If The Government Really Cared About The Environment, They'd Do This
Believe it or not, there are actually people out there who think that government exists to "do good".
LOL
No way. Practically everything the government does is worse than a private sector solution, and caring for the environment is one of the big ones.
[ A straw ban? Seriously? That's the big, Earth-saving idea? ]
Most of what the government want's to do in the name of saving the environment is total garbage that either does not good or does more harm, or is just a front for satisfying special interests.
If they really wanted to save the environment in a proactive way, they would do this:
Combine home loans and student loans into a comprehensive loan to put young people through school to build their own Earthship
If you're not familiar, let me introduce you to Earthships.
Earthships are buildings that are designed to maximize the environment around them to reduce the footprint of their inhabitance to zero.
They use solar and wind power to generate electricity, which eliminates a power bill.
They use a water catching system with gravity-fed filtration, and a gray water system that utilizes the water 4 times before finally disposing of it. This eliminates water and sewage bills as well as resolving the responsibility of the individual for fresh-water shortages.
They have built-in greenhouses which not only provide fresh and healthy fruits and vegetables that are good for you and will drastically reduce (if not eliminate) your food budget, but the greenhouse also keeps the temperate of your home regulated, which solves any heating bills and puts no stress on your sources of electricity.
They are built out of garbage like bottles, cans, and tires, and repurposed materials, which makes them cheaper to build and also REDUCE the amount of waste in the landfills by making some of the worst residence of those landfills into something useful.
What the government could do is this:
Instead of offering home and student loans to people who aren't able to pay for them - or in the case of students: people who will get a worthless education - they could put young people through a course to build their own Earthship.
The benefits of this are immense, and the results would be very far-reaching.
People would be developing very practical skills in the process of building the house. They will learn very useful building skills, along with a deep knowledge of what their own home needs to sustain itself. This is a skill they could use to start their own constucton business or to teach others to build their own self-sustaining homes, it'll also help with general knowledge and maintenance of their own homes and those of their friends and family.
These homes are self-sustaining and require very little maintenance. When I interviewed a representative from Earthship HQ a few years ago, she told me that a typical 3 bedroom 2 bathroom model costs less than $200 per year to maintain. Compare that to the average rental of that size which would cost around $,1500/month in most localities, or a traditional home which costs thousands after mortgage to replace and maintain infrastructure points. This is imply a smarter option, especially for young people.
Just think about it: you're fresh out of school and you take the next 2 years to build your own home which is very, very cheap to maintain and provides you with ALL of your essential needs, and you can take those skills (or any other skills you might have) and create a career, which, because the house is so cheap, you'll be able to save or invest.
If the Government took the collective investment of first-time home loans or sub-prime loans and combined it with student loans to create a loan that would teach young people to build their own self-sustaining Earthships, then any country that did this would get a return on their investment by hundreds of times.
People would have a home base they can rely on that will take care of them and that they know how to take care of in return.
The way that home loans and student loans work in this country are preditory and harmful to people (at least in the US). Doing something like this instead would be a million times better.
Lear more about Earthsihps: https://www.earthshipglobal.com
Tell me what you think.
I kind of like ideas useful for developing stewardship and teaching people to live off of the land, to really take pride and ownership of what they made.
Wouldn't it be better if entrepreneurs were able to profit off of the production of crops, energy, and other natural resources being made by the earthship homes, instead of requiring individuals and families to go into debt, taking the risk of failure upon themselves, just to own them? McDonalds, for instance, builds thousands of franchises all over the world, but they only need a majority of the stores to be profitable in order to be a successful corporation able to sustain them all and grow.
I really worry about the value of money when people rake in large debts right after college. That's when most people want to get married, buy a car, get a house, start a job, and maybe have a baby. Lots of expenses and debts! Unless they come from a wealthy family, or get hired into a great paying job position with long-term potential, they are going to become a bank slave, or worse, a criminal if they avoid paying their bills and taxes.
Many people cannot sell the foods they grow because they do not know how to get past regulations, or how to be a profitable business. I would imagine that would be part of the education part. I guess I don't have much faith in government run education anymore. They are very good at teaching people general topics approved to be included within the curriculum, but I never learned the specialized skills I needed for most jobs. I would have had to go to a private vocational school for that. I think I learned more skills in my own personal research that are considered valuable life skills and experience.
I'm just ranting about my own misfortunes. If I had an earthship home and a greenhouse, I would really enjoy learning to live off of the land, but I am not sure how many years it would take me to learn to live fully self-sustainably, if ever. I think I would need a patient mentor to teach me some helpful shortcuts and maybe a bit of business strategy to make some money doing it.
What is the expense of a typical earthship home construction and food forest to sustain a family? Is heavy equipment required to dig out the space below the earth? Most of the construction materials look simple enough that they may not need a crane to hoist heavy construction pieces of the building.
The govern-cements are "secretly" out to destroy the environment.
The straw ban is soooo shtuuuupid...
You take a tiny bit of plastic and a tiny bit of energy to create a handy and disposable implement.
To make them out of paper takes a lot more energy, a lot more resources, and isn't as good or hygenic.
Instead, all municipalities should have two stage, high temperature furnaces for turning all the trash into heat energy which will be used to create electric power. It has been proven effective and efficient and very clean with the two stage burn. But, do you hear of any in The US? No. Because the trash division cannot talk to the electric division.
Loans for houses is shtupid.
Loans for colleges is shtupidder.
However, learning to build an earth ship is great experience.
Unfortunately, getting permits for one is often a pain, as no one wants to take responsibility for this new fangled building.
In the future, heating a home with oil will be more expensive than building an earthship.
We are about to see a huge section of suburbia become wasteland. Where people will go from house to house removing anything of value. (mostly metals)
I live in Oregon, and you might be interested to know that Marion County in Oregon, USA, has an Energy from Waste facility that has been in operation since 1987. The facility processes 550 tons per day of municipal solid waste, which generates up to 13.1 megawatts of renewable energy. I believe there are about 75 such facilities in the USA. It's not much, but it's a start. You might like to check out these sights:
www.Covanta.com/Our-Facilities/Covanta-Marion ----- as well as:
www.oregonmetro.gov/news/powering-homes-garbage
And, yes, we need to do much more of this in the USA.
Yes, i know of them. I also know of many that were never built... because the trash people couldn't talk to the power people... grrrrr.
There was one set to go on-line, but the investors wanted to patent it, but the inventor wouldn't do it, saying it is for the good of humanity. The investors dumped the project.
But really, we should be burning all the plastic rubbish. Trucking the shit back to the plant for recycling wastes more oil than making them anew.
(unless you recycle locally, which is totally possible.)
Thanks for the links. I hope all the cities get their own.
I agree!!
There is a solution - there are many solutions - but the government will not recognize them because they don't satisfy the special interests that policy makers made to get the support/money to get elected. This whole idea is hypothetical. In reality, people will just have to do this on their own and wait for the government to collapse.
The government don't give two hoots about the environment or anyone in this country just profit and greed. I will be building my earth ship once I have bought some land after saving some money that is. I also have to find ways around the law preventing this in the UK. I have plans to employ homeless people and teach them this valuable skill. Thanks for the link I will read it for sure.
You have thought of something that I have also: a program to help the homeless (who are capable of it) to learn to build earthships by teaching them to build their own. This could be a program for the homeless, where they can learn this valuable skill and also cultivate a home that will take care of them.
The government will hate this.
The plan is in motion, I just need to make a few hundred grand to buy the land haha, as for the government 🖕🏼 💯🐒
How about running for a position in government. If you win and do good then maybe you can also say that the government CAN do good.
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I've been online, trolling, since the 90's. There's no way I could win an election with all the shit they'd find about me lol
Ah I see, so you prefer to troll. Ok then. Good luck!
But have you ever held any leadership position anywhere? Like in school group work or in communities?
This great idea is not in the best interest of the money lenders and every metric and policy on earth today is governed by what is best for this group of worldwide usurers.
You want the FED to loan money to build something out of garbage so people can escape the clutches of the Private FED who "loaned" the money?
Think about all those ACTUAL construction jobs eliminated by the lack of new subdivisions. And all those utility jobs. All of those professors?
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Yeah, it would be bad for the system but good for people and great for the environment. That's why it's titled "if the government really cared about the environment."
I never heard about this before but it sounds great. The government is bad but it would be nice if they cared
Agreed!