Ecological footprint project

If he can do it, why can't I?. That is a general idea that has been rattling around in my head for a while.

Another theme in my thoughts is related to what I do when I find time between volunteer farming, interning, fermenting beans, making tofu, hunting wild boar, collapsing on the kitchen floor, and having cameras snaked down my throat, I try to follow some great sites that highlight hopeful new ideas and technologies that will usher us into the "bright green" future. There are some amazing things going on out there in almost any field you can imagine.

Yesterday's post was documenting my effort to bring these two themes together. While I am not too stubborn to see the benefits of many of these up-and-coming technologies, I don't feel like I am a part of it, after all, I am only reading about them, but not using them. I am also a bit fearful that this may be because too much focus on technology leads us to feel safe and content to just sit and wait for the hydrogen economy so that we don't have to do anything -we don't have to make any sacrifice. On the other hand, if Bill McKibben can go a year following the basic concept of "eat local", why can't I stop reading about these things and concepts that will save the world, and start using/practicing them?

That being said, the goal is not to "try out cool technologies", nor to "see how primitive I can get". The goal (something I have longed to do for years now, is "simply" to lower my ecological footprint. If I can do that by using lots of cool gadgets, great. If, however, it takes a little sacrifice and not eating imported bananas (actually I don't eat bananas anyway), so be it. I suppose that it will constitute a combination of both new technology and old fashioned will-power and thinking before I consume. But I hope that I will at least be able to find out, once and for all, if it is possible for me to live as a responsible member of not only the global society, but also the global ecosystem.

And although this is not intended to be a competition between "bright green" and "radical simplicity", I am sure that I will sometimes have a tendency to frame it as such (sorry about that). For example, yesterday I was looking for alternative energy options that are available, affordable, attractive, fit my lifestyle, and most importantly, will lead to the largest decrease in my overall ecological footprint. As it turns out, there are a lot of great products out there, and even more that are on the horizon, but my tentative conclusion from yesterday is that, in my current situation as a renter, I am probably better off just being more conscious about how much on the grid energy I use -and that, extremely regrettably, none of the technologies currently available seem to fit my particular usage patterns (of course, I have a feeling that if the current fossile fuel / nuclear subsidies were given to renewable instead, there would be no way I can afford to use the grid -I'd be forced to get the amazingly affordable solar panels). I was really looking forward to hanging out a solar panel, but I don't want to have to buy an iPod to make it worth it.

So, getting to the whole "ecological footprint" thing.

Yesterday I did what I usually do, and started without a plan. I just decided I wanted solar panels, and started searching as well as really paying attention to the electric meter above my door. While I encourage people get out of their seat and look at the meter right now, write down the number and then look at it again tomorrow, or in a few hours, I am going to take a step back because, it's time for a plan.

"Finally", I think to myself, "I can use something I learned last year." While the stages of effective planning and acting are not new, and in fact most people follow them unconsciously, last year I learned a nifty little acronym to summarize them. It's helpful for me to keep it in mind because sometimes I'm not such an orderly person and can have a tendency to jump ahead to the juicy "action" part before I have a plan.

Anyway, the nifty acronym I learned last year was simply ABCD.

This ABCD planning method is just a basic framework that we naturally apply to many life decisions, wether we realize it or not. When it comes to getting more specific about what a plan for lowering my ecological footprint actually looks like, I'm lucky that I don't have to make the plan up all by myself from scratch. Jim Merkel has already done a lot of the leg work regarding how make and carry out your plan, and he even published it in his book Radical Simplicity. I am simply following along and applying the process he outlined to my own life. The only difference is that, as I wrote above, I am going to be on the lookout for ways to lower the footprint without being "radically" simple. i.e. using bright green technology to keep as much complexity as I want and is appropriate while still meeting my goals.

And now, I am tired of writing, so consider this part two (yesterday was part one) in my new ecological footprint series. If you want to, feel free to follow along, try it out, rip it apart, tell me I'm a crazy idealistic moron, or tell me that I am not "radically simplistic" enough.