Hie! This is Naoko from Broken Shield and Sword. You’d probably have seen me posting comments in this blog and Pelf’s other blog, pelf-ism is contagious!

With environmental issues to the fore now, it’s hard not to turn off whenever one sees it. If you follow the news, it’s hard not to be depressed, especially when most scientists have predicted that we’ve either reached the point of no return or we’ve passed it already. Either way, it seems to be bad news all the way, though some hope that we may still be able to reverse it if people become more aware and make a few changes in their lives.

I won’t lecture or give you guys more tips because I’m sure most already have that covered (and because I don’t have much myself heh), but I would like to point out efforts to be a bit more environmental-friendly over the Net. Previously I mentioned about efforts in books like The Mallorean. Today I’m going to point out a website that I surf daily — GaiaOnline.

Gaia is an anime-based forum website. Though it started originally as a role-play community, what I like about it is that there are a number of literate people who know how to spell and word their sentences in a way that won’t claw your eyes out, though there are still a lot of n00bs around, but thankfully they’re not that prevalent in the boards I hang around. One of Gaia’s features is a flash-based game called Towns, where one can set up their homes and get people to come in and have a look.

Towns looks like a regular neighbourhood, complete with trees and trash. Yes, you saw it, trash. Picking up the trash has two objectives, one is to keep Gaia clean, and the other is that when you amass enough, you can exchange the trash for a nifty paper hat to decorate your avatar with. In real life, this would probably make people think twice about throwing rubbish everywhere. It could also serve as a pretty good exercise for parents and children: when was the last time you made something out of old newspapers? (My dad had a story where my grandmother would look for him every time the papers and the threads went
missing; they’d make kites out of both. XD)

Raising awareness to change our daily habits has become sort of a mindset now. The trend in places like Malaysia and the US, I think, should stop from raising awareness and start to move towards: What can we do? Well, some governments have some ideas:

Carbon credits and alternative fuel sources are also two ways (according to most advocates) of breaking the destructive environmental cycle. We need to change the way we consume fuels like gasoline and the like, because we’re running out of them and they’re destructive to the environment.

The most popular fuel alternative in the US is ethanol, made from corn. It is said that because corn is renewable and they’re abundant in the US, it’s the best alternative to gas (think about Malaysia’s own palm oil being used for these purposes).

A check on BusinessWeek regarding ethanol though puts paid to this notion. It is basically a case of putting the cart before the horse. While Ethanol usage has increased, it has not come without a price. There is more supply than demand, the efficiency of ethanol as a burning fuel is still up for debate, and most tellingly of all, food prices has increased as farmers devote more time and money to growing corn as a fuel substitute rather than a food product. Ranchers and those that depend on corn waste have been faced with rising prices, driving many out of business.

Then there’s carbon credits. The idea behind carbon credits is simple: you pay for the CO2 you emit. In many cases, they’re being paid for by companies in an attempt to be more eco-friendly. The process is: Carbon X $$ = trees planted to replace it. However, here’s something either they didn’t tell you or they didn’t know: Trees planted today will only have an effect 100 years from now in reducing carbon dioxide in the air. Add to that conservative estimates that we have only 10 years to change the world to live in it or for some scientists, we’ve already left that turning point far behind, and it looks like the human race is running to extinction.

Are we? Remember all those tricks and tips our grandparents taught us so as to save money and energy? You know, like switching the lights off when not in use, using cloth nappies instead of disposables, using a fan instead of an air-cond?

Yes, do those. And then take it a step further.

Buy from your local market instead of the hypermarket. Their products tend to be fresher, and they also tend to be sourced locally, which cuts down on the traveling time and emissions. Even more than buying organic, buy local. If you have a computer, change it to a laptop if you can afford it. They use less energy and emit less heat (mostly).

And if you can, join in initiatives like these. Raise the awareness, RAISE THE ALARM! Change your life, change the life of your friends! Don’t stand aside. Don’t keep quiet. BUG your council to implement more eco-friendly measures, write to the papers.

DON’T STAND STILL.