Recent Comments

1. Use your LOAF at the shops (Local, Organic, Animal-Friendly and Fair Trade) - 10 Oct 2006

   RE the comment about buying local versus buying organic or buying fairtrade: I think that local is first in the hierarchy, particularly if you are buying your organic stuff at a supermarket, who have much less flexibility about reducing food miles. Some people would say that if something ‘organic’ has had to be flown in, then it isn’t organic!

   I have to say that, despite having campaigned on fairtrade for 20 years, I won’t buy FT apples from S Africa…

2. Don't just recycle, Freecycle - 10 Oct 2006

   Yo! We got rid of our child’s bike seats to someone looking for them! It’s amazing seeing what people want that we’ve actually got!!

3. Offset your Airmiles - 10 Oct 2006

   A Rocha is a christian environmental organisation that has set up a scheme planting trees in Ghana and Kenya with long term sustainability as the ethos, both in terms of local employment, and ensuring that the trees aren’t going to be chopped down.

   Have a look at www.climatestewards.co.uk

   The first thing tho’ is always to reduce, reduce, reduce….

4. Car Share (Save A Fortune Slash Your Emissions) - 10 Oct 2006

   We have a different sort of car sharing arrangement – we gave up our car but there are the odd occasions when I can’t actually get to somewhere by public transport (speaking somewhere in deepest Warwickshire on a Sunday morning…) so 3 of my wonderful friends have put me on the insurance for their cars. About once a fortnight on average, I borrow a car.

   What we found was that the very fact of having a car sitting outside meant that we were much more likely to use it, and not really to think of the alternatives. But getting rid of the car, borrowning a vehicle (rather than sharing lifts, which didn’t work for us, except occasionally) and orientating our life around access to public transport (living near the station so we can get the train easily) and so on meant a much more significant change. Life is possible (possibly even better!) without a car! Yo!

5. Get Rid of Your Car - OK, ambitious, but... - 10 Oct 2006

   We set up a car share scheme, with Smart Moves (see the link at the top) which sadly closed due to the folks in it not using the car enough!! But that was the start for us of getting rid of the car. Once the car club folded, we just didn’t go back to car ownership. I’m on the insurance of 3 of my friends’ cars, so if I do need a vehicle I can borrow (which is about once a fortnight on average).

   I agree with Jo above that I found that life became less stressed once we gave up the car, precisely for the same reason – if I can’t do something I just say ‘no’! I find travelling by train a much more pleasurable experience. It takes longer, but hey, I can read books… and sleep!

6. See An Inconvenient Truth. - 17 May 2007

   We have a regular film night at our house for local friends to watch a film and have a discussion, so we watched the Al Gore film. It provoked quite a discussion!

7. Phone a friend - someone who has sent you a card this year who you don't see often - 17 May 2007

   Yo! I did this with an old friend from primary school… we exchange Christmas cards, which for the last 10 years have read ‘we must get together’ so I did it. Went and stayed overnight. And strange how our journeys were so similar. It was great to get back in touch.

8. Go Local - Join A Food Cooperative - 17 May 2007

   A group of us get together and put in a wholesale order to Suma (wholefood co-op) and one of us has it delivered into the front room. It works really well, and means I haven’t visited the big supermarkets for years. A similar group do the same with Daily Bread (www.dailybread.co.uk) for amounts that don’t have to be wholesale amounts, and again – it works really well!

9. Switch it off at the Plug. (Don't Stand By.) - 17 May 2007

   We have had a project over the last year to put everything so that it is easy to turn off at the socket. We’ve also made a determined effort to turn off lights and so on. In the last 12 months we have saved 15% on our electricity usage!! I was completely gobsmacked! So it is definitely worth doing.

10. Improve your home's energy efficiency - 17 May 2007

    Well, after much umming and ahhing, we finally got around to insulating our back bedroom (coldest in the house) with insulated plaster board. This was a major thing for us… and expensive (insulated plaster board was £400 and £600 to pay the plasterer to fix the boards then plaster the walls…). Hopefully tho it should make the room warmer in winter and colder in the summer!