Antarctica Pictures | Antarctica Cruise | Facts | History | Sandals | Store | Clothes | Whales | Books | Video | Schools | Forum | Site Map | FIDS / OAE's
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Antarctica Pictures | Antarctica Cruise | Facts | History | Sandals | Store | Clothes | Whales | Books | Video | Schools | Forum | Site Map | FIDS / OAE's
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Global Warming Prevention
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Antarctica
Fact File index |
What's
it like in Antarctica? page 1 page
2 | Fascinating
Facts | FAQ's
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Threats |
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Cold and survival: Humans | Hypothermia | Food | Food 2 | Clothing | Penguins |
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Climate / Weather graphs: Comparisons | Australian Coastal | Deep South | Ozone hole |
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Climate Change: Global Warming | GW Antarctica | Misconceptions | Carbon sinks | Carbon cycle | Prevention | Carbon Offsetting | Tree Planting |
 You'll
find plenty of lists of how to "save the world" in easy steps, and a
lot of them are fiddly little things that it's a problem to remember and
sometimes a pain to do. There's also the fact that some make a huge difference,
others, while terribly worthy may be wiped out by that light-bulb you forgot
to turn off last night.I thought I'd make it easier and in particular focus on the biggies - that make the largest difference, if you want to re-use supermarket bags as well even better, but if you don't do those listed here, you're not really making much of an effort. It comes down to reducing the amount of greenhouse gases you are personally responsible for releasing. Some are obvious, drive a car - carbon dioxide (CO2) comes out of the exhaust, some are less obvious, buying just one new shirt instead of two that you don't really need for instance saves on CO2 emissions in its production and transport. So here goes, roughly in some kind of order.
Switch your brain on, take an interest in the world, it's an ecosystem that you're part of - not on the outside of. While technology may provide cushions and barriers, when Mother Nature turns her mighty wheels, nothing, but nothing is going to stop them. Sticking your head in the sand may be temporarily comforting, but ultimately disastrous as a survival technique. I can't remember where I first heard this, so can't attribute the quote properly, I've changed it a bit but it's relevant here.
Make sure you're in 1 or 2 and definitely not group 3.
So how bad is it? A single long-haul return flight, say from the UK to Australia, South America or the Far East can release about as much CO2 as driving 15,000 miles in a fairly standard 1.6L car on your own (and yes that is per person, you don't divide it by all the people on the plane). The average annual mileage by a motorist in the UK is about 10,000, so one long-haul airline round trip is the same as 18 months of normal motoring - and wipes out an awful lot of eco-friendly bike-riding in a single stroke. All of these thing produce about the same amount of CO2
Get it from the tap and you will prevent the huge amount of fossil fuels consumed in transporting bottles of water to and from the supermarket, millions of tonnes of water unnecessarily transported over millions of road-miles. You will also help to avoid all those billions of one-trip plastic bottles needed. If you want your tap water to be even cleaner, you can get a filter jug, or for greater convenience a water filter under the sink so it comes straight out of the tap super-filtered.
Organic food doesn't need to be bought from the supermarket and is much more widely available than imagined. "Vegetable box" schemes are popular ways of getting organic food whereby you buy a box of veg that is delivered once a week or so of whatever veg is in season. Organic food often has a price premium over non-organic, which is more reason to grow it yourself if you have the space. I don't see the point of struggling against the slugs and weather to get a crop of lettuce that I can't possibly eat quick enough at the time when they are almost giving them away in the shops. Instead you could try lollo rosso, rocket and especially those cut-and-come-again salads and tomatoes which are never as great as directly from plant to plate in a few minutes. Other ideal vegetables to grow are beans which are easy and don't travel well so the ones in the shops are never as good or as fresh as home grown. Broad beans are good as are French beans and very easy too. French beans don't need all the long canes that runner beans need, but wait until early May before sowing them outdoors. They can be started off earlier if you like in 3" pots in an unheated greenhouse. I also go for spinach because I like it in salad better than any other leaf (apart from watercress, but I don't have the appropriate flowing watercourse).
Why are ready-meals not so good?
What's the alternative? - This is for the unconverted, if you already cook from scratch (or thereabouts) you're already there.
Garden refuse that is too large for you to handle into the compost bin if you must, but it's better to make and use your own compost Other stuff you should be recycling
at the minimum:
Further steps:
For some reason I don't entirely understand, all of the above often goes instantly out of the window when business is concerned. Here's a few obvious ways that business can help VERY considerably:
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Climate Change: Global Warming | GW Antarctica | Misconceptions | Carbon sinks | Carbon cycle | Prevention | Carbon Offsetting | Tree Planting
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Isn't
that a bit militant? Well maybe it is Mr. Airline-Industry-Dependent-Guy,
but flying is the one usually unnecessary
thing we do that can have the biggest immediate effect on greenhouse gas
emissions (CO2). Long-haul flights are the worst as they have
to carry extra fuel that in the early part of the journey that is needed
to burn to carry the extra fuel that is needed in the later parts of the
journey - short-haul flights don't need to do that to the same extent.
(Swallows
diplomacy pill) You can probably reduce your CO2 emissions
by at least a third by getting a far more fuel efficient vehicle.
An MPV will do pretty much the same job as an SUV for this saving
in fuel and emissions while giving a similar internal space, though
maybe not being so good at mounting a machine-gun on the back and
taking part in a limited regional armed conflict or hauling a whole
winter's worth of lumber from the back-woods - hands up who needs
to do those things?
(Spits
diplomacy pill out) No-one really needs to drive around in something
the size of a school bus, safety considerations are negated
by the increased tendency of SUVs to overturn in accidents as
they're top-heavy, they are also more dangerous to pedestrians.
So help the planet, the Poles and get a better car that can
go round corners too and is far more fun to drive.
In
most homes, the single most energy-hungry appliance
over the year is the refrigerator. Buy the most
energy efficient model you can - it will be cheaper
in the long run. Less efficient models are usually
less expensive to buy, though the initial cost price
difference is getting slimmer compared to the most
effective machines. The extra running cost of electricity
of cheaper models easily wipes out
the initial cost-saving.
Despite
what it sounds like, this is about heating the spaces that we
live and work in and not on heating outer space.
One
of the easiest ways of doing this is to take showers and not
baths, though it is possible to use an awful lot of energy
in the shower too. Power Showers are the worst culprits, normal
showers are fine for getting you clean. Also, don't spend so
long in the shower.
We're
all aware of energy efficient light-bulbs - effectively
short coiled fluorescent tubes that use a fraction of the energy
of an ordinary light bulb and last far longer too. They've come
down in price a lot in recent years, and though they are still
a premium-priced product compared to old-fashioned energy-inefficient
bulbs, they are considerably cheaper over the life of the
bulb - so why aren't you using more of them, if you already
know this?
In
the vast majority of the 1st world our tap water is more than clean
enough to drink, but somehow we started to fall for marketing messages
that tell us to go out and buy drinking water in bottles instead of
just getting it from the tap.
Organic
food is food that is grown without man-made chemicals such as pesticides
and fertilisers. It also means no human waste, or sewage sludge,
has been used on the fields and that no ionizing radiation or food additives
were used in their production. Organic meat has been reared without
the routine use of antibiotics and without using growth hormones.
Our
busy lifestyles mean that we have been sold the idea that
we have no time to properly cook or prepare food anymore.
We arrive home late, exhausted and unable to do anything
other than take a packet of something exotic sounding from
the refrigerator - barely able to press the microwave start
button before slumping semi-lifeless in front of the idiot-lantern.
It's
becoming easier and easier to do this as recycling facilities become
more widespread reducing the need to throw things away to landfill.
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