In case of global warming…

While I’m away, I thought I’d just link to a cartoon by Tom Toles that appeared in the Washington Post just over a year ago. Not much has changed since then, but it still made me smile a bit at human nature.

In Case Of Global Warming

I’ll be back later this week, see you then!

Ecological footprint quiz

The Redefining Progress environmental footprint calculator has been updated: it now takes into account more recent information about local averages and new options like hybrid cars and water-saving devices. You might like to give it a whirl to see what it’s like.

Footprint calculators are a way to get a rough idea of how you’re doing with your environmental impact. They estimate the area of land and ocean needed to provide your food, goods, services, housing, and energy as well as absorbing your wastes. They’re not perfect by a long shot, but they can help people understand the consequences of their choices. The Redefining Progress one can also compare your impact to the averages for your own country (you can read more about how RP calculates their figures here: FAQ).

My footprint is much smaller than the Aussie average in greenhouse gas emissions, and a bit smaller than average for food, goods and services, and housing. Even so, if everyone lived the way I do, we’d still need more than 2 planets to provide for us all. Luckily, I’m not done yet with improving my house and food, and I’m finding more and more eco-friendly shops for when I do need to replace things.

Green websites in Australia

You might have noticed that I’ve added a new blogroll to the sidebar of this site, showing the Australian environmental websites I regularly read. I thought you might like to see what else is going on for greenies in Australia.

• Greenfoot – Trina is living sustainably in Sydney, and is always up to date with green news and events
• The Greening of Gavin – Gavin discusses the whys and hows of living a more sustainable life
• O2 WA – Wilma runs the Perth branch of the O2 network for sustainable design, and organises the Perth Green Drinks every second month (next drinks are in May!)
• Ockham’s Razor – Clare knows heaps about green gardening, and native flora and fauna

Other Aussie blogs I like that aren’t specifically about the environment, but do cover environmental issues:

• Larvatus Prodeo – a politics blog with frequent posts about environmental issues in Australia
• Cosmos magazine – science news including biodiversity, pollution, climate science and so on among the rest.

If you’ve got a favourite green blog or website, please share it with us in the comments

I’m off to Melbourne this week for work, so I won’t be able to respond to comments as usual. However, I’ve pre-posted a couple of entries to keep you entertained while I’m away. Have fun everyone!

Water efficiency at my house

Are you conserving water?

Originally uploaded by RXAphotos

Given that I haven’t done anything about water efficiency in our house, even though I made a resolution about it, I thought it was time to come up with a plan of action. I’ve had a look at the usual water-saving websites and come up with a series of things I can do, roughly in order of difficulty.

1. Find out total water use for 2007, so we can tell when we’ve actually made a significant change.
2. Check for leaks and fix them.
3. Check how we use water: this means going down the lists of water-efficiency steps like shorter showers, only running the washing-machine on full, etc and making sure that we actually do them.
4. Get flow aerators or something similar for our taps.
5. Get a shower-head with at least a 3-star water-efficiency rating.
6. Change our toilet to a dual-flush.
7. See if it’s worth upgrading our washing-machine to a more efficient model or not.
8. Make the garden more water-efficient. We already mulch and only water on our scheduled days, but I’d like to look into rainwater tanks, greywater systems and so on.

Tips, recommendations and suggestions are all welcome! Let us all know if you’ve got some good water-saving advice.

Solar energy for your home, on the cheap

If you’re interested in getting a photo-voltaic solar energy system for your home, and you live in the Perth metropolitan region, you might like to check out the RenewableLogic website. They’re going to buy 1500 systems in bulk and install them, lowering the usual cost from about $4500 to $1500 after you get all the usual government rebates. They’re only offering small systems at the moment, in a limited area, but have had a huge response so they may expand their range later on.

Our house is in the right area, and a small system would suit the two of us just fine, so we’ve put our names down. We’re a bit concerned that our roof might not be suitable (possibly the wrong angle), but it’s only an expression of interest so if we don’t work out then they just move on to the next person on the list.

We hadn’t considered getting a PV solar energy setup, because it was way out of our price range for home improvements. However, if this works out, we’d really like to give it a try. I’ll post updates as I find out more.