World carbon emissions out of control

I am writing another post that has been triggered by a news article, only this time it is about climate change. The headline 'China's per capita carbon emissions overtake EU's' came as a bit of a shock.

'While the per capita average for the world as a whole is 5 tonnes of carbon dioxide, China is now producing 7.2 tonnes per person, to the EU's 6.8 tonnes. The US is still far ahead on 16.5 tonnes per person.'

I was always led to believe that it was China's 1 tonne footprint, based on less consumer goods, lower energy consumption and higher bicycle usage, that we were meant to aspire to.  The chart below taken from Shrink That Footprint shows how things stood back in 2001.


In 2001 the carbon footprint for the whole world was 4 tonnes per person per year, so over the last 12 years, despite knowing that carbon emissions are causing catastrophic climate change, the world's footprint has increased to 5 tonnes per person. The actual carbon emissions are even worse than this, because there are an additional 1 billion people in the world now, who are all emitting 5 tonnes each too.

Why wasn't this the headline? World carbon emissions are still increasing wildly. Any pretence that carbon emissions are under control let alone decreasing is a farce!

So how could China's per capita carbon emissions overtake the EU, from such humble beginnings? That is an enormous change from 1.7 tonnes per person in 2001 to 7.2 tonnes in 2013.  I have mentioned previously, a large part of the increase in carbon emissions is a result of the shift in manufacturing industries from the West to China. So the largest increase in their emissions is from burning coal, to power factories, that are producing cheap goods for us.

Also emissions in the EU have decreased slightly, but that is mainly the other side of manufacturing industries moving to China and taking the energy consumption with them.

It is such a bad idea. Labour is cheaper in China because there is a lower standard of living and less regulations to protect the workers. So instead of keeping jobs in the EU, where there is a minimum wage, sick pay, holiday pay, paid maternity leave, strict health and safety rules, regulations on pollution and pressure to reduce carbon emissions, companies have cut costs so that we can have more 'stuff' at a lower price.

Personally, I don't want more 'stuff' and when I do really need to buy something new, I aim to buy local products or EU as a minimum, so that I know no one has been exploited making it and my money helps to support local industries. This may mean paying higher prices, but that will just mean that I can't buy so much stuff. It also reduces shipping all round the world and hidden carbon emissions.

What the above article really made me question is why have I been basing my personal carbon reductions on 90% of the average American, when they are clearly the biggest carbon emitters. Using the formula that Sharon Astyk used in the Riot for Austerity, was relatively easy to understand and follow so it had some appeal, but in all honesty I personally wanted quite a generous starting point, to make my target easier. Making a 90% reduction seemed......overwhelming. Now I feel like not making a 90% reduction is overwhelming!

So from now on I am going to frame things differently, and continue to significantly reduce my carbon emissions.

Barry's ecohome

I spent the Open Homes weekend helping out at Barry's house. It was the most gorgeous weather and we sat at picnic tables in the garden drinking tea and chatting about all number of green issues.

Barry has been very pro-active about reducing his environmental impact for a number of years. He is very practical with technology and DIY so has implemented many of his own solutions, but at the same time he has embraced lifestyle changes to reduce his consumption further. I have been aiming for a 90% reduction compared to the average American, but Barry has in many areas already achieved this, if not surpassed it. Here is how he has done it.

Barry has sold his car and travels everywhere by bicycle, by bus or on foot. He couldn't manage this living in a rural location, but being close to the centre of a small town means that there are shops, the library, the market and bus stops all close by.

Barry doesn't pay any water rates because he is completely off the mains. He collects rainwater from the roof of his house and workshops, and uses various simple methods to filter it, including brush bristles in the guttering to trap the leaves. He also has his own well with a manual pump. Barry decided a manual pump would be safer than fitting an electric pump in case of a power shortage, so Saturday morning involves the light exercise of pumping water to fill a stainless steel drum, which is then enough drinking water for a week. He uses the traditional method of a silver spoon in the bottom of the well to kill bacteria as it slowly corrodes. Barry will drink the rainwater once boiled for tea and it is also diverted to the upstairs bathroom. The toilets are compost loos, so they don't waste water or create a waste stream.

Which nicely brings me on to other waste. Barry composts all his kitchen and garden waste and finds ingenious ways to re-use most things. There are 4 compost bins around the site and the resulting fertility is spread on the garden. One of the compost bins is made from the back end of an old car! (Sorry I forgot to take a photo!) I love this idea! It is stood on end so the car boot is at the top to load compost into. Old beer cans have been welded together to make an original downpipe. Old bike tyres make a surprisingly comfy toilet seat, for a compost toilet made of old washing machine parts, plastic bins and large plant pots.

Barry doesn't like seeing things go to waste and rather than buying things new, can pick up and salvage things that people may throw away in skips. We were sitting on folding picnic benches rescued from a supermarket skip. Barry regularly collects food from the local supermarket skip too. Often things like fruit is thrown away because it is past it's 'display until' date, even though it is still in perfect condition. He also grows fruit and vegetables in his garden.

Barry heats his home using a woodburning stove. His garden is large enough to have plenty of tall trees around the edges, which he trims for firewood, providing a free heating fuel. It also supplies the heat for cooking in winter too.

The main house was built in the 1800's and as such has hard to treat cavity walls. Look at the small gap between the bricks above, which makes it very difficult to add any insulation. The house is in a conservation area, (which means it is very difficult to get approval to change any of the external features of the building) so external wall insulation is not an option.

Barry has chosen to insulate the walls internally. These old terraced houses are pretty small inside by current standards, so internal insulation will reduce the space even more. Small homes are a lot cheaper to keep warm though.

It is a big project which is underway, and has involved moving out while the work is completed. The roof and floors are not being neglected either with insulation board due to be fitted between the rafters and a thick layer of insulation added to the floor. It will be down to the details of the joints to ensure good air tightness.

The windows have been upgraded for double glazing at the side and rear of the building, but the front windows need to retain their original wooden appearance. Barry will be installing secondary glazing internally and is looking into the best way to seal it. On the front door Barry has opted to have a deep reveal to act as a barrier to draughts too.

Barry has solar hot water provided by evacuated tubes, which he had removed for maintenance. You can just make out the unit below the window, with one tube still attached. He saved money by buying the parts and building the system himself. Electricity is also from solar energy. Barry has a large array of PV panels for his workshop roof, as they are not allowed on the South facing house roof, due to the conservation status. These panels feed into a series of batteries and are off grid. This means that when the sun shines they will charge the batteries, giving Barry a low voltage supply of electricity, even in the event of a power cut.

Barry does have a mains electricity supply which he can use if required, but generally he can manage with a low voltage supply. He would like to have a small wind turbine too on the main house, but again that is prohibited.

Barry uses his mains electricity wisely. For instance he will boil the kettle when he wakes in the morning, whilst the electricity is still on the night rate. He heats enough for 4 cups of tea and pours it into a thermos flask to last him the whole day. He also manages without a fridge by storing chilled goods in a container of cold water in the coolest north west corner of the house. Small regular shopping or 'skip-diving' trips also help to reduce the need for chilled food storage. By using the computers and internet access at the library he also avoids many of the standby devices that drain electricity.

The Open Homes visitors had plenty of questions for Barry and he was in his element talking about his ideas and green issues. It is very interesting to see how with a lot of ingenuity and a change of attitudes, it is possible to become more self-sufficient and live a sustainable and ecologically friendly lifestyle.

Frugal purchases

Last year I started looking at how much 'stuff' we buy and set myself a goal to reduce it. I was following Sharon Astyk's Riot for Austerity to some extent, so my rules for what I was buying were somewhat different to those used by Judith Levine in Not Buying It, who was just trying not to buy anything for a year. For instance buying secondhand is good for me, as it is re-using items that other people no longer need and stopping them being thrown away. It also doesn't have the carbon footprint of buying a new item (though there are sometimes some transport emissions involved).

The Riot for Austerity uses the measure of how much you spend each year, with a target of reducing that to 90% of the average American spend. So buying expensive designer goods would work out bad, but then so could buying higher priced fair trade items or locally produced products. Buying secondhand is cheaper (unless you are buying antiques) so it is a very good way to reduce your annual spend. Even better is not buying anything. The ideal for me would be to focus on just buying the raw materials rather than finished goods where possible. So seeds, manure and wood are raw materials, whereas a new oven would be a finished goods. To replace my broken oven I would need to look for a second hand replacement as an alternative to buying new (As I certainly can't make one from raw materials ;-) ). Can you see how this should work?

I would love to have the skills and time to make all my own clothes, so just buying material, thread and wool, but for now buying secondhand is my aim. With this in mind I have been off to my local carboot sale again!

My darling husband always asks why I go to the carboot sale to buy things, when I would be better off selling some of our unwanted 'stuff'. I do occasionally do a stall to sell things, but I find it is much easier to give outgrown kids clothes to friends or family, or to put it in a charity bag. I save far more money buying things than I would make in a day of selling. Let me show you some examples......

This glass measuring jug is as good as new and cost me 30p, whereas to buy it new would have cost £3.75 (price from Tesco direct). It replaces the last of my very old plastic jugs and should last years, so I can justify this as not useless 'stuff'.

Jeans from Next that look like they have only been worn a few times cost me £1. These are exactly the jeans I would usually buy, so I know that a basic new pair would cost £20 from the shop. I also got another pair of M&S jeans for £2, though they aren't such a good fit. Jeans that fit are an essential to replace worn out jeans, but ones that aren't a good fit will just clutter up my wardrobe, so will go straight into a charity bag.

A plain t-shirt in very good condition from M&S cost me 67p, because I bought 3 t-shirts for £2. To buy it new would be around £6. (Two of the t-shirts didn't fit so really it cost me £2 for one t-shirt, which is still a saving.)

I also bought a T-shirt for my daughter for 50p as we had seen a similar one in New Look for £6.99. Essentials again for growing kids.

A thick warm jumper from Roxy cost me £1, although it was a bit grubby. New ones start at £50 on their website. Warm jumpers are another essential for winter.

A set of baskets (they look like a set but I bought them from 2 separate stalls) cost £2. How much would they be new? Maybe £15? I am just guessing here. Again these are replacing plastic tubs, and are not only more aesthetically pleasing, but made of natural materials.

Oh and a campervan mug cost 50p, but they cost £7 new. Hmmm......there is always an impulse buy! This kind of 'stuff' shouldn't be creeping in my home, even if it is secondhand.

Oh and how could I forget! I spent £1.50 on a cast iron hand mincer. Just the weight of the metal would be worth more than that. Although I can't really claim to have saved any money because I never would have bought it new. I'm sure I will get round to using it eventually. Plus it is made in England, so its a local product.

Not bad for a mornings shopping. I spent £15 in total if you include a few more items that didn't fit properly when I got home, 3 DVD's and the 50p admission fee. To buy just the items mentioned above new would have cost me £108 a saving of over £93. The most I have ever taken on a day selling my unwanted goods at the carboot is £80, though £50 to £60 is more normal. If it rains you risk taking a lot less money and coming home with a boot full of soggy items.

For me the Riot for Austerity target of a 90% reduction of 'stuff' based on money spent, is looking much more achievable than to not buy anything like Judith Levine did for a year. And if bargain hunting is something you enjoy, then find your nearest carboot sale for a frugal and eco-friendly shopping experience :-)

90% transport

I have been tracking our fuel receipts for a few years now. We have 2 cars. One is a small, fairly efficient, petrol-engined car. The other is a very old diesel-engined, 8 seater people carrier. You may have guessed it is rather inefficient, but incredibly useful for camping, sharing lifts or carrying big loads. It is also 4 wheel drive, so tends to be safer to use in muddy or snowy conditions (ok mainly muddy conditions!). It isn't used so much now, but on Thursdays it really comes into its own, when I drop off at dancing on the other side of town. Last week I gave lifts to girls from 4 different families as well as my own kids, so we are potentially saving 4 other car journeys. In my mind that makes it effectively 4 times more efficient. Also I wait outside dance, rather than going to and fro, so saving even more journeys :-)

I am a bit of a spreadsheet anorak! The graph below shows the total amount of fuel we use a year, made up of the blue for diesel and red for petrol. It is great to see that we spend £840 a year less on fuel now than we did 2 years ago, which equates to 700 litres (154 gallons) less fuel. Some of this saving is down to changing to a more efficient, smaller car in April 2012. We have also reduced our speed on motorways, averaging just 60-65mph, where the limit is 70mph, to reduce our fuel consumption.

How do we do against the average American and can we achieve a 90% reduction? I'm going to use Sharon Astyks analysis to work it out. This is the section referring to transport fuel.

1. Gasoline. Average American usage is 500 gallons (2,273 litres) PER PERSON, PER YEAR. A 90 percent reduction would be 50 gallons (227 litres) PER PERSON, PER YEAR.

I'm not really sure if gasoline is petrol or diesel, but for ease I'm going to use it for both. Our total for 2013 was 2,006 litres (441 gallons). However this is for the whole family and also includes our business miles. At first I thought that 'per person' consumption meant per person who can drive a car, but after a bit of digging through old posts it appears that it means per person in the family. I'm going to exclude my eldest daughter who is at Uni most of the time and has now had her own small car for 6 months. So for 5 people we use 401 litres (88 gallons) each. What about business miles? Should they count or not?

I only have mileage figures to go on for business use, so I have used the annual odometer reading, taken from the MOT records, and worked out that 50% of our total mileage is business use. If we recalculated our consumption per person, excluding business use, we are at 200 litres (44 gallons) per person per year. Now in addition a journey shared is a journey halved - but this is just too much to record and analyse. Without the business miles we are below the 90% target and including them we are only a little bit over, especially if shared lifts were included. Hurray - this is one target that I have more or less nailed!

We have taken lots of steps to reduce our car usage, but I really feel we could still do better. I have specifically chosen to work from home to cut out time, money and pollution commuting. We live on the edge of town, but still only 2 or 3 miles away from the town centre, and there is a good bus route (which I don't use, but should!) . It is 2 minutes walk to the supermarket and post office, 15 minutes walk to my daughters school, 25 minutes bike ride to my sons school and 25 minutes ride to the train station. We rarely go to the nearest city for shopping, which is a whole 15 miles away, but we do travel 150 miles to visit family. I feel like I am always driving around giving kids lifts places, but as most of the journeys are short and our car is small these aren't really amounting to as much as it seems.

Still, I know families who bike almost everywhere and I pass them in my car everyday :-(  They aren't just 'fairweather' cyclists like us! The weather can really put you off cycling, as you need head-to-toe waterproofs, gloves, hi-vis gear and of course bike lights. We are not well kitted out for this and to top it all off my bike has been stolen, so no cycling this winter! But when we go bike shopping I will be looking to get properly kitted out, so there are no more excuses. If I can skim another £800 off our fuel bill it will be well worth it.

 

My perception of a 90% reduction would be like one of these cycling families who are all on their bikes whatever the weather, no matter what distance - but my perception is wrong. They are the 99% reduction. A 90% reduction looks more like me! Living close to the places that we visit every day, walking when I can but still using a small efficient car regularly for short journeys and making sure that we liftshare whenever possible. Where do you think you fit on the scale?

I have been searching for the UK average per person fuel consumption and the best I can come up with is from the Department of Transport: Road Transport Forcasts 2011, which state...

In 2010 the average person in Great Britain made 960 trips, travelling a total of 6,726 miles.

Using average UK fuel efficiency would give 808 litres (178 gallons) per person, which I have used in the graph above. This is already 36% of the American average that Sharon uses. So chances are, if you live on this small island, your fuel consumption isn't too bad either ;-)

Energy saving 1

Busy, busy, busy....the last few months have flown by. Maybe it is because the days are shorter that they seem to rush by quicker, or because there is so much that I want to do. Sigh!

Back in October I wrote that I planned to reduce our energy consumption by 65%. The idea was that this would hopefully offset the increase in prices to 2020 at the current rate. (It is possible that prices will increase more than my projection to 2020, but despite all the political hot air going on right now, it seems unlikely that overall price increases will be lower.) Then a few weeks back I re-assessed how much further I would need to go to reduce our consumption to 90% of the average American consumption. After a 65% reduction we would still be double the target consumption. How are we going to achieve this?

So this is the start of a mini-series, a step-by-step look at energy reduction measures, that may continue on a sporadic basis for some time. I'm not going to just list a standard '10 tips', without telling you how to go about doing them. No, they are all going to be based around improving my very real home, and include discussion of the options available and how to do it. Feel free to ask questions or let me know any energy efficiency measures you have taken.

 

 

Insulation is always first on the list. It not only saves energy on heating, but it makes your home noticeably warmer and cosier. It can also be fairly cheap and cost-effective to install, and you can reap the benefits for the next 20 - 40 years.

The simplest measure is to install a thick layer of insulation in your loft. My hubby installed a 150mm layer of rockwool insulation between the joists of the main roof, the year we moved in. Then I layed a second layer across the rafters in 2007. It isn't a very nice job, crawling across joists dressed in gloves, boiler suit, goggles and mask, but if I can do it then it really isn't soo hard, especially now that there are so many more options for insulation rather than Rockwool which is a skin irritant. My local DIY store stocks lambs wool and insulation made from recycled plastic bottles, alongside rockwool that is sealed in a 'bag' that can just be rolled out.

It's not a perfect job though. For a start the loft hatch isn't insulated. We also have a walkway along the middle, made from chipboard laying on the rafters, so there is only one layer of insulation under the boards there. Perhaps all the junk stacked on the chipboard counts as additional insulation?

Energy saving no.1 : Insulating the loft hatch
I bought one sheet of condensed insulation board, that was big enouth to cover the loft hatch twice, for £8 from the DIY store. I cut it neatly to size with the bread knife, including cutting a notch around the opening mechanism. I would have liked to stick 2 layers of insulation on the loft hatch, but there is a ladder attached, which only allowed room for one layer. Tah dah! Estimated annual savings for insulating the loft hatch is £9 a year. (I think that figure was from the Energy Savings Trust a few years back, so it should get an even bigger saving on current energy prices)

 

Energy saving no.2 : Top-up loft insulation on the walkway
The next job should be to lay insulation boards on top of the walkway. There are some handy solutions in the DIY store now, that weren't available a few years ago, to make this job a lot easier. The first are insulated loft boards - chipboard with insulation attached, so you can lay the boards across the rafters and they are ready to walk on.

The next is plastic legs, that attach to the rafters. They allow you to lay an new walkway on top of them to walk on, whilst giving space for insulation below them.

 

Luckily the walkway in our loft is just a small area, so we could insulate it for £100 using the legs with rockwool below and re-laying most of the existing boards on top. The downside is that we will lose even more head height which is not ideal as this provides access to the boiler. I am picturing our plumber having to crawl along on his hands and knees with his toolbox, which is far from ideal. Dilemma - ease of access over energy efficiency?

For this year I have come up with a compromise. We have several rolls of off cuts of carpet and underlay stored in our garage. I'm going to roll out a couple of layers of carpet over the loft walkway. This should provide some additional insulation, though probably not as good as the proper insulation. It also has the bonus of freeing up some space in the garage and not costing a penny :-)

I will post the photos of the completed jobs next time, along with more energy savings. If you are living in the UK and receive certain benefits, you may be applicable to have you loft insulation topped-up for free by applying for ECO funding. This applies even if you live in rented accomodation or are not the homeowner. Try calling the Energy Saving Advice Service on 0300 123 1234 to see if you qualify for free loft insulation and other energy efficiency measures.

90% energy correction

So I have got it wrong! I have just found the original 'Riot for Austerity' Rules as laid out by Sharon Astyk, and it gives all the average US consumption figures to compare with. Of course it would have been good to have found this earlier :)

It turns out that when the US Energy Information Administration gives a figure for domestic energy consumption it is just heating energy and doesn't include electricity. No wonder it was all in BTUs! So if you look back to Part 1: Choices in March you will see the following table comparing my energy consumption with the average US consumption. If we add in the additional 11,000kWh per year of electricity consumption for the average household that I inadvertently missed off, it changes everything. I'm sorry if I have misled anyone with my mistake.

	Average Household Energy Consumption kWh	Average Household Energy Consumption Btu
US 2009	26,259 (Actually 40,587)	89,600,000 (Actually 138,500,000)
UK 2009	19,020	64,900,000
My home 2009	25,813	88,100,000
My home 2012	22,594	77,100,000
90% reduction target	2,626 (Actually 4,058)	10,260,000 (Actually 13,850,000)

I am somewhat relieved to find that our household consumption is already only 56% of the average US household, rather than 86%, and it certainly makes the target seem much more achievable. Whilst I am not prepared to give up my fridge and use a coolbox as Sharon did, I have got plans for further energy reductions, including installing solar PV panels to generate electricity and reduce my grid-supplied electricity by around 40%.

The relief didn't last long because I started thinking about the average person in the US. I had found it incredibly daunting to contemplate an 86% reduction in energy consumption. It is not easy to achieve without significant investment or losing some luxuries, like a warm home and a fridge. Yet on the other hand how can we justify the vast amount of energy we use when millions of people get by with very little at all. And here's me fretting about giving up my fridge!

Here is a graph that I spotted in the UK Energy Trends for September 2013 from the Department of Energy and Climate Change. Though not about the domestic energy consumption it shows the disparity in consumption for crude oil across OECD countries, and I think demonstrates the point. It is showing the proportion of crude oil supply that is produced at home on the vertical 'self-sufficiency' axis. The 'diversity index' along the horizontal axis is showing the stability of the supply. Neither of these features interests me though. It is the size of the bubbles which are used to represent the actual consumption of each of the countries, which made this graph stand out for me. The big blue bubble represents the US crude oil consumption and the red dot on top of it represents the UKs consumption.

This disparity doesn't make reductions any easier, but it just amazes me how the differences can be so large. I can't really get to grips with what it all means, and all sense of outrage or guilt has been suspended. It seems like the choices we make now are even more important than ever.

I have posted the Riot for Austerity rules below in case anyone would like to have a go. It is copied from here I have just inserted a few conversions in to make it easier for us Europeans to compare.

Here are the 7 categories:

1. Gasoline. Average American usage is 500 gallons (2,273 litres) PER PERSON, PER YEAR. A 90 percent reduction would be 50 gallons (227 litres) PER PERSON, PER YEAR.

-No reduction in emissions for ethanol or biodiesel.
-Public transportation and Waste Veggie Oil Fuel are deemed to get 100 mpg, and should be calculated accordingly.

2. Electricity. Average US usage is 11,000 kwh PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR, or about 900 kwh PER HOUSEHOLD PER MONTH. A 90% reduction would mean using 1,100 PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR or 90 kwh PER HOUSEHOLD PER MONTH

- Solar Renewables are deemed to have a 50% payback – that is, you get twice as many watts.
- Hydro and Wind are deemed to have a 4 to 1 payback over other methods – you get 4 times as many.

3. Heating and Cooking Energy – this is divided into 3 categories, gas, wood and oil. Your household probably uses one of these, and they are not interchangeable. If you use an electric stove or electric heat, this goes under electric usage.

- Natural Gas (this is used by the vast majority of US households as heating and cooking fuel). For this purpose, Propane will be calculated as the same as natural gas. Calculations in therms should be available from your gas provider.
- US Average Natural Gas usage is 1000 therms  (29,307kWh) PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR. A 90% reduction would mean a reduction to 100 therms (2,930kWh) PER HOUSEHOLD PER YEAR
- Heating Oil (this is used by only about 8% of all US households, mostly in the Northeast, including mine).
- Average US usage is 750 Gallons (3,410 litres) PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR. A 90% cut would mean using 75 gallons PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR. Biodiesel is calculated as equivalent.
- Wood. This is a tough one. The conventional line is that wood is carbon neutral, but, of course, wood that is harvested would have otherwise been absorbing carbon and providing forest. There are good reasons to be skeptical about this. So I’ve divided wood into two categories.
- Locally and sustainably harvested, and either using deadwood, trees that had to come down anyway, coppiced or harvested by someone who replaces every lost tree. This is deemed carbon neutral, and you can use an unlimited supply. This would include street trees your town is taking down anyway, wood you cut on your property and replant, coppiced wood (that is, you cut down some part of the tree but leave it to grow), and standing and fallen deadwood. You can use as much of this as you like.
- Wood not sustainably harvested, or transported long distances, or you don’t know. 1 cord of this is equal to 15 gallons of oil or 20 therms of natural gas.

4. Garbage – the average American generates about 4.5 lbs (2kg) of garbage PER PERSON, PER DAY. A 90% reduction would mean .45 lbs (0.2kg) of garbage PER PERSON, PER DAY.

5. Water. The Average American uses 100 Gallons (450 litre) of water PER PERSON, PER DAY. A 90% reduction would mean 10 gallons (45 litres) PER PERSON, PER DAY.

6. Consumer Goods. The best metric I could find for this is using money. A Professor at Syracuse University calculates that as an average, every consumer dollar we spend puts .5 lbs (0.2kg) of carbon into the atmosphere. This isn’t perfect, of course, but it averages out pretty well.

The average American spends 10K (£6,200 or 7,400 Euros) PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR on consumer goods, not including things like mortgage, health care, debt service, car payments, etc… Obviously, we recommend you minimize those things to the extent you can, but what we’re mostly talking about is things like gifts, toys, music, books, tools, household goods, cosmetics, toiletries, paper goods, etc… A 90% cut would be 1,000 dollars (£620 or 740 Euros) PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR

~_ _+ Used goods are deemed to have an energy cost of 10% of their actual purchase price. That is, if you buy a used sofa for $50, you just spent $5 of your allotment. The reason for this is that used goods bought from previous owners put money back into circulation that is then spent on new goods. This would apply to Craigslist, Yardsales, etc… but not Goodwill and other charities, as noted below. This rule does not apply if you know that the item would otherwise be thrown out – that is, if someone says, “If you don’t buy it, I’m going to toss it.” Those items are unlimited as well, because they keep crap out of landfills.
~_ _+ Goods that were donated are deemed to be unlimited, with no carbon cost. That is, you can spend all you want at Goodwill and the church rummage sale. Putting things back into use that would otherwise be tossed should be strongly encouraged.

7. Food. This was by far the hardest thing to come up with a simple metric for. Using food miles, or price gives what I believe is a radically inaccurate way of thinking about this. So here’s the best I can do. Food is divided into 3 categories.

1- is food you grow, or which is produced *LOCALLY AND ORGANICALLY* (or mostly – it doesn’t have to be certified, but should be low input, because chemical fertilizers produce nitrous oxide which is a major greenhouse contributor). Local means within 100 miles to me. This includes all produce, grains, beans, and meats and dairy products that are mostly either *GRASSFED* or produced with *HOME GROWN OR LOCALLY GROWN, ORGANIC FEED.* That is, chicken meat produced with GM corn from IOWA in Florida is not local. A 90% reduction would involve this being AT LEAST 70% of your diet, year round. Ideally, it would be even more. I also include locally produced things like soap in this category, if most of the ingredients are local.

#2 is is *DRY, BULK* goods, transported from longer distances. That is, *whole, unprocessed* beans, grains, and small light things like tea, coffee, spices (fair trade and sustainably grown *ONLY*), or locally produced animal products partly raised on unprocessed but non-local grains, and locally produced wet products like oils. This is hard to calculate, because Americans spend very little on these things (except coffee) and whole grains don’t constitute a large portion of the diet. These are comparatively low carbon to transport and produce. Purchased in bulk, with minimal packaging (beans in 50lb paper sacks, pasta in bulk, tea loose, by the pound, rather than in little bags), this would also include things like recycled toilet paper, purchased garden seeds and other light, dry items. This should be no more than 25% of your total purchases.

#3 is Wet goods – conventionally grown meat, fruits, vegetables, juices, oils, milk etc… transported long distances, and processed foods like chips, soda, potatoes. Also regular shampoo, dish soap, etc… And that no one should buy more than 5% of their food in this form. Right now, the above makes up more than 50% of everyone’s diet.

Thus, if you purchase 20 food items in a week, you’d use 14 home or locally produced items, 5 bulk dry items, and only 1 processed or out of season thing

6 month roundup

Back in March, having read "Depletion and Abundance: Life on the New Home Front" by Sharon Astyk, I started comparing my lifestyle with the average American, and the average Brit, and looking at the possibility of reducing our consumption by 90%. Ploughing through the figures made me realise really how difficult a 90% reduction in anything was going to be. My assumption that compared to the Americans we consumed less, so we would have a massive headstart, only panned out to be a small headstart. Still it was worth looking at what could be achieved, and it prompted a change in habits.

Reducing my impact in the food category, has involved increasing my home grown produce, shopping more locally and trying to avoid excess packaging. Free food has been available from growing more produce in my garden, helping at the Transition community allotment and sharing the harvest, and gifts or exchanges from family and friends. Along with my normal food foraging forays, I have been introduced to food rescued from supermarket skips. One bad pear in a bag of 6, results in the whole bag being thrown away. I am certainly learning and improving in this area, and there is far more potential for reducing the impact of our food than I had originally thought. Having only a small garden and little spare time have not been the limiting factors that I had expected. The image above shows all the free food from last weekend :)

Certainly on the 'stuff' level we have really achieved quite a big change. Looking back at the 'One Month Stuff' project, I can see several items that I have found ways to obtain for free. Some of it requires a bit of time and effort, or an exchange of goods with others, which is very sociable and can lead to making new friends. The local car boot sale has been a great source of low cost secondhand goods, and I have even managed to get myself clothes from there, which have quickly become my comfortable favourites. Cheaper and more fun than ebay! No fur or fringes like Macklemore yet :) I have never been one to rummage, but I am learning new tricks and really enjoying it too.

New stuff for the kids is a difficult area to tackle. Recently there have been new shoes, clothes and sports equipment, as it is the start of a new school year. Overall, questioning whether things are really necessary and if they can be bought more ethically elsewhere has been an easy habit to pick up. If I have to buy new, then there may still be ethical options, but they tend to have a higher pricetag, like this georgeous handcrafted cherry wood chopping board that I bought from the local Woodfair event. (Ok - impulse buy!)

Recycled waste has dropped by a third and non recyclable waste has reduced further. The recycled waste savings are partly business, with a reduction in cardboard scraps. Changing from liquid soap to bars of soap, and buying more goods from the market has cut packaging too. We only have about 2 carrier bags of non-recyclable waste each week, which is pretty good for a large family and 2 businesses. More food scraps and cardboard is now going into the compost bin. I was wondering if old cotton rags can be composted too, as I really can't put them in the textile recycling. Does anyone know?

My hubby has also been very good at repairing broken goods this month, such as replacing an iphone screen, which has saved on getting new stuff and reduced waste. He didn't even have any random parts or odd screws leftover at the end ;) What a pro!

Transport, though I never got round to comparing the figures, did show some improvement for a while over the summer. My youngest son started biking to school and tennis club, and I was walking to school with my youngest daughter. It seemed great, but then my son went over his handlebars...on two occasions! No serious injuries luckily, but I'm a bit concerned about a third time. The walking has been cut back too as it seems a bit cruel walking to school and back without bringing Lottie our dog, who is stuck at home.

Sitting in the car reading my book whilst my daughter is at dance lessons, halves the travelling back and forth, and we also give lifts to 3 other girls, reducing our share of emissions. But then add in the additional trips driving to the carboot sale, farm shop, weekly market, and community allotment, which are all further away, so I doubt there has been any reduction in driving habits over the last 6 months. Still, with no daily commute and most facilities close at hand we were already below the average mileage. Just a lot still to do to reach the 90% target.

Energy is my hot topic, and I was gobsmacked that the electricity company reduced our direct debit payments by 10%! Electricity consumption is so difficult to cut back on. All efficiency measures tend to be wiped out by the increase in number or size of gadgets. For instance, 15 years ago we had one landline phone that wasn't plugged in, but now everyone in the house has their own mobile too. I checked my energy data and we have only seen a 3% reduction in electricty consumption over the last year. This is dismal, especially since I was expecting savings whilst my eldest daughter was at Uni. The graph below shows the actual energy consumption as the red line, and the green columns show the cost. (The big column in 2009 shows how energy companies increase the price of your tariff
if you don't compare and switch every 2 years!)

We have been making small improvements, like disconnecting the modem at night, (although I always forget to plug it back in in the morning and wonder why there are no emails) switching off the landing light and having a very efficient nightlight (the kids bedroom is right in front of the stairs, so if they get up at night they could fall - safety before efficiency!) and more recently replacing some of the lights for LEDs. We have tried LEDs before and the light was so bad that we ended up taking them out again. The light from LEDs has improved greatly over the last couple of years, and these ones in our office should pay for themselves in about 2.5 years. Thank goodness, because they are awfully expensive to buy compared to standard lamps. Hopefully we will see reductions in consumption longer term.

Gas consumption for heating has increased, mainly due to the long winter. Adjusting for degree days the consumption would be about the same as the trend for the last few years, so there still would have been no reduction in consumption had the winter been milder. Actual annual consumption is shown below by the dark blue line, whilst the columns show the actual cost.

Super-insulating the house has got to be the best solution to reduce the need for heating. That way not only do you substantially reduce heating costs, but in the event of a supply failure you are better prepared to survive without heating. Dr Tina Holt is our local hero, for retro-fitting her 1930's house to passive house standards and promoting the work as part of the Hobbs report for Transition West Bridgford. It may be far more appealing to consider a new home built from scratch, but it is perfectly possible to retofit if you pay attention to the details. It certainly has the potential to give a significant proportion of the energy saving we are looking for.

What is quite clear is that these relatively small incremental steps can only take me so far towards a 90% reduction in carbon emissions, and a far more significant change is required to get anywhere near the 90% target. This could come about by moving to somewhere with more land and a woodburner, leading us to become more self-sufficient for food and heating, as Sharon Astyk has. Or by retro-fitting our current home, so it is super-insulated, with solar water heating and PV for electricity generation. These are the voluntary options, but there is also the possibility of rocketing fuel prices or financial collapse putting us in a position where we are forced to go without some of the luxuries we are accustomed to. If energy prices are high do you choose to keep your fridge running or watch x-factor? Do you heat your home or have a hot bath? Many people round the World live without any of these luxuries in the first place.

Personally I prefer the voluntary options don't you? Reducing my consumption levels now, may help to cushion the shock of changes that are coming. Even the small changes are adaptions that bring us closer.

It is so nice writing a good news post and sharing achievements, but I am warning you now that this isn't going to continue. It is a wonderful distraction to discuss my garden or secondhand bargains, but it is not the reason that I started this blog.

We are on the brink of massive changes and upheavals, peak everything from peak energy and peak debt to peak pensioners, climate change altering everything we thought we knew about seasons and weather patterns, and the massively unfair distribution of wealth sparking social discontent. Although we feel as if changes happen slowly and incrementally, history has been much more a series of necessary rapid adaptions to a sudden change in circumstances. It's scary and challenging and there is plenty to discuss in future posts to help become better prepared.