One cool feature of Google is that it performs unit conversions. It makes it easy to learn that 1000 rods is the same as 2750 fathoms. One useful addition would be the calculation of carbon dioxide equivalents: you could plunk in “250 tonnes of methane in CO2 equivalent” and have it generate the appropriate output, based on the methodology of the IPCC. The gasses for which the calculator should work would also include nitrous oxide, SF6, HCFCs, HFCs, CFCs, and PFCs.
Sure, this feature would only be useful for less than one person in a million, but Google has often shown itself willing to cater to the needs of techie minorities.
One complication here is that CO2 equivalent is a combination of the radiative forcing potential of a gas (the amount of heat it traps) and its duration in the environment. As such, a stronger greenhouse gas that lasts a lesser amount of time may get the same rating as a less powerful gas that is more long-lived.
This strikes me as a bit wrong-headed:
Obesity ‘as bad as climate risk’
The public health threat posed by obesity in the UK is a “potential crisis on the scale of climate change”, the health secretary has warned.
Alan Johnson said the magnitude of the problem was becoming clear for the first time and “it is in everybody’s interest to turn things round”.