Images from a Workshop Presentation by Bob Kistler, Modifying Energy Use in Congregations
at Changing the Climate: Responding in Faith to Global Warming
Sponsored by the Minnesota Interfaith Campaign for Climate Change,
Minnesota Council of Churches
12/4/2000

Microsoft Word Document Version
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Click on the Figure/Graph/Image for a full size version
Much of the problem of global warming lies in areas in which we in institutions, like churches, and we as individuals play major parts. Transportation, commercial, and residential all contribute significantly to carbon dioxide emissions.

Two roads...

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;


Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same


And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.


I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost
Each technological object that we use, uses energy which contributes to global warming. Instruments like the one at right (Electronic Product Design, Inc. manufactures these energy meters.) can be used by individuals and churches to look at their energy usage of appliances. The figure at left shows results for common appliances used by students.

Lighting is one area of considerable energy inefficiency due to a failure to adopt existing new technologies like compact fluorescents and T-8 fluorescents with electronic ballasts. We can have a significant impact on greenhouse gas reduction worldwide by using readily available efficient lighting technology at both individual and institution levels.
Highly efficient household appliances are readily available and are sometimes even cheaper initially and are always "cheaper" when considered over the life of the appliance and when external costs like Carbon Dioxide production are considered.
Heating the buildings in which we live and work can be highly efficient with existing technologies if we would just install them to replace the outdated and inefficient technologies.

Energy from Recycling, Reducing, and Acting

  • Secondary aluminum production (from recycled sources) requires 95 per cent less energy than primary aluminum production.
  • The energy saved by recycling one aluminum can would operate the average television for more than 100 minutes?
  • The energy saved by recycling one glass bottle could power a television for three hours.
  • Recycling one ton of newspaper saves 4,000 KWH of Energy and decreases the production of CO2 by more than 4 tons.
  • If each commuter car carried just one more person (for a day), we'd save 600 thousand gallons of gasoline, and would prevent 12 million pounds of carbon dioxide from polluting the atmosphere.
  • If you convinced two people to do something about the environment, and the next day they convinced two people and so on, it would take only one month to get everyone in the US to take action!
Green Power in Minnesota The American Wind Energy Association  
Climate Change Impacts in Minnesota    
    Dr. Bob Kistler
Some Links to Further Resources   December 5, 2000