Your foot and you

By now… if you haven’t heard about carbon footprint… you simply need to get out more dude! When you switch on that light, boil the kettle, drive to work – you have an impact on the environment…. you emit caaaaarbon/greenhouse gasses that create your very own carbon footprint. Say it…. “my caaaarbon footprint”. So- the hoohaa is to do as much as we can to reduce this footprint.

In a nutshell - our natural resources just cannot replenish itself fast enough to keep up with our increasing energy demands. You want this… you want that… go here…go there- they all require energy. And thus the hype of alternate/renewable energy sources, like solar, hydro and wind power, to slowly shift our reliance from dirty fossil fuels …. yes baby! I’m talking about coal. And so we’re clear on things, er.. nuclear is not a renewable energy source.

However, in our little transition phase, we’re not quite ready to be entirely dependant upon alternate energy sources and for now have to settle for a bit of both. And in circumstances where it may be difficult to reduce your energy consumption or reliance on fossil fuels, it helps to off-set by planting a tree or recycling for example. See??... there’s always something you can do.

We’re at a stage where changing what and how we’ve been doing things is absolutely necessary. Already it has been forecast that from 2011 Cape Town will once again be battling with supply and demand issues similar to that of 2008. Candlelight dinners… here we come!

So next time you turn on that light or drive to work, think about something you can do, however small it may seem, on a daily basis towards reducing your carbon emissions. When more of us start doing those little things differently, the gross impact can only be beautiful. I for one, have started using a bit of solar energy and am sure to switch off my plugs before leaving home.

Aaaaand – don’t blame ‘the other’ please - its not just the big corporations that should be doing something – its you… its me … and our combined little efforts that make aaaaall the difference. My parting little thought, imagine a world where we generate our own electricity…. and its free. Bye bye Mr Carbon Footprint.

(Pic: http://is.gd/gvU4U)