More green tips
A friend sent me a list of suggested ecological (via Goolgle Translate)...
Other bulbs: Replace incandescent bulbs with low-energy. They are more expensive but last up to ten times more, and spend four to five times less. This was the first council of the promotion campaign A film Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore. The Australian government earlier this year forced to undertake this change in the country, a revolution of bulbs. We have to reduce energy consumption. Our behavior is critical to slowing climate change, which, according to experts, this century will cause an increase in average temperatures of two to four degrees, a rise in the waters of the seas 28 to 43 cm and 20 percent extinction of species.
Too much garbage, garbage bags of our homes do not stop gaining weight. Another symptom of the consumer society. Remember the golden rule for triple manage waste: reduce, reuse and recycle. Society advances in recycling, but not in the first two options. From near and a half kilo of waste generated each day at home, almost half a kilo up to packaging and wrapping. These materials are very bulky, and often unnecessary and even difficult to recycle. We should avoid buying products with excessive packaging. If we follow this simple rule, our trash bags have solved most of their weight.
The sun at home: renewable energies are being implemented. Promote wind turbines is an excellent alternative. Despite the extraordinary potential of sun we have, is very poorly developed panel installations in homes. Germany and Austria, which support many cloudy days, are at the forefront.
A sweater and a canopy: If you have individual heating, install a thermostat to control spending. Before turn up the heat or air conditioning, try other options that do not require energy, such as wearing a sweater in winter, or generate cross-currents of air in summer. Let's hand also awnings, blinds and ceiling fans in hot weather. And what time vigilant ventilate the spaces. If the end is not enough these measures, at least have reduced the needs for heat or cold of the initial situation. Note also that improvements in housing insulation allow energy and economic savings of up to 30 percent in heating and air conditioning.
Technological waste: waste Beware technological electronics contain hazardous substances. A mobile phone battery can contaminate cadmium 600,000 liters water. Do not dispose of these waste waste. Bring to a clean point. And think twice before switching device. To make a computer have required 240 kilos of fossil fuels, 22 kilos of chemicals and 1500 liters water. Making a phone involves generating up to 75 kilos of waste pollutants, but then we sold as a breakthrough their small size.
Faucets in good condition: Beware of the water. Check all taps home. That not drip. One way to reduce consumption is to place flow diffusers.
Watch bills: Check each month water bills and energy to track consumption. Moreover, plan to lower it. Check a challenge, a goal. If successful, double satisfaction.
Market: buy furniture durable. This does not mean they have to be new, we can also recycle some or go to thrift stores.
Drop by drop: If you have a garden, install drip irrigation. Make your own compost organic waste. And he's careful use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers.
Letters of paper: We pray that invoices and monthly statements arrive in our e-mail instead of letters to mail home. Less paper to throw away.
Drive less: The most important rule for our urban environment more livable: drive less. The cars are now consuming 20 percent less than 20 years ago. The data sing: it is found that one in ten journeys made by car in the city is to move less than 500 meters , A distance that we can cover virtually all healthy foot.
ECOAUTO: If our only option is the car, look for one that consumed the least. Do not forget that the larger vehicles spend more than small ones. And much of their consumption also depends on the person behind the wheel. Efficient driving can reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions by 15 percent. First rule: a moderate, steady speed.
Compact city: If you are looking for a house to rent or buy, shuffle seriously considering living in the heart of the city, preferably in a renovated old building. Do not let the death of the compact city model, so human, and the city changed to widespread, scattered, much like the U.S., a succession of developments in which it is difficult to establish relationships between neighbors and force us to depend on the vehicle private.
More green: Reclaim parkland, small lungs for our city. Play an important psychological function. It is proven that in neighborhoods with green recreational areas, levels of conflict, stress and depression decrease their neighbors. They are a valve of decongestion.
Less noise: A bit of silence, please. Caring for the environment is not only the health of the planet, but also for ours, the balance of all the beings that inhabit Earth. For we must keep our behavior in the city is very noisy. Noise pollution impairs the quality of life of a city and also has direct health effects, the most clear: nervousness, irritability and stress.
Non-consumptive recreation: Choose a less-consumptive recreation. Do not let an obsession with buying the condition and become the hero of his free time.
More Bicycles: Move a bicycle, if the terrain, weather and traffic in their city permit. And if you see it is not safe to move on two wheels, requiring your local bike lanes.
Escapes: Tell municipal services when it detects a leak in the distribution network.
The brightness of the stars: Have your town that street lighting is efficient and low consumption, which does not waste light into the sky, which also pollutes the stars.
More participatory: 60 percent of the population lives in cities. The pace of urban concentration continues at an increasingly rapid pace. Do not adopt a passive attitude. Mobilize. The city we do together. Participate in neighborhood associations and movements, and takes into account the true environmental commitments when you vote.
Your money or your life: When we go to buy, do not forget to take our own bag, basket or cart. Plastic bags are an environmental cost too high for use on a single journey home market. Can take hundreds of years to decompose, in their nearly 25 year history have become a plague. The web www.reusablebags.com ensures that every minute is manufactured in the world about a million plastic bags. You can also ask your local supplier to provide other types of reusable bags.
Bet on the biological: Opt for organic food, also known as biological or bio. From agriculture and livestock that does not use synthetic chemicals to enhance their performance or to combat pests. Can not we appreciate us? Support the efforts of these farmers and ranchers who have decided to change the environment.
While the glass is recycled: glass, carton, plastic or aluminum can? What to choose when the same product can be found in different packaging? "The best is glass," says Juan Lopez de Uralde, director of Greenpeace Spain, which ensures that the purchase does not come without your basket or bag. And then the glass? He says plastic than PVC and tin are easier to recycle the cartons. "However, when in doubt, I take the less packaging by offering more content."
Respect to fish: The fish, we must read the label identifying each fish. It must include the type of gear used in fishing. The more selective, more sustainable (better longlines with hooks or nets).
Less carnivores: To produce a kilo of wheat requires about 1,000 liters water, and for a kilo of rice, 1,400 liters According to the World Water Council. However, for a kilo of beef requires 13,000 liters . Go with the meat! Reduce your consumption. No need to eat so much, with two or three servings a week is sufficient. With food, think first of all health. Also tends to be as environmentally friendly. Let us heed the experts in nutrition and follow a balanced diet with plenty of fruit and vegetables.
Nearby: Buy local products, because to get to the counter market have required less travel and therefore less energy.
Tap water: Think about whether it is worth buying bottled water when you can drink out of bobbin. Increases energy costs and create a future waste.
Sin bin: Buy in bulk natural foods whenever possible. Reduce packaging and will be improved. Avoid taking home those white trays increasingly common in the supermarket.
Warning: GM: One of the enemy number one of the environmentalists are the GM. Do not drink because they say it still lacks evidence to prove its safety to human health and the environment. Their presence must be notified in the product label.
The small business: Avoid going by car to a place far away if we can make the purchase without leaving the neighborhood walking. Support small business.
More sobriety: Bet on the simple life, consume less, think more. The economist EF Schumacher ended his days as a farmer and wrote the librofilosofía Small is beautiful. Whole philosophy of life. According to the European Report on Consumer Addiction, 15 percent of the population is addicted to consumption and 46 percent of youth purchase excess. Think a bit: developed countries (20 per cent of the population) use 80 percent of natural resources. If all the world's people consume at this rate, the Earth would be dead in no time. Before buying a new garment, a new appliance, consider whether you really need. Behind every object, however simple, is energy consumption, waste generation, small amount of water.
Think about what you throw: The Mexican writer and Nobel laureate Octavio Paz was very critical: "Having fallen into idolatry of ideological systems, the twentieth century has ended in the worship of things." Before you buy, reuse. A little imagination and you can save much trouble to Earth (and pocket). An egg carton can be recycled as a toy for children, a beautiful glass bottle, in a small vase, the averages can be converted into dolls, with remnants of fabrics can make quilts or blankets for the couch. There are hundreds of ideas.
Limits on "fastfa - Shion" We are very critical of the fastfood, since the same be done with the fastfashion (fast fashion), disposable garments that barely last a season. Thus, from the ecological point of view, it is an aberration. Give them a second chance at things. Go to stores where they sell second-hand clothes. Help these objects have a new life against wasteful impulse to shorten his life growing with slogans such as "is old-fashioned" or "redecorate your life."
More sustainable wood: Wood is a very ecological, but when it bears the name of some exotic tropical species may have come from the deforestation of the world's last virgin forests. We must be sure that the product you want to buy come from sustainably harvested.
Fair trade: When you buy something, do you think of where it comes from? Bit for bit, little decision a small decision, the consumer can greatly influence what is produced and how it occurs. We realize that our actions, however insignificant they may seem, have environmental, social and economic. One recommendation: go to the fair trade stores that have opened some NGOs.
Recycled paper: In the stationery, buy products (folders, notebooks, books, folios) made from unbleached recycled paper and chlorine.
Banks with initiative: A time to save, go to those banks know that investing a portion of their benefits in promoting social and environmental initiatives.
Dignity of Work: Help keep what has been done with quality and dignity. Avoid industrial mass production in factories in countries where not clear that respect for workers.
Toys and time: Do not saturate the children by giving them toys that they will not appreciate. Value plus other things that the largest spend more time with them or teach them to make their own entertainment using the imagination.
Learn: Read press continue now, be interested in the world. An informed consumer is a responsible consumer. So you know which companies are unsustainable.
One resident, a seed: In the twentieth century, the 5000 million hectares of forest cover was reduced to less than 4000 million, the World Bank. Plant a tree. And best of an indigenous species. Apart from the satisfaction of assisting their growth and improve the landscape in a country with such trend of desertification, there is a critical input to curb climate change: on average, a single tree absorbs one ton of carbon dioxide over of his life.
Careful with fire: Very important: prevent forest fires. We must be very careful in our stays in the field or woods, do not light a fire in the field or pasture or stubble burning or grills or campfires. At the time of high-risk summer months, especially if there is drought, better not to do or places provided for such purpose, any spark could end in disaster. Do not throw cigarette butts on the ground matches, or any burning object or paper, plastic, glass or any other waste which may come in combustion and cause a fire.
Without engines: For rural areas and natural sites attempt to use the least possible motor vehicles that break the calm that we love, drive away animals, disrupt the tranquility of the villagers, and forest roads , severely eroded soil. Circular with the terrain in every corner is more predator than adventurous. Infinitely better biking, horse, donkey or foot.
Best rehabilitation: If looking for a house on the outskirts of the city, it is best to choose the rehabilitation of an old building in town that the building of new housing developments. It may be more cumbersome and perhaps even more expensive, but the choice of the typical house has more charm, in the end we will make our own, and avoid permanent urban developments that both are attacking our landscapes. The same can be applied to the costs. It is better to opt for the built and natural areas that invade more.
Denounce the outrages: Report that includes attacks against the natural environment from a facility that is polluting a river or stream to the burning of tires, or uncontrolled landfills, or the use of poisons, which continue to ravage the countryside, and illegal fences. Report also all those illegal development projects seeking only faster enrichment of few at the expense of abusing the natural landscape. Do not install in the comfort looking the other way.
Less browsers: Respect the rules of each site in all areas relating to camping and climbing. Scroll through these spaces without leaving routes enabled.
From village to village: Rural tourism is a great way to contribute to the modest savings of the people living in the countryside and to help set people in small towns.
The "souvenir": A wonderful way to contact with nature and is fond of her photograph. A hobby fun and much less striking than make noise with a 4x4.
Mushroom Question: When collecting fungi in the places where they exist, should not pluck, but cut with a knife in the trunk. Also, bring a basket instead of a plastic bag to let go scattering spores.
Natural language: The natural world is a book to know how to read. Guides can we afford to teach us the names of birds, trees, plants, insects, geological ..