Sustainability matters. In the US, CO2 per capita exceeds 15 tonnes and 4.9 pounds of municipal waste is produced per person every day. Making climate-conscious changes can be intimidating, but is easier than you’d think. By making holistic choices, you can embed sustainable choices into your everyday life.
Holistic changes to your lifestyle are designed to make sustainability easier. You don’t need to go off the grid or check the label of everything you eat. Instead, holistically sustainable lifestyles require you to take proactive steps like growing your own produce and insulating your home.
Here are a few ways you can weave sustainability into your own life.
Grow Your Own
Growing your own fruit and vegetables is a great way to reduce your CO2 footprint and cut down on plastics. Research finds that the average meal travels 1,500 miles and uses 10 kcal of fossil fuel to produce just 1 kcal of food. The food we buy from grocery stores uses unfathomable amounts of fossil fuel, so making the effort to grow your own is a great way to live more sustainably.
If you plan on gardening for sustainability purposes, you must source sustainable soil and fertilizers. In particular, stay away from any soil mixes which contain peat. Peat is great for your plants but is a finite source that holds massive amounts of ground carbon — using it in your garden is extremely unsustainable. Instead, utilize your vegetable waste or leaf mold as compost.
Growing your food is fun, but can contain a few dangers. Vermiculite is one such danger to look out for. Vermiculite is a puffy, light mineral that is naturally sourced and can be used in your garden. However, until 1990, vermiculite was mined from the same sources as asbestos (which causes cancers like mesothelioma). So, if you see any signs of vermiculite in your soil it’s best to throw it out and start again.
Lifestyle Changes
A green future requires green lifestyles. At the moment, it’s easy to go with the flow of mass production and fast fashion. However, reaching the goal of net-zero by 2050 will require changes from us all. If you want to be an early adopter of carbon-conscious lifestyles, your best two options are to consider plant-based lifestyles and reduce your plastic waste.
Plant-Based / Vegan Lifestyles
Food accounts for at least 30% of all carbon emissions, and research from the University of Oxford found a vegan diet could reduce one’s carbon emissions by up to 73%. While growing your fruit and veg is a great way to negate some of those emissions, the reality is that diets high in meat, dairy, and eggs are largely unsustainable.
Of course, it is unrealistic to prescribe veganism to all. However, by making climate-conscious decisions about the volume of animal products you consume, you can continue to live a holistically sustainable lifestyle. So, instead of eating red meat or dairy every day, try to cut down to a few servings or less per week.
Plastic Waste
There are 2 trillion pieces of plastic in the North Pacific Ocean. In the U.S. alone, 2.24 million tonnes of plastic waste was mismanaged with dire ecological consequences. Our plastic waste problem is polluting the seas and is routinely disrupting our efforts to lead sustainable lifestyles.
Changes in consumer behavior play a vital role in combating plastic waste. Consumers only recycle 40% of their recyclable plastics, even when access to recycling is convenient. The easiest way to increase the amount you recycle is to educate yourself on what you can recycle, and how you should recycle it.
If you’re not sure of what can be recycled, you can find more information online or get in touch with your local waste management organization.
Energy Efficient Homes
Running our homes uses massive amounts of fossil fuels. Energy usage in the home is mostly attributable to air conditioning and space heating. Moving towards an energy-efficient home is, therefore, a vital step in living holistically sustainable lifestyles.
The easiest way to address the fossil fuel usage in your home is to ensure your house is adequately insulated. Investing in double-glazing and attic insulation can significantly reduce the energy it takes to regulate the temperature of your home. Insulation is also straightforward and requires little-to-no maintenance once you’ve made the change.
You can also make holistic changes to your home habits. Simple steps like reducing your shower time and ensuring your dishwasher is full before you complete a wash will reduce your overall environmental impact. Additionally, you can make logistical changes in your home: use lights that are on timers, and set up recycling stations to ensure you don’t accidentally throw away recyclable plastics.
Support Climate Initiatives
Research into sustainability and climate change is always evolving. New guidance is created as more investment is made into understanding our lifestyle’s impact on climate change. As such, a holistic approach towards climate change requires us to meaningfully engage with reputable, climate-conscious news.
Instead of relying upon new sources with profit-oriented stakeholders, go straight to the source. The UN keeps a collection of news sources that are often peer-reviewed and led by scientists, rather than journalists.
The Climate Change Tracker reports that politicians globally have “a massive credibility, action and commitment gap”. As such, one of the most valuable changes you can make in your day-to-day life is to advocate for sustainable initiatives and show public support for policies that reduce our impact on the climate. By publicly supporting climate initiatives, policymakers can see the public demand for greener actions.
Holistic Living for the Future
Eventually, we will all live sustainable, climate-conscious lifestyles. The key is to make the switch before it is too late. By ingraining sustainability into your everyday behaviors, you can reduce your carbon footprint and become a role model for others who are looking to live more sustainable lifestyles.
Image source Unsplash.
