Twenty Three and a Half Degrees

My bicycle leans on our back wall at much the same angle as planet Earth leans on space --  a distinctly casual, street-corner 23.5 degrees, or thereabouts.  That crucial tilt of our planet's axis from the vertical explains pretty much everything about climate, varying day length, and seasons, or so I was taught at school.  The angle of inclination of my bike, as far as I know, has no effect on the Earth's climate.

Or...  Does it?  That bike spends a lot more time leaning against that wall than it should.  And, although I walk whenever I can when I feel like it, I drive to work much more often than I should.  It seems that, by letting that bike lounge around all day, I'm doing my bit to screw things up, climate-wise.

Now, we all need to be reminded, constantly, of the way our small choices add up to big consequences.  If only so that we cannot claim, as the sea-level rises and the forests burn, that no-one ever told us it could have been otherwise.  Moralists are annoying, of course.  Everyone accepts the truth that over-fondness for biscuits will lead to weight gain, but no-one likes to be told that the overweight are, morally, second-class citizens.  The morally-trim are annoying, in the same way thin or young or good-looking people are annoying, because they are a walking critique of and rebuke to the rest of us.

What we need is facts, and arguments backed by well-researched figures, not holier-than-thou finger-wagging.  Enter my old friend, Science Man.  I've talked about Andy before (for example, here and here).  He's my go-to man when I have a scientific or environmental conundrum, particularly one that involves the use of numbers, a language I do not speak.

For example, I was exercised by the way so many homes now have central-heating systems operated by a condensing boiler. On a cold morning you see vast plumes of water vapour belching from every house's boiler vent, like traction engines getting up steam.  Surely Britain would soon be disappearing under a veiling smog of boiler-generated cloud-cover?  Apparently not:

"Don't worry  about the water vapour. Whenever you burn a carbon based fuel you get carbon dioxide and water. The only difference with a condensing boiler is that some of the latent heat that was used, inadvertently, to turn this water into steam is recovered and so doesn't go to waste. So, an ordinary boiler will also be emitting steam but you don't see it because it hasn't been condensed. Plus because the ordinary boiler is less efficient there'll actually be more water vapour emitted than from a condensing boiler."

Reassuring, simply put, and (to the best of my limited knowledge) correct.

So, if, like me, you need your eco-conscience to be pricked by evidence and convincing arguments, and don't like to be hectored with trendentious assertions, you may welcome the advent of Andy's blog, Seven Billion to One.  However, if you find fault with his reasoning and reckoning there, take it up with him, not me.  As I say, I don't speak numbers.  Or ride a bike as often as I should.