Roundhouses are for hobbits...apparently not?

I just finished going through a photo gallery on the BBC's website which is certainly worth sharing: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/06/in_pictures_life_in_an_eco_roundhouse/html/1.stm

Our consumer lifestyle is recklessly indulgent. And I don't think we have the time to wait for the government to come up with stricter emission standards, but to take on the responsibility ourselves. Societal attitudes need to change. Just putting your paper in a blue bin really isn't enough. Bringing down the amount of trash and recycle you create is the next step. Using less energy on a daily basis (turn that light off!), wasting less water etc etc.

What I think would be really great is if more eco-friendly products could be more accessible to middle- and low-income earners. I'm talking about eco-friendly building materials, and clean energy sources like solar panels (so easy to install on rooftops), things that will have an enormous impact, if taken up wholesale. But for most people, these are too costly. It's analogous to expecting a poor person to shop at Whole Foods for healthy foods rather than going to McDonalds for an unhealthy but considerably cheaper meal.

Although, come to think of it, cooperative communities/attitudes could manage where individual households cannot in achieving energy independence. For example, a single streetlight provides light for about 4-5 houses around it, right? That means that if we replace regular street lights with a solar-charged LED light, with contributions from each household, the costs would be about $100 per household for the panel, the light and the battery/converter kit. Imagine how much energy & money could be saved by getting rid of every street light in the country. Now I know that we don't pay for our street lights, at least not directly, but I'm just using this as an example. If someone wants to start a project replacing streetlights with solar-powered ones, I'm all for it...

There's also a downside to renewable/clean energy, however, that I should point out. The use of corn to produce ethanol caused an increase in corn prices, impacting consumers detrimentally. Cellulosic ethanol requires too much energy to produce. Even the use of non-useful plants for ethanol production (there's a plant in India--I can't remember the name), can cause a shift in production as farmers stop growing other essential products, such as soya bean. Wind turbines are not simply eyesores, the setting up of a wind farm also takes up large tracts of land. Solar panels won't work so well in perennially cloudy areas. When applying these different technologies, I think we must not give up any but rather plan on a combination of them to balance out economic and environmental issues. Diversifying our sources of energy is only practical, the dependence on oil proves that if nothing else.

Getting back to the article that sparked this blog: Now, I'm not ready to give up some of the conveniences that Tony Wrench and Jane Faith have, such as washing machines (washing by hand is not pleasant), but I really admire their philosophy of living within one's means and practising a low-impact lifestyle. I've been trying to slowly change my lifestyle to be make more environmentally conscious choices. These decisions have not even meant major sacrifices, I'm building up towards them! Here are some things I've done (and many others have also taken up).

**Using eco-friendly (i.e. natural), concentrated detergent: regular detergent is made less concentrated by adding water and ends up requiring more plastic for packaging, a waste all round. My clothes are no dirtier, and nor am I spending more money (I may be saving money actually...). Likewise with dishwashing detergent and cleaning sprays, household freshening sprays etc. etc. I use only naturally made products. This is partially because bleach smells disgusting and I am too paranoid to use it on places where my skin will touch it...i.e. everywhere.

**I have had one roll of paper towels in my kitchen all year. And I didn't buy it, it was already there and so far I've used maybe five sheets of it. Instead, I bought a very cheap set of kitchen cloths and use them for the same purpose. They can be regularly cleaned with my laundry and reused. I also only buy toilet paper that's made of 100% recycled paper.

**Not using a hot water cycle in the washing machine, cold cycles work fine 99.9% of the time. I have a very white-collar lifestyle and so my clothes do not collect grime that may warrant hot water usage. This also means that I don't do two separate loads of whites and colours (even washing machines are racist?!) I also run the dryer for a shorter period than a normal hour-long cycle. Victoria is too rainy to allow for air drying or I may be tempted to use that system instead.

**Limiting my use of the vacuum cleaner to every two weeks, sweeping regularly instead. I have a small place, it takes thirty minutes to sweep up the entire apartment! Turning off unused lights, and generally unplugging devices which are not in regular use. Turning the heat down/off when leaving a room/the flat.

**Buying local/close to local produce whenever possible, and limiting my intake of imported foods which have to travel incredibly long distances. BC grows great apples, but tomatoes unfortunately come from either California or Mexico most of the year...what can you do? Also, I like my European cheeses. But I have started purchasing Canadian produced chocolate...without realising it.

These are just a few things among many that anyone can do and I'm always looking for suggestions of how to decrease my carbon footprint...