Put on your walking shoes, get out your change

"I think a trading range between $80 and $120 a barrel this year is about right, but with the softness of the dollar, and the occasional interruptions that you have because of politics, I think we could see $120 oil.''  So says Peter Barker-Homek, head of the Abu Dhabi National Energy Co. in an interview with Bloomberg.com.(Bloomberg)

Wouldn't you know it, right after I started this post, in pops an article from the Seattle Times which begins

 

OPEC said today it will not put more oil on the global market despite record-high prices for crude, blaming the U.S. for economic "mismanagement" that it said was having a worldwide effect.

 

Oil soared past $104 for the first time after the OPEC announcement and the release of a government report showing a surprise drop in crude-oil stockpiles.

 

Light, sweet crude for April delivery jumped $5 to settle at a record $104.52 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange after earlier rising to $104.64, a new trading record. Earlier this week, oil prices broke the previous inflation-adjusted price record of $103.76, set in 1980 during the Iran hostage crisis.

 

The U.S. dollar sunk to record lows today, with the euro fetching $1.53 for the first time ever in Europe.

So. let's see. The $100.00 per barrel oil we're seeing right now gives us a gas price at the pump of about $3.60 per gallon in my area. An increase of 20% would push it to about $4.32 per gallon at the pump. That's a pretty big jump.

It wasn't actually that many years ago I could fill my tank for about a buck a gallon. It cost me about $20.00 if the tank was nearly empty.  If gas jumps to $4.32 per gallon that same tank will cost me $86.40. For one tank!  Not that I am complaining mind you. I never complain about the price of gas because every dollar bump in the price is another "tax" imposed on frivolous driving and Hummers.  Take that Frieda! 

Eighty-six bucks will almost buy me a decent pair of boots or walking shoes unless I want some really nice ones then that might set me back two tankful's. I've never really personally kept track, but a good pair of hiking boots will probably get me a couple thousand miles or so before the Yellow Plug Vibrams wear out.  (I base this on the experience of those who have through-hiked the Appalachian Trail, which is 2200 miles long. A fresh pair of good boots usually wears out about the end of that hike. Cheap boots are a different story. Moral: Don't buy cheap boots. They're expensive.)

So let us say I spend $134.95 on my boots; Rocky Boots has a nice pair for that amount; and I walk two thousand-two-hundred miles in them. That equates to about six cents per mile. My car gets about eighteen miles to the gallon so if I multiply the per mile cost of the boots by eighteen and that will equate the cost of my boot soles to the price of fuel. Are you still with me here? The end result is this. One gallon of fuel will carry me eighteen miles for $4.32 (projected). The boot soles will cost me about $1.10 to travel the same distance, albeit much slower. (Hey, I figure if Frieda can liken light rail to freight trains, well I can pull a little latitude between boots and gas.) 

But wait, I can get a Tri-Met bus pass for just $76.00 and go anywhere I want in the entire Portland Metro area all month for less than the cost of just one tankful of gas. I even get there much quicker than I do with my boots. Although you still might consider wearing shoes when you get off the bus. It's just the polite thing to do unless you're at Collins Beach or something.  So anyhow back to the math.  If you travel 2200 miles on a bus in one month (could happen but probably not) it ends up costing  you only about three and half cents per mile.  So multiply that out by the eighteen mpg of my car and it costs only sixty cents to travel the same distance as my $4.32 did in the car.  A savings of about $3.72 cents.  

Ok, I know the math is a bit fuzzy and questionable but the point I make is this. Gas is no longer cheap, it probably won't be ever cheap again. That means a frivolous trip is no longer frivolous, it's downright expensive.  So, why not walk, or ride the bus, or take the train, or just play at the park instead of having to park.  If you can't bring yourself to do that to stay green, why not do it to save some green. It just adds up.  Oh, and Frieda, no offense...I was just having a little fun. Enjoy your Hummer. There may be more room on the road for you real soon.

Cars, cars and more cars

In the U.S. there are 239 million cars and light trucks on the road. All these vehicles log roughly 2.7 trillion miles every year. That is a 160% increase in miles driven just since 1970 and the amount increases every year. It costs all of us, in the form of taxes, 66.3 billion dollars every year to build and maintain the roadways for all these cars. Public transit sees about one-tenth that amount of funding and Amtrak sees even much less than that.

In the U.S. we account for just 5% of the worlds population, yet we contribute 45% of the global pollution from vehicles. Some states, like California, have decided to get tough on this pollution, but only fifteen other states have decided to follow their lead. The rest have lax, or no standards at all. And here is something that may actually surprise you. The big three automakers, GM, Ford and Chrysler, have actually called for a cap on global warming emissions yet, despite their call for a cap, there have been no federal bills passed to cap, or even reduce, pollution from ANY source. Hmmm...

Source: The Environmental Defense Fund

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Spread the word! September 22 is "World Car Free Day". "WORLD CAR-FREE DAY" started in the 70's and 80's in different forms but is now a regular planned event, and each year just gets bigger. "Car-Free Day 2007" may end up being the biggest yet. Even the government of China is planning official events in more than 100 cities, including Beijing and Shanghai. They even plan to close some of their roads to private cars.

Our cities, towns and streets don't have to be dominated by cars. It was not long ago they weren't. We can convert our cities and streets into avenues for people-powered transportation once again, it just takes enough voices to make change. Cities can easily be traversed by foot, bike or,for longer distances, bus, light rail, subway or train.

Let's all make "Car Free" day a special event.

Note: Have a blog? Please cut and paste this text into your blog, including this note. Think viral!

Car Free Day is coming!-September 22

Spread the word! September 22 is "World Car Free Day".  "WORLD CAR-FREE DAY" started  in the 70's and 80's in different forms but is now a regular planned event, and each year just gets bigger. "Car-Free Day 2007" may end up being the biggest yet.  Even the government of China is planning official events in more than 100 cities, including Beijing and Shanghai. They even plan to close some of their roads to private cars. 

Our cities, towns and streets don't have to be dominated by cars. It was not that long ago they weren't.  We can convert our cities and streets again into avenues for people-powered transportation, it just takes enough voices to make change. Cities can easily be traversed by foot, bike or,for longer distances, bus, light rail, subway or train. 

Let's all make "Car Free" day a special event. 

Note: Have a blog?  Please cut and paste this text into your blog, including this note. Think viral!

EIA Kids Page - Waste to Landfill

This is a great site for learning how landfills work. It is geared toward kids but if you are an adult...don't let that stop you. It's good for you too.

A Kids Page - Waste to Landfill

Do plastic bags really take 500 years to break down in a landfill? - By Juliet Lapidos - Slate Magazine

Please enjoy this article while I take a slight hiatus from my own posts.

Do plastic bags really take 500 years to break down in a landfill? - By Juliet Lapidos - Slate Magazine

So where do I go from here?

The more I see how my "American way of life" is subsidized by other people's suffering, the more I am offended by the way things are. I know I can't change the world, I can't even change another person, but I can change me. I am not obligated to participate in causing another persons suffering though my actions...or purchases. Even if it is the accepted norm.

I ran across another blog quite by accident, about a week ago or so, which summarized exactly how I have been feeling for the last few months. I have reprinted one of the posts here, in it's entirety, because it's so well written and I didn't feel a small excerpt would have the same impact. I reprint it here with the authors permission. I have also given the link below in case you want to read the rest of his blog. Most of his blog is not about resource conservation, but it is some really good stuff about life and living compassionately. I recommend it as a must read. Be warned though, it is very powerful and quite an emotional read. Here is the excerpt I promised from Weblog "Spirit Poor".

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Think about the drink

I washed my hair by a mountain stream once. We were backpacking for an entire week and I stunk. So I took an impromptu bath, rinsed my hair in the stream, and watched the bubbles drift downriver.
Didn't give much thought to the hikers who would be collecting water from that same stream down below.
We live our lives with that same thoughtlessness. "I can live any way I darn well please. To hell with the rest of you."
We wouldn't say that out loud, or maybe even think it. But it's how we live.
It's what we do when we buy clothes made in third-world countries at the expense of someone else's near-slave labor.
It's what we do when we sip rich coffee grown and harvested by the sweat of people who will see almost no income for their efforts.
It's what we do when we buy products that can't be easily recycled. When we carry them home in plastic bags. When we toss away the glossy packaging and eventually the item itself with its non-degrading plastic and toxic chemicals.
It's what we do when we treat the waitress that way. Or the co-worker. Former friend. Husband. Wife. Child.
What's your trickle down? What are you dumping in the river for others to drink? What lives are impacted by your actions? Take a long, hard look downstream.

Spirit Poor: Think About the Drink

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I am aware that sometimes my blog or comments probably sound like I have jumped up on a high horse and don't know how to get off. It's really not that way exactly. At least I hope not. I do have a bone dry sense of humor that is sometimes missed or misunderstood and that often gets me in trouble. I also tend to rant about things that are really just hitting me square between the eyes and I would like to change in myself. I am truly a novice when it comes to using resources correctly so I give myself challenges and put my thoughts out there in cyberspace so I have a higher standard to live up to. But in the end, I do believe I have still missed the mark a bit.

So back to my original question, "Where do I go from here?"

I have reasonably determined that if I stay mindful of what is leaving me in the form of trash, garbage, refuse, water, wasted food, hydrocarbons, methane?, recyclables--and anything else I might have forgotten in the list-- then I will be making headway. However, having given this careful thought, I don't think it is enough to just think about my waste stream. I also must think about where what I acquire comes from.

As I look around my house I find things that most likely were made by another man's poorly compensated sweat in a third world country. There are other things too that used an extreme amount of resources to produce or probably created a great amount of pollution in their manufacture. When I buy these goods, do I not perpetuate suffering or extreme pollution and also share in the blame?

There is a hidden price for cheap goods that someone else pays instead of me. I can only live cheaply because the cost to produce my goods is kept low by cheating someone else out of the right to pursue happiness. Is that fair? I have the right to pursue happiness but those in "developing" countries don't? That's arrogant and piggish and I don't want to be that way.

I plan on being more mindful of what I purchase. I am with No Impact Man on buying used but that is not always possible so here are some points I am going to consider on every new purchase. I am sure I will revisit this list later and add to it, but this is the list for now.

1. In which country was this product made?
2. Were the persons that manufactured or assembled it paid a decent wage, and did they work decent hours? Is there a chance they were kept locked in their place of employment for long hours with no breaks? Were they forbidden to use the restroom for long periods? Is it Fair Trade?
3. How far did this product have to travel to reach me? How much oil was consumed in it's manufacture and shipment?
4. What air /water /soil pollution occurred when this product was made?
5. How many tons of resources did it actually take to manufacture any metals in the product?
6. Did anyone die to extract the resources necessary to manufacture the product?
7. How much plastic is in the product? If there is plastic, is it recyclable or will it end up in the landfill?
8. Is the packaging excessive? Can the packaging be recycled or will it just end up in the landfill?
9. How long will this product last? Can it be renewed or repaired? Is it manufactured specifically to be disposable?
10. Do I really NEED it, or do I just WANT it?
11. Does my use of this product create any additional pollution?
12. When I am through with this product will it be difficult or impossible to dispose of?
13. How long will it take for this product to decompose? Will it ever decompose?
14. Will this product harm me, or those around me?
15. Can this product be purchased from a local manufacturer instead of an importer?

Whoa, that's a big list, you might be saying. Well, it should be. I would call it mindful consumption rather than impulsive and it is what I should be practicing. If it takes me a few days or hours to determine if I should buy something...that's good! Stores are set up for impulse purchases. If I must run myself through a checklist before I purchase, I will be less prone to buy on impulse. And I do love to buy on impulse. It makes me downright giddy. Until I leave the store. Then it just makes me less rich.

Peace.

Eating Local

Here is an excellent video that clearly spells out the need to eat local. Following the video is a link to find a CSA in your area. This link has every CSA and farmers market which belongs to "Local Harvest" but there may be other small CSA's or markets in your area as well that are not members. Your community may have a CSA organization that has a list of more.

LOCAL HARVEST

Eating locally for me is one of the biggest challenges I face and is is going to require a major shift in the way my life is organized. That is coming soon. I was once a member of a CSA but they only delivered produce in the summer and I wasn't fully satisfied with the produce they provided. Very little variety and not as fresh as I would have expected. But when I get settled in my new place I may give this a try again. Suggestions are always welcome.

Move it!

I woke up early this morning so I have had a bit of a chance to work on a few things. One of them being this blog. I have moved some of the links to a new heading called "Blog Honor Roll" . These are, in my opinion, some of the better blogs out there regarding sustainability. If you only have a chance to look at one right now I highly recommend you peruse "Fake Plastic Fish". Plastic is something I have begun to hate. Not just because we live in such a plastic society, I have seen the damage it does to wildlife and the eyesore it leaves on our roads.

About a month ago I went to the Oregon coast to do some hiking on the Oregon Coastal Trail. The trailhead was not properly marked on the highway and I never found it. I ended up walking 22 miles on the highway. It wasn't the nature experience I had anticipated. By the way I should mention that I did take the bus to the trail. Anyhow, having walked 22 miles of public highway it was quite alarming the amount of crap that lay all over the shoulder of the road. And it wasn't just on the shoulder. It was even blown into the trees and shrubs. Quite ugly. For a visual example of what plastic bags are doing to our environment AND OUR WILDLIFE visit the Photo Gallery at Reusable Bags. com Here is a direct link to the gallery (CLICK HERE)

Another thing that hit me recently, since I am packing, is that I have a lot of crap. Well, I am weeding it out and getting rid of a bunch of stuff. Another thing I am finding too is that I have a huge volume of waste paper that I am hauling to the recycle bins. I think this is going to be one of my projects for self. To reduce my paper consumption drastically. I really haven't paid attention to where this stuff comes from.

Well, that is about all the time I have today to write. Have a great day all.

Why, mommy, why?

Some feel that the world is doomed and there is no reason to try and live differently. Others believe we can do whatever we want and the earth will just take care of itself-it always has and it always will. I agree with both sides.

Perhaps it sounds as if I am at odds with myself but really I am not. I do believe the earth is rather doomed because, in order to save it, the global population will have to end it's headlong rush to disaster. The odds of that happening are nearly zilch. But on the other hand, as I have said before, nature has a way of taking care of these things. It's called natural disaster, famine, disease, resource shortages...I probably don't need to go on.

There is no doubt in my mind that as we pull at the earth's resources and go against nature, more than at any time in history, we are going to run out of resources and upset completely the natural balance...eventually. I don't know if that will be in my lifetime or not.

We have manipulated our crops to hybrid them and made them ultimately unstable and non-resistant to mutated diseases. One only need to look back in history to know that crops often fail on a massive scale. We have weakened the human immune system through overuse of antibiotics and by trying to protect ourselves have just made some fairly tame bugs into superbugs that can't be killed. We are pumping the aquifers dry at an alarming rate to grow grain for cattle and now cars. What do we do when they have run out? It is practically an endless list of no-no's we are perpetrating as a species on the earth. We consume resources simply to consume. No finger pointing here. Go back a few days in my blog you'll see that I am a guilty man.

It is only a matter of time before there will be wars over water, oil, minerals and the like as the limited resources become scarce. As the aquifers dry up there will be less food and more famine. The green places will desertify and become less habitable. This will bring about great shifts in the population and wars between nations and people will again result. Diseases will appear that will wipe out huge numbers of people in the form of plagues. Again, I could go on with quite a list but the point is, there is nothing I can personally do to stop it on a global scale.

However, every day on the freeway there are accidents. It is inevitable that people will get hurt and die. Can I stop it? No. I have no control over how people drive. Many people get in their cars and tune out the fact that there are living, breathing people surrounding them. They just want to get where they are going...as fast as they can get there...and disobey the rules of safety. And so...we have lots of accidents on the freeways.

I can change me. If I obey the rules of the road, drive defensively, act courteous and limit the number of miles I drive I limit my exposure to harm. Perhaps even save a life. But most of all I help to solve the problem in my own very small way. Do I change the fact that people die on the freeway? No! People are still going to die but my actions still make a difference, even if it is in a very small way. And that is why I try to act responsibly now in what I consume. I can make a difference to me, I can be pleased that I have acted responsibly. Even if it is in just one very small way for me and my neighbors on this big blue marble.

Ecological Dieting

My wife and I have been in two major car crashes in our life, one from the front and one from the back and this has left us with many aches and pains we would not normally have. The first accident left both of us with some residual back troubles and the second accident hobbled me with a double compound leg fracture and fractured my wife's skull. I was in a cast and brace for about a year and then followed that up by five years of self therapy. She was fairly debilitated for a number of years. It was a long road back and an Andy Warhol moment as we made the front page of the paper. I could have forgone the fame.

When you experience this type of physical trauma you never really do get fully back to "normal". The reminders of the accidents exist in your tissues and heat and ice become very good friends since they help ease many of these discomforts. I have just a few visible scars left but I have quite a bit of unseen scar tissue in my back and leg. Also since one leg is just slightly shorter than the other it messes with my hips a bit and throws off my gait. My wifes injuries are mostly invisible but they cause her chronic pain every day. There is no therapy that fixes scar tissue. It is just a residual agony that must be dealt with. (Here is where you sigh and offer meaningful sympathies in our direction before resuming your normal life. But please, no cards unless they contain money.) I have mostly recovered from my injuries and I am still able to walk, hike, backpack and ride a bike so I have no real complaints. My wife is less fortunate in this regard but she does mostly OK despite having quite a bit of pain still.

Why do I ramble on here about our accidents you are probably asking by now? What does this have to do with ecological dieting? Well, I enjoy walking and right now I try to walk about six miles every day. I am fortunate to live next to a Nature Park that has miles of wooded trails since the air is filled with scents and the sound of birds, there are ponds, creeks, snakes and even poisonous newts and it makes for a great place to walk. Anyhow, as I was out walking yesterday and thinking about all this ecology stuff I suddenly realized that what we have now in America are a bunch of good intentioned people putting themselves on an unsustainable ecological diet. Just like America is getting fatter while at the same time dieting like crazy we are now looking for the Atkins South Beach Zone Deprivation diet for planet earth. We think if we just eliminate this, add that, then boom...the ecological impact will magically drift away, bluebirds will sing, and the earth will be forever saved. Wrong! Deprivation never works. The unaltered human psyche simply catalogs our deprivations and then nags at us until we finally give in and pig out to reward ourselves for our earlier deprivation. (Citation: Human Nature 101)

I was a teen in the 70's and watched the wholesale development of an earth movement sprout into something great. But then over the next few decades the same exact people lost the vision and turned into rampant consumers. For all the weirdness of the hippie movement there was a lot of good that came from the "back to the earth" movement side of it. Not all lost the dream, but it seems most did. Some of us are coming back to the dream. ( OK, I wasn't a real hippie, but I shared in the dream and loved Carole King.)

We can try to adapt our current lifestyle to one that is more green but really the only true answer is to seek contentment without over-indulgence. We need to find what things we actually need and what are the things we just want but don't really need. Keep the needs, whatever they are, and get rid of the wants. It is not the same for everyone. A lot of it has to do with where you live. For example, if you live in an apartment it is just not practical that you are going to be able to start a worm bin, have a solar shower and grow an organic garden. It is not practical or financially feasible for everyone to move to God's green acre and live off the land. However if this is what you really want; worms, solar heated water and organic gooseberries; then by all means find a new place to live and go for it. But simplicity and proper earth stewardship can take place nearly anywhere.

But back to my original topic about the accidents. When I start talking about reducing our consumption my wife often says,"I couldn't get through the day without my morning warm shower". Here, here, I completely understand what she is saying and agree with her. In the first accident we were rammed in the back at about 45 milers per hour by an old fart that should not have even been driving. He was on some sort of medication that put him in a different realm than his automobile was in. He rocketed us through the intersection from a dead stop and as a result we both suffered equivalent and substantial back injuries that left us in pain for quite a number of months. It also left both of us with some residual back troubles. Scar tissue is abiding. That warm shower in the morning sure helps work out the kinks that develop overnight. So when I start talking about limiting our consumption to a few measly gallons of water per day I must decide if that will really work for us. How else could we erase the stiffness without a shower and the occasional soak. Is that a want or is that a need? It's a good question. I am not fortunate enough to have a hot spring in my backyard so if I want hot water I have to produce it myself and that takes resources. Plus, if I abandoned my fridge as well, as some suggest I should do, I would no longer have a freezer compartment with its stack of ice packs. Then my and my wifes life would dissolve into pain. Truthfully, it probably wouldn't be totally debilitating but life would become a drag and the chronic pain caused by chronic inflammation due to scar tissue would begin to take over our minds. Probably make us depressed. That would definitely limit our capabilities and we would become less productive in other ways...such as starting a garden, avid recycling, walking or riding a bike.

When I examine human history, to the best of my availability, I do not discover that we were dropped here from somewhere else and are aliens upon the land. We live here too! We are allowed to leave a footprint. What it really comes down to is, how big of a footprint can I leave before I am no longer a man but a pig? (My apologies to all things porcine, it's just an analogy.)

I read other blogs by those who are trying to "reduce, reuse and recycle". I admire anyone that moves in this direction and support their decision. It's a tough change to make. I too was once a gluttonous consumer pig stocking my larders with things I really don't need and woke up one day to my folly. (OK, I still have a bit of folly in me but I'm getting better) But I also see people anguishing over how they are going to survive without things like hot water. Forget the anguish. If you need a little hot water, then by gum, use a little hot water. The idea is to move to a simpler life and not just go on a complex ecological diet.

Dieting doesn't work and never will. It doesn't matter if it is a food diet or an ecological diet. If becoming green means becoming guilt-ridden and enduring self-flogging hardship, it is not worth it and it will never work. You will just give up and go back to your old gluttonous consumerist ways. True change only comes from finding a new satisfaction and changing inside. Only when something has become truly unnecessary will it truly be gone from your life. So if you want to really be green, then the only way to get there is to learn to be simple. That might still mean some abrupt changes but they should be positive changes that make life simpler and more worth living and not things that bring about deprivation.

Several years ago I switched nearly cold tofu to eating a completely plant based diet. I did it for me. My concern at the time was not the planet or the animals, (although later I did incorporate these concerns in my decision), I did it because I was selfish. My father died at age sixty from a life of eating bad and I did not want that for myself. When I reached middle age and realized I was pushing two hundred pounds on my fairly small frame and saw my blood pressure begin the inevitable climb I started seeking answers. Over a period of about two years I went from being a junk food junkie to a very healthy whole grain, low fat plant based way of eating. I am happy with the food I eat, and I am completely satisfied and free of cravings for junk. But I made the change for me. It made my body healthier, meals are a snap to put together and I know I won't keel over and die in a Mexican restaurant with a mouthful of fatty food like my father did. Had I made this switch simply because I worried about the planet or the animals, but inside still desired the junk food or big juicy steak, my change would fail me and I would eventually go back to eating the old way. I've watched it happen over and over with people I know. We must first admit to ourselves that we are selfish creatures and then realize true change will only come from a true change of heart and desire for our own good...but never from self-sacrifice.

Whoa, this is getting heavy now. That's too deep for me. This is a blog not a philosophy class. OK, so here is the point I am really making without delving into religion. "Happy is he who does not condemn himself in that thing which he allows." That is what Paul the apostle wrote to the Romans when they questioned him about unclean things. If you want to save the animals and the planet, GREAT!, but you have to start with the man in the mirror and change you first. But not through deprivation. If you start with turning off the electricity, running a hose to the roof to collect hot water from the sun, fill your basement with worms to digest your garbage and then convert your one-acre yard to an organic garden you will most likely fail. If life is just a series of chores to save the world you will most likely lose heart. (You could try saving the cheerleafer first but I think that only works on TV.)

From my experience it has taken years to reach where I am now, consumer wise. I am probably not that far along compared to others but I am happy for the moment where I am. I have drastically reduced my driving, I recycle like crazy, I eat plant-based organic, I buy less junk and now I am working on eating locally. I also am trying to reduce my stuff. I have lots of junk and I am trying to end my attachments. Stuff lock I think it is called. That's a pretty full plate for now. I am concerned about the planet but, to be honest, I am more concerned about the stress my stuff brings me right now. I have a desire within me to move to a simpler life. One step at a time I am getting there. But I honestly think a warm shower and an occasional soak in a warm tub will be a part of that simple life. I'll let everyone else feel guilty for me and then won't give it a second thought.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

If you wander around long enough you can usually find a garbage can, probably one that is stuffed and overflowing, emblazoned with the slogan "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle". I think this slogan was developed in the 70"s and actually meant something back then. Now it is just a conscience buster. It is OK to load up the can as long as you read the slogan and promise next time to try and reuse something. But I really got to thinking about this slogan again. This really is the order we should think about things in.

Reduce--This is probably my biggest goal. I have cut back considerably but recently signed up for the Yahoo Group Riot for Austerity, 90% Emissions Reduction Project and apparently have a long way to go. I'm not sure what they propose is readily possible for a city or burb dweller. This group has the simple goal to reduce what we use by 90%. Here are the austere goals they have in mind to save the planet followed by my own comments.

Gasoline:

• 50 gallons per PERSON, per YEAR

It is my goal to "Divorce my Car" and move closer to where I shop. work etc. but right now that is an impossibility. When I am finally able to accomplish this, I will have met this goal. At least directly. Must not forget that every single thing we buy leaves a fuel footprint as well. We often think this stuff grows like mushrooms in the stores. No...it is trucked in.

Electricity:

• 1,100 kWh per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR

To be honest this one is a little difficult to figure out for the average Joe like me. I need to get out my bill and see what I am using now. Living in an apartment I also don't think they would take kindly to me punching a chimney through the wall and putting a wood stove in the corner. So...this may be unrealistic at the time. At least in the winter. However, we have stopped turning the heat on at every slight chill in the air and wear sweatshirts a lot more. We also have a good supply of blankets in the living area and use them quite often. Nothing like cozying up under the blankets too for a little book reading before bed. There are also other ways to stay warm but this is a family blog.

Heating and cooking energy:

• If your home uses propane or natural gas, 100 therms per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR
• If your home uses heating oil, 75 gallons per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR.
• If your home uses locally and sustainably harvested wood: Unlimited
• If your home uses unsustainably harvested wood, 5 cords per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR

Everything in my home is electric. Everything! Hey, it's the Northwest and we are proud of those fish kills we have labeled hydroelectric dams. Except all that power runs off to California now to run the AC instead of sticking closer to home. Which brings me to a good point. Why would anyone need AC here in the Northwest. We see what, two 100 degree days per year. Give me a break. Even if my apartment had it I wouldn't turn it on. But yet I see AC compressors all over the place. And AC uses a lot of energy. On the really hot days why not just turn on the fans and pretend it is a vacation in the desert for a couple of days. How did we all become such wimps?

Garbage:

• 0.45 pounds of garbage per PERSON, per DAY

Wow, I guess I will have to weigh my garbage now. We take about one bag a week to the dumpster and so I think we might be getting close to this one but I really have no idea. I buy all I can in bulk and we eat strictly plant-based so most of the stuff leaving in the trash can is biodegradable anyhow. I realize that is not necessarily good for the landfill and am looking for a place to take it for composting. I have no real backyard that is mine for a bin and my wife hates worms so an inside worm bin is currently out of the question. Rumor has it that the county is going to start a composting drop and when they do I will be first in line. We create a lot of compost and I really hate to see it go to waste. If we can find a place with a backyard then I will start a composting bin. Hopefully that will be soon.

I should mention that it is only because landfills are essentially buried and sealed off from the air that biodegradable waste is an issue. It is my understanding this actually converts the decay into a greenhouse gas. and if the dumps were open air then the stuff would just rot on its own and not be an issue. However the volume of garbage we piggish Americans produce every day is more than can be left in the open. We actually truck and barge the stuff around looking for a place to put it. Read "Garbage Land." It is a real eye opener.

Water:

• 10 gallons per PERSON, per DAY

I guess I will have to stop showering and flushing the toilet. How do I meet this rule in an apartment? I don't think it is possible. They suggest buckets of sawdust instead of using the toilet but what do I do with it then? Throw it out the back door? This is an impossible goal for an apartment dweller I think.

Consumer goods:

• $1,000 worth per HOUSEHOLD, per YEAR.
• Used goods count only ten percent of their purchase price (so you could buy $10,000 of used stuff).
• Used goods that were donated to Goodwill or the church rummage sale, etc, can be bought in unlimited amounts (since might otherwise just end up in landfill).

OK, this is one that I may be able to manage easily since I am basically broke anyway. And I actually do love shopping at Goodwill type places. There are some real treasures to be had if you look. We live in a disposable nation and it is amazing what people give and throw away. I recently discovered that if you need furniture just wander around the dumpster areas of apartment complexes. People throw perfectly good stuff away every day when they move. Actually, I worked in an apartment complex years ago and some people would leave out the front door and never look back. Leaving behind literally everything. Clothes, furniture, shoes, refrigerators full of food. Amazing.

Food:

• No less than 70% of food purchases should be organic and be grown within 100 miles.
• No more than 25% of food purchases should be bulk, dry goods (flour, pasta, etc) from more than 100 miles away.
• No more than 5% of food purchases should be wet goods (meat, fruit, shampoo) from more than 100 miles away.

This is a goal we are moving toward. We buy about 95% organic now and are working on the "local" part. One of our goals this year is to buy as much as possible at the farmers market. That should solve the "within 100 miles" conundrum, at least in the growing season. When shopping at the grocery store I try to buy as much as possible from Washington and Oregon growers but winter usually gets a little lean in the local department. I am much more conscious of the ramifications of buying lettuce from Mexico now. That is a lot of fuel spent for my salad. Certainly we can grow enough lettuce locally to sustain us. Once I move I will start a garden and produce as much of what we eat as possible. I think we meet the 25% and 5% goal mentioned already.

Mind you now, we all must meet these goals, every single person on the planet, to stop our self-destruction. I assure you most in developed nations are not that motivated. I do fear though that nature is much stronger than any of us, and always seeks a balance to force sustainability. We have mickey moused around with nature so much, eventually it is going to strike back. And then, we will have no choice but to make these changes. Forget the Alamo. we should all remember the dust bowl of Oklahoma and the potato famine of Ireland instead.


Reuse-This is a difficult one. Most of the crap we have now is not made to be fixed. For example, I have a small appliances I use daily to grind flax etc. The only parts that are sturdy are the contact parts. The rest is cheap plastic and over time that plastic is cracking, simply from age and vibration. When it finally cracks all the way the motor will be out of line with the shaft and that will cause it to wear out. Can I fix it? Well, if there were a place to buy parts I guess I could. But, there is no place to buy parts. When I was a kid there were small appliance repair shops, but not anymore. Now we just throw it away and buy another cheap one. Even the computer that sits on my desk that I use for writing this blog is mostly disposable. Hard drive crashed? Buy another one. CD not working, buy another one. No one fixes these things and then puts them back in. You just pop down to CompUSA and buy it again. Convenient, yes but right? Not really.

Recycle-Ah, I love this one. I have become really good at recycling. I have stuff stacked all over which I run to the recycling places on a regular basis. Most of my garbage gets recycled. Any batteries I use get recycled. Anything I can recycle gets recycled. I have become very aware.

This fall I am planning on completing the Master Recycler" program. Why? Because this is the jumping off place into awareness. If you can make people aware of complete recycling you can get them thinking about reducing and reusing too. I'm not talking about the yellow curbside box recycling. That in some ways is a cop out. I mean thinking about everything that can be recycled. Batteries, compost, clothing, old electronics, etc. Things that are not necessarily picked up at the curb but can still be recycled with just a little effort. If you can keep it out of the landfill, then do! It is much easier than one thinks. It just takes a little practice and it becomes second nature. So much so that when my wife and I attended a Sustainability Fair and were handed a sample in a plastic bottle we could not bring ourselves to throw it away in the trash. And guess what? The Sustainability Fair had no recycle bins. We both found that very weird.

Well, I have really rambled on this time. Check out the 90% project. I'm not sure it is attainable for everyone living in the middle of the burbs but it has some worthwhile goals to strive for. The link is over there to your right.

Welcome-I am a resource pig

I am a resource pig and I know it. I'm trying to change. Honest. In this blog I hope to document my steps away from my own resource over consumption and on toward more sustainable life practices. Nothing like a little transparency to do the trick, huh.

One of my favorite past times is hiking. I have always followed the cardinal rule of hiking "leave only footprints and take only memories". It just seemed like the right thing to do. A day came that I realized as soon as the hike was over I was right back to trampling good old planet earth without care. I thought to myself, "Self, shouldn't you try to leave the least footprint you possibly can all the time? Not just when recreating? Hmm...good point. So, before I recycle myself back to soil and feed the dandelions, marigolds and lilies I decided it was time to clean up my act.

After my "conversion" I discovered that society in general views my goal of trying to live more sustainably as being very uncool for the most part. I sometimes find myself lumped together with being a "new ager", "hippie leftover" or sometimes even viewed as being "unpatriotic". "What do you mean you avoid the mall? It's your patriotic duty to shop and keep the economy humming. Waht about the corporations? What will happen to the stockholders? The economy will crash if we all start to live sustainably and stop buying more stuff."

OK, that may be all true. But, economy collapses are survivable. It's happened many times before and we all just went back to eating worms or something while we looked for a good farm and then waited for a good crop of broccoli and carrots. Ice ages and total desertification on the other hand are probably not as easily survivable. Mabybe if you have some good Eddie Bauer gear and a basement full of canned food. Wait! Did someone turn up the heat? Water, I need water!

Another example of falling outside the mainstream is when I chose to begin eating a plant-based rather than an animal-based diet. To be perfectly honest my first intent in changing was health and not sustainability but the ecology bandwagon rolled by soon after and I just jumped right on. My choice was severely questioned by nearly everyone I mentioned it too though. With great concern they would ask, "How on earth do you get your protein if not from a dead cow or chicken?" The answer, of course is that I get it the same place the cow and chicken did before they died. From plants, nuts, seeds, etc, etc. etc. Also, since I gave up mothers milk about fifty-one years ago I decided, very late in life, to give up cow's milk too. I mean it is true I do have calves but I use those mostly for walking and not drinking. And yes, I get my calcium the same way believe it or now. Plants. If somenone out there does find any carnivore cows or chickens please let me know and I may reconsider this choice.

It takes a lot of work to move toward sustainability since the choices are many and it may not be for the faint of heart. One of the easier choices to make is; do I use a paper bag that consumes a tree and saves oil or do I opt for the plastic one that consumes oil and saves a tree? I recently opted for the reusable plastic bags as they seemed to leave the least footprint.

A move toward sustainability may be difficult but it does have a very positive result. It will cost a lot less to live, life will become simpler and less stressful,and I will be much healthier. Admittedly I have taken just a few small baby steps, but it is a start. Each week (month?, year?, decade?) I plan to move a little closer to my goal as I read, learn, adapt and apply. Here are a few of the things I have done so far.

1. I recycle anything I possibly can and end up dumping very little in the dumpster.
2. I eat low on the food chain. That means I eat a very sustainable plant based diet and have eliminated all animal products from the menu since they consume resources at an alarming rate. I do use honey from time to time but mostly agave nectar.
3. I strive to leave the car parked as much as possible and walk or take the bus whenever I can. I'm still working on that one and have considered selling the car and using Flex Cars or a rental whenever I really, really, really need a car.
4. I have taken steps to reduce the junk mail I receive. Here are some instructions on how to do that: Stop the Junk Mail
5. I buy organic when it is available and shop local as much as I can. I am also trying now to eat with the seasons but have not yet fully refined that goal.
6. I read. Books, blogs, websites, anything I can to learn and adapt. Society it seems has moved so far away from sustainability in the last one-hundred years much of our knowledge of living with the earth has been lost. I know I certainly did not grow up in a sustainable household. There are still a few persons in the U.S. that live simply and it is from these I hope to learn how to return.
7. I do not sell my "allotment for polluting" by buying "carbon credits" so I can continue to pollute. I would much rather reduce my own consumption, educate others to do so as well and reduce the carbon emissions that way.

Well, that is my story for now. I hope to keep this blog going and document my progress. I actuallly hope to make quicker progress now than before and I encourage others to join me and post suggestions, good books to read and most of all encouragement. As time goes on I also hope to expand this site and offer select books for sale that will help others move toward co-habiting peacefully with the earth. The way we all did for thousands and thousands of years.

Please recycle this blog properly in the right bin.