Happy Earth Day! #Vote for your favorite Environmental Sustainability policies. #EarthDay #Earth #Sustainability #fun

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Happy Earth Day! #Vote for your favorite Environmental Sustainability policies. #EarthDay #Earth #Sustainability #fun

Hi Everyone,

Happy Earth Day!  Today represents the pinnacle of environmental and environmental sustainability policies that have been implemented and the ones that still need to be implemented.  

I wish I could write a super positive wonderful review of the last 50 years of the environmental movement, but even with the massive strides and successes, which I am very thankful for, I still think there is a lot more to do than what we have accomplished.

In summary the consumption and waste in society is at an all time high.  We are destroying our environment faster than ever, by leveling rain forests, expanding agriculture, and pouring more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere than ever before.  Oh and we are still in the mist of the largest species die off in millions of years because of our society.  I guess the only other thing I'll say, is that the current largest scale environmental and "green" activity going on, is in the corporate sector with billions of dollars going to fund advertising and product campaigns that get people to buy "green" products.  I have no problem with green products, but someone has to call out the oxy-moron of a consumption based economy that is "green".  Is it even possible?  In our current system, if we continue to buy more and more things, because they are called "green", does that actually protect the environment?  I don't think so.  A green product that just gets thrown away in a landfill is just not enough by itself.  We must change the foundation of our economy and the way we actually go about re-using resources.

So what should we do to move the Environmental Sustainability Movement forward?  I invite you to vote in the "Environment Elections" to see which policy proposal gets the most interest.   The ideas that get the most support we will include within our Unity Post Card campaign to get signatures and directly lobby decision makers in government and industry, and all the votes will be tallied into our CommunityElections.org (Alpha) prioritization system as well.  Any new ideas can be added if you'd like to submit an idea: http://IdeaFun.org

Here are 10 ideas I talk in detail about bellow, that could save humanity if people wanted to help implement them:

1. Integrated Sustainable Design: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/9bN2fi
2. Transform Landfills into Resource Cycling Centers:Vote Link: http://goo.gl/BCewUP
3. Resource Cycling Value (RCV): Vote Link: http://goo.gl/RHYo8l
4. End Littering of Cigarette Butts with RCV: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/AkIyyc
5. End Non-Point Source Pollution: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/6PMlwe
6. Reduce Global Carbon Emissions: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/SniS7K
7. Match Carbon Emissions to Level the Planet Can Naturally Sequester: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/8CTMje
8. Carbon Based Currency: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/LOKUKP
9. End Non-Point Source Carbon Sinks: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/yPQWHl
10. Toxin Based Currencies: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/VrOOlP

Also Please Support the Earth Flag: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/eCMkSz

How Integrated Sustainable Design and related ideas could save humanity as we know it

Introduction to Integrated Sustainable Design:

For me, the most important and fundamental environmental issue to address is waste and excessive resource consumption.  The general idea is what I call "Integrated Sustainable Design", and combines all aspects of production, use, and re-use of resources and products into the design itself.  The law would simply state that no product can ever be put into production or sold without a pre-planned process for cycling the materials and waste after the product is used, and those costs must be included in the design.  Every product would simply need to be designed to reduce the cost of proper cycling back into the resource stream.  

Integrated Sustainable Design: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/9bN2fi

Resource Cycling Centers:

This would allow the ability to transform all current Landfills into Resource Cycling Centers by banning the concept of LANDFILL as we currently use it.  We all know that with simple pre-planning we could easily create a society that has zero waste at all times.  Everything can be designed to easily be re-used, up-cycled, re-cycled, down-cycled, or inoculated for compost to make soil.  For toxic materials they can be slowly broken down over decades using enzymes, fungus, bacteria, and plants.  Worst case scenario toxic materials can be stored for breakdown and cycling at a future time.  The key is that in the design of the products the cost of the resource cycling must be included into the products to ensure they end up back in the resource stream.  

Transform Landfills into Resource Cycling Centers:Vote Link: http://goo.gl/BCewUP

Resource Cycling Value:

To more clearly explain how Integrated Sustainable Design would directly effect the consumer, I can introduce the next idea which is "RVC" or Resource Cycling Value (RCV).  RVC is exactly like CRV that is used for cans and bottles in most states.  The can or bottle has a small 10c value added to it, to ensure that the can or bottle is properly cycled and preventing it from ending up in trash heaps at the side of the road.  The whole idea of RCV, is that instead of just cans and bottles, it would apply to ALL products and materials.  Every single product, package, shipping container, or anything that is a solid material product, would match its bar code, just like a can or bottle, to a specific RCV which would be valued based on the pre-established design for the products resource cycling plan.  Any increase in product price would only be because of the true cost of the product production, but most non-toxic products would not change relative to inflation. The added cost of RCV would simply be off-set by redeeming the RCV after use, just like a can or bottle.  The higher the RCV, the higher the probability people will personally redeem a product to get their refund.

Resource Cycling Value (RCV): Vote Link: http://goo.gl/RHYo8l

End Littering of Cigarette Butts

A perfect example of RCV and a good place to start would be cigaret butts.  Back in the day before CRV, cans and bottles littered the streets and highways. Now that we have CRV for cans and bottles, even when there is a can on the street, someone picks it up and redeems it because it is worth money.  Now the #1 littered item on streets is cigaret butts.  If each cigaret butt was worth just 5c, 90% of them would disappear.  A simple refundable RVC of $1, per pack of cigarets, could end the current littering of cigaret butts everywhere and make sure they get composted and turned into soil.

End Littering of Cigarette Butts with RCV: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/AkIyyc

The beauty of RCV is that it doesn't just need to be cigaret butts. What if everything, every single product, package, and component had value, even if it was just tossed to the side of the road, and that value ensured that it was cycled correctly into a new product that could be sold.  The entire concept of trash would disappear, as all "trash" would actually become money.  There simply wouldn't ever be trash on the side of the road because someone would eventually pick it up and get paid for it.

By implementing Integrated Sustainable Design, Resource Cycling Centers, and Resource Cycling Value (RCV), these laws would end trash, waste, garbage lying around, and endlessly expanding landfills.  For products that used the cycled materials, prices would be dramatically reduced for the cost of raw resources.  This could all easily be implemented within a decade or less, and launch engaged political campaigns for as little as $2,000-$5,000.

Links to Vote:

1. Integrated Sustainable Design: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/9bN2fi
2. Transform Landfills into Resource Cycling Centers:Vote Link: http://goo.gl/BCewUP
3. Resource Cycling Value (RCV): Vote Link: http://goo.gl/RHYo8l
4. End Littering of Cigarette Butts with RCV: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/AkIyyc

Applying Integrated Sustainable Design to Gas and Liquid waste:

In general Integrated Sustainable Design, although primarily focused on physical land based waste, also directly applies to the design of products that create airborne and water based waste.  The exact same processes in the product design plan must include both the physical product after use, as well as any bi-products created, including airborne and water based pollution.  The plan must have a system to mitigate, clean and cycle any resources regardless of wether those sources are solid, liquid, or gas.  Because these costs are associated primarily with production and large scale pollution of air, soil, and water, the costs would be directly be applied to factories and companies, but can also be applied to consumers who pollute individually.  Since air and water pollution is more complicated and more expensive to fix, any correct application of Integrated Sustainable Design could take 25-50 years to phase in implementation, as opposed to a decade or less for solid waste.  The following ideas help allow successful implementation of Integrated Sustainable Design to production of products that create bi-product pollution within air, water, or pollute land/soil.  

Ending Non-Point Source Pollution:

The primary essential component to reducing and preventing pollution in air and water in the context of Integrated Sustainable Design is Ending Non-Point Source Pollution.  In the opposite context, Point Source Pollution is simply a source of pollution that is documented and reported on, and with Integrated Sustainable Design we would take that a step further and require reporting directly to the public and within the product labels being sold. Therefore non-point source pollution is simply pollution that is not documented and therefore is not reported or tracked. There is no way to guarantee the prevention or reduction of pollution that we don't even know about.  Reducing and eventually Ending Non-Point Source Pollution is difficult at best and could take 50-100 years, and most importantly cooperation from individuals and industrial corporations, but I think we could get 75% of pollution tracked within 5 years.  The goal would be eventually to track any and all sources of pollution including every individual person driving a car or doing household construction.  This raises an essential concern because personal protections and privacy are more important than tracking pollution. Therefore tracking and recording pollution should happen at the local level and be dependent on the cooperation and verification of records, not the top down control of peoples personal lives or the inner workings of companies and corporations.

End Non-Point Source Pollution: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/6PMlwe

As more and more sources of waste and pollution are tracked and publicly recorded so that everyone can understand the basic information about what they are buying, it becomes increasingly easier to do simple calculations and math to price pollution directly based off of the natural ability for the earth to neutralize it. This process of establishing the cost of waste and pollution would have to be calculated and coordinated per pollutant.  Although I can show this with any pollutant or industrial chemical, amazingly enough the easiest example to use is carbon emissions.

Reduce Global Carbon Emissions to the level the Planet Can Naturally Sequester

The first proposal would be to directly Reduce Global Carbon Emissions to the level the Planet Can Naturally Sequester.  It is very easy to scientifically calculate the amount of carbon a single tree or ocean plankton sequesters. From that you can easily estimate the ability for a forest or portion of ocean to consume carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.  Then you can easily estimate the total amount of carbon dioxide that the planet can consume per year.  And that is our number.  Humans are allowed to waste as much carbon as the planet itself can consume.  Its that simple, we must reduce our global carbon usage to an amount that is in balance with what the planet is able to sequester.  What is so cool about this, is that using agriculture, forestry, science, technology, and aquaculture, humans can easily increase the ability for the planet to sequester more and more carbon dioxide over time, allowing humans to use more and more fossil fuels in balance with the earth. Of course we wouldn't be able to do this overnight, but if you incrementally implemented this policy over the course of 50 years, it wouldn't be a problem at all on our human economy or individual companies.  All you need to do is create the economic incentive.

Match Carbon Emissions to Level the Planet Can Naturally Sequester: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/8CTMje

Carbon Based Currency

This is where the creation of a Carbon Based Currency that anyone and everyone in the world could use comes in.  The current is directly based off science.  Simply pay carbon sinks, and charge carbon emitters based exactly on the actual amount that is emitted or sequestered.  It is as simple as that, but this simple equation done over and over again creates something magical without human manufactured caps and pre-set limits.  It allows any individual in the world to directly grow "money" simply by planting any plant.  

Carbon Based Currency: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/LOKUKP

End Non-Point Source Carbon Sinks

All we have to do is End Non-Point Source Carbon Sinks in the same way that we end Non-Point Source Pollution, in this case Carbon waste.  By directly paying plants and anything that can sequester carbon, we create a reality where plants immediately have economic value just for being.  We create a direct economic incentive to plant trees, reforest jungles, rechaparral deserts, and invest in massive scale aquaculture infrastructure.  

End Non-Point Source Carbon Sinks: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/yPQWHl

Also because the entire currency system is based on science and not human manufactured laws, the currency can actually be started, on a smaller scale, without any government entity pre-establishing the system, just like bit-coin and other electronic currencies.  Instead of mining "bit coins" online, you are simply growing trees in your font yard.  Overtime as more and more people got involved by trading their carbon currency, governments could adopt its use at any level, either local, national, or all around the globe.  It doesn't matter if the law comes after the currency, or if the currency comes after the law.  

The last question if you haven't already asked, is how does this Carbon Currency relate to other human based fiat currencies like the dollar, euro etc. . .  Answer: It would simply be exchanged on the market based on the value people were willing to pay for it.  This makes the entire system 100% economic and capitalist based, and requires minimal systems of regulation which goes along perfectly with our current society functions. You would only have to validate the creation and sequestration of the carbon dioxide, but that can be done scientifically.  The more carbon people want to use, the more valuable carbon currency will be.  Entire forests will become extremely valuable and corporations will buy entire forests not to them cut down, but to make money by preserving them.   Instead of national parks struggling to pay bills and even stay open, national parks and forests would be paid huge sums of carbon currency.  Instead of closing, they would spend most of their time deciding which exchange bids they would take to sell all their carbon currency for dollars or other currencies.  Overtime people could even start using carbon currency for buying and selling any product they wanted to, just like bit coins and other online currencies.  If everything worked out, and we balanced our carbon usage on this planet, eventually the carbon currency would become less valuable because the need for burning more and more carbon would be reduced.

Toxin Based Currencies

Of course carbon is only one of 10,000's of pollutants, toxins, and waste.  It may sound crazy, but in the same way that we created a Carbon Currency, we could easily create a scientifically based currency for each and every toxin, pollutant, or waste bi-product using the foundation of Integrated Sustainable Design.  In this way if someone invents a more efficient and lower cost alternative to neutralizing a toxin, their company can make money on that invention while simultaneously reducing the cost of production and the cost to the consumer for products.  Currently companies can simply throw away their toxins, or worst case scenario just "token" pay off a fake "independent" corporation to store them.  If you think it might be too much to have an additional 100+ currencies, only people who are directly involved in the creation or neutralization of these toxins would even know about these random Toxin Based Currencies.  This isn't much different than the hundreds of securities, notes, and bonds out there that normal everyday people have no idea about, or what they mean to financiers.  In that way it isn't much different than how our current system functions.  

Toxin Based Currencies: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/VrOOlP

Overall if people wanted to implement these ideas we could easily have the foundation set up within 1 year with a cost of 10,000-$100,000.  Within 5 years and with public support, the basic laws of Integrated Sustainable Design could get passed.  Within 10 years 90% of the entire system could be in place and functional on a alpha/beta/trial basis, with or without global government buy in.  Within 25-50 years we would slowly implement government based laws in stepped increments that would be simple and easy for both individuals and businesses to follow and plan for.  Overall the goal is a system that integrates directly into the way people are already living their lives, and best of all to enhance their user experience of our collective human society.  

Thanks so much for reading these ideas :)

Jay

415-323-5833

jay(at)wc.tc

Remember to Vote:

1. Integrated Sustainable Design: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/9bN2fi
2. Transform Landfills into Resource Cycling Centers:Vote Link: http://goo.gl/BCewUP
3. Resource Cycling Value (RCV): Vote Link: http://goo.gl/RHYo8l
4. End Littering of Cigarette Butts with RCV: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/AkIyyc
5. End Non-Point Source Pollution: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/6PMlwe
6. Reduce Global Carbon Emissions: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/SniS7K
7. Match Carbon Emissions to Level the Planet Can Naturally Sequester: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/8CTMje
8. Carbon Based Currency: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/LOKUKP
9. End Non-Point Source Carbon Sinks: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/yPQWHl
10. Toxin Based Currencies: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/VrOOlP

Also Please Support the Earth Flag: Vote Link: http://goo.gl/eCMkSz

These of course are just a few of the many possible ideas. . .

For more environmental ideas: http://wctc.titanpad.com/EnvironmentElections

For the current top ideas in the Level 1 Community Election:

http://wc.tc/voteL1

For other ideas: 

• Public URL Voting Pad: http://wctc.titanpad.com/PublicURLvoting

Make sure to Connect to the Unity Network:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/UnityMOE

Twitter: https://twitter.com/UnityNet

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