micro climate actions
Pitch
some possible micro actions to counter the current inaction, the feeling of an overwhelming helplessness towards this issue.
Summary
Kari Norgaard her book and presentation of living in denial gave me a possible explanation towards the inaction I encountered over time countering climate change.
That’s why I digged into my own life for a bit and found some possible answers to counter that feeling of helplessness and start acting towards countering climate change more in a micro way.
Actions
the no design concept
The nodesign concept started as a questioning of my field (design) and resulted in a “no design” as best design in a way.
I was wandering the other day about packaging design, and the ridiculous amount of plastics being used.
The designer in me almost immediately went searching for an alternative design. The “no design” won.
Hence the case I’m trying to make as a designer, as an artist, to add reduction to the menu, to go towards virtualization instead of designing physical objects.
It raises questions about:
- rigid economics vs ecology, where in this case ecology takes on the winning side. A rather relevant and surprisingly constructive approach considering the challenges we face.
- materialism vs the progress towards de-materialism or virtualization, where this option takes on the virtual element for 100%.
- the business as usual concept as opposed to a more business as unusual type of field.
- the designers aim to really try to make a difference by putting materialistic design into question.
- …
Lately I have been using this no design concept as a design filter.
de-materialization/virtualization
the de-materialization/virtualization of things is another brainstorm result to break away from our more materialized, physical based tendencies.
The latest climate rapport made it very clear, at least to me, that some things just have to change. And it confirmed my previous thoughts about going more towards de-materialization and virtualization in an attempt to (even) further decrease my own footprint and contribute towards the issue called climate change.
No more (or way less) real materials to mess around with and way less material things to hold on to. the message of (physical) reduction is needed nevertheless.
the garden project
the garden project is maybe the most easy way to make a contribution to give nature back it’s place and to suck up some more co2 from the air.
I live near a bit of nature and wish to extend that bit of a forest into my garden, contrasting it with the rather tight and minimalistic look and feel of the interior and architecture (and contrasting this again with the rather chaotic human that inhabits the place ;-)
The design is in a way very simple, do nothing, let nature do it’s thing and thus restraining the designer in me trying to fix this and that into some orderly and limited human form and vision. The nodesign concept certainly helped me with going into this direction, exploring the action of non action in a way.
This isn’t my first attempt doing this. I already created this little piece of nature before in the middle of a city. I noticed after a while life appearing in many forms, trees popping up, insects, birds that came to visit (including a rare bird of prey) in this little oasis. Too bad most of it has been torn down except for one tree that still stands proudly in the middle of the garden.
I’m going to try and do this again in a micro way, thanks to Jadav Payeng (1) and a recent study to bewilder your garden(2) to give nature back it’s place, and do my little contribution towards climate change.
(1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkZDSqyE1do
localization
a more localized way of living keeps popping up as another option:
Dump or reduce the usage of a car, airplane, …
the promotion of working from home to reduce or dump the need to have 2 physical places (work/home environment) and the need to travel between those two places.
This results in a more localized way of living all together.
population control
population control is a possible answer to start reducing our impact on the earth in general. That’s why I decided early on never to have kids.
3D printing
3D printing as a possible relevant way towards virtual plans that travel virtually and production happens locally (to break away from the habit of physically traveling objects across the world). Mind you though this technology still needs a lot of progress.
a vegetarian diet
Meat has a gigantic impact, cutting or reducing that factor also helps reducing the CO2 emissions.
tapping water
depending on where you live, you can always use tapping water instead of bottled water.
LED technology
I have been observing this technology for years, and now that it becomes more and more affordable I took it to a successful personal test in one of my interior design projects. A whole studio is lid with the equivalent of one 50w light bulb.
