How much water is in your kettle? April 21, 2008

It’s easy to get overwhelmed by the issue of climate change.  But, there are lots of small things that, when multiplied, can make an appreciable difference in how much energy we use.

Do you heat water for coffee, tea, or cocoa?  There’s one thing that I know I am guilty of: putting too much water in the kettle.  When I fill my travel mug in the morning, I want it to hold as much as possible.  It’s annoying to be rushing to leave the house, only to find that your mug is only 2/3 full.  So, what do I do? Make sure there’s plenty of water in the kettle before I turn on the stove.

As it turns out, it’s a very wasteful thing to do.  A recent Ethical Living Blog in the UK Guardian states the people routinely boil twice as much water as they need.   The Energy Saving Trust, a non-profit organization charged with cutting emissions of carbon dioxide (CO₂) by promoting the sustainable and efficient use of energy, concluded that if residents of the UK were to each boil the water they need to make a cup of tea instead of filling the kettle every time, they could save enough electricity in a year to run nearly half of all the street lighting in the country.

So, what can you do?  It just takes a minute to measure the amount of water required to fill your cup or mug and then adding it to the kettle before putting it on to boil.  If you do, you’ll have started the day by doing something good for the environment.

For a future post – which is more efficient, using an electric kettle, or the stove?  Comments are welcome in advance.

Greening your office March 26, 2008

Apparently even those who are dedicated environmentalists at home tend to be slackers in the office.   Is it the lack of ownership of the situation that makes people less dedicated, or maybe the anonymity?  At the risk of appearing to be a vigilante, I’ve started to do the following:

• I try not to print.  This has two benefits.  Aside from saving paper, it helps keep my desk neater.  There are some times that I have to print. When making copy edits I still prefer to have a hard copy.  When I can, I print double-sided, or if it’s a PowerPoint presentation, I print 2 slides on a page if not too many numbers or graphs are included.  One important step, from Dan Costa’s article at PC Magazine, is to use Print Preview (in the File dropdown menu in Word, or via the icon with paper and a magnifying glass).  Make sure your document isn’t just one line too long (if so choose Shrink to Fit) or that your spreadsheet isn’t spilling over into unnecessary pages.
• I turn out lights when I leave a conference room, and have been known to duck into unused rooms to turn lights off.
• I bring home my discarded papers to recycle.  Even though we all have blue recycling bins, the paper goes into the same garbage as everything else, so I keep a pile of recycling under my desk and bring it home every so often.  This has also encouraged me to print less.
• I have a china cup and often make my own coffee or tea.  Aside from decreasing the amount of garbage I generate in a day, it also saves money.  I must admit, however, that I often go to the cafe to buy coffee in the morning with my colleagues because I don’t want to miss the social aspect.

This leads me to one of the things I think is most important for us all to remember.  We don’t have to be perfect.   Whether it’s recycling or budgeting or dieting, we can’t expect to live up to impossible standards.  The point is that if we all try a little, we can make a difference.

Big Green Purse March 21, 2008

Big Green Purse is a website founded by Diane MacEachern, which focuses on the power of women to impact environmental issues by their shopping choices. According to Diane, women spend (I wonder if she means “control the spend”?) of $.85 of ever dollar spent in the marketplace, therefore women can influence change by choosing environmentally-safe, socially responsible products and services.

Diane has also just published a new book , also called Big Green Purse. Try to get it at your local library and save a tree!

No water / tap water / bottled water March 19, 2008

As World Water Day approaches, this Saturday March 22, it seems fitting to talk about bottled water. Maybe the tide is starting to turn. Beverage Digest reported that bottled water sales in 2007 grew only 9% vs. 16% in 2006 (excluding vending machines and Wal-Mart). Let’s hope that some of this is attributable to more consumers just refilling their water bottles with tap water.

An article by Richard Brill in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin details all the reasons why we shouldn’t buy bottled water. The discarded bottles at the side of the road or in people’s trash are only the tip of the iceberg. Apparently 90% of the environmental impact takes place before the bottle is opened. Read the article for some startling facts.

“What’s wrong with tap water?” ask members of The Rabun Gap-Nacoochee School’s Environmental Stewardship project. They found that it’s actually permissible for water labeled “spring water” to come from a tap, and that 25% of bottled water comes from municipal water systems.
What can you do?

1. Stop buying bottled water. If you must, buy it in a large container, so the plastic to water ratio is lower. Try not to buy it from a local producer to reduce its carbon footprint.
2. Recycle any plastic bottles you do purchase.
3. If you try to do good by reusing your plastic bottles, be aware that over time plastic bottles leach chemicals into the water, especially if cracked or exposed to high temperatures (e.g. a hot car), so only reuse them a few times.
4. Reusable glass or stainless steel is best. Here are a few places to order reusable containers: kleancanteen.com & mysigg.com.

Lastly, remember how fortunate we are to have safe and convenient tap water. Celebrated since 1993, World Water Day is an international day of observance and action to draw attention to the plight of the more than 1 billion people world wide that lack access to clean, safe drinking water. Major events and activities are being planned in New York, Los Angeles, and Seattle as well as select local communities. Instead of buying bottled water in the week ahead, drink tap water and sign up for the Walk for Water in New York, Los Angeles or Seattle, or for the Virtual Walk for Water, this Saturday, March 22, World Water Day.

Back to the future: Windpower on the seas again March 19, 2008

This is a bit off topic, but I can’t help but mention a newsworthy event. I read on the Lingua Franca blog that today The Beluga Group signed a contract to furnish a diesel freighter with sail power. The sails, by SkySails, a German company founded in 2001, are not like the sails of old. A 160 meter kite-like sail helped to propel the MV Beluga SkySails across the seas last month, and as a result 20% less fuel was consumed. The savings during the 2-month voyage added up to 2.5 tons of fuel, or $1000 a day. The goal is to save twice that much as the technology is improved.

There’s something majestic about seeing even the modern-looking kite-sail on the open sea:

SkySails expects that ships fitted with the special sails will be able to reduce their fuel consumption on average from 10-35%, and for short periods as much as 50% depending on the actual wind conditions and the time deployed.