In the UK 700 million batteries are sold a year, (about 21 per person.) Each of these batteries takes roughly 50 times more energy to make than it provides. You get 50 times more energy out of a rechargeable battery than it takes to make one - equivalent to 2,500 times more than for a disposable battery.

They save waste. If you recharge your battery 500 times you save 500 other batteries ending up in landfill sites.

They save money. You get the extra money you paid for the battery back after just five charges, so you get the equivalent of 495 charges for free.

The cost of recharging batteries is only about 1p.

Like old style lightbulbs, disposable batteries are an old fashioned technology that should be avoided at all costs.

Have a read of this article

Burning fuel to produce fertiliser to grow feed, to produce meat and to transport it - and clearing vegetation for grazing - produces 9 per cent of all emissions of carbon dioxide, the most common greenhouse gas. And their wind and manure emit more than one third of emissions of another, methane, which warms the world 20 times faster than carbon dioxide.

 

So If you don’t fancy becoming fully vegan, just a reduction in the amount of meat meals you consume will help.

If you want to get to grips with the complex issues involved in solving climate change then I can recommend reading George Monbiot’s book Heat: How to Stop the Planet Burning.

This book more than any other will give you an insight into how we’ve got ourselves into this situation and offers ways in which we might get ourselves out of it.

Definitely worth a read.

Small steps can make a big difference. (especially if a lot of people make them together) So here are some kitchen tips….

1. When you’ve got stuff in a pan, make sure you put it a lid on it. This will reduce the cooking time.
2. Don’t fill the kettle up, if you are only making one cup of tea.
3. If you have a garden, invest in a composter. This will reduce the amount of methane produced in landfilled sites (Methane is worse for the environment than co2 emissions.)
4. If you are boiling an egg, but the egg in cold water. Bring it to the boil. Then turn the heat off and leave for 5 mins. You have used less power than boiling the water, then putting the egg in.
5. Check your fridge, you might have it turned up to the max, turning it down slightly, will reduce the power you use.
6. Use your microwave. Weirdly, it uses about a third of the energy of a normal oven.
7. Try not to buy food with unnecessary packaging. Its a waste and often ends up back in the ground producing more methane.
8. If you have a dishwasher, only put it on at night and always make sure it is completely full.

I’ve been meaning to do this for ages and had fitted only a couple previously when bulbs had gone. In case you don’t know, low energy bulbs are also called CFLs (compact fluorescent lamps) It cost me about £150 to do all of them in one go, but I figured this will actually pay for itself over time, since it seems these bulbs will last 10 times longer than normal bulbs and are cheaper to run. The electricity used by a normal bulb is often more than 90% of its total cost.

The energy saving trust says:

“Each bulb you fit could save up to £100 on electricity over the bulb’s lifetime.”

I think one of the big problems with changing over is that most people (unless they are really committed) are not going to spend £150 on bulbs in one go! Money is tight, the answer to this problem would be to just make normal incandescent bulbs illegal, or another option would be to make CFL bulbs very cheap or give them away, this would dramatically help reduce your personal co2 emissions. But it seems to still be a bit of a way off in government thinking.

There also seems to be a problem with adapting to bulbs that look slightly different

There are a few myths that put people off getting CFLs, that having done it, I can say are just wrong.

The Myths

1) They look ugly. They’re not, I actually think they look elegant, (particularly the newer smaller ones.)
2) A concern that they don’t give you a bright light immediately when you flick the switch - who cares! its a split second does it really matter?
3) They give off a different type of light that some people find a bit strange at first. Its just different, it won’t kill you.
4) That they don’t fit all types of lights. Shops and DIY shops seem to still be a bit behind on this but have a look a round on the internet, you can get an energy saving bulb for every type of fitting.

If you cant afford to change all your bulbs in one go, have a think about the 5 bulbs you use most often and start wit these and then when other bulbs go, jsut make sure you replace them with low energy ones.

Changing to CFL’s is an easy step you do have control of changing. I bought mine from The Green Shop

It becomes a bit addictive as you got round the house turns things on and off and watch the meter go up and and down. After just a couple of days of use I’ve started making sure all lights are off when I’m not in the room and things not being used are unplugged (like mobile phone chargers)

A very visual way of seeing your carbon emissions fall and your electricity bill decrease.

Its a really good starting point to think about how you can reduce emissions from your own home. Its the ipod of the climate change debate, everyone should get one.

Do not make the rookie mistake I made and fall for Juice (from Npower) Heavily marketed, but ultimately owned by a German parent company called RWE who are the largest CO2 emitter in European power production! with many coal powered stations.

I have done a bit of research and it seems there are three much better options to consider:

1) Ecotricity:
“Ecotricity is an electricity company with a difference - we’re dedicated to changing the way electricity is made. We take the money our customers spend on electricity and invest it in clean forms of power like wind energy. What’s more, we’re the only green electricity company actually building these new renewable energy sources. This year alone we’re investing £25 million in wind energy.”

2) Green Energy UK:
“By making us your electricity supplier, you’ll have a direct impact on the demand for electricity generated from renewable resources. Not only will you encourage the growth of green solutions, you’ll reduce both our reliance on electricity generated by fossil fuels and the amount of greenhouse gases in our environment. As green generators grow and develop, they will become more efficient, less expensive and better. One day, we’ll wonder why we ever did anything else.”

3) Good Energy:
“All the electricity we supply comes from wind, small scale hydro and solar power generators from all over Britain. They are either small or medium sized sites and many of them are the result of diversification from areas such as farming and other family businesses. Our Home Generation scheme supports the smaller generator and home owner.”

I’ve not yet decided which one of these three to go for, so if you have any thoughts, please let me know.

I’ve yet to discover which one offers the best service at the right price. Any Ideas?

If you want to reduce your own carbon footprint, the advice in the media seems to be to avoid flights at all costs. Flights more than anything seem to be the most single damaging thing an individual can do.

There are lots of calculators online to help you work out how much co2 will be released in the atmosphere for each flight that you make, here is an example:

http://www.carbonfootprint.com/flight_calc.html

But is offsetting a good idea? Does it actually help at all?

Friends of the Earth advise against offsetting because they think it throws us off the real issue. Their website says:

Friends of the Earth, along with a number of other organisations, is becoming increasingly concerned that carbon offsetting is being used as a smoke-screen to ward off legislation and delay the urgent action needed to cut emissions and develop alternative low-carbon solutions. Offsets can even encourage businesses and people to continue with (or even increase) unnecessary polluting activities, promoting the mindset ‘I’ve offset so it’s OK to fly’.

I think it’s pretty hard to avoid all flights completely. You can try by taking the train or holidaying within your own country, but these are not completely realistic for most people. Sometimes due to time pressures you have to fly to go longer distances.
While we wait for Governments and business to create an alternative to high co2 emitting flights some questions remain:

As an individual is it better to offset or not offset?
And if you do offset, what is the best way of doing it?

I feel so strongly about this that whenever I’m offered one from now on I have decided to say that I don’t want it. At firstthis might be annoying but I will soon learn to bring a bag with me to the shop.

According to Waste Watch, every year 17.5bn plastic bags are given away by supermarkets. That’s equivalent to more than 290 bags for every person in the UK.

Some supermarkets have started to charge for a bag or reward people who re use bags. But what we really need is a sea change so that bags are not given out at all.

This week San Francisco has made plastic bags illegal. In Ireland the government has taxed plastic bags, but sadly nothing in the UK.

If you agree with me and would like to see plastic bags disappear from our lives, pick your shop from the list below, phone them and tell them you don’t want plastic bags and when you are in their shop just refuse to have one given to you.

UK Supermarket Share – the 10 biggest.

Tesco (31.3% share) phone 0800 505555

Asda (16.9% share) phone 0845 300 1111

Sainsbury’s (16.5% share) phone 0800 636262

Morrisons (11.1% share) phone 0845 611 6111

Co-op (4.7% share) phone 0800 0686 727
customer.relations@co-op.co.uk

Waitrose (4.0% share) phone 0800 188 884
customer_service@waitrose.co.uk

Somerfield (3.6% share) phone 0117 935 9359

Aldi (2.4% share) phone 01245 215000

Lidl (2.1% share) phone 0870 444 1234

Iceland (1.8% share) phone 01244 842842