FIRST THE WHY ...There is a native American saying that environmentalists are fond of quoting: "We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."
Now, more than any other time in human history, we're borrowing heavily from future generations, and we have little hope of ever paying it back. Climate change is knocking loudly on our door, and peak oil is rattling at the gate.
Together they are formidable visitors, bringing a bouquet of dire threats, including drought, famine, desertification, crop failure and resource wars. It's not a pretty picture. And, to make matters even more grave, our planet isn't just heating up and running out of oil, it's also running out of other essentials: water, land, and minerals.
Pessimists say we're too late, that there is no going back, and that the world is facing an inevitable catastrophe. Most of us don't know what to think, while some of us feel too disheartened to care. A few people don't give a damn one way or the other. But, we have to care, because it's for our children, and our children's children. For them, and for all the future generations of people on this earth, we have to put a stop to our crazy gallop. It will take more than changing our lightbulbs (which we have to do anyway, like it or not, by the beginning of next year). We have to change a lot more: we have to change our thinking.
... THEN THE HOW
1 TURN OFF everything every time you've finished with it: the light, the radio, the television, the heater, the computer, the curling tongs - everything. Unplug mobile phone and camera chargers when not in use. The more we turn things off, the more it becomes a habit.
2 REUSE EVERYTHING POSSIBLE. An amazing number of things can be used a second time, or even indefinitely. Green-minded folks never throw out a piece of string, rubber band or paper clip (and never have to buy them).
Many envelopes can be given a second life with a new address label, and reports and other corporate bumf that are usually wastefully printed on only one side, can be reused for notes or rough drafts. Plastic containers, jam jars, plastic bags, cardboard boxes, wrapping paper, bits of wood, bricks, blocks, nuts, bolts, and a hundred other everyday things can all be put to excellent use and kept out of landfill.
3 RECYCLE EVERYTHING POSSIBLE - paper, plastic, glass and especially aluminium cans. The metal can be reused indefinitely without deteriorating, and processing uses only five per cent of the energy that it takes to mine and refine aluminium from bauxite. Recycle steel tins too, as well as biscuit tins and jam jar lids.
4 RECYCLE YOUR WEEE (the unfortunate acronym for "waste electrical and electronic equipment"). When you buy a new item, the seller is obliged to take back a similar used one. Or bring it back to your local WEEE collection centre (see: www.weeeireland.ie). If you are upgrading computer equipment, consider Camara, the charity (with offices in Dublin and Belfast) which sends Irish computers to Africa. Check out the minimum specifications on www.camara.ie, or telephone 01-6811111.
5 FREECYCLE EVERYTHING ELSE that has a possible use. There are 25 Freecycle groups on this island: informal, internet-based, regional associations where people give and get items (see: www.freecycle.org). No money changes hands, and a lot of good stuff passes from person to person, and is kept out of landfill. See also www.jumbletown.ie and "Free Trade" on www.dublinwaste.ie.
6 DON'T THROW THINGS OUT if they're broken. Get them fixed, or mend them yourself. Not only will you keep them out of landfill, but you won't be using up the planet's resources by getting a replacement item.
7 CHOOSE SECOND-HAND furniture and other household items, where possible. Call them "vintage" or "antique" and it sounds more chic. Auctions, markets, junk shops, charity shops, family members, friends and internet swap sites (such as Freecycle, above) are rich hunting grounds for everything from book shelves to plant pots.
8 BUY THE BEST, that is, if you have to buy at all. Invest in the best that you can afford. And "best" doesn't equate to "brand", by the way. Well-made things may cost a little more, but they last longer, and are better for both your pocket and the planet.
9 JOIN THE LIBRARY, and save more trees from being turned into books. Your local library now has much more to offer than mere books and periodicals. Music CDs, DVDs, audio books and language courses are all standard fare, while many branches now also have free internet access. There are 350 public libraries in Ireland, and all the books in this vast nationwide treasury of literature are available to library members via an online catalogue (www.borrow books.ie). If you order your book, it will be delivered to your local library, in the fullness of time.
10 MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD. If businesses that you deal with are wasting resources or otherwise behaving irresponsibly, let them know. If they pay no attention, vote with your feet and take your business elsewhere. That'll make 'em sit up and listen.
11 GET EDUCATED. Go to lectures, classes, look up websites. Bone up on peak oil and climate change and on living a more sustainable life. The more you know, the better you'll be able to equip yourself for the future. www.combatclimatechange.ie; www.feasta.org; www.cultivate.ie; www.postcarbon.org; www.communitysolution.org
12 GET INVOLVED with your community. Help keep it vibrant by supporting local initiatives and businesses. The more self-sustaining it is, the more resilient it will be in the face of future shortages of food, energy, services and products. Get to know your neighbours: not only are they good for loans of jugs of milk, but each one possesses a unique bundle of skills that might come in handy (just as yours might do the same for them). And don't forget, they're always good for a bit of entertainment, too.
13 ACQUIRE YOUR GRANDPARENTS' SKILLS. Learn to build, chop wood, garden, cook, sew, knit and repair things. The more self-sufficient and resourceful we are, the less impact we have on the earth. (It's also rather good for the ego to be able to say "I made it myself," "I fixed it", or "Oh, it's just a little thing I did.")
14 BUILD SUSTAINABLY. If you are constructing a new house or extension, go for the most sustainable and the most energy-conserving methods. Fit the best insulation and consider solar water-heating panels, geothermal heating or a wood pellet boiler. Use the power of the sun to heat your living rooms by angling them towards the south.
15 DON'T BE ARTIFICIAL. Natural building materials are generally more sustainable, and are less harmful to the environment in the manufacturing. They also off-gas fewer volatile organic compounds and are better for human health. Choose recycled wood, or check that it is from well-managed resources (look for labels such as Forest Stewardship Council certification). Use natural floor coverings and paint, and sheep's wool or hemp insulation. Use less concrete.
16 USE CLEAN CLEANERS. Choose the least harmful product for the job. It's not necessary to bring out chemical-heavy cleaning fluids for every little job. Baking soda, vinegar and lemon juice are all fine, traditional cleaners (even rubbing a post-juiced lemon around the kitchen sink brings a lovely, aromatic shine). Sunlight and oxygen (as found on your clothesline) bleach whites beautifully and kill germs as effectively as bottled disinfectants.
17HANG OUT YOUR CLOTHES (see sunlight and oxygen, above). Dryers are fierce energy hogs, so use a clothesline or drying rack. If you have to use a dryer, don't run it longer than necessary, and clean the lint filter after every use. Wash your clothes at 30 degrees, unless they are really mucky, and make sure the machine is full every time.
18 CHOOSE A-RATED WHITE GOODS if you are buying new. Fridges, freezers, washing machines and other household appliances with an 'A' rate use only 55 per cent of the electricity that is consumed by similar-sized D-rated items. Look also for the EU "Eco Label" symbol for further environmental benefits. See www.sei.ie for more information.
19 SWITCH your electricity supply to green-energy provider Airtricity, and lessen the amount of CO2 your house is pumping into the atmosphere. Make the change online at www.airtricity.com/ireland, or by phoning 1850-404080.
20 TURN DOWN the thermostat, and/or decrease the hours that your heating is on. Put on another layer of clothes, or snuggle up with someone you like.
21 INSULATE your attic, walls and water cylinder. Fit draught excluders to doors, double-glaze windows and close the curtains at night. Keep the cold out and the heat in.
22 BURN WOOD instead of coal or peat, if you have an open fire or stove. Trees take between five and 20 years to reach burnable size (and six months to a year to dry after being cut into logs), coal takes hundreds of thousands of years to form, while peat develops at the rate of 1mm per year. Wood is sustainable, if it is continually replanted. It is also carbon neutral, because it absorbs the same amount of CO2 while it is growing as it releases when it burns.
23 COOK SENSIBLY. Boil only the amount of water in the kettle that you need; cook with saucepan lids on to save energy; match the size of your pot or pan to the element or gas ring; make double meals and freeze the excess.
24 USE RECHARGEABLE BATTERIES. Single-use batteries require 50 times more power to manufacture than they yield. Rechargeable nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries, on the other hand, can be reused hundreds of times before they wear out. When buying, go for the largest milli-ampere hour rating, denoted as "mAh". For example, choose 2,700 mAh batteries instead of 1,300 mAh batteries. The former may be three times the price of the latter, but they deliver many more hours of energy and need to be recharged less frequently, which means they have a much longer life span.
25 BE WATER WISE. Take showers instead of baths; fit a dual-flush mechanism to your toilet; fix leaky taps and toilets; don't let the water run while you're brushing your teeth. If you're waiting for the warm water to flow when you're washing dishes, catch the cooler stuff in a basin and use it on your plants.
26 RECYCLE YOUR GREY WATER from your bathroom and kitchen either with a purpose-made system, or with an ad hoc arrangement of buckets and/or siphons. Use it for watering plants or flushing toilets.
27 FIT WATER BUTTS to your drainpipes, or install an underground storage tank. A modest house (with a footprint of 50sq m) receives 22,000 litres of rainwater a year in Dublin, and more in most other parts of the country. When you harvest rainwater, you do the planet a double favour. You're putting less pressure on the water system, and you're decreasing the amount of rain run-off that ends up in sewage treatment plants.
28 WALK to work, or cycle, or take public transport instead of driving. Consider starting a walking-bus for school-going children.
29 GET A SMALLER CAR, if you have to drive. The emissions from a large SUV are three times greater than those of the smallest cars on the road. So buy a smaller car (so much easier to drive!) and buy second-hand.
30 GET AN ELECTRIC CAR, if you must buy a new vehicle. The REVAi (pronounced Ree-vah-eye) costs €12,500 and uses about €204 worth of electricity a year, while saving two tonnes of transport-generated CO2 (if you use renewable energy provider Airtricity). An overnight charge gives it an 80km range, while a two-and-a-half hour zap will put 60km at your disposal. Order now for a February delivery (www.greenaer.ie and 01-6588825).
31 DON'T DRIVE ALONE. Join a car pool and share lifts, fuel and gossip on the way to work. Cut your emissions by at least half, and take traffic off the roads at the same time. Get there more quickly.
32 DRIVE CLEVERLY. Muscular revving, sudden braking, rapid acceleration, speeding and other testosterone-charged modes of propulsion consume five to 33 per cent more fuel than sensible driving, and produce more emissions. All vehicles are not the same, but in general, if you are in top gear, a 90km/h cruising speed will give maximum fuel economy. Check tyre pressure regularly: under-inflated tyres can reduce fuel efficiency and shorten the life of the tyre. If you're travelling at less than 70km/h don't turn on the air conditioning as it decreases fuel efficiency by 12 per cent. Instead, open the windows including the back ones (to reduce drag). At over 70km/h, wind resistance makes it more efficient to turn on the air and close the windows. Click on www.ecodrive.org for more information.
33 BIN THE BUSINESS TRIP. Face-to-face meetings are not essential every time you have to talk to overseas associates, and they clock up tonnes of carbon dioxide. The same could be said of the thousands of work-related flights and car trips all over this island. We're not suggesting that all business people should stay inside their offices, but a bit less tearing about would be kinder to the earth.
34 HOLIDAY AT HOME. Our little island may not be the cheapest place in the world, but it's one of the prettiest. And while all those bargain flights abroad may be light on our pockets, they tread heavily on the planet. If we all take one less flight overseas per year, we're making a start.
35 BUY LOCAL FOOD and if you can't buy local, buy Irish, British or European (in that order). Eating green beans that have been air-freighted 8,500km from Zimbabwe or grapes that flew more than 11,265km from Chile is madness. Some people argue that such crops give work to people in developing nations, but ultimately, such air-transport-dependent long-haul provisioning is unsustainable.
36 EAT ORGANIC but not if the food has been flown from halfway around the world. Chemical-free agriculture is kinder to the earth and more sustainable. Choose Fairtrade chocolate, tea, coffee and other foods from developing countries. Buy free-range meat and eggs. If they seem too expensive, eat less of them (see below).
37 EAT LESS FOOD, especially meat and dairy, which require enormous amounts of the earth's resources to produce. An animal must eat 2-10kg of food in order to provide us with one kilo of meat. We now consume 60 per cent more meat than we did 40 years ago, and we're more prone to obesity and heart disease than ever before.
38 DRINK LESS bottled water. Plastic water bottles are made from polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which comes from crude oil extracts ethylene and paraxylene, a non-renewable resource. Transporting pallets of the stuff all over Ireland (and from Europe) burns fuel, produces greenhouse gases and adds to traffic. Buy a reusable water bottle and fill it with filtered tap water.
39FINISH OFF your jars of food, tubes of toothpaste and squeezy bottles of lotion. An Irish Times reader, Ursula Redmond, suggests: "Cut the bottle with a scissors or strong knife" to get the last quarter of the product. "Use the remainder and then put the bottle halves through the dishwasher next time it runs (or even rinse it after washing dishes)." Then recycle the bits.
40 SHOP ETHICALLY. If something is unrealistically cheap, it's because someone or something is paying a price. It may be that another human being, or an animal, or the environment is suffering. Be prepared to pay a little more, in order to do a little less damage.
41 INVEST YOUR MONEY WITH CARE. Make sure that it is not being used to fund companies that condone or cause environmental destruction, or that exploit workers. Ask your bank or broker about ethical investing or socially responsible investment (sri) funds.
42 GREEN THE ROOF of your new house or extension. The soil and vegetation will insulate it effectively and cut down on heating bills, trap water that would otherwise flow down the drains (and release it back into the atmosphere), and attract wildlife.
43 PLANT TREES. Trees mop up carbon dioxide and fix it in their wood. They also clean the air, trapping tiny particles of pollution with their foliage. In cities especially, they help to bring down the temperature by taking in water, and later releasing it back into the atmosphere by both transpiration and evaporation (collectively known as evapotranspiration). According to a team at the University of Manchester, a 10 per cent increase in green space in built-up areas can reduce surface temperatures by up to four degrees.
44 STOP SPRAYING pesticides and using weedkillers in your garden. Plant native and nectar-rich species to attract birds, bees and butterflies. Put in a hedgerow and you'll make a haven for wildlife.
45 START A COMPOST HEAP, wormery or green cone (see: www.greencone.ie) for your food waste. Not only will you be keeping the material out of landfill, but it will eventually turn into fertiliser, soil conditioner or potting compost for your plants.
46 GROW YOUR OWN food, and watch your food miles shrink to food metres. Even if you don't have a garden, grow herbs and salads in pots on a windowsill or balcony. And if you don't have either of those, you can still raise beansprouts.
47 LEARN TO PICKLE and to make chutneys and preserves from your garden produce. Blanch freshly-picked vegetables, cool them quickly in cold water and freeze. A full freezer uses less energy than a half-empty one, and a chest freezer loses less cold air than an upright one when you open it.
48 KEEP HEALTHY and fit by eating well, exercising and not putting anything foolish into your body. The more hale and hearty each of us is, the less pressure there is on our medical system, and the more capacity there is for those who really need it.
49 BE CONTENT WITH LESS. Relative prosperity has given us an appetite for consumption that never seems to be satisfied. The more we have, the more we want. But the earth doesn't have enough resources to go around fairly. So, let's crave less, and give something back. Time, money, expertise and goodwill: all these can help to keep the planet alive.
50 BE HAPPY. It's not the end of the world. It's the start of an adventure.