Tag: renewable energy (page 1 of 1)

How I’m staying (Mostly) green without losing my mind

Welcome to the May 2021 blog post where there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I’m (Emma) due for my second vaccine in just two weeks and then I can go to restaurants or the cinema or on holiday in the UK. To make the most of this brief break in my depression, I thought I’d let you in on my green plans for the rest of the year.

Flight-free 2021

Now, given that it’s nearly June and most countries that I would want to go to require a negative coronavirus test and isolation on arrival, I still won’t be travelling. As someone who works from home, I couldn’t care less about isolating when returning to the UK, but I’m not spending all that money to sit in a hotel room in Gran Canaria.

My plan is for a UK-based holiday next month and then, hopefully, a trip by ferry to one of the Channel Islands or the Eurostar to France. The chances are that my next flight will be to the US in 2022.

An all-electric home and solar panels

Okay, this is the major one. We already get our power from renewable sources and frack-free gas, but my parents have been floating around the idea of solar panels for a while. However, my parents are now getting information about changing our gas central heating to an all-electric one, which will mean that our home will entirely be powered by renewables (even some that we got ourselves) and removing all dependence on fossil fuels. Mum also hopes it will cut our water bill because it won’t need water running through the radiators.

There are a lot of things to consider. For one thing, in the case of a power cut, we’d lose heating and the ability to cook as well. Luckily, we live in an area where lengthy power cuts are rare, so we’ve pretty much decided that the benefits outweigh the risks. For another, it’s a major undertaking. The price doesn’t appear to be that much in terms of house maintenance costs – between £5,000 and £10,000 for our 4-bed house – but the installation involves having the boiler decommissioned, all existing radiators and pipes removed, as well as an electricity check, before the installation of the electric radiators.

Now, this is the subject of a future blog post, but I wanted to give you all the information I have right now.

Continuing my existing green lifestyle

One of the most important things to do if we want to make the world a greener place is to continue with the things that we are already doing. For me, that’s walking to most places (until I feel comfortable enough to get on the bus again), eating vegetarian (and vegan where I can), reducing what I buy (especially new), and recycling everything I can through the kerbside scheme, Terracycle, and various banks across the city.

Tamara Vs Lockdown: The HEAT Edition

Look how happy she is. I am baffled by this.
Image from Pixabay
Disclaimer Warning:
 
Yo, Tamara here.I am in Storytime mode today. So, grab yourself and coffee and get comfy. I am going to use ten words when I could use two. 

Meandering Introduction about the Cold

I hate the cold. I hate ice, I hate snow. I hate cold mornings. My Trinidadian roots show when I am presented with icy pavements, as I gingerly tiptoe over a minute sprinkling of snow whilst wearing my crampons. {Sidebar – if you are anything like me, get yourself some crampons. Trust me. Icy pavements will cower under your confident step. They will revolutionise your life!}

The one and only time I attempted ice skating in my teens, I clung to the sides and fell on my butt multiple times. To no one’s surprise, I hate ice skating with a vengeance. In my twenties, I spent many a winter (and summer!) visit at the Dutchman’s family home in DutchLand huddling under blankets. His family were bemused by my lack of appropriate clothing and suggested I put a hat on. Wear a hat. Inside. I was shooketh!!

#notmyfeet
Image from Pixabay

Meandering Thoughts about the Heat

When I was younger, I used to love the heat. While I was at university, living in a house-share with all bills included, the heating was cranked up high and on literally all the time. But as I began to adult and pay my own energy bills, I realised not only how bloody expensive it was but also the environmental cost and unsustainability of fossil fuels, I became oh-so-miserly with my heating.

Now heading swiftly towards my fabulous forties, this has developed into a genuine preference for a cooler bedroom at night and a general dislike of the stifling heat of central heating. My Dutch schoonmoeder (mother-in-law – yeah I speak Dutch!) can barely recognise me!

Image from Pixabay

A Green Energy Point is Made and Energy Savings Tips Begin

When the Dutchman and I moved out of shared housing, we quickly moved away from the traditional energy providers, preferring to invest in green energy, using Ecotricity for both gas and electric. Green energy was (and remains) my non-negotiable and I was prepared to spend out on this. To counteract the fact that it was (at the time) more expensive than non-green energy, I became a ninja with the thermostat.

I had the central heating down to a fine art with adjustable room thermostats which meant I carefully controlled everyone’s heating usage. My lodgers loved me. Hah. Not.

I began to understand the wisdom of my dear Norwegian friend and long-ago housemate K who insisted my beloved chunky sweater was useless against the cold and I needed to use multiple thin layers. My go-to was now lots of layers including actual thermal leggings, an old-man vest, blankets at the ready by the sofa, multiple hot water bottles and socks in bed. I don’t know what you mean – energy saving is totally sexy.

Image by ri from Pixabay

The drama about Central Heating

So it was a shock when I moved just over a year ago to my new home as my Trinidadian mother keeps her section of the house at a balmy 21 degrees. Prior to us moving into a shared inter-generational household, we had a very frank conversation about our non-negotiables. Her heating was her non-negotiable. As was her ancient energy sucking microwave, dryer and electric blanket.

Image by Simon from Pixabay

Tamara’s Extreme Energy Saving

To counteract this, I went on an energy-saving overdrive. An extra-large outdoor rotary air dryer was erected in the garden. Fingerless gloves were purchased for the Dutchman who now spends his lockdown days working from home. I begrudgingly allow his working space to have the heating on but I’m not happy about it. Thick slippers were purchased from the charity shop to insulate my tootsies from the cold Victorian tiles -beautiful and original yes, but oh so bloody cold. There are blankets liberally spread all over the house. Windows are firmly closed and a door draught stopper is now in use. The oven door is left open to allow the heat remnants to warm the biting cold kitchen.

I was so proud of myself that even when I struggled with my mental health at the beginning of the third lockdown in January 2021 and stayed in bed with the curtains closed for a good few days, I did not put the heating on once.

The Big Reveal

This as it turned out was a big HUGE mistake. I had gone too far. Turns out closed windows together with unopened long curtains mixed with absolutely no heating is a recipe for mould. Who knew? Certainly not me!

I almost cried when I discovered the black mould in the bedroom- under the bay window behind the unopened curtains, behind the wardrobe and even on our clothes. It was as if my house had betrayed me. I was tempted to burn all the clothes and move to a new house immediately.

Dealing with Mould Like an Actual Adult

As this was not an option, I had to actually adult and deal with the problem. Turns out cleaning the wall, using some eco-ish mould cleaning spray and regularly airing out the room is a fine solution.

On awakening, I now open the window and curtains immediately and close the window after I am dressed for the day, usually an hour later. However, the wisdom of the internet tells me 10 mins a day airing should suffice. On the advice of a friend whose partner also likes a super cold bedroom, once a week I close the bedroom door, turn the heating on, open both the window and all wardrobe doors and let the room air for a good couple of hours. Midweek, I also do a bonus wardrobe doors opener. I will never ever have mouldy clothes again. But my gas bill is definitely going to suffer. Sigh. Tamara 1: Heat 2. What’s a gal to do?

Conclusion

The heat won.

Written by Tamara, a Green Hairy Feminist

The eco-friendliness of Walt Disney World

This is a follow-up piece to my How to eco-hack you Walt Disney World Vacation post and focuses on how Walt Disney World (WDW) is attempting to be green.

Basically, when I (Emma) wrote that post, I was very much aware that the onus should not be on the individual visitor because the entity with the power to make real change is WDW itself. And they are doing a lot, don’t get me wrong, but they can always do better.

Conservation isn’t just the business of a few people. It’s a matter that concerns all of us.

Walt Disney

What is WDW doing to make itself more eco-friendly?

Disney does do a lot to make itself a greener place and has over the years, especially at Animal Kingdom and EPCOT theme parks educated guests about issues like conservation, renewable energy use, and animal welfare. (Around one-third of WDW’s property is a conservation area.) They also take time to drum this into employees during training and have donated millions of dollars to animal and conservation charities over the years.

Giraffe ambling away from safari car
Spotting giraffes on the Kilimanjaro Safari at Animal Kingdom, where you can learn all about animal conservation

They’ve had recycling bins all across property since at least 2011 and their sanitation crew still hand sorts the rubbish bins to remove recyclables. Their hotels are Green Lodging-certified, which means that they are helping to conserve water and energy, reducing waste, and educating the public.

They’re also doing a lot to reduce energy use by utilising energy-saving fixtures, like florescent or LED bulbs. To be clear, Disney managed to save enough energy to power their Animal Kingdom theme park for a year. And they’ve created a Mickey-shaped solar panel field.

As mentioned above in our previous piece, they are committed to growing a lot of food on property, which they do using reclaimed water. However, Disney also helps to reduce food waste by distributing excess prepared food to the Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida. Their buses even run on a renewable fuel made from non-consumable food waste.

Recently, WDW has pledged to completely eliminate all single-use plastics by the end of 2019, which means that for the most part, we were served with cardboard/paper plates and drinks came without lids or straws. (On the one occasion that we got a plastic bowl for our salad, I assume it was because that location hadn’t yet run out of the plastic bowls and they were just using up what they had.)

It’s a penguin statue made from plastic waste (click through to see more)

What could WDW do better?

In my ideal world, Disney would serve every counter-service meal with reusable cutlery and crockery, but I definitely understand why that wouldn’t work. People break things and metal knives would be unsafe and how would washing up on such a major scale be done? Also, I fully accept that it would be a logistical and health and safety nightmare to place meals and (most) snacks in reusable containers that people had brought in.

The best option would, I feel, be for WDW to use compostable food containers/cutlery and put a compost bin at all rubbish bin locations. Not only would this be a bonus for the environment, but Disney could use the soil produced for its on-site food production. Yes, it would take time for people to get used to, but so did the recycling bins and those were a great idea.

https://www.instagram.com/p/By3SM2Qg-vT/

They could also encourage people to bring their own reusable cutlery/bottles by offering a discount. Disney could even sell branded ones at food locations as they do popcorn buckets and soda mugs. Also, Starbucks is happy to fill my mug in the UK, so why can’t the Starbucks in Disney do that?

Anyway, so that’s my thoughts on the subject, but now I want to hear from you. Are there any more green initiatives that you know Disney is taking? What do you think Disney could do better? Let me know in the comments below.