So this morning I actually thought I need to get as green as I can with my smithing. Now, I am not a political liberal or left wing environmentalist nutcase. I have serious reservations about the whole global warming hype; however, I do see myself as a steward of the earth on which I live. I do think about the sort of earth we are passing on to our descendants. With that in mind...
I will stick to using recycled steel, as I always have.
I will phase out of propane forging.
I will use my charcoal forge with locally and responsibly collected fuel.
I'm sure there are other things, but this is the beginning...
Something to think about...
6 comments:
Is Propane harsher for the atmosphere than Coal?
Good question. I don't use coal; I use charcoal. I do believe charcoal is much more earth friendly (in my situation anyway). I tend to think coal is better than propane, but I'm certainly no expert here. I don't even know how they get propane, but I imagine it's somewhat labor and technology intensive, more so than coal. However, I'm sure its fumes are less invasive than coal's fumes. My uneducated opinion is that coal is the greener choice. Once again, though, I'm using charcoal from a renewable source. I think this matter ends up being individually unique to each person's situation. You just do the best you can in your environment with the resources available to you. Atmosphere is only part of the equation.
Yes I do agree with you. Unfortunately where I live I would get in a lot of trouble from the fumes of coal or charcoal. So I'm stuck with propane, which isn't a horrible thing since I'm not a very skilled smith.
There are many advantages to using propane, and that is all that many city dwellers can use, which is fine. I'm out in the country, so I have more options. Good luck developing your skills. Have you been able to get lessons from anyone? Lessons from a pro will put you at a new skill level like nothing else can, in my opinion anyway.
I have taken a intro to blade smithing class over in Alameda. It most definitely helped to understand things. Although I would love to be able to afford a class from Tai. Perhaps in the future when I'm not so poor.
I, too, am a recycler. Where I live you can find an abundance of discarded concrete-cutting saw blades, used by road crews. I make about 95% of all of my knives out of those.
I use propane for heat treating, however. Here in the city, it doesn't pay to have ash flying around, and it's against code.
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