Green facts and tips

Award-winning scientist environmentalist Dr David Suzuki said: “We are in a giant car heading towards a brick wall and everyone is arguing over where they are going to sit.” If this is so, and if we continue damaging our environment and the earth with the effects clearly showing, instead of focusing on consciously saving it, surely there would not be much left for our children?

Imagine this — every year, areas the size of countries like Nicaragua and Greece are lost to deforestation. Plastic and other toxic industrial wastes are destroying ecosystems and wildlife and their habitats. We are also witnessing extreme and unpredictable weather. According to www.carbonfootprint.com, 20,000 sq km of fresh water ice melted in the Arctic between 1965 and 1995.
Dr Stuart L Pimm, a zoologist, in an interview with the New York Times about animals going extinct, said: “The animal populations become fragmented because of farming and development. The remaining creatures can’t find a date on a Saturday night.” Pimm won the Heineken Prize for Environmental Sciences, the Nobel of the ecology world, in 2006.

Former US vice-president Al Gore in the Oscar-winning 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth, said: “The warnings about global warming have been extremely clear for a long time. We are facing a global climate crisis. It is deepening. We are entering a period of consequences.”

The message is clear — while we may not be able to undo what we have done to the earth/environment, we owe it to our future generations and primarily to ourselves, to possibly improve the situation around us. “Carbon footprint” is a term often mentioned in “green” articles. Carbon footprint is a measure of the impact of our activities on the environment, particularly climate change. Basically, it relates to the amount of greenhouse gases produced in our daily lives through burning fossil fuels for electricity, transport and so on.

Consider some of the facts on this page and see if you need to act. City & Country also compiled a list of green tips, and while they may seem “too simple” to some of us, how many of them are being practised? Just being more conscious about your carbon footprint and what you can do daily to reduce it would make a huge difference.




This article appeared in City & Country, the property pullout of The Edge Malaysia, Issue 760, June 22 - 28, 2009.