Low Impact

I’ve been playing around with making paper bricks as a substitute for firewood. One small issue is that I don’t actually have a fireplace at my current house, but I’m not going to let a trivial thing like that hold me back!

So what’s the concept? Its pretty simple. You soak some newspaper in water, put it in brick mold, squish out the water and leave it to dry. The brick maker I’m using and a sample brick are pictured. You end up with a compressed brick of newspaper that you can throw in your slow-combustion fireplace.

Getting the brick maker can be a little… Continue reading

Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs (CFLs) are fantastic little inventions - they use only a quarter (or less) of the electricity of an incandescent globe, and can last 6 to 10 times as long. It turns out that replacing 4 of your 100 watt incandescent globes with CFL alternatives can save almost half a tonne of CO2 emissions every year. As an added bonus, when you factor in the savings on your electricity bill with their longer life, they end up saving you money over old-style globes.

(You might also be interested in having a look at this post on Low Impact, with hints and tips on how to best to use CFL lights.)

Still, there is one issue to be aware of… Continue reading

When it comes to lowering your environmental impact, its all about “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle”… in that order! Its better to recycle things than send them to landfill and waste the raw materials. And an even better way to reduce your environmental impact is to use less in the first place - reducing your consumption means that less materials need to be refined, manufactured and transported, all resulting in lower resource use and lower CO2 emissions.

Freecycle is a group/concept that helps with that middle action - “reuse”. It aims to provide a community within which people can easily give away items they no longer need to other members. This has a number of benefits:

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