Climate protestors

10 things you can do to reduce your carbon footprint in 2020

Protestors at a Denver, Colo. Climate Strike in Sept. 2019. [Photo by Christof Demont-Heinrich]
As we usher in a new year — and decade — it’s a good time to reflect on what each of us can do to reduce our impact on the environment and advocate for, and build, a cleaner, greener world. We are not helpless and it is not — yet — hopeless.

editors-blog-entry3There is plenty that we can each do. Here are 10 things that you can do to reduce your carbon footprint and ensure that the future is a place in which fewer humans, and living beings, suffer and/or die as a result of the impact of the burning of fossil fuels ==>

  1. Drive less and bike, walk and take public transportation more.
  2. Make your next car an electric car. Electric cars can be fueled with 100% renewable energy generated electricity! Hundreds of cities, states, and dozens of countries have committed to generating 100% of their electricity with 100% renewable energy by 2030, 2040, or 2050.
  3. Go solar and add solar panels to your home’s rooftop — if you can! If you cannot go solar — you live in an apartment, in a home that is not well-suited to solar, etc. choose renewable energy generated electricity from your utility. In the United States, about 50% of Americans can choose to have their electricity sourced at least indirectly via renewable energy via programs such as one that I am enrolled in Xcel Energy’s Windsource Program.
  4. Eat less meat, especially less red meat. You do NOT need to eliminate meat — that is a myth that is often used to undermine the call to eat less meat by meat industry PR folks, just eat less (red) meat.
  5. Yup, climate action starts here! [Photo by Christof Demont-Heinrich]
    Turn down your heat — especially at night when you can easily throw another blanket on your bed to stay warm while sleeping! Most people also sleep better in cooler rooms with more blankets than in hot rooms with fewer blankets.
  6. Be stingy with your home air conditioning. Set your AC temperature higher. Push the setting up from 72 to 74 or 75 degrees Fahrenheit, for example. You’ll save money, too!
  7. Be energy efficient. Insulate your home properly, buy energy efficient appliances, an energy efficient furnace, etc.
  8. Support AND vote for local, state and national politicians who advocate for a 100% renewable energy future and who actively practice what they preach!
  9. Participate in local, state and national demonstrations for immediate action on the climate emergency!
  10. Spread the world on the Climate Emergency AND on what you are doing — and what others can do — to address and, ideally, reverse the Climate Emergency.

Happy New Year!

May 2020 be a good year, and the 2020s a good decade, for you, your family, your friends as well as for the planet and for global humanity and all living beings on earth šŸ™‚ !

A Denver Climate Strike protestor. [Photo by Christof Demont-Heinrich]