The term conservation, especially when it is included with the term energy has become very common fare for this generation. Children who may not know the intricacies of the weather patterns, or how important maintaining the correct temperature is for us as a species are nonetheless aware of global warming, and that they are supposed to conserve as much energy as 
possible. Many of us actually try. We pay more for a more fuel efficient car, and even if the performance is not good, we opt for a hybrid or an electric car.
We try to remember to switch off the light when we leave a room, and try to install energy star rated appliances because they are more efficient. We talk about how this is what everyone should be doing, and try to convert others too. Every little bit helps.
While it is true that little drops of water do make the mighty ocean, but however commendable this is when you consider the carbon footprint that each of us have, you will realize that this is as nothing to what we should be doing. An average American has 20 times the carbon footprint of a person living in Africa, and 8 times that of an Asian. Even the Europeans are better than us in that their carbon footprint per person is only about half that of us.
Just doing what we have been doing is just not enough. For example if we cut down on our fuel bills by going with more efficient vehicles you would hardly be reducing 1% of your carbon footprint.
Going with energy star appliances are similar. The reason for this is that we tend to have more electrical gadgets than we need. And we don’t think beforehand what is sufficient and what we don’t need. For example most of us go with central HVAC units and these add up to 6% of our carbon footprint in just the wasted heating or cooling. If we are staying in one room, this is the cost to the environment for ensuring that the rest of the home too is kept at the same temperature. Just by installing individual units for each room, you can reduce so much, but how many of us really want to do this.
We would rather try scraping a few 0.001% from something that is already performing at optimum efficiency than give up even a little bit of our comfort. Imagine that if you are constructing your home, going the extra mile and putting in good insulation will ensure that you don’t even have to have such a large HVAC system. And none of this is going to cost you more either.
Energy conservation is more something in the mind, rather than in what we do. If we change our mindset to start thinking that we really should do something about helping the environment, instead of doing something that will give us brownie points, we will very soon find that we’re doing quite a bit, and that others will be getting influenced just by looking at us.
View the original article here
Visit LightingShowroom.com for all your home lighting needs.
See all LightingShowroom.com Press releases here.
No comments:
Post a Comment