500 Million Tonnes?!

fozzle

In both the Irish Independents and Radio Ones coverage of the Minister for the Environment's proposed 5c chewing gum tax quantity of chewing gum on Ireland's streets was quoted as being 500 million tonnes.

500 million tonnes!

Now I'd would be interested if anyone here knows where they got this figure for, because that seems insane, it's about 1km cubed of chewing gum!!!

Is it just me or does it seem someone made a slight calculation mistake?!

woosaysdan

i know there is a problem with chewing gum on roads a footpaths but i have to agree that this figure is just a tad bit off the mark!!!also they said that the increase will bring in about 4-5 million euro to clean up the streets, but known our government this figure will rise dramatically!!!

Borzoi

500m tonnes = 125 tonnes for each of us (pop Irl= 4m)

say 10g per stick of gum

that's 12.5 million sticks each

even over a 70 year life span

that's almost 500 sticks a day


We've a lot of chewing to do.
or someone needs some help with their maths

Lenny

Someones working hard..

Borzoi wrote:

500m tonnes = 125 tonnes for each of us (pop Irl= 4m)

say 10g per stick of gum

that's 12.5 million sticks each

even over a 70 year life span

that's almost 500 sticks a day


We've a lot of chewing to do.
or someone needs some help with their maths

fozzle

Oh good, I'm glad someone did the maths I was too lazy to do! (Plus I couldn't find the weight on the gum in the canteen.)

So who's up for using this 500,000,000 tonnes of gum to build a landbridge to France?

seamus

500 tonnes sounds a little saner somehow

PH01

Borzoi wrote:

500m tonnes = 125 tonnes for each of us (pop Irl= 4m)

say 10g per stick of gum

that's 12.5 million sticks each

even over a 70 year life span

that's almost 500 sticks a day


We've a lot of chewing to do.
or someone needs some help with their maths

Nice one Borzoi.
I reckon that this proves this 500 million tons story is inaccurate. There is no way that the average person chews 500 sticks a day in Ireland.
And there aren't many streets in Ireland either!
A case of Dept. of Environment scare tactics, perhaps?

Idbatterim

Even 500 tonnes is a huge weight, thats 500 standard hatchback cars in weight! I bet whoever wrote that probaly has qualifications coming out of their ears yet they dont even realise how ridiculous that figure of 500 million tonnes is!

woosaysdan

Idbatterim wrote:

Even 500 tonnes is a huge weight, thats 500 standard hatchback cars in weight! I bet whoever wrote that probaly has qualifications coming out of their ears yet they dont even realise how ridiculous that figure of 500 million tonnes is!

LOL its funny cos its soo true!!!

ur mentor

did it say million or m? didnt see article myself
m could stand for metric rather than million?

chrismon

little bit overdoing it i think

Tommy Vercetti

They're totally blowing this out of proportion, so much **** going on in the world and the best we can come up with are proposals for taxes on chewing gum and atm receipts :rolleyes:

Idbatterim

I think anything to clean this country up is a good idea. Id definetly be for the taxes on gum, atm receipts and fast food wrappings ect. They should get their priorities right though and go for the illegal dumpers, co2 emssions, water pollution ect, ect , ect

Victor

90,000 km of road, at say 10m wide average = 900,000,000 m2

500,000,000 tonnes / 900,000,000 m2 = 0.56 tonnes/m2

Thats ick up to your thighs.

elivsvonchiaing

Aside from Ur_mentor's theory on this - if anyone really did come up with this figure - may be a spreadsheet formula is to blame or something - the fact that they never questioned it leads me to believe they should be sacked - or demoted to coffee making (assuming it was civil servant)

unkel

Victor wrote:

Thats ick up to your thighs.

LOL - lovely maths Victor

billy the squid

There is no god

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/05/25/singapore.gum.ap/


BAN CHEWING GUM FOREVER

elivsvonchiaing

billy the squid wrote:

There is no god

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/05/25/singapore.gum.ap/


BAN CHEWING GUM FOREVER

No Tax on chewing gum is the way - banning it is fascism- Christ when it comes to some forms of this I am a fan

Victor

Do you mean

No. Tax on chewing gum is the way

or

No tax on chewing gum is the way

sceptre

PH01 wrote:

There is no way that the average person chews 500 sticks a day in Ireland.

It's the use of the word "average" in there I found interesting:). As opposed to, say: "there's no ****ing way that anyone chews 500 sticks a day unless they're doing it for a big big bet that they probably wouldn't win"

fozzle

I feel i need to attempt this, if only to prove it's impossibility. Who wants to buy me chewing gum?

Superman

fozzle wrote:

Who wants to buy me chewing gum?

Meet me beside the clock at noon for free gum!

I think the tax is a great idea, I sugested this to a mate before. Also it takes ages to get the crap off the roads and they actually had to invent a special machine to get it off!

Give it a few years and there will be a tax on cigarette papers !

Gilgamesh

500.000.000 tonnes, hmmm... chewing Gum......

that must have happened after they banned smoking in the working place.
but seriously, I know that the gunk of chewing is all over the place, but 500.000.000, that's a lot of gum.
I don't think I could even afford to buy 500 sticks of gum a day.
I think I will keep up with the smoking, would probably also be healthier than chewing tht much.


I think that they should start these campaigns with the more critical problems, like the packaging the Shops and fast food joints use.
Also rubbish seperation to be enforced more.

James_M

Borzoi wrote:

500m tonnes = 125 tonnes for each of us (pop Irl= 4m)

say 10g per stick of gum

that's 12.5 million sticks each

even over a 70 year life span

that's almost 500 sticks a day


We've a lot of chewing to do.
or someone needs some help with their maths

Although considering they are saying that there are 500m tonnes on the streets now (i.e. at any one time) then you wouldn't have a lifetime to do that. No idea how long it takes for chewing gum to disintegrate but its got to be off the street in a lot shorter time than that. So you're probably looking at ,000's of sticks a day.

Gilgamesh

500.000.000 tones of Gum on the street, I think they mean conrete not gum. but I gues you would have better traction ;-)

stagolee

theres an idea , why dont they replace the gum in chewing gum with tar, its nice and chewy and when you spit it out youd be resurfacing the road and filling in potholes

fozzle

Superman wrote:

Meet me beside the clock at noon for free gum!

I think the tax is a great idea, I sugested this to a mate before. Also it takes ages to get the crap off the roads and they actually had to invent a special machine to get it off!

Give it a few years and there will be a tax on cigarette papers !

Beside the clock, eh?

Gotta disagree with you there, I think the tax is nonsense, it just means that the kind of people who dump their gum on the street (I never do) are going to feel justified in doing so. What is needed is better anti-litter education in primary schools, and more bin. There's a chronic shortage of litter bins in this country, and the ones that are there don't get emptied often enough. For instance, in the 20/25 minute walk from the shop beside NUIG to two estates I used to live in (in different directions) there are no bins. None. At all. Surely if there were more bins it'd be an improvement? Persoally I'm one of those people who carry their rubbish home if there's no bin, and who'll make friends pick up rubbish if they drop it, but I'm aware that plenty of Irish are too lazy, so until the next generation can be thought otherwise, can't we accomodate these people too?

Argh, I don't even know if that makes sense, apologies.

Imposter

fozzle wrote:

Gotta disagree with you there, I think the tax is nonsense, it just means that the kind of people who dump their gum on the street (I never do) are going to feel justified in doing so. What is needed is better anti-litter education in primary schools, and more bin. There's a chronic shortage of litter bins in this country, and the ones that are there don't get emptied often enough. For instance, in the 20/25 minute walk from the shop beside NUIG to two estates I used to live in (in different directions) there are no bins. None. At all. Surely if there were more bins it'd be an improvement? Persoally I'm one of those people who carry their rubbish home if there's no bin, and who'll make friends pick up rubbish if they drop it, but I'm aware that plenty of Irish are too lazy, so until the next generation can be thought otherwise, can't we accomodate these people too?

Argh, I don't even know if that makes sense, apologies.

That makes perfect sense to me and is pretty much my take on it as well.

Gilgamesh

I think that they should modify the chewing gum.
the biggest problem with Gum is, theat it doesn't disintegrate.
it just stays where it was thrown.
why can't they just 'tweak' the recipe fo Gum, that it doesn't fossilise to the ground or surface.
The stuff is more effective that blue tack.
Hang up a picture with it, once dried, you wil never get it away again.
It's like having a cigarette that would never burn out or finish, but just start smoking more and more, the older it gets.
In singapore they have forbidden chewing gum, just because they had the littering problem.
furthermore I don't understand why people think it is cool, the stick it onto a chair.
It's worse than people spitting on the streets or blowing their nose onto the road, without a tissue.
I think that this, and many other countries just have problems with the general habbits.
I would definatly batter someone who would have the Idea of spitting into my livingroom or firing boogers on my floor.

sprinkles

And they say that the level of maths in the country is falling. I spent a whole evening with 3 friends in my flat working out how much the Earth drops per mile (i.e. the curvature of the earth)...yes I am sad, and no I don't have a girlfriend!

Anyway I think it was a missprint in the independant and the correct figure was more like 500 tonnes.

http://www.checkout.ie/Feature.asp?ID=109

jor el

So what is the curvature of the earth then?
But back on topic, as fozzle says, taxing gum will only make people feel justified in spitting their gum where ever they want as they are already paying to have it cleaned up. The other thing is, will all this tax go into cleaning streets and providing bins, or will it just be used to build needles in the middle of cities, or perhaps to buy an shiny new government jet? Does all the tax collected on tobacco go back into the health system, or does all the road/petrol and vehicle registration tax go into the roads and public transport? I don't think so, so even if they tax chewing gum there's no guarantee the money will be used to clean up the streets.

Commissar

I'm all for taxing chewing gum and I wouldn't say no to banning it completely. Though I can't see at all how a tax would justify spitting your gum on the foot path.
Tbh I wouldn't expect even a tax wouldn't help much considering how long the gum can last. It would be years before any effects would be noticeable.