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Written by Elizabeth Jones   
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Thursday, 05 January 2012

Top New Year Resolutions

The events of 2011 tested the resolve of environmentalists everywhere. The year was full of reminders of the kind of resolution it will take to continue to gain small environmental victories in 2012, but it was also full of events that should inspire us as we consider new resolutions and environmental goals we want to meet in 2012.

The bad news first: global warming won't go away. Perhaps the most frustrating parts for me about environmental politics in the United States is that one of the two major political parties—I think we all know which one I’m talking about—tends not to believe in climate change. And yet, the events of 2011 indicate that the planet is still warming. This past year there was a brief post-recession lull in greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), but then it was broken by a record rise in GHGs.1 Meanwhile, 2011 turned out to be the 10th warmest year on record, and there were 12 natural disasters in the United States alone.2 Although snowstorms, hurricanes, and tornadoes can’t be blamed directly on climate change, these events send a warning sign regarding the freak weather events that could take place in a warming world. The global climate talks that took place in Durban, South Africa this past December did nothing to make me optimistic about changing the direction we are headed. We are still on pace to heat the planet 3.5°C by the end of the century, a risky prospect given what scientists know about the link between climate change and natural disasters, as well as about feedbacks like melting permafrost in the Arctic.3

Now for a more positive note: there is plenty of good environmental news to celebrate as we enter 2012! Even though 2011 was a very slow year for energy and environmental policy in Congress, the Obama Administration’s new rules on mercury, smog, acid rain,4 and the fuel-economy of cars and lights,5 along with the recent boom in solar energy (despite the Solyndra debacle), the grassroots actions of citizens related to preventing hydraulic fracturing,6 and the installment of the Keystone XL Pipeline, all helped spurn environmental change.

I recount these 2011 events because I believe that 2012 will have a remarkably similar landscape. As an election year, it is unlikely that any major climate change legislation will be passed. Most change will come from investment in renewable energy, and citizens standing up for what they believe in and making changes in their day-to-day lifestyle. For this reason, I have made a list of 2012 New Year’s resolutions that help me focus on things that I can do as an individual, and help me turn my resolutions into habits that I hope may inspire further change in others.

In order to make New Year's resolutions into habits, sometimes it's necessary to break down larger goals into smaller, simpler ones. Here is my strategy—identify one thing to focus on each day of the week:

Meatless Mondays
Are you one of those people that know a vegetarian diet is good for your health and for the planet, but just can't get on board with such a big change in your life? Try meatless Mondays. Eating vegetarian one day a week will allow you to get comfortable with new vegetarian recipes. Before you know it, you'll be eating more vegetarian meals throughout the week. Another fun way to increase your awareness of environmental issues related to food is to try to figure out where all of the meal’s ingredients came from, and how they were grown. Here are some fun recipes to get you started: Green-Recipes, and for more on vegetarianism read up: Vegetarianism.

Trashy Tuesdays
Take Tuesdays to reflect on what you throw away everyday. You can learn a lot about how you're wasting money, as well as energy and natural resource, if you examine what you're throwing out each day. Why not start at home, with a DIY energy audit, which will help you identify how you're wasting energy so you can spend a future Tuesday weatherizing your home? Also look into your local recycling programs and make sure you are doing all that you can to divert waste from landfills! Maybe even start composting ☺

Wacky Wednesdays
Set aside a few minutes or hours on Wednesdays to give yourself time to create and work on DIY projects. This is a great time to making gifts, turn trash into crafts, or do some projects around the house. Check out some Greeniacs Guides to get some fun ideas!

Thankful Thursdays
Take the time once a week to relax and appreciate what you have. Spend time with family or friends, write a letter – or reflect on all the progress you're making on those other resolutions.

Find-out Fridays
Take a minute to catch up on what's going on in the world relating to environmental issues. An informed citizen is one who can make better choices about their own life and help convince others that we are all in this climate change mess together.

Get Outside Saturdays
Most of us start the New Year with some sort of exercise goal, but it's hard to find time to get to the gym. One way to make sure you stick to your exercise goals is to get outside: bike a new trail, or hike at a forest preserve. Adding an element of exploration to your week will deepen your connection with the outdoors and improve your health at the same time. Here are some more ideas for working out in the elements: Working out Green Style No Gym Required.


Good Samaritan Sundays
Make generosity a habit by doing one new good deed once a week. Maybe it's volunteering, donating an old cell phone, piece of clothing, or other item, or just lending a hand to a neighbor.

Whatever you choose for your resolution/s, you can make being environmentally conscious a habit by focusing on it once a week. Good luck and happy New Year!

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1 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/global-co2-emissions-
    outpacing-worst-case-scenarios/2011/11/04/gIQA74r1mM_blog.html
2 http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2011/20111207_novusstats.html
3 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/five-things-to-know-
    about-the-durban-climate-agreement/2011/12/12/gIQAfEJ3pO_blog.html
4 http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/bd4379a92ceceeac8525735900400c27/
    bd8b3f37edf5716d8525796d005dd086!OpenDocument
5 http://money.cnn.com/2011/07/28/autos/fuel_economy/index.htm
6 http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/01/state-fracking-hearings-drew-6000-n-y-says/




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Last Updated ( Thursday, 05 January 2012 )

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Green Facts

  • For every 38,000 bills consumers pay online instead of by mail, 5,058 pounds of greenhouse gases are avoided and two tons of trees are preserved.

  • A single quart of motor oil, if disposed of improperly, can contaminate up to 2,000,000 gallons of fresh water.

  • Americans use 100 million tin and steel cans every day.

  • Due to tiger poaching, habitat destruction, and other human-tiger conflicts, tigers now number around 3,200—a decrease in population by about 70% from 100 years ago.

  • In California homes, about 10% of energy usage is related to TVs, DVRs, cable and satellite boxes, and DVD players.

  • American workers spend an average of 47 hours per year commuting through rush hour traffic. This adds up to 23 billion gallons of gas wasted in traffic each year.

  • Current sea ice levels are at least 47% lower than they were in 1979.

  • Shaving 10 miles off of your weekly driving pattern can eliminate about 500 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions a year.

  • Washing your clothes in cold or warm instead of hot water saves 500 pounds of carbon dioxide a year, and drying your clothes on a clothesline six months out of the year would save another 700 pounds.

  • The World Health Organization estimates that 2 million people die prematurely worldwide every year due to air pollution.

  • Recycling aluminum saves 95% of the energy used to make the material from scratch.

  • Less than 1% of electricity in the United States is generated from solar power.

  • Nudge your thermostat up two degrees in the summer and down two degrees in the winter to prevent 2,000 pounds of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere.

  • 82 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. come from burning fossil fuels.

  • Refrigerators built in 1975 used 4 times more energy than current models.

  • 77% of people who commute to work by car drive alone.

  • Plastic bags and other plastic garbage thrown into the ocean kill as many as 1,000,000 sea creatures every year.

  • A laptop consumes five times less electricity than a desktop computer.

  • Turning off the tap when brushing your teeth can save as much as 10 gallons a day per person.

  • You will save 300 pounds of carbon dioxide for every 10,000 miles you drive if you always keep your car’s tires fully inflated.

  • A steel mill using recycled scrap reduces related water pollution, air pollution, and mining wastes by about 70%.

  • Bamboo absorbs 35% more carbon dioxide than equivalent stands of trees.

  • If every U.S. household turned the thermostat down by 10 degrees for seven hours each night during the cold months, and seven hours each weekday, it would prevent nearly gas emissions.

  • States with bottle deposit laws have 35-40% less litter by volume.

  • Rainforests are being cut down at the rate of 100 acres per minute.

  • Glass can be recycled over and over again without ever wearing down.

  • In the United States, automobiles produce over 20 percent of total carbon emissions. Walk or bike and you'll save one pound of carbon for every mile you travel.

  • You’ll save two pounds of carbon for every 20 glass bottles that you recycle.

  • Recycling 100 million cell phones can save enough energy to power 18,500 homes in the U.S. for a year.

  • You will save 100 pounds of carbon for each incandescent bulb that you replace with a compact fluorescent bulb (CFL), over the life of the bulb.

  • Americans throw away enough aluminum to rebuild our entire commercial fleet of airplanes every 3 months

  • An aluminum can that is thrown away instead of recycled will still be a can 500 years from now!

  • A tree that provides a home with shade from the sun can reduce the energy required to run the air conditioner and save an additional 200 to 2,000 pounds of carbon over its lifetime.

  • One recycled aluminum can will save enough energy to run a 100-watt bulb for 20 hours, a computer for 3 hours, or a TV for 2 hours.

  • Recycling 1 million laptop computers can save the amount of energy used by 3,657 homes in the U.S. over the course of a year.

  • Americans throw away more than 120 million cell phones each year, which contribute 60,000 tons of waste to landfills annually.

  • It takes 6,000,000 trees to make 1 year's worth of tissues for the world.

  • Recycling for one year at Stanford University saved the equivalent of 33,913 trees and the need for 636 tons of iron ore, coal, and limestone.

  • Every week about 20 species of plants and animals become extinct.