Editing to be green

Back in high school I was enrolled in a course called Citizenship in Action 30S. I think it was probably the most valuable course in high school in my opinion. It taught me about the issues the world faced and what we could do to maintain a sustainable life for future generations and how to reduce our carbon foot print.

We learned about fair trade products, and issues affecting Canada. I guess, I could say because of this course, I became a little activist. I wrote letters with Amnesty International, signed petitions, and stuck my nose in almost everyone's lifestyle and picked on them to try to change their way to better living. (Trust me, I converted a lot of my friend's families who didn't use a recycling bin to use one)

As many people will know, one of the simplest things to do is to unplug appliances that aren't in use. Decreasing your electricity usage can be a major way to decrease your impact on the environment.

Since almost everything is about going green these days, you've probably heard the term "energy vampire". If you haven't, an energy vampire is an appliance that uses electricity even if it's turned off, as long as it's plugged in.

This is an easy problem to solve, simply unplug things when you're not using them. Or, if you don't even want to go to that much effort, use power bars for everything. But be careful of over plugging appliances (that's a big fire hazard) That's what I do anyway, I just turn off the power bar and viola! It's that easy peasy. You could have a setup where you plug in your TV, DVD player, VCR player (if you still have one) or video game consoles. That's what my dad does. Although, I still find myself unplugging my dad's entertainment system.

Another obvious place to cut down on electricity is your computer or laptop. The one thing you can do is turn it off at night. And when you do leave it on, change your computer settings to put it to sleep, rather than using a screensaver.

There are many ways to decrease your carbon foot print, there's only so much one person can do, but if more people do these simple little things we can all create a wave. We can all create a movement.

I stumbled upon this site called My Plastic-fee Life: Show Us Your Plastic. It's a site where people tally up their plastic waste and review how they can reduce their accumulation of plastic. In the next few days, try to keep track how much plastic and recyclable items you use. It's amazing how much plastic we use everyday from bottled water to chocolate bar wrappers. What changes can we do to help with the environment?