Organic yummies

During the week I received the Biome hamper sent to me by G Magazine – it’s fantastic!

What’s in it?
2 Dagoba organic chocolate bars (berry and hazelnut)
Choc-covered liqorice and choc-covered sun-muscats from Green Grove Organics
A pack of Oz Tukka bush spices
Murray River salt flakes
Finger-lime marmalade from Kurrajong Native Foods
Olive paste with herbs from Rosnay
Blueberry and grape paste from Bio-Grape
Patrice Newell’s organic extra-virgin olive oil
Toby’s Estate organic peppermint, lemongrass and green tea
Toby’s Estate organic coffee beans

What I find the most interesting are the Murrary River salt flakes – I’m glad to see that something good has come from the inland salinity problem there!

The bush spices are going to be given to a friend who is learning to cook with Australian native foods. We’ve tried lemon myrtle before (really good in marinades and bbqs, but a little goes a long way), but the little sample pack also includes bush tomato, Tasmanian pepper berry, Tasmanian pepper leaf, and wattle seed. By using herbs and spices that grow well in our climate, there’s less need for pesticides and all that junk.

Anyway, if you need to get a gift for a greenie, or for a cook who likes new foods, a Biome hamper would be ideal. It’s a great mix of treats and sensible foods, is packaged nicely, and you might get invited around for dinner too!

The Weather Makers

If you’ve been wondering how Earth’s climate works, what global warming is, and how it creates climate change, then Tim Flannery’s The Weather Makers is the book for you.

Flannery starts by explaining how our climate works and what we’re currently doing to change it. His enthusiastic approach to explaining the science makes this book far more entertaining to read than a dry recital of statistics. Anyone who did a few science units in high school will be able to follow the details, because he goes through the concepts clearly and simply. However, he never dumbs it down – the information is accurate and reliable.

In the next section Flannery shows the effect our changes to the atmosphere have already caused, with examples from around the world, particularly Australia and the US. Then he covers the major solutions proposed (solar, wind, nuclear, etc), what politicians are doing, and then a section on what we as individuals can do. I found the section on politics rather depressing, but since the book was written there’s been a groundswell of support in Australia for taking action on climate change, and more demands from the public for politicians to do something about it.

Flannery finishes with a list of stuff you can do to prevent climate change, which is also available on the The Weather Makers website. I think the list is great – it’s aimed at getting you to make the changes that will make the most difference, rather than tiny changes that will chip away at the problem. I particularly like that ‘write to a politician’ is on the list, since many of the “Top 10 Ways to Save the World” lists neglect political action. The website also has excerpts from the book (so you can try before you buy), reviews and further resources.

Recommended?
The Weather Makers is a clear and comprehensive look at climate change, providing us with the information we need to make decisions about possible solutions to the problem. Flannery’s enthusiasm is catching, and I think that’s why he received the Australian of the Year award in January – he shows us we can understand the problem, we can figure out solutions, and we can make changes for our future. I’d recommend this book to anyone in Australia or the USA who’s been looking for an overview of the climate change situation.

If you haven’t done much high-school science, then I’d recommend We Are the Weather Makers instead. It’s the “young adult” edition: same content, but simplified. I think it’s a great option for people interested in learning about climate change even though they might not have any scientific knowledge. It’d also be good for anyone who hasn’t got the time to read the longer version

Other green car options

So, even though we bought a secondhand Prius to replace our old car, what were our other options?

Fuel-efficient petrol cars

The less petrol you use, the fewer greenhouse-gas emissions you create. Buying a fuel-efficient car is the easiest green choice for cars now, as the fuel-efficiency is marked on a sticker on all new cars sold in Australia, as is the amount of pollution it will create per 100km. However, it’s not the only way to make a greener choice when buying a car.

Diesel

Hybrid cars work at their best in city trafffic – but if you do a lot of country driving, diesel could be the way to go instead. Diesel is fuel-efficient, and it also creates fewer greenhouse-gas emissions than petrol does. However, it also creates more air-pollution than petrol or LPG, in the form of particulates and nitrogen oxides, and a diesel vehicle is usually more expensive to buy than an equivalent petrol car.

Bio-diesel

Bio-diesel is made by creating a chemical reaction between vegetable oil or animal fat and alcohol, so it’s from sources that are renewable as opposed to fossil-fuels like diesel, petrol and LPG. However, it still has to be blended with diesel and many car manufacturers will not guarantee the performance of their cars when biodiesel makes up more than 5% of the fuel mix.

LPG

LPG is an attractive option because it’s cheaper than petrol and creates fewer greenhouse-gas emissions. You can also get rebates from both state and federal government on the cost of converting an old car to run on LPG. It’s less polluting than diesel, although I couldn’t find any info on how it compares to petrol in this regard. The disadvantage is that it uses more fuel than petrol. It’s a good option for some people, and you can use the RAC website’s LPG calculator to see if it would suit you.

In the end…
…what it comes down to is that Australia has a pretty limited range of cars that cause less damage to the environment. Setting fuel-efficiency standards for all types of vehicles (plus some rebates or incentives for the cars that do better than those standards) would go a long way to reduce the damage we do to the environment by driving. I could get started on how public transport, biking and walking are also made more difficult than they have to be, but that’s a rant for another day

If you’re interested in the future of transport in Australia, check out the Alternative Fuels Australia blog. It’s well written and covers the different fuel options available around Australia, and how they’re used, with news and updates.

The Big Switch

Now that climate change is on the agenda for the upcoming federal election, have you wondered what your MP thinks about it? Probably not! But now that I’ve asked you, I’m sure you’re curious

The Big Switch sent out a survey about climate change and it’s solutions to each sitting Member of Parliament. You can search for your Federal MP to see what their climate change policies are. If they haven’t answered The Big Switch survey, you can email it to them to see if they respond. They’ve also assessed the policies of the major parties plus a few of the minor ones (Democrats, Greens, Family First), and some opposing candidates are answering the survey too.

I sent the survey to the Labor MP for my seat and haven’t had a reply yet. I also emailed Kevin Rudd: first I got a form letter response with Labor’s general environment policy, so I replied that that was nice but I’d like to see the survey questions answered. Recently I got another form letter from his office, but this time more closely addressing the survey questions. I sent it to the Big Switch to see if it could be used to give Rudd a rating on climate change, so we’ll see how that goes.

The site also has information about what climate change is, what you can do about it, and what people in your community are doing about it. It’s very encouraging to see so many people making an effort to change their lifestyles and neighbourhoods.

We now own a (used) Prius

We got our used Prius yesterday, trading in our old car. We used it for all our usual Saturday errands, and it was great! I haven’t gotten used to the display showing when the car is using the battery, regenerating it, or using petrol, so I keep staring at it. But Dave has adjusted and finds it much the same as any other dashboard display now.

Click the photo to see the large version at my Flickr account.

Our old car was using about 10 litres of petrol per 100 kilometres. So far the Prius is using 5.5L per 100 km. According to the Toyota Australia website, it’s possible to get an efficiency of 4.4L/100km. I used the Prius fuel saver calculator to see how much we’re reducing our pollution and fuel costs.

So if the 5.5L/100km becomes standard for us, then we’re looking at CO2 emissions reduced by 1715 kilograms, and fuel savings of $912.

And the stereo is way better than the one we had in the old car