Greetings and welcome to my blog on solving global warming. I am a professor of telecommunications at the University of Georgia, although this blog has no connection to my employer. Along with Dr. Henah Hannah, we are looking for success stories in attacking the global warming issue. This blog picks up where Vice President Gore's award-winning "An Inconvenient Truth" documentary on "climate change" ends. "Climate change" is a term that has been adopted by some (emphasis on "some") members the conservative community who can not handle the concept of "global warming" which somehow seems to do a better job placing "blame" on human activity, whereas "climate change" sounds more like an act of God. Personally, I prefer global warming because of the mountains of evidence including what we are seeing in the United States this summer with floods in some areas of the country and drought with record-breaking heat in other areas.
I would like to add a personal thanks to the Weather Channel who took far too long to address "climate change." You were far too timid, my friends, but you are making up for it now with occasional mini-documentaries on "climate change" (hey, the Weather Channel has to pay attention to the satellite, cable and advertising industries that are its bread and butter).
I would like to extend a welcoming hand to the coal and oil industries that have the financial resources to commit to research to reverse the trend of evermore carbon in the atmosphere. If anyone sees this blog and can point us to enlightened energy industry executives, we want to call attention to them, highlight their contributions, and, we hope, inspire others to consider alternatives to where their profits are now going.
In addition, welcome to the automobile industry that burns the oil that contrbutes to global warming. We would like to publicize efforts not just by the major car companies but by student engineering competitions in which students are asked to present alternative forms of transportation that do not use as much or perhaps any fossil fuels to operate.
Click to enlarge.Source: http://www.soumu.go.jp
Welcome to the The Telework Association, The Telework Coalition, Telework Trendlines, the Canadian Telework Association, The Telework Association, The Telework Coalition, and all other organizations that promote teleworking. I happen to live near Atlanta which has so much automobile air pollution that it has affected weather patterns around the city. Teleworking is one very important way in which we could cut emissions dramatically if only companies would have the will to look at the research supporting the notion that those who work at home are even more productive than those who face rush hour traffic twice a day.
Want proof? Really? OK, this took .5 second to find:
A new productivity survey by consultancy Hudson finds that while only 23 percent of U.S. employees work from home or are given that option, the majority of the workforce (59 percent) believes that telecommuting at least part time is the ideal work situation.
There remains quite a bit of resistance to telecommuting on employers’ parts, though, some of which outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas CEO John Challenger traces to "a century of workplace habits that involve going into the office and having a supervisor who sits over our shoulder and makes sure we work." Managers seem to think there is loss of control if workers put in time without going to and from the company workplace. Calling that kind of monitoring outdated, Challenger recently explained to The Christian Science Monitor that companies now measure performance much more objectively, with performance-based pay and "metrics-based" measurements of performance. Source: http://news.thomasnet.com/
Source: http://www.bts.gov
For example (this just popped up and is not an example of a serious effort to find studies on teleworking or teleworking productivity):
Telework Trendlines
A report by WorldatWork based on data collected by The Dieringer Research Group
Key findings: Employers Are Expanding Teleworking Opportunities
- Number of "At Least Once Per Year" Teleworkers Remains Steady
- Frequency of Teleworking is Growing
- Broadband Use Rises Sharply for Home-Based Teleworkers
- Teleworkers Are Far More Prevalent Users of Wireless
- Workers Increasingly Working from Anywhere [Starbucks?]
The telework data in this report were commissioned by special arrangement of WorldatWork through the "2006 American Interactive Consumer Survey" conducted by The Dieringer Research Group, Inc. WorldatWork wrote this survey report and is responsible for its content. Data for all U.S. adults in the survey (n=1,001) is considered reliable at the 95% confidence interval to within +/- 3.1 %. Any data or tables taken from this summary for other purposes should be referenced as "WorldatWork 2006 Telework Trendlines™ commissioned from The Dieringer Research Group." Source: Telework Trendlines for 2006
Congratulations to the U.S. government agencies of The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and the General Services Administration (GSA) who have established a joint web site on Telework to provide access to guidance issued by both agencies. Here you will find information for employees who think they might like to telework (or are already doing so), for managers and supervisors who supervise teleworkers, and for agency telework coordinators.
