• Don’t use plastic or waxed paper bags. They aren’t good for you or the environment. They both use petrochemicals, they aren’t easily recyclable, and they aren’t economical. Use reusable containers and stop filling our waste dumps unnecessarily.
• Stop using chlorine bleach. This stuff is nasty and releases carcinogenic dioxins into the atmosphere eventually getting into our food and water then into us. Use chlorine free products like Bi-O-Kleen Oxygen Bleach Plus, Ecover Non-Chlorine Laundry Bleach, OxiClean, Oxy-Boost, or Seventh Generation Chlorine Free Bleach.
• Don’t use air fresheners. They contain harmful phthalates and they do nothing more than cover up bad smells.
• Drop fabric softeners and dryer sheets. Use baking soda in the rinse cycle instead and it soften fabrics and eliminate static cling.
• Don’t use paper napkins, switch to cloth only.
• Lower your thermostat in cold weather to 62 degrees when you aren’t at home and/or at night (at least to 65 at night).
• Stop wasting food. The average family throws away 14% of their food. Yikes.
• Think about what you can do driving wise to save 1 gallon of gas a week. At $3.25 per gallon that adds up to $169 a year. Not bad when you think about it.
  • Accelerate slower
  • Drive at 65 mph max. Some say 55 other 60, but the speed limit set at 65 is smart. For every 5 mph over 60, you lose 5-10% gas efficiency.
  • Plan your trips so you travel shorter distances and don’t track back and forth.
  • Make sure you aren’t carrying extra unnecessary weight in your vehicle. Every 100 pounds of unneeded weight cuts you fuel efficiency by 1-2%.
• Go one day a week minimum without eating meat. It takes a lot of energy to produce meat. Also, you’ll save money in the mean time.

#1. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – This group of scientists were the ones to come out and show, global warming is real and we need as interconnected humans, to do something and to do it now. We have to stop the denial and move ahead before we are so overwhelmed, we would be unable to make a difference.

#2. The U.S. Climate Action Partnership (USCAP) – Since our government is idiotically refusing to lead the charge against global warming, corporations together with the USCAP are taking over. According to the Time article “USCAP called for mandatory cuts of 60% to 80% in carbon emissions by 2050, and a uniform nationwide market for carbon. When big business is this far ahead of government, it’s clearly time for a change.”

#3. The Green Supply Chain – Companies like Wal-Mart, Procter and Gamble as well as Unilever are pressuring their suppliers to cut greenhouse-gas emissions and try to combat climate change.

#4. Avoided Deforestation – This is a no-brainer. We need our forests to save us from ourselves. We need to stop cutting down trees with no thought of tomorrow.

#5. Green-Collar Jobs – Instead of thinking that we cannot become more efficient because we will lose jobs, which is what our present Administration in the White House thinks, we can build jobs by creating new jobs that are green and friendly to the environment like organic biodynamic farming.

#6. Plug-in Hybrids – There is a company that can convert a car into a plug-in hybrid. CalCar is the company and while it is expensive, the technology is moving forward.

#7. E-Flex – Cars that can be made to run on newer technologies as soon as they came out.

#8. Congestion Pricing – Make people pay to use their cars in cities like New York. When I visited there I was astonished at how many people drove cars into Manhattan unnecessarily. It was insane. London and Singapore have already implemented this system.

#9. Carbon Capping – This idea puts a limit to how much carbon burning companies can do. The government would charge a fee for each unit of burning and then refund it to the people most needing help.

#10. Geo-engineering – This idea is to create large projects to help cool the planet. No one know if any idea on the table will work, but there is a sense of urgency to start thinking about ways before it is too late.

What I would add to the discussion is the need for everybody to do something, anything, each and every day to help combat global warming and also to reduce our polluting ways. Stop using pesticides, buy only organic when possible, vote with your dollars and buy ecologically superior products. We can do something, the important thing is to do it and do it now.