Environmental pollution causes harm for animals and people (especially for those living in poor countries or poor neighborhoods). Once you start looking at the problem, you can easily find some rather disturbing images and videos. [Read more…]
Genetic erosion is a process where a limited gene pool of some species diminishes even more. In wild endangered plant and animal species, low genetic diversity leads to a further diminishing gene pool pushing that species towards eventual extinction.
Yet during the last century humanity has lost also a significant amount of agricultural biodiversity despite it being important for food security and dealing with a changing climate. [Read more…]
Food waste. An enormous problem. Approximately one-third of all the food humans produce gets wasted and remains uneaten.
Food waste is a major part of the impact of agriculture on climate change. In order to grow food, we cut down forests, we use fossil fuel to run farm equipment, produce nitrogen fertilizer, and distribute food to consumers. Moreover, when organic waste is not handled properly (through composting), it produces methane, a greenhouse gas, from anaerobic digestion of organic matter in a landfill. Also, non reclaimed phosphorus in food waste leads to further phosphate mining, which is a finite natural resource.
On one hand, humanity wastes a lot of food that we produce. Meanwhile, millions of impoverished people experience hunger and malnutrition. [Read more…]
Americans have a skewed sense of size. They will use adjectives like “tiny” to describe living spaces and kitchen appliances that would be considered “huge” or at least “normal” in the rest of the world. I have long since learned to expect to see the trend towards glorifying large size and wasted space in American mainstream interior magazines. What surprises and worries me more is to see American environmental activists embracing the idea that their perfectly normal or even large living spaces should be called “tiny.” In my opinion, environmentally conscious people should refuse to accept and embrace American mainstream ideas about what ought to be considered “normal” in terms of size and also in terms of lifestyle choices. After all, size is relative, and we can choose our own vocabulary and benchmarks for what constitutes “large” or “small.” [Read more…]
Scientists routinely identify some lifestyle habit that contributes to global warming and come up with a better alternative that causes less environmental harm. Then people recommend that others should change their lifestyles and do the better alternative whenever possible. So far so good. And then somebody shows up and says, “Let’s all do this one thing and we will save the planet.” Um, no, that’s not how it works. [Read more…]
Regular readers of my blog already know that I am interested in environmentally friendlier lifestyles. I don’t like the idea of leaving a trail of trash behind me. Unfortunately, once you start searching online for advice on how to avoid trashing the planet as badly, you face a minefield of pseudoscience. [Read more…]
It’s July now. The month in which people are reminded that they could try to reduce the amount of waste they create. Plastic Free July challenge encourages people to refuse single-use plastics in July (and beyond). The idea is that people can experiment with ways how to reduce the amount of plastic waste they create, find great alternatives for disposable goods, and hopefully also develop some new and better lifestyle habits.
What can you do? Here is a list of some basic ideas you can try. And in this blog post I have already written about how individuals can try to reduce the amount of waste they create. Basically, avoid single-use plastic packaging for the goods you buy, refuse takeaway items (plastic bags, bottles, straws, coffee cups), replace single-use items with reusable items (for example, safety razors and glass straws instead of plastic equivalents).
And here’s a picture with a summery of various things you can try to live with less waste:
How to Live with Less Waste
Modern lifestyles result in people creating a lot of waste. Plastic waste from single use items and packaging. Food waste. Last generation iPhones. Electronics that are actually broken and cannot be repaired or recycled (often due to planned obsolescence). Clothes that were worn for a couple of times and then thrown out. I believe that human societies should change how we live towards something more environmentally friendly. Those are the kind of lifestyle changes that must be simultaneously done by a significant portion of the society in order to make a difference, but individuals can still try to do at least something. [Read more…]