Five Things...
...that you can do to reduce your impact on the planet (and maybe save a bit of money too)
If you've read what this site is about then you'll know that we aren't about being all preachy and eco-warrior, but we do think that the impact our species has on the environment could be better managed. So off-grid smelly communal mung-bean eating right-on hippie existances are out, sensible yet painless lifestyle changes are in. To give a better idea what we at Earth Dream are all about we present our fabulous "Five Things" list which provides a few ideas for reducing your impact. If we all adopt just a couple of these then we'll be passing on a much pleasenter world to our children.
- 1) Your right foot
- This one should be a fairly obvious start. You know when you are driving your car? On the road? Well try just relaxing your right foot a little bit. Rev the ol' lump a little lower, and if you drive a manual (stick if you wear cowboy boots) you could even change gear a touch earlier. Saves petrol (gas if you chew tobaccy), reduces emissions, saves you money, might even save your life as slower drivers won't be crashing so often. Finding this difficult? Try turing off the Motorhead CD and listen to talk radio instead. Oh yeah and make sure your tyres are pumped up and turn the air-con off once in a while too.
- 2) Your square eyes
- Here's an interesting fact. We all know that LCD and plasma televisions consume less power than chunky old CRT's right? But did you know that as we are all replacing our worn our cathode ray goggleboxes with shiny new LCD devices the average power consumption per TV set is actually going up? The reason of course is that we are now buying such huge screens that the benefit from an energy point of view is being cancelled out. So what can you do? Well if you've not upgraded yet and are thinking about it how about asking yourself this simple question. Do I really need a 150 inch wall mounted HD TV to view soaps, talent shows and 24 hour rolling news making my lounge look like a cross between ace 80's Schwarzenegger vehicle Total Recall and the stuff of Orwellian nightmares? Do I bollocks. You probably don't live in a Sports Bar so why not buy a smaller but better quality set that suits the size of your room? And don't forget to turn them off rather than leave them on standby overnight.
- 3) Let there be light
- ...and let there not. Remember when you leave a room you can turn your lights off. Even if you have replaced the bulbs with energy savers no energy is better than low energy.
- 4) Bin there done that
- Tins, bottles, newspapers, clothes, plastic bags...there are collection bins for all manner of household waste. Use them. Even better, if like most of the UK you are provided with multiple bins or bags for your waste don't be a wanker about it and moan, use them properly. And if you have a problem with that maybe you should stop reading the Daily Mail. OK so most of these schemes aren't ideal (for a start half this cak is shipped halfway across the world for sorting out by Chinese child labour) but when you consider that there is a floating island twice the size of the USA made of plastic rubbish trapped in currents in the North Pacific there are worse choices.
- 5) Bit much like hard work that
- No. Work is what you (hopefully) do during the day. At a place with other people who probably don't want to be there either. Why not amuse yourself by encouraging a bit of social and environmental responsibility around your office. Suggest that people turn off their PC's overnight, that they consider whether they really need to print every single fucking e-mail they ever get sent, if they can recycle their toner cartridges rather than binning them, if the last person out of the office at night can turn off the lighs, if old noisy power hungry desktop PC's can be replaced with sleek efficient laptops, if a recycling policy can be implemented, if they can offer incentives for people to cycle to work...you get the idea - use your imagination, it'll make your day go quicker if nothing else.
So there you go. None of that will be too painful, and some of it might even be fun (or at least mildly annoying to others, which is entertaining in itself). And this is just the start. We've got hundreds of things to suggest, not all of them about your carbon footprint either, but we don't want to shoot our load too early, and behavioural psychologists working with monkeys and rats have found that an article any longer than this won't be read so you'll just have to wait for "5 things part 2" coming to an Earth Dream near you soon.
Pip pip tally hooo