Save the Planet in Your Spare Time: A Climate Protection Handbook for the Busy Person

Chapter 1

You Can Make a Difference

Are you wondering what difference one person can make to combat climate change? If so, this handbook is for you! The enormous challenge of climate change can be overwhelming, but a critical part of the solution is regular people like you pulling together to make a collective difference. To avert the most extreme impacts on the planet, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2023 report indicates we need to cut emissions in half by 2030 and bring them down to zero by 2050 to limit the temperature change to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. But what can one person do to help beyond reducing their own emissions? The answer is a lot!

I will share with you my journey of how a busy working mom of two became a friendly environmental activist to help save the planet in my spare time. What got me started? I read a National Geographic article on climate change. One chart showed the strong correlation between the earth’s temperature and carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere over millions of years, then showed the current levels of carbon dioxide way above any time in the last 4 million years. This chart was my wake-up call. I realized I needed to do much more than change a few lightbulbs and recycle. I decided right then to make a difference in my community with a series of actions to not only change my habits, but to influence others to change theirs. Climate change can be downright depressing and overwhelming, but I found the cure for these feelings is taking personal action to make a difference. You can too! It feels great with each little win you achieve. Just do what you can fit into your lifestyle, taking it one step at a time.

I started by systematically reducing my carbon footprint (the amount of carbon dioxide and other carbon compound gases emitted because of an individual’s actions). This action proved valuable beyond my own emissions reduction. I led by example to influence others and learned how to help others reduce their carbon footprints. Reducing your own carbon footprint is a great place to start. Once you get going, you can have a greater impact by taking the actions outlined in the remaining chapters of this handbook.

Correlation chart between temperature and carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere from The Royal Society.

I started reading up on ways to reduce my greenhouse gas emissions. Greenhouse gases are gases that absorb infrared radiation in the atmosphere, thereby warming the planet. There is a paper online called Understanding and Responding to Climate Change, Highlights of National Academies Reports, which does a good job of explaining climate change in layperson’s terms. It describes the various greenhouse gases and their sources, explains the effects of climate change, and focuses on the importance of replacing fossil fuels with new energy sources. The other item I found very helpful is the book Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming edited by Paul Hawken. It goes through over 200 solutions to climate change. I have organized the carbon footprint reduction actions by emission categories. The category emission percentages listed for the United States are from the Environmental Protection Agency, while the emissions listed globally are from Drawdown.

Transportation

27% of emissions in the United States

14% of emissions globally

The first thing I did to reduce my carbon footprint was to dust off my bike in the garage and start using it to run errands around town instead of driving my car. I then added a basket, rack, and panniers (baskets that attach to the bike rack in the back) to my bike, and now