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A 2007 survey of 1,012 Americans found that three-fifths of us identify with the label. We think global warming is real and serious. We think the nation is on the wrong environmental and energy track. But when it comes to spending a little extra for green alternatives, the vast majority of us balk.
In places where utilities offer their customers power from renewable sources like wind and solar, the average rate of participation is an abysmal 1.8 percent. What all this means is that most people consider themselves enviros and agree with the statement “Alternative energy is the most important energy-related issue facing the U.S. today” but aren’t willing to spend an extra $6 a month to support it.
But you’re different. Because you’ve read this far, I know something else about you. I know that you’re a problem solver, you want to do your part to save the earth, and you don’t mind a few numbers thrown your way. So here are 17 ways all of us can start being better environmentalists right now. They’re something we can all have in common.
1. Go Low-Carb
The way to make the biggest impact on the environment is to do three things. The first, and biggest, is to reduce your energy use through energy efficiency and reducing demand. Figure out ways you can go on a low-carbon diet by hitting the greenhouse gas hotspots: electricity and natural gas, driving and the environmental impacts of the stuff you buy (local tangerines vs. Chilean ones, tap water vs. water bottled from a distant island nation). Reduce as much as you possibly can before you do anything else—we’ve got some ideas in this issue. That means watching your lighting and heating and not buying things that are energy-intensive to make or recycle. A great start is buying compact fluorescents, installing good insulation, driving less and bringing your own bags when you shop.2. Buy Renewable Energy
Since getting the lights to turn on is the most carbon-intensive activity we have (think of the boiler room on the Titanic, only without the Irish accents and about a bazillion times bigger), the next best thing you can do, after getting as lean and clean as possible, is buy renewable energy. You can’t do it through Pacific Gas and Electricity yet, but you can through online renewable energy sellers. After you take a quick look at your electric bill to figure out your current usage, they can match up your brown power with an equivalent amount of renewable energy certificates. To search for renewable energy that meets the strictest environmental criteria, check outwww.green-e.org/buy.
3. Offset the Rest
For greenhouse gas emissions you can’t avoid, like plane flights and car trips, you can buy carbon offsets. Carbon offsets represent a reduction in greenhouse gasses, measured in tons of carbon dioxide, that you can match up one-to-one with your own emissions, effectively canceling out yours. There are many different kinds of projects that reduce greenhouse gases and are part of this global marketplace—projects like renewable energy, forestry, methane capture from landfills and dairies, and industrial gas reduction in developing countries. The tons are reduced, and your offset buys the rights to the ones you bought, creating a market-based incentive to develop more projects that reduce greenhouse gases worldwide. Look for Green-e Climate Certified offsets (www.green-e.org/climate), or ones that are verified by Gold Standard, Voluntary Carbon Standard or Clean Development Mechanism. Prices range from $4 to $20 a ton (some projects are more expensive than others to run, thus the price difference). Check out www.ecobusinesslinks.com/carbon_offset_wind_credits_carbon_reduction.htm for a great comparison chart. You can start by checking out Bonneville Environmental Foundation (www.greentagsusa.org), The Carbon Neutral Company (www.carbonneutral.com), NativeEnergy (www.nativeenergy.com) and Terrapass (www.terrapass.com). Just remember, reduce your load first, offset last.4. Pick up a Low-Flow Showerhead (for Free)
That’s right, first we tell you that you’re not supposed to drive, then we take away your plastic grocery bags and now we tell you to take short showers with a low-flow showerhead. The inhumanity! But acting as a cooling balm on that open wound is the fact that you can get these aesthetically bereft but reasonably effective nodes for free from two locations in Oakland, courtesy of the East Bay Municipal Utility District. Check out www.ebmud.com/conserving_&_recycling/conservation_devices/ for more details. Limit 10 per household.5. Be the King of Conservation
What’s that you say? They make toilets with a little flush and a big flush? And you thought American ingenuity was dead. And now, for an unspecified amount of time, you can unload your antique one-size-fits-all flusher in exchange for one fit for royalty, and even get cash back from the ’MUD (up to $150 back or the cost of a new commode). New WaterSmart high-efficiency toilets use 20 percent less water (presumably even on the big flush), so you don’t have to feel bad if “letting it mellow” grosses you out. Now you can beat those naturists at their own game. Take that, nudie!6. Take a Personal Greenhouse Gas Inventory
Otherwise known as a carbon calculator, a greenhouse gas inventory is a little spreadsheet where you enter the details of your life and it tells you how many kittens are going to perish because of the amount you drive, fly, heat your house and forget to recycle. The results are in tons of CO2, the most common greenhouse gas. It’s a useful exercise to help determine where you can trim to make the most difference, and if you’re buying offsets, how many you need to buy. There are many calculators out there. Take a look at the one you can download from Clean Air, Cool Planet at www.cleanair-coolplanet.org/OfficeFootprint.php. For an easy online version, see the one with the name everyone’s wincing about—the U.S. EPA’s Emissions Calculator, available at www.epa.gov/climatechange/emissions/ind_calculator.html.7. Ban Styrofoam
Styrofoam is a bad actor for two reasons: Considered the asbestos of the plastic world, it flakes into smaller and smaller pieces, but never really goes away. It’s light, and so it gets washed out to sea, where it resembles food for seabirds and fish. The animals eat it, and it begins to take up so much room in their stomachs that they starve to death, while adult birds even feed the tiny pieces to their chicks. It is a major component of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, the world’s largest landfill that floats between here and Hawaii, the natural accumulation of the estimated 10 percent of plastic that ends up in the world’s oceans. Styrofoam is hard to dispose of and harder still to recycle, a couple reasons why Oakland passed a Styrofoam ban in 2006. Avoid the packing peanuts and the take-out containers, two major sources.8. Put eWaste in its Place
It seems like you could build a supercomputer from all the motherboards and fatherboards and graphics cards and nanoaccellerators and iPods and eMacs and LCDs and CRTs and mice and chips and Nokias and Sidekicks and Where You At?s. But instead of being networked together in a Rube Goldbergian–SETI assist or RC5-64 challenge, the neglected middle children of our technological age are being shipped overseas to developing countries, where the plastics are often burned off the metals, and the boards are chipped apart by hand. Throwing them in the landfill isn’t an option, where the toxic metals can leach into groundwater (and as of February 2006, it’s against the law). Instead, try to donate your electronics to a nonprofit or school. Then check out www.erecycle.org for a recycler near you, or just drop it off at the Alameda County Computer Resource Center (www.accrc.org) on Eastshore Highway or Alameda County’s Household Hazardous Waste facility at 2100 E. Seventh St. You can make an appointment by calling (800) 606-6606.9. Use the Green Bin
Sure, you recycle cans and bottles and ticket stubs, but do you compost? OK, so the green bin can get a little sticky, and there isn’t exactly a very good place on the counter for it, but it’s a crucial third of the recycling trifecta. Composting organic waste lets nutrients get back to the soil instead of being buried underground, where they break down and create methane, a harmful greenhouse gas (See Waste and Recycling, p. 21). Oakland’s so serious about composting, it even hosted the U.S. Composting Council’s 16th Annual Conference in February (Biosolids Trends and Case Studies! Odor Management and Control!) Use the bin for yard and food waste, and you’ll be helping the earth and the sky. See www.oaklandpw.com/Page298.aspx for what can be included.10. Buy Green
The Bay Area Green Business Program certifies companies that are doing a little something extra on the environmental front, like buying recycled materials, using less toxic cleaners, upgrading their lighting and installing low-flow appliances. Businesses that qualify as official Green Businesses get to fly the logo, so you can easily tell them apart from their less forward-thinking brethren. Find the list of businesses participating in the program at www.greenbiz.ca.gov/ShopGreen.html.11. Is That a Bike Lane I See?
Nothing says freedom like a bike. You think driving around is easy; try doing it on two wheels. No traffic, ever. No looking for a spot to park in, ever. You drop five pounds, park right in front every time and never pay for gas. It’s the best thing you’ll ever do for yourself, besides kicking the habit. The folks at Oakland’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Program are working to make biking even easier for us and just scored a few victories for two-wheelers: In December, the city council approved the first update to the city’s Bicycle Master Plan since 1999, a proposal that guides the creation of new bike lanes towards the goal of a united Bikeway Network. Take your neglected bike to the shop before Bike to Work Day on May 15 and have the mechanics give it the once-over—most of the time, no matter how long it’s sat in the garage, all it takes is a quick pump and a turn of the wrench to get coasting again. Check out the Bicycle Program page at www.oaklandbikes.info.12. Buy Compact Fluorescents
OK, no envirolist would be complete without the omnipresent, unapologetic, inimitable mother of all environmental tips. OK, here it is. Are you ready? Don’t miss this one, because it’s going to be good and you don’t want to have to look it up on YouTube later. Here goes, whabap: swap out your incandescent bulbs for compact fluorescents. They use a fourth the amount of electricity for the same amount of light, last 10 times as long and can save 2,000 times their weight in greenhouse gas. What you might not know if you skipped this story last year is that they come in different color temperatures (no more green skin or blue walls) and the light is brighter, truer and more, I dunno, modern-seeming than the old yellow lights. They’re a little more expensive than the incandescents, but they pay off the difference quickly.13. Move Downtown
Come on, wouldn’t it be nice to walk to get coffee in the morning? To be able to walk to BART, and get a fat breakfast and a Bloody Mary on Sunday? If you never think about what you miss about your days as an urban 20-something, it’s usually about being close to the action, about not having to drive everywhere, about not being landlocked in your nice house with your nice yard next to that funny couple that you can never remember her name, and what’s with that creeping vine? By living in an apartment that will still be connected to the mainland after we hit peak oil, you’ll save gallons of gas and hours of aggravation, starting the moment you move in. Check out the deals on a loft building downtown or by Jack London Square.14. Ah, Fresh Mokelumne-Brand Water
Blue sky, no one around for miles, a gurgling stream cold with Sierra snowmelt. If this water was a thousand feet deep, it’s so clear you could see a penny on the bottom. If I were a businessman, I’d bottle it, call it “liquid crystal” and sell it all over the East Bay. And you know what? People would buy it, even though it comes straight from the tap. The Mokelumne River is the source for everything that gets water poured on, over or in it, in and around the East Bay (see Water, p. 15), but it gets left behind in favor of bottled water way too much. The city itself spends $45,000 a year on water that could have been bottled in Oklahoma City and is usually sold to consumers at a 300,000 percent markup. Head to REI or Wilderness Exchange and pick up a clear-plastic Nalgene bottle or PVC-free aluminum SIGG bottle, and get your bottled water straight from the tap. Just the way nature intended.15. Sack the Bag
I cannot tell the story better than Council Member Nancy Nadel’s memo to the Oakland Public Works Committee on June 26, 2007, about banning plastic bags in the city. “Globally, 500 billion to 1 trillion single-use disposable bags are used each year, which is over one million per minute, the production of which requires over 12 million barrels of oil and results in the deaths of thousands of marine animals through ingestion and entanglement. Californians alone use 19 billion such bags each year, and throw away 600 per second.” You may be seeing people at places other than Berkeley Bowl finally bringing their own bags, and it’s refreshing to see a simple practice that makes so much sense finally being widely embraced (though perennially challenged). But then, we have to remind ourselves that this is still the Bay Area, and we’re often environmental early adopters, but times they are a changin’ all over the rest of the country, too. Pick up real bags at Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s.16. Watch Those Highway Miles
California is actually a pretty clean state when it comes to electrical production, switching to cleaner-burning natural gas in the late 1970s to try to reverse the era’s serious air-quality issues. Today, natural gas makes up a third of our energy production. Our biggest greenhouse gas contribution is from our state’s endless highways. California is the third-largest consumer of gas in the world (after China and the rest of the country), even with our stringent emission standards. That’s why we need to do everything we can to get off the road, and barring that, be more efficient when we’re on it. Keep your tires pumped up, your air filter changed, take that bulky cargo box off your roof and drive slower. Start biking and taking transit. Keep your cars as long as is feasible (they’re energy-intensive to produce), then, when it comes time to shop, check the gas sippers first.
17. Wrap Your House in a Big Wooly Blanket
Our homes take a lot of juice to keep comfy, from AC in the summer to natural gas and space heaters in the winter, so make sure it’s insulated. You don’t need to start ripping your walls apart to get at the cotton-candy center; just concentrate on the attic, the place where most houses give up their heat. Layer insulation to achieve an R-value of at least 50. Be careful with ripping out older vermiculite insulation, though; some contains asbestos. Check out the U.S. Department of Energy’s guide to attic insulation at www.eere.energy.gov/consumer/your_home/insulation_airsealing.
