What have you done personally to help the environment?

Question

With all the talk of global warming, I'm interested to hear what people have done individually to help out. Thanks in advance for your answers.

Answer 1

I started my local Freecycle group in 2004 and now have over 1900 members recycling unwanted items for free and keeping tons from the landfill every week!  Find your local group by visiting www.freecycle.org

Answer 2

Recycle! Recycle! Recycle! I donate my childrens old clothing. recycle my plastics, cardboard and papers. Old towels are great kitchen clothes to wash the floors. Old blankets I donate to the animal shelters or vets.

Answer 3

http://answers.yahoo.com/my/my;_ylt=AkOj...

check my best answers ,that is what i do here ,

http://answers.yahoo.com/dir/;_ylt=AhgEZ...

and i talk to farmers about sustainble farming,water harvesting ,reforestation and organic pest control

to kids i talk about Environmental awareness

and i have made some parks and a lot of gardens

until recently i was working for a department of ecology for a Mexican municipality ,and before that on a citizens council to clean up and protect a large catchment area of a river

And in the garden where i sit now we have a lot of visitors to whom we sell the idea that nature is our friend

Answer 4

I cut my use of gasoline by 66% by driving a Prius.

I reduced my electricity consumption by 75% by putting solar panels on my house.

I reduced the amount of garbage I toss by 50% by recycling and composting.

Answer 5

DONT RECYCLE! A bit extreme, but not everything should be recycled!

Here in the UK most of the glass we dipose of is from wine & beer bottles & is green. We hardly produce anything that is made of green glass therefore that glass has to be transported to somewhere that does. This is far more energy intensive than making new glass.

In the paper recycling process a lot of bleach is used to get white paper suitable for printing on. Bleach is a very harmful chemical. Using paper from a renewable source & composting it at home is as near to environmentally friendly as you are going to get.

Fuel. Indonesia is going to be the first major oil producing country to run out of oil in approx 5 years.

In the UK 2% of our Co2 output comes from personal transport.

Globally, last year, 16% of ALL Co2 output was from Indonesia. They are systematically burning down their rainforests to clear the space to grow crops to produce biofuels to replace oil. Not so environmentally friendly now!

I believe the concequences of resource shortages will have far more of an impact than we are currently having. i.e. conservation is the key - walking, using public transport, house insulation, turn down your heating, turn off lights, dont waste, fuel efficient car, etc.

We should be investin far more in alternative fuel supplies. Most of the Sahara desert is unusable. Why is it not covered in solar farms? A massive proportion of out energy could be produced in this way with a minimal detrimental effect on the environment.

Personally, i wouldnt worry about global warming. It is undoubtedly happening, but its causes are extremely contencious. Co2 is proven to have an effect, but what percentage of current warming is as a result is completely unknown - it could be a tiny percentage. For example, temperatures on Mars have increased by 0.5C since 1970, the same as on this planet. No human greenhouse gasses there!

Scientists are split about 50/50 as to whether we are having an effect on global temperatures, but we only hear from those who believe we are. Why is that? Governments fund scientific research & publication. They are currently making huge amounts of cash from green taxes. Are they going to fund someone who is going to debase that? No.

The truth needs to come out soon. If we are responsible for global warming then we need to be doing something about it now on a large scale, but a lot of people dont believe so wont do anything.

Conservation of resources usually has an upside environmentally so i believe that conservation is the key.

For my part i gave up my car 2 years ago & now walk, lift share or take public transport everywhere.

Answer 6

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Here's what I did. I bought an electric car. Everybody here could too. Check out the link at the end.

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A couple years ago I spotted an electric car for sale on eBay. On a whim, I bought it - it only cost me $2000. It took another couple thousand to fix up the rust and replace the batteries (it's quite old, from 1981.)

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But now I drive it to and from work every day. It gets about 4 miles to the kilowatt-hour, and there is a special off-peak electric rate available here for charging (overnight) of only 3 cents per KWH. So that's less than ONE PENNY per mile!

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It does freeway speeds, and looks and handles like a normal car. The battery pack is good for 20,000 miles, and costs $800 to replace, so that's another 4 cents per mile. Total cost of driving, 5 cents per mile - way cheaper than gas.

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Why is electricity so much cheaper than gas? Because electric cars are several times more efficient than gas vehicles. This also means that more miles can be driven on less energy (and therefore less pollution per mile is created.)

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And there's almost no maintenance! The electric motor has only one moving part - there's no oil changes, no filters, timing belts, spark plugs, coolant, none of that stuff. My motor still has all the original parts from 1981 - it has never needed service!

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I made a webpage - a picture of my car is at the top. Here's some info on how to find inexpensive electric cars:

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http://www.squidoo.com/cheap-electric-ca...

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Answer 7

I burn all my paper products in the chimney indtead of the trash where the landfills are

Answer 8

All my lights in the house are CFL bulbs, which also saves on my electric bill.  I do all my gardening by hand no machines.  I compost and recycle and my family throws away one small bag of garbage every 2 weeks.  I keep my car tuned up and drive only when necessary otherwise I walk or bike.

Answer 9

I make sure everyone hears the "inconvenient thruth" about our existance and upload the film "an incomveninet truth" Made my family be much more "green" and that's just a beginning I will become a vegatarian and make other people have a green life :P