Green Baby Steps For The Future Of The Earth
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 09.17.07
Baby Boróka Torda (pictured below-the-fold with her father) has had her "foot print" made green, literally, as pictured here, and prospectively: Baby's lifespan carbon footprint has been offset through tree plantings which will be professionally managed in a Hungarian State park.
"A new baby girl born to proud parents Gergely & Ildikó Torda of Budapest on August 20th. will become Europe’s greenest newborn as hundreds of trees are planted next month to celebrate her birth. Boróka’s lifetime ‘Carbon Footprint’ will become greener every day of her life as her part of a new protected forest grows in Bukk National Park in northeastern Hungary. This is part of the KlimaFa / Planktos new ‘Greener Solutions’ eco-restoration projects intended to produce large volumes of low cost carbon offsets."
“While we don’t know with perfect certainty what baby Boróka’s carbon footprint will be (her CO2 emissions for life) we’ve used benchmarks from multiple agencies to calculate the amount, a mere 416 tonnes requiring about 300 trees to be planted on her behalf,” says Dr. David Gazdag, managing director of Budapest’s KlimaFa."
"In a few weeks time trees to create baby Boróka’s forest will be planted into the new KlimaFa 10,000 hectare climate forest protected forever by the rangers of Bukk National Park. Her trees will grow next to those planted to offset the Vatican’s emission. Additional trees in the project are part of the Dell Computer ‘Plant a Tree For Me’ campaign."
"According to Gazdag, this is the first of many ‘climate forests’ the company intends to create throughout the EU as a powerful tool to mitigate global climate change. Her father, Gergely, a research scientist at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, assisted in forestry research necessary to prepare for this planetary first aid project."
"While we expect little Boróka to live an eco-aware life minimizing her energy use and consumable wastes, with these seedling trees Boróka’s entire life be green for certain. The carbon dioxide her lifestyle generates is no longer destined to create global warming and ocean acidification. Instead that carbon dioxide will be breathed in by native oak and beech trees to help them grow and slow global climate change. Boróka’s forest will make Europe a better place for her to grow and live and over time do the same for her children and generations to come."
TreeHugger comment:- People can be sentimental and protective about trees they helped plant when they were young. As a child, this writer planted a few apple trees; and when I return to the town of my birth I always drive by to see how they are doing. A few years ago a stranger knocked at my door, explaining that he had been raised in my house and had helped his parents plant the white oak in my front yard. He wanted permission to sit under it and admire it for a bit. It is wonderful to think about the future in which thousands of young children might growing with an attachment to "their" forests.
Via:: Planktos.
The biggest thing Gergely & Ildikó Torda can do to save their daughter's future is to not have any more babies. One is enough. Thank you for the trees!
hey!" I think thats a bit unfair - my opinion would be as long as they live eco friendly lives, the children they have do not matter.
What a great way to celebrate a baby!
I'm a 'member' of VHEMT but if folks want to have a baby and start her off as 'green' as this then more power to them. At least we can be sure she'll be raised to be very ecologically aware, and pass that on to her friends, etc. Plus, the publicity of this news item will get more parents to do the same, so it's all good, y'know!
What do you want to bet she grows up to drive a hummer?
>The biggest thing Gergely & Ildikó Torda can do to save
>their daughter's future is to not have any more babies.
That's silly and wrong on many levels. For one thing, political views and values are largely passed on from parents to children. If greens don't breed, there will be few people left to fight for our cause.
This is also the main problem with VHEMT. The people who are conscious of human impact are exactly NOT the ones we can afford to lose. Instead, they should have equally conscious children.
VHEMT only works if everybody does it, but this will never happen. In practice VHEMT amounts to handing the Earth over to conservatives and religious fundamentalists of all stripes, who deliberately breed as much as possible.
Besides, I don't agree with VHEMT even in principle, though I do believe that the world human population should be lower.
That for the global effects. On the individual level, a brother or sister can make life a lot richer, and can teach children that they have to share; a basic environmental message.
The most rational child-bearing policy for greens is to have two children, or three if their extended family or social group is having a low birthrate.
Alonso Perez - YOU are what is destroying our world.
I can not believe the short-sighted ignorance you displayed in your comments. If every couple as ignorant as you of the impact of humans (even "green" ones) has more than one child, then we've absolutely lost all hope.
I am sorry - you are NOT somehow more intelligent and less hurtful than anyone else. When your child eats a slice of bread the earth is hurt just as much as when anyone else does.
The earth needs to REDUCE human population; that goal can not be reached by starting a reproduction competition with people that you imagine to be inferior to you.
News flash - humans can learn. They all have basically the same intelligence, but they ALL think they are more intelligent than most (Thank you for proving that one in advance). Circumstances can influence their choices, but they all have choices to make; Why don't you at least try making your public speaking choices more responsible ones?
There is no circumstance where telling people to reproduce helps anything. Even if we could do it - creating an additional billion Al Gores would not help anything - the rest still need changing, we can't remove non-Gores from the population, and (As proven by Al Gore) those billion Gores STILL contribute to earths destruction!
For the sake of all of our children - go buy some condoms, and teach your existing children that reducing harm is never as good as not harming in the first place.
Wow, Talk about a green footprint. Poor kid might never wear flip flops. So sad. But yes it is a great idea to plant tress in celebration of her birth. And yes it would be ironic if she drove a Hummer!