Help stop climate change by eating your domestic pet.

I stumbled onto a book recently by a couple of New Zealand scientists named Robert and Brenda Vale, The book is called Time to Eat the Dog: The Real Guide to Sustainable Living.

An interesting concept, I thought. According to their book the annual impact of a medium sized family dog is the same as driving a large four wheel drive 10,000km.

Yes, this will upset a lot of people especially if they have to eat faithful 11 year old Fido, Rover or Spot.

So I thought I would list a few other sacrifices people should make and the associated solution.

• The delegated who attended the recent United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in December 2009 should have held their conference online using modern communication technologies instead of taking jet airplanes to Copenhagen.

• We all need to stop eating meat and become vegetarian. You will contribute less to methane and carbon emissions and have a healthier and better quality life.

• Stop using cars and gas guzzling SUV's and ride a bicycle or take public transport. This will reduce greenhouse emissions and help you get healthy.

• Replant your lovely green grass lawn that you rarely use with a food garden. You will not have to cut the lawn and you will be rewarded with healthy produce.

• Change you incandescent lights for compact fluorescent lights. This one will save you money and reduce your contribution to global warming.

• Recycle everything you can.

• Use a reusable shopping bag more than 100 times. This will negate the effects of using plastic bags.

• Don't eat frozen food and eat fresh food. Fresh food uses 10% of the energy to produce than frozen food.

• Have fewer children. The population of the world is expected to reach 7 billion on the 10th of April this year (2010). That is an extra 3 billion people since the 17th of July 1971 when the population reached 4 billion people. If you really want to be responsible for raising children you can adopt an orphan. There are plenty to go around.

• Outlaw war and weapons which not only contributes to climate change but also unquantifiable human suffering.

• You can visit the following website for 50 more ideas http://globalwarming-facts.info/50-tips.html

Ok. I know these are all drastic measures but so too is global warming, the melting of the polar ice-caps, the abnormally high levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the large numbers of wars.

Peace, Love, Sustainability, Happiness and Health.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch- "No bag please."

YUK

This photo from wikipedia is of an albatross that starved becuse its stomach was full of garbage. Why? Read on to find out more.

The "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" is an area bigger than the size of Texas in the USA consisting of 3.5 million tons of rubbish, mainly plastic and cigarette butts. It was formed by the North Pacific Gyre and 80% of it comes from sources on land, the remaining 20% is believed to come from boats. It was discovered in 1988 and has only taken 50 years to form since the mass use of plastic became popular.

When plastic breaks down it forms minute shards which are then eaten and ingested by all kinds of marine animals. The parts that don't break down quickly are often eaten by birds and fish which eventually starve to death because their stomachs are full of plastic.

What can you do?

• Take individual responsibility for your plastic use and disposal.


• Take part in Clean Up Australia Day or get out and clean up your neighbourhood before the next big rain washes any rubbish into the storm water drains and into the ocean.


• Buy "green bags" and put them back in your car when you've finished with them so you don;t forget to take them shopping next time.


• Refuse plastic bags, especially if you are buying only a couple of things, it takes no effort to say " No bag please"


• Shop for fruit and vegetables at a farmer's market and get it in a box.


• Don't throw your cigarette buts out the window of your car. I know many smokers are reluctant to use the ashtray in their car because they don't want the car to smell like an ashtray. You can use a TicTac container or and old film canister for this and with an airtight seal the cigarette is extinguished by lack of oxygen.


• Finally, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE, never throw out any rubbish.

It is only by working together that we can stop the Great Pacific Garbage Patch from becoming ENORMOUS.