Help Green the Planet

The world has enough for every man's need
but not enough for every man's greed.

Mahatma Gandhi

Everyone knows we must change our ways and our governments hold endless conferences and resolve to change their ecologically harmful policies but not yet. So the downward spiral continues leaving most individuals feeling powerless. Yet the worldwide damage we're doing is the collective result of each of our individual daily acts.
So here are ten things you can do personally - ranging from simple changes to your daily routines, to harder ones that require a high degree of commitment. If you’ve already made all of these changes, congratulations! You’re no longer a part of the problem - you’re a part of the solution!

1 Refuse unnecessary packaging
Always have a shopping bag with you and when you buy something, refuse additional packaging.

Plastic bags are made from petroleum, a non-renewable resource, yet most are thrown away after one use.
Although 60% of plastic waste could be recycled, billions of tons are buried in landfill sites every year.

2 Wash yourself with plain water
Wash your face and body with plain and simple water.It's healthier, just as effective and will save you money. Soap is only necessary to remove ingrained grime. If you don't believe me try it for 10 days. You'll pong a bit for the first day or two while your body re-establishes its natural ecology, then you'll smell sweet, have healthier skin and save yourself money for the rest of your life. And how gratifying to know you're not unnecessarily using up resources or contributing to pollution.

Soap harms the natural ecology of the skin by killing micro-organisms that live there and deal with the skin's waste products. It is the continual removal of these micro-organisms that makes you smell.
Deodorants make things worse because they are powerful chemicals which suppress the body's attempts to rectify the situation, leading to a vicious cycle of applying and washing off unnecessary and harmful industrial products.

3 Use environmentally-friendly products
Whenever possible choose biodegradable and recycled products. They’re dearer at the moment but only because not enough people use them yet.

Ordinary household products contain a cocktail of harmful chemicals which disturb the natural balance of rivers and lakes, cause algae blooms and lead to the death of water plants and fish, and the birds and mammals that feed on them.

4 Wash dishes once daily
Simply stack dirty dishes in a bowl as you use them and only add hot water and half the washing-up liquid you'd normally use when the bowl is full. Most of the cleansing action is due to water. (Virtually none is due to lather!) The average sinkful uses 4 gallons of water while washing up under hot running water can easily use 20. This method works just as well and saves time and money. Cutting out two dish-washing sessions a day will reduce your water consumption by thousands of gallons a year.

Cutting down on water consumption reduces the chemicals and energy used in water and sewage treatment plants as well as the energy needed to pump and heat it.

5 Sort and recycle your rubbish
Keep discarded glass, paper and cans in separate bags and take them to your local recycling centre.

Billions of tonnes of metal, worth billions of pounds, are thrown away annually.
The evergy saved recycling a single glass bottle will light a 100W bulb for 4 hours.

6 Use low-energy light bulbs
LED (Light Emitting Diode) strip-lighting is the lowest energy now available - lower than tungsten halogen or compact fluorescent and a lot lower than filament bulbs. It uses a 15th of the power of filament bulbs so although it’s dearer to buy initially costs a lot less to run and will last for decades.

A 4-watt ½-metre LED strip gives the same light as a 60-watt filament bulb for a 15th of the power.
Billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide are released into the Earth's atmosphere because of humanity's indifference to the millions of filament and fluorescent bulbs left on all night in empty office blocks all over the world... so the last point is obvious:
Turn off unnecessary lights.

7 Use rechargeable batteries
Although rechargeable batteries and a charger cost more initially, you save money in the long run because they can be used again and again.

In Britain alone, 400 million batteries are thrown away with household waste every year. Most end up buried in tips where they corrode, break up and release dangerous poisons, such as mercury or cadmium, into the soil.
Incinerated batteries release their poisons directly into the air.
Although rechargeable batteries also contain poisons (such as cadmium) the fact that they can be re-used hundreds of times helps reduce our hazardous waste problem.

8 All cars must be tuned and shared!
If you really have no alternative to using a car, get it properly tuned, so that it at least gives maximum travelling for the pollution it creates and offer empty seats to others - especially if you make the same journey regularly. Or set up a 'Shared Car-Ownership Scheme'.

Air pollution could be reduced by up to a third if all vehicles were properly tuned.
Every year 105 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, 4.5 million tonnes of carbon monoxide, 100,000 tonnes of hydrocarbons, 2,500 tonnes of tetraethyl lead and huge quantities of nitrogen oxide are dumped into our air by motor vehicles. These are the major pollutants which cause acid rain, ozone-smog, global warming and are permanently changing the climate of the whole planet.
50 times more energy is used manufacturing a car than the car itself will consume in its lifetime. That's why every new car on the road is bad news for the environment and there's no such thing as a ‘green’ car.

9 Walk, cycle or bus!
Walk trips of up to a mile and cycle those of up to 3 or 4 miles. Use public transport for longer trips. You’ll save money, get good exercise and nurture your soul by removing the major source of stress, bad temper and accidents that is driving.

Every time you drive a car you make your biggest contribution to damaging the environment.
Every time you use public transport you strengthen the case for better services and more investment.
A bus can carry as many people as 80 and a train as many as 1000 private cars, each spewing out its brew of toxic fumes.

10 Eat non-animal food!
No one has the right to tell anyone else what to eat, but we should all be aware of the consequences of our choices for the environment. 90% of primary crops produced by intensive chemical farming are fed to animals - so everyone who cuts out animal food helps reduce this assault on our countryside. Fresh fruit and vegetables, salads, grains, seeds, nuts and pulses are recommended by nutritionists as the healthiest diet there is. (Research shows vegetarians live up to 9 years longer than meat-eaters!) For proof that a pure vegetarian diet can be a sensual pleasure too, read The Vegan Cookbook, Alan Wakeman & Gordon Baskerville, Faber & Faber, London 1986 & 1996.

Over 60 vegans can be fed on the land needed for just one meat-eater.
It takes 100 times more water to produce a pound of meat than a pound of wheat.
Over 100,000 square kilometers of tropical rainforest in Brazil and half the forests of Central America have been cleared for beef production.