Use 10 Percent Less

All things must change when the consumer changes

sustainability

Useless emissions, for what?

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The science is very clear. The concentration of carbon dioxide (and other so-called “greenhouse” gases) is increasing and this is leading to an increase in the average temperature of the atmosphere. Without arguing about the the details of why this is happening, the science of the above statement is undeniable. Adding to this, the knowledge that human pollution is adding about 45 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere each year, then it really disturbs me when I see some of the useless emissions that we create every year. It’s extremely urgent that we avoid adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, yet we add extra for no useful purpose whatsoever. Argh!

An example of useless emissions at a cricket match
A photo I took from my tv during a cricket match – an example of useless emissions

What are we celebrating here?

Sometimes I’m concerned that seemingly minor things seem to irritate me significantly. I took the photo above from my television last year. During a cricket game in the UK, they used flames to celebrate and “create an atmosphere”. Ironic to use that word “atmosphere” here because they’re adding more carbon dioxide to the ever warming atmosphere that we live in. We’ve just been through the COP26 meeting and realised (temporarily?) how urgent it is to reduce our pollution, and then we see these useless emissions being created at a sporting event. It makes me mad.

When I first saw this, it really struck me that a stadium full of people were cheering as the flame throwers released their energy, and added more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. It was almost as if the people where cheering the addition of more warming gases into the atmosphere, just after all the issues raised at COP26. It will sound extreme, but it felt to me like a group of people standing around and cheering a hunter who just killed one of the few elephants left on the planet.

useless emissions used to "celebrate" during a cricket match
Another photo of useless emissions being made during a cricket match

Little things matter

When it comes to greenhouse gas pollution and the warming of the atmosphere, we’re in an absolute emergency situation. There is no time left to wait and there are some very big challenges that we have to tackle. If we don’t get on with this urgently, we’ll not be able to slow the degradation of the climate enough and it will become extremely uncomfortable for us.

Even though there are big topics to deal with, little things matter too. And the burning of fossils fuels at a sporting event just to create an impact is one of those small things. It’s a symbol that we just don’t get it. We don’t realise that we’re adding pollution to the atmosphere that we don’t have to, and this pollution is accelerating the heating of the Earth (a process already well underway). It’s a relatively little thing, but let’s stop it! No more useless burning of fossil fuels for such things as “celebrating”. And let’s find all the other little things where we pollute for no reason, and stop those as well.

Let’s be serious. Let’s stop all useless emissions. Let’s buy ourselves some time to fix this problem

We can fix this, but no more useless emissions

Let’s not get depressed about global warming. There’s no point in that. At least we understand what’s happening now and what the mechanism is, so we have a chance to do the things that will be needed to keep the temperature of our atmosphere within a relatively comfortable range. But we have act seriously and urgently. Every kilogram of greenhouse gases that is released into the atmosphere simply increases the warming and makes our task harder.

These useless emissions that I’ve highlighted here are, for the most part, a glaring signal that we don’t understand our predicament and the urgent need to find solutions. Please eliminate all useless emissions now. Immediately. If ever we create greenhouse gas emissions, let’s be sure we understand what we’re doing and verify that we’re only doing so because their isn’t a viable alternative yet.

flame based celebrations at a rugby game

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The Power of Less – from Good Energy

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The Power or Less – a video from Good Energy

I’ve been a customer of Good Energy for about 5 years now and I have to say they appear to be a good, responsible, renewable energy company. I don’t have any affiliation with them at all, and I’m receiving nothing from them for writing this article (they have no idea I’m writing it). When I saw that they had recently released this short, one-minute video, “The Power of Less”, and that its message was so closely aligned with the sentiment of “Use 10 Percent Less“, I just had to post the video here. It’s only one minute long – please take a look. [Read more…] about The Power of Less – from Good Energy

Fairphone – a better phone option?

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A couple of years ago, I read an article about Fairphone in an edition of “The Big Issue” and I was fascinated. The first thing that caught my notice was that when Fairphone’s founder, Bas van Abel, first wanted to create a fair mobile phone, one of the first things he needed to do was pay a bribe in Africa to access a mine. I’d heard that the mines in Africa can be run in terrible ways for the local people (who are basically desperate for any money they can get) and this was, and still is, a major concern for me. Just because it’s in Africa and out of my sight, doesn’t mean I can just put this out of my mind and accept it.

Eventually Bas van Abel sourced ethical materials and the Fairphone dream was underway. This dream wasn’t just the sourcing of ethical materials, the bigger part of the dream was to create a phone that was modular and could be easily repaired by the owner using inexpensive spare parts. This is why the Fairphone is of interest here at use10percentless.com, it’s a phone that you’re intended to keep for much longer than the standard smart phones, hence less waste.

Obviously, I decided to buy a Fairphone. I wanted my usage of a phone to have less impact on the world. It wasn’t an easy choice because it also meant I’d be switching from an Apple iPhone to an Android based phone. I’d never used Android before. However, on the positive side, it worked out that I spent roughly half as much money on my new Fairphone compared to the iPhone I would have bought if I’d stayed with Apple. [Read more…] about Fairphone – a better phone option?

Shaving without plastic

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We are often caught in a trap of creating waste, paying too much money for unnecessary things, and not even realising there’s a less wasteful, cheaper way to go. Shaving is a classic case. We’re stuck in the disposable plastic world of shaving and have forgotten that there’s a simpler way. It’s crazy! It is possible to organise your shaving without plastic and it’s been around for centuries, and it’s cheap. Maybe all we can say is it’s less convenient, but it’s not really.

How I used to shave

I’ve been concerned about disposable (whatever that means!) plastic involved in shaving for many years now. Way back in 2007, I purchased a plastic razor from a company called Preserve because it was made out of recycled plastic already and because you only needed to replace the razor head when it got blunt. The idea was to keep the razor handle for a long time (I used mine for 12 years without the need to replace the handle) and only “throw away” the small head with the blades. The following three images are some photos of the razor I was using and its detachable blade head. [Read more…] about Shaving without plastic

Extinction of convenience

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The human race today, even in the midst of the novel coronavirus pandemic, is addicted to convenience. It’s this addiction that is bringing us down and, with all likelihood, be the main cause of our extinction. Due to our desire for extreme convenience, we use the resources of the world with gay abandon and create enormous amounts of pollution everywhere. In response to this, the world’s environment has been changing rapidly in recent decades, as if the world is preparing for the extinction of convenience, which includes us. Our only hope is to create an “extinction of convenience” of our own, and eliminate our insatiable desire for endless convenience.

During the current coronavirus pandemic, I see a persistent desire to get back to the ways things were even though there are plenty of fantastic examples of how things could be better. The skies are clearer because there are not many planes flying, pollution from our cities has dropped dramatically, nature in many parts of the world is springing back into action and local communities are becoming stronger all over the world, just to name a few. Do we really want to go back to the way things were? People are worried about the “economy” but we really need to build a new economy rather than simply return to the old one. [Read more…] about Extinction of convenience

They need us more than we need them

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I was surprised a few days ago to find a quote that was advocating one of the Use 10 Percent Less themes, namely “all things must change when the consumer does“. When I found the following quote in the April/May 2020 edition of the “Resurgence & Ecologist” magazine and saw “they need us more than we need them“, I was very interested.

“The corporate world will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling – their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability.

Remember this: We be many and they be few. They need us more than we need them.

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”

– Arundhati Roy, War Talk

[Read more…] about They need us more than we need them

Concerns about HS2

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The new high-speed rail link in England, HS2, has recently been given the go ahead by politicians. For some reason I feel deep concerns about HS2, and I thought I’d better investigate it properly. Even though trains are a less polluting way to travel than cars or airplanes, the new rail line will cut a new swathe through the English countryside and contribute even to more to the continuing destruction of natural environments that we can’t afford. When I have concerns about HS2, I keep hearing Satish Kumar’s call to “tread lightly” on the Earth and I believe this is a goal we must pursue with conviction.

In the spirit of “Use 10 Percent Less”, you could say that building new train links would be a good thing overall as these might lead to less road transport. But then we can also ask, do we really need a train that can move 1,100 people at a time between Manchester and London in 45 minutes? It would actually be better if we could devise ways that reduced the need for people to travel so much. We’ll also see below that the HS2 project does not stack up well on environmental grounds.

I’m concerned that HS2 is going ahead for two main reasons, (1) politicians need a highly visible project to demonstrate their commitment to people in the north of England (to help ensure being re-elected, even though the money could be well spent upgrading transport services along existing routes with little additional damage to the environment), and (2) pressure from the construction sector to keep a high value project alive with the threat of losing jobs (some companies are going to make a lot of money out of HS2).

In reality, of all the concerns about HS2, we should be first examining its effect on our environment. [Read more…] about Concerns about HS2

Just don’t waste – Sir David Attenborough

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The amazing Sir David Attenborough gave us the very simple message of “Just don’t waste!” a couple of months ago at the BBC launch of the series “Seven Worlds, One Planet”. Here is what he said.

…the best motto to think about is not waste things. Don’t waste electricity, don’t waste paper, don’t waste food. Live the way you want to live but just don’t waste. Look after the natural world, and the animals in it, and the plants in it too. This is their planet as well as ours. Don’t waste them.

It’s such a beautiful summary of the sentiment behind the Use 10 Percent Less initiative. Modern life is very wasteful and we have been getting more and more wasteful, and more disposable, over recent decades. It’s really good to see that the disposable culture is being challenged very strongly now and that we might actually be able to start reducing our waste. [Read more…] about Just don’t waste – Sir David Attenborough

UK Climate Debate and Pollution

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On Thursday, November 28th, the leaders of most of the political parties in the UK took part in a “Climate Debate” (unfortunately the leaders of the Conservative Party and the Brexit Party did not accept the invitation). If you haven’t seen the debate, you can see the whole thing right here below, as Channel 4 has released it on YouTube. I’ll make my comments further down in this post. For me, what the political parties are planning to do to make us rapidly reduce pollution and environmental destruction is the key issue in this election.

From my point of view, focussing on “climate” is not as good as focussing on “pollution” and “environmental destruction”. The real problem is the amount of pollution that humans are creating and that includes carbon dioxide, methane and lots of other gases, as well as plastics and discarded junk in land fills. The pollution also comes from our eating habits and our need to clear natural land to feed our habits. Once you talk about “climate” it’s easy for people to point out that the climate of the Earth has changed often during history, even before humans were around. It’s certainly true that the change now is more rapid than it has ever been before, but we still get stuck on the issue of whether it’s really humans causing the climate change. It’s easier to stick to the most obvious fact that humans are polluting the Earth really badly at the moment, as well as blatantly destroying the natural environment to create profits in our financial system.

 

If we’re really going to tackle pollution strongly, politicians need to take a strong stand on issues like additional runways at major airports, specifically Heathrow, and cheap flights. It’s not good to be promoting cheap flights because of the benefit to the economy while, at the same time, these flights are causing enormous pollution to our atmosphere. We have to begin reducing flights, especially short haul flights (so much pollution from take-off and landing for a short flight), right now and quickly. This issue came up in the debate but it wasn’t fully covered to my satisfaction, so I downloaded all the political parties manifestos and examined them for their policies in this direction. This is what I found. [Read more…] about UK Climate Debate and Pollution

We are just greedy and wasteful

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Forget the argument about whether climate change is being caused by humans or not, it’s perfectly clear that we humans are very greedy and wasteful. This is what has to stop. Let’s acknowledge how greedy and wasteful we are, and then let’s start trying to address it. We don’t need any other reason than the fact that greed leading to lots of waste can’t be good for anything.

Some time ago I was researching about the amount of energy we use. It’s no surprise that the world is using exponentially more energy as time passes. The counter argument goes that there are more and more people on the planet too, so maybe the extra energy usage is just natural. However, I wasn’t expecting to find what I found.

Growth of energy usage

Can I say first that humans are the only organisms on the planet that use supplemental energy? All other organisms only use the energy they get from digesting their food, breathing air and absorbing sunlight. Humans use electricity, oil, gas, coal, uranium, solar, wind, water, etc. to create supplemental energy for our benefit.

I found this graph (from Our World in Data) that shows the growth of energy consumption over the past 200 years. [Read more…] about We are just greedy and wasteful