"Carbon dioxide levels in the air are at their highest in 650,000 years"
"9 out of the 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 2000."
"The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is TWICE the size of continental U.S. and is believed to hold almost 100 million tons of garbage"
"Our planet is now in the sixth mass extinction of plants and animals"
"If every country were to consume as much as the United States alone it would be as if there were a global population of 72 billion people."
Have I got your attention? Good...scary stuff right?
With Earth day having just passed, I figured now was a good time to help spread the message that although a special day was marked on your calendar, we need to consider every day Earth Day. We do not own Earth. Earth is our home and we are merely passing through and it is not our right to trash it nor exhaust its resources as we please. And while the planet as a whole might seem big, your individual, everyday decisions can leave a lasting impact.
1. Turn off the lights when you're not in the room
2. Unplug things when you're not using them
3. Carpool
4. But if you're going somewhere in walking or biking distance...ditch the car
5. Take pride in leftovers!!
(Americans waste 40% of food each year. Food that ends up in landfills and turns into a greenhouse gas called methane...not good)
6. Make it a goal to have less trash each week
(Try to minimize your waste. Not just food...although food is a great place to start. Reduce the amount of paper and plastic you're throwing out. Reducing how much trash you're producing can have lasting impacts)
7. Look into a composite site or create a composite site in your backyard
If you're not fully sure about what a composite site is I highly recommend you look into it...it's a great way to deliver nutrients back into the ecosystem!
8. Use Less Food Packaging!
This is especially huge in the produce section of the supermarket. If you don't absolutely need a bag for the produce that's most likely going right into another plastic bag don't use it! I promise the food will make it from the supermarket to your kitchen in a safe condition.
9. Bring reusable bags to the Supermarket
Going off tip #8, a great start to reducing your plastic use is to bring your own bags to the supermarket. It's estimated that humans go through 16,000 plastic bags a minute...scary stuff.
10. Make use of reusable cups
11. Convert to glass and stainless steel
Even better then plastic reusable cups are glass ones! Convert your containers to glass and opt out your plastic straws to stainless steel straws. The difference you'll be making is huge!
12. Reduce your meat and dairy intake!!!!
As much as I would love for everyone to stop consuming meat and dairy completely, I understand it isn't realistic for everyone. However, reducing your meals to "meat free" just once or twice a day and opting for alternatives to milk such as almond or cashew milk make an immense impact on our environment (and of course the animals you're saving.)
" It takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce a single pound of beef. And each hamburger that comes from animals on ex-forestry ground is responsible for the destruction of fifty-five square feet of forest. "
13. Take quicker showers
I'm not saying make it an Olympic race but maybe you could skip on the private jam session every now and then..
14. Combine Laundry
15. When doing laundry, go from a hot water temperature to warm
If every person in just the U.S. were to do this we could save 100,000 barrels of oil PER DAY
16. Shut down your computer at night
This ultimately saves a great amount of energy and is better for your computer and electric bill anyway.
17. Take it easy on the clothes shopping
"It takes 1800 gallons of water to produce one pair of jeans and 400 gallons of water to produce a cotton t-shirt."
18. Use fewer napkins
"If everyone in just the U.S. were to use 1 less napkin a day, it could save a billion pounds of space in landfills."
19. Don't litter
While this may seem obvious, that doesn't stop people from giving into dropping their slightly inconvenient piece of trash on the ground. This may have saved you 2 minutes of inconvenience but now that small piece of trash just ended up somewhere it's not supposed to...most likely the ocean getting swallowed by poor fish.
20. Reuse paper
You jot down a note or two on a piece of paper and then you're done with it but instead f just throwing it away fold it over and save it. Americans waste 21 million tons of paper a year....do you know how much paper it takes to weigh 21 million tons?
Point is, you may be one person but your impact is huge and if you can play your part in taking care of this earth why wouldn't you? Because if it's not us then who? And if it's not now, then when? Remember these tips, share with others you think could benefit and lets work together to a more green and lasting world!
