Want to live green?

Simply take a look around you, what do you see, what do you feel? Well, the climate is changing, the seasons are shifting and there are more and more natural disasters occurring all over the world. Tsunamis, landslides, earthquakes, hurricanes and tornadoes.

Why do you think it is?

The Environment (via green-networld.com)

The environment is suffering critical stress:

The Atmosphere
Stratospheric ozone depletion threatens us with enhanced ultra-violet radiation at the earth’s surface, which can be damaging or lethal to many life forms. Air pollution near ground level, and acid precipitation, are already causing widespread injury to humans, forests and crops.

Water Resources
Heedless exploitation of depletable ground water supplies endangers food production and other essential human systems. Heavy demands on the world’s surface waters have resulted in serious shortages in some 80 countries, containing 40% of the world’s population. Pollution of rivers, lakes and ground water further limits the supply.

Oceans
Destructive pressure on the oceans is severe, particularly in the coastal regions which produce most of the world’s food fish. The total marine catch is now at or above the estimated maximum sustainable yield. Some fisheries have already shown signs of collapse. Rivers carrying heavy burdens of eroded soil into the seas also carry industrial, municipal, agricultural, and livestock waste — some of it toxic.

Soil
Loss of soil productivity, which is causing extensive Land abandonment, is a widespread byproduct of current practices in agriculture and animal husbandry. Since 1945, 11% of the earth’s vegetated surface has been degraded — an area larger than India and China combined — and per capita food production in many parts of the world is decreasing.

Forests
Tropical rain forests, as well as tropical and temperate dry forests, are being destroyed rapidly. At present rates, some critical forest types will be gone in a few years and most of the tropical rain forest will be gone before the end of the next century. With them will go large numbers of plant and animal species.

Living Species
The irreversible loss of species, which by 2100 may reach one-third of all species now living, is especially serious. We are losing the potential they hold for providing medicinal and other benefits, and the contribution that genetic diversity of life forms gives to the robustness of the world’s biological systems and to the astonishing beauty of the earth itself.

Much of this damage is irreversible on a scale of centuries or permanent. Other processes appear to pose additional threats. Increasing levels of gases in the atmosphere from human activities, including carbon dioxide released from fossil fuel burning and from deforestation, may alter climate on a global scale. Predictions of global warming are still uncertain — with projected effects ranging from tolerable to very severe — but the potential risks are very great.

Our massive tampering with the world’s interdependent web of life — coupled with the environmental damage inflicted by deforestation, species loss, and climate change — could trigger widespread adverse effects, including unpredictable collapses of critical biological systems whose interactions and dynamics we only imperfectly understand.

Uncertainty over the extent of these effects cannot excuse complacency or delay in facing the threat.

What Can You Do?

These are a few things that I have done to lessen my carbon footprint:

• Start small. Small changes make big differences in the long run.
• Stop littering. (You know you’ve been guilty of this, we all have.)
• Buy reusable shopping bags, buy products with less packaging.
• Switch to a BPA-free reusable bottle for your water, don’t buy bottled.
• Walk more. Especially if you are going to places near you, it’s better for you and the planet.
• Switch to LED lights in your home.
• Take shorter showers, shut off the water when you brush your teeth or shave.
• RECYCLE. It’s easy and once you get going, you’ll wonder why you never did. I have to emphasize, recycle glass, it takes 1-2 million years to decompose in the landfill.
• Use bentos and try to reduce the amount of packaging in lunches and meals.
• REUSE. There are plenty of things that you can make into crafts with your children, containers you can use for storage or watering plants.
• REDUCE. Use less energy, less water and turn off lights and your computer when not in use.
• Go ORGANIC if you can. It reduces the use of pesticides and harmful irritants, in the long run–the cost is outweighed by how much better it is for you and your family.
• Go LOCAL. The further away that the food comes from, the more pesticides and preservatives it has so it can be “fresh” once it gets to you.
• Don’t think it’s the “trendy” thing to do, try to make this planet last longer for you and your children and for generations after you.
• Explore greener options for baby. Especially diapers and clothing. It takes over 500 years for diapers to decompose and clothing if not organic, pollutes the earth.
• Make your own organic baby foods and cereals. Easy and so fun! Less packaging and much healthier.
• Don’t jump into it all at once, do what you can and start with the simple things first and don’t go crazy. It is easy to be overwhelmed but you will see how the smallest things will make the biggest differences. For example, shut your computers off at night, plan to reduce your energy usage and track your monthly bill and see the difference. Good for your pocket, good for the earth.

A Few Tips:

• Unplug your Appliances.

  Many appliances use electricity even when they’re turned off. It’s called a Phantom Load, or Vampire Electricity, and as much as 75 percent of the electricity used by home electronics and small appliances is used while they’re turned off.

• Compost improves the soil structure.

  Make compost from vegetable matter (e.g. potato peels, leftover food) and garden waste (e.g. leaves/grass cuttings). Compost improves the soil structure and provides extra nutrients for garden plants.

• Stop subscribing to magazines hat you don’t have time to read your local library will probably stock a range of periodicals.
• Eat more raw vegetables which are healthier for you as well as saves on cooking energy.
• 95% of the plastic bottles are not recycled.Switching from bottled water to filtered tap water helps to go green and saves your money.You could get a high quality staged water filter to make your tap water perfect. Use a BPA-free bottle to take it with you.
• Led lights have more life, less wattage. More life means less garbage. It also produces less heat than other lights.

Great Resources:

• Green Living Tips
• Yahoo Green
• Planet Green
• Global Green USA
• Green Networld
• Tree Hugger
• Your Green Baby

For more tips via Green Living Tips.

I’ve only touched upon the tip of the iceberg on how to live green, there are plenty of ways to start and if you’ve been thinking about it. Here are some great resources to get you started. Good luck and thank-you for at least thinking about going green, any action is better than no action at all m’deres.

Til then, cheers m’deres!

-NPC

Related Articles

• Top 10 environmental stories of 2010. (news.mongabay.com)
• Facts About Environmental Issues (brighthub.com)
• “2010: Earth’s warmest year on record” and related posts (pakspectator.com)