iPhone costs.
      - k_sze 6y ago
        On the other hand, this just came out a few days ago: https://debugger.medium.com/apples-new-iphone-is-far-from-green-1803f4f9a58a https://debugger.medium.com/apples-new-iphone-is-far-from-gr... This discussion also just came up 2 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24911413 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24911413

k_sze 6y ago

A large part of our consumption is not food. You can’t grow iPhones on a tree. You’re not going to consume less iPhones because you planted hundreds of tomato trees. You could argue that you can offset the total lifecycle energy for owning an iPhone (mining, purification, synthesis of raw materials, manufacture, packaging, transportation, recycling), by planting enough plants, but how many plants is that going to take?

roboben 6y ago
That's a great idea for another calculation! You want to do this together? hello at permapeople org :)
- k_sze 6y ago
  Unfortunately I don't really know where to start. I mean, I'm a software engineer by training. Back in university, we had a courses on engineering ethics, environmental responsibility, stuff like that. That's where I learned the concept of lifecycle energy assessment. I know it's a thing, but I never learned how to actually do the assessment (e.g. where to pull figures, the kind of ballpark calculations you do). It might be interesting to make the methodology of lifecycle energy assessment more accessible to the general populace. I think everybody can benefit from a new perspective.
  - roboben 6y ago
    Look what I’ve found of a bit googling: https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/iphone/iPhone_11_PER_sept2019.pdf https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/products/iphone/iPhone... While it is made by Apple itself it gives a rough idea of how much an iPhone costs.
    - k_sze 6y ago
      On the other hand, this just came out a few days ago: https://debugger.medium.com/apples-new-iphone-is-far-from-green-1803f4f9a58a https://debugger.medium.com/apples-new-iphone-is-far-from-gr... This discussion also just came up 2 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24911413 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24911413