Recycling

Now let’s talk recycling.

Now everyone has always been told about the three R’s

         Reduce - Reuse - Recycle

But it amazes me how many people don’t actually follow these three easy points. I recently had about a 9 hour wait in an airport waiting to fly to Australia, and yes I’m the guy who clicks yes to the extra carbon off setting charge. But anyway spent about 5 hours sitting near to a group of three bins; they were paper and card, plastics and general waste.

During my time there I must have watched hundreds for people wander past and many of who were attempting to down bottles of water and other liquids before going through security and in some cases they would have put even the hardest of student drinkers to shame in the time it took them to finish litre bottles of water.

After these were finished it amazed me how many people would simply put it in the general waste bin simple because it was the first in the line of bins in the directions of security. I would say around 2/3rds of the people that needed to bin something put an item into the general waste bin when it could have been placed into a recycling bin next to it. It isn’t just there however if you look into any bin in public and households they are over flowing with recyclable goods which are destined for landfills

A landfill packed with recyclable materials

So all I’m really trying to say in this post is that just take a second longer to look at the options available to you when disposing of waste. In many developed countries it is now possible to find recycling bins spread out in public. However if you aren’t able to find a suitable bin possibly consider taking the rubbish home where you can recycle it yourself.

Now I understand that many people don’t want to carry rubbish around with them all day especially if they are not heading home for a while. So instead try to prioritise as much as it pains me to say things like this. Paper and card break down faster and have less energy put into its production  than items such as plastic bottles and aluminium cans so if there is a choice bin the paper and aim to recycle as much plastic, glass and metal as possible.

You can take things a little bit further however by simple picking up any of these three groups I’ve mentioned if you see them laying around and either take them home to recycle or find an appropriate bin. I know no one wants to pick up manky bits of rubbish on their way home from work or the shops but if everybody could pick up ‘clean’ pieces it would greatly reduce the amount of litter you see and make those walks a much more enjoyable experience.

It’s going to leave you with this link which is both interesting and informative and shows what actually happens to plastic after you’ve finished with it.

So I hope next time it comes to bin something you’ll remember and take the right option.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6xlNyWPpB8

Interesting link

Now this isn't a post from me but if you have a spare couple of minutes this is well worth a look.

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141016-your-life-on-earth

This is extremely interesting and informative but also scary and a warning. It makes it clear that we aren't able to carry on living the way most people do and expect the earth to be able to sustain that style of living.

Check it out!!!

Kitchen

I have decided to start in the kitchen as a place where everyone is able to save power and so help make a difference.

Now lots of University students come straight from A levels or collages and when they arrive at university they don’t have a clue how to cook anything more complex than a pizza. For instance the first night I spent in halls one of my new flat mates spent several hours attempting to cook chicken drumsticks in the oven without success. To give him his dues though it turned out the oven was broken but still it took a while for anyone to realise.

Anyway back to the point, it’s very easy to waste resources in the kitchen whether that be, gas, electricity, water or fo

od because everything has an ecological and environmental cost.

Now all the things I’m about to list might seem simple and extremely obvious but from what I’ve seen it is still unknown for most people.

Let’s start with water, now although it almost appears that water requires no energy to come out the tap this isn’t the case. The water which comes fresh out the taps has been thoroughly processed using different methods depending on its source and the country the processing was done in, and used a lot of energy to make it that far.

The water has had to be removed from the water course and this in its self-causes problems to the aquatic wildlife in the area it was taken from and the terrestrial animals which require the water source. But removing water isn’t the only way humans affect the flow of water across the world, more and more dams are being built to allow companies to cope with the huge demands for fresh clean water which are put upon them. These dams in turn upset both the migration of fish and organisms along waterways and also change the area above it into a static water body flooding vast areas of land, while the area’s below suffer from a lack of water and even with dam’s releasing compensation flows it’s never as rich or abundant in species once the dam is completed.

Right once the water is taken from the source and pumped to the treatment plant which could be miles away, it is then put through a series of treatments such as micro-filters and bacterial cleaning to remove the waste and make it fit for consumption. Some of these processes require vast amounts of power and the plants are run round the clock to fill demands.

So the water is now clean and drinkable but it still has to be piped across the country to your tap ready to be used.

So it’s ideal if you can attempt to preserve as much water as possible.

The ways in which I suggest you do this are as follows

1.       If you are washing up don’t leave the taps running simple fill up a bowl (which usually take 10-15L) and use that. Never use dishwashers as some machines get through 90-100L in a single cycle, and even if you have to refill the washing bowl it’s still overall less water than the dishwasher.

2.       Try to use as little water as possible when cooking things such as veg. This will not only save water but save the power taken to heat the water (which I will talk about in another post) and save time as there is less water to heat.

3.       Try to reuse water in things such as gravy and sauces simple use the water something has boiled in.

4.       Keep a jug of water in the fridge so you don’t have to run the tap for ages to get cold water to drink.

Now I know those four points appear obvious but I still amazed how many people don’t follow them.

I will leave you with a few figures and statistics which will show that the current rate which humans consume water is far from sustainable.

·         Australia in 2009-10 used 4,444 gigalitres (GL) of water in the course of the year and this is with a relatively small population of around 20million.

·         In the UK water usage has increased by 1% every year since 1930 so now every person of the 60+million population uses 150L a day (2012).

·         In USA 2010 water used for domestic reasons was 23,800Mgal/d which is 90092.8 liters a day or 32906395.2l a year.

water usage in USA

The Plan

The Plan

So first a bit of back ground on myself

I’m a current student and because of this I have spent 3 years in different house shares and I’m currently living in a house share with 6 other people. Now as a university student studying zoology the environment is close to my heart and it is for this reason I’ve decided to write this blog. The general plan for this blog is to give the readers a few ideas of how they can act to benefit the environment around them and will also allow them save you a bit of money in a few places.

Now most of these ideas might be well known by the readers of this blog, but I just wanted to be able to give a reminder to everyone and possibly a new view of simple ways to change your lifestyle so as to benefit the environment.

There are countless articles on both news channels and scientific journals of the effect that human activity has on both the environment in the form of climate change, pollution and other such things and the rate at which other species we share this planet with are in decline and becoming extinct. This cannot continue at it’s current rate and with the human population still growing everyone has to change to make living more sustainable.

Now I don’t want to be one of those people who are wandering round the streets with a wellie on my head shouting at walls saying the end is nigh but there are changes we are going to have to make if humans want to continue to live in the same comfort and among the same diversity of life we currently have and are losing, everyone is going to have to learn and play their part.