I’ve been using up a lot of spare brain cycles on wanting to find ways to reduce my family’s use of resources and our footprint on this earth. We’re most likely heading into a recession, both as a family (ha ha) and as a nation, so I figure some serious forethought will go a long way toward not only reducing our impact on our environment, but also on our finances.
This is rather long. If you’re reading it from a feed or other source, I apologize! I can’t seem to do a cut with this version of wordpress.
I checked out this site to see what our current consumption of natural resources looks like, to get an idea of our starting point. Here is a synopsis of our life as it is today. For an explanation of the measurement system used here, please read this. Basically, the measurements are in global acres, which is the approximate number of acres it takes to sustain the rate at which you’re using up earth’s resources. At the rate our family is going now, it would take 4+ earths to sustain life on this planet if everyone lived at our same usage.
Carbon footprint
I drive approximately 60 miles per day to transport kids to and from school. Together, Allen and I probably put 10,000 miles on one car, and close to that on the other car, per year in our current housing situation. We live on the outskirts of Greensboro, in a rural area. We thought we’d love it. It’s quiet, and the sun sets in our backyard every evening. But the cost in terms of fossil fuels used is pretty high. So, our carbon footprint is much higher than we’d like. Right now, with our current lifestyle, our carbon footprint equates to about 59.4 global acres/year. The national average is 91.4, so we’re far below the norm. But there is much room for improvement that will translate to big changes for our family in the coming years. More on that in a minute.
Food footprint (and some carbon)
We buy organic when we can, but we also have to be cost-conscious. And, unfortunately, buying organics and local foods can be expensive, both because of the higher price, and the fact that we have to drive out of our way to get them. The availability of good local produce is low. We can get some seasonal vegetables at our local farmer’s market, but not near enough of the fruits we consume can be found from local farms. We’re doing what we can afford. And I consider where the produce is coming from before I buy. I’ll buy oranges from Florida rather than California, because the amount of fossil fuels used to transport the fruit to my area is part of the equation. Although we live in a rural area, most of the farms in our area produce corn (not food grade, mostly) or tobacco. There is a strawberry farm nearby, but that provides a favorite fruit for just a few weeks of the year. There were more roadside stands in Rhode Island than there are here, a fact that puzzles me quite a bit, with all this land around us. Our food footprint equates to 42.9 acres/year. The national average is 65.7. If we were staying put, I would plant a vegetable and herb garden to help offset that number. We have a .75-acre lot, and there is plenty of space. But we’re not staying. Which brings me to talking about our house.
Housing footprint
We have far too much space for our family. Our meager, hand-me-down furnishings look lonely in our sprawling 2,400 square foot brand-new house. It’s more space than we need. We have central heat/air, and we try to keep the thermostat set at a reasonable temperature. It’s a very efficient house, as it’s new, so our bills are not terribly high. But the fact that we have so much space feels wasteful, and heating/cooling this much space is a definite burden. In addition, we have a lawn, and there is pressure from our neighborhood housing association to upkeep our lawn, both for the home values of our neighbors and ourselves, and to sell more houses in our development. I used to think I wanted more space, because I don’t like crowded rooms. And I thought I wanted a yard — room to run and play. But it takes gasoline in our lawn mower to keep this lawn trimmed, and watering is sometimes necessary. IF I want less crowded rooms, I need to simplify our furnishings instead and find a way to use storage space more efficiently. And if I want to run and play, I need to bring my kids to a nearby park. Overall, our housing footprint is too high, at 29.6 acres/year, close to the national average of 31.6. I’m not proud to be your average American in this regard. This number needs serious slashing.
Goods/Services Footprint
We recycle everything. Our community supports recycling, and most times our recycling trash is far more than our regular household trash. We buy recycled paper products when we can, and we don’t replace things in our house unless they cease working. We’ve had no new furniture, choosing instead to recycle furniture from friends or family, except for 6 dining room chairs I’ll be giving away before we move. Currently, our goods/services footprint equates to about 27.4 acres/year. The national average is 57.4, so we’re moving in the right direction here.
Big changes
All of this brings me to the exciting part! Change! It is happening now!
Allen is now living in Arlington, staying with friends. He began working last week at an awesome company in nearby Cambridge, and he is very happy. He flew for this relocation, as there is a dearth of affordable parking in the area he’s staying. He bought a monthly public transportation pass for the Boston area, allowing him unlimited travel on public transport to get around. He can take the bus or subway to most of his destinations. The cost is low, compared to the cost of gas and maintenance and (increasing) costs of insurance. Once we join him, we’ll be selling one of our cars. So our fuel/insurance prices will be cut almost in half.
And the carbon footprint should be changing as well. We’re relocating to a city, so shopping is closer, schools are in walking distance, public transportation is abundant and cheap. We won’t have to spend excessive amounts of money and fuel traveling to see grandparents, as my family is within a 20-mile drive instead of an 800-mile drive. Of course, we’ll still have to travel to Florida/Alabama once a year at least to see Allen’s side of the family, but we’ll try to stagger that with their visits to us to cut down costs.
We’ll be moving into an apartment with a smaller amount of square footage, which should mean a decrease in the amount of energy we consume to heat/cool. This is not guaranteed, as we don’t know about the apartment’s efficiency elements or medium of heating yet. But we’ll do our best.
There are a number of local farms that have co-ops in the Boston area, so getting fresh produce during the growing season should be somewhat easy. Since we consume almost no meat now, having adopted a mostly vegetarian diet for health reasons, the way we eat has seen a dramatic change. We don’t consume red meat at all, and very little chicken or pork. Some friends of ours are doing a meat co-op, and if we DID want to consume some meat, we could help support local farmers. We’ll continue to make conscious decisions about where our food comes from, hoping to support local agriculture or at least throw our money at companies that transport food to us with the least amount of fossil fuels possible.
As far as our goods used, we already use such things as Craig’s List, yard sales, friends, freecycle, and EBay to get slightly used things for our home. And I’m a huge fan of buying from Salvation Army or other non-profit companies for things such as clothing and furniture. In return, we donate our used things back into the system as much as possible, trying to reduce the landfill space it takes to accommodate our waste.
Overall, our upcoming move will help decrease our current usage of natural resources from a rate of approximately 160 acres/year to 101/year. We hope to keep decreasing that number as much as possible, through conscientious decision making and finding ways to offset our uses of natural resources.
What are YOU doing? Do you have suggestions for other ways we can help?
Last night, we had a huge meltdown because it was Kelsey’s night to pick out the book. Today’s meltdown is about Laurel’s clothing to go to the dentist. Nothing unusual here. And then she has another meltdown because Kelsey won’t let her get in on her side of the car.
