Live Sustainably In 2019 By Making These 5 Easy Changes
The world is becoming increasingly industrialized leading to major problems including climate change, food insecurity, and environmental waste.
Luckily, there has been a lot of awareness raised within the past few years around the need for humans to live more sustainably.
If you’re here, good!
It means that you’ve already doing more than many others, and are on your way towards living a sustainable lifestyle that will help you live healthier while helping protect the future of our planet and society.
To help you achieve that goal, we’ve put together a list of 5 easy, impactful lifestyle changes you can make in 2019!
In recent years, many areas around the world have begun to ban the use of single-use plastic bags — and for good reason.
Americans alone use over 100 billion plastic bags per year which require over 12 million barrels of oil to manufacture.
Less than 1 percent of these bags are recycled with much of it ending up in the ocean leading to marine animal death as well as micro-plastic toxicity as the bags break down over their 500+ year lifespan.
Instead, opt for a re-useable bag which could help you save the environment from 22,000 plastic bags over the course of your lifetime.
While on the topic of plastic, choose paper packaged products over plastic packaged ones, and try switching to a re-useable water bottle over single-use plastic ones!
It’s the 21st century, and re-useable, sustainable technology exists everywhere.
If you have an appliance that requires the use of batteries, invest in some re-chargeable batteries. Not only will you save money, but they’re also easier to recycle making them the more environmentally friendly option.
Of course, one of the most technologically impactful things you can do would be to make the switch over to green-energy through the use of a windmill or solar-panel attached to your home.
They’ll help save you money and can even increase the re-sale value of your home by up to $18,000 or more. In addition to saving you money, you’ll help reduce reliance on fossil fuels leading to cleaner air quality, reduced global warming, and you’ll do this while stimulating the economy!
On average, Americans spend more than 8 hours per day sleeping — makes sense, right?
Throw in additional time used for eating, showering, or leisurely activities, and it stands to reason that we’re at home for…
A whole lot of the day.
This means that your home is where you can make a huge impact on living a more sustainable lifestyle!
Here’s what you can do at your home to turn things green:
- Switch over to LED lights — they have a longer lifespan and conserve more energy
- Turn your lights off when leaving the room — a simple, but easy thing to do
- Reduce use of artificial lighting whenever possible — open up those blinds!
- Switch off your heater, and bundle up — you’ll save money and energy
After taking care of your household, how about the food you eat?
Did you know that getting food from the farm to your table creates a huge strain on the environment and our energy resources?
In fact, in the United States alone, this process accounts for 10% of the country’s energy budget!
To put things in a different perspective, this means that the energy required for the United States to feed its population is the same as the amount of energy used by the entire country of Mexico.
Many expect that production of the food would require the bulk of that energy, but in actuality, it accounts for a meagre 15.9% of energy consumption.
On the other hand, handling of food (packaging, refrigeration, etc) consumes a massive 48.5% of the energy used.
What does this mean for you?
It means that if you were to grow more food at home, you’d reduce the cost of transportation, processing, and handling while potentially cutting back on agricultural costs leading to energy savings of 80–90%.
You can do this as simply as starting a garden in your backyard using seeds, soil, fertilizer, and water.
If you’d like to be more efficient in conserving resources while growing food more effectively, you can also try growing hydroponically using planters such as the EcoQube Frame to easily grown fresh, nutritious microgreens in 7–10 days, or you can try setting up your own hydroponic home system!
Vehicular pollution is a major source of air pollution accounting for an estimated 28% of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States.
Poor air quality due to air pollution has lead to people around the world experiencing health problems ranging from a cough to lung cancer.
Air filters are often needed, but many do not have them.
On a positive note, cars are becoming cleaner, non-traditional ride-sharing services such as Uber, and Lyft have exploded in popularity, and traditional ride-sharing services such as buses, and trains are regaining popularity.
If you do need to travel using a vehicle, opt for the use of a clean-emission car, or the use of a ride-sharing service.
Even better, start using a bicycle and walk to places that you’ve previously driven to.
2019 is an important year for the world.
The U.N. recently released a report stating that we have until 2030 to make change to prevent runaway climate change which could lead to disastrous consequences such as mass-migration, job insecurity, and food scarcity.
We believe that each of us has the ability to help make the change needed, and it starts small with you and me.
We’ve put together the following list of 5 easy actions you can take immediately to live more sustainably and make an impact in 2019:
- Shop more sustainably — single-use plastic bags are out, re-useable is in
- Become technologically sustainable — green technology exists, lets use it
- Green-ify your home — take simple actions such as turning off your lights
- Eat fresh food and reduce waste — reduce energy use by up to 90%
- Your commute matters — reduce or remove fossil-fuel emitting transportation use
We hope that these steps will help you achieve your sustainability goals in 2019, and live a healthier life!
Do you have any easy actions we can take on a day to day basis to live sustainably and protect our future?
Let us know in the comments below!
Originally published at getecoqube.com.
