What Do You Want From Me?
Michael at Musing’s musings makes an important point in Trying to do the right thing: what do you do after you’ve done all you can on your own?
Back when I was living in California I conserved water from the start. I was used to it from the military and living in a city where water was relatively expensive. I put the jug in the toilet tank, turned off water when it wasn’t necessary, watered plants with the dish water, etc. I did these things before there were any “real problems” in San Diego because it was a desert, and you don’t waste water in a desert.
Then they had a drought and instituted water restrictions. Fine, reasonable thing to do except they did it by mandating a 10% cut in water usage by everyone. Now the people who had never done anything could achieve such a cut without bothering to do everything I had always done. How was I expected to cut usage?
The problem with such blunt action is that it encourages people to over-consume so that when the restrictions come, they won’t be inconvenienced. It’s time for some leadership and clearly defined goals to deal with the problem. The goals shouldn’t just be for the nation, or the state, but for the individual, so we have some way of knowing we are doing good.
9 comments
Make conservation convenient and rewarding, and people will do it.
At least tell people what works and what doesn’t, and explain the trade offs. Most people don’t want to use CFLs because they don’t know that they now come with a choice of light types, including a very good daylight type, and some of them can be dimmed, etc.
I have a five light goose-neck floor lamp that even when all five are lit only uses 75 watts, but puts out 300 watts of light.
Looking for efficient appliances when you have to buy something new saves you money in the long run, even though they are more expensive to buy. My Mother saved the extra cost on her new air conditioner in two months of use.
Saving electricity, saves you money, and cuts down on green house gases.
People need to know these things, but no one in government is making the effort.
daylight cfl’s? i’d buy some of those, but haven’t seen them in the stores i’ve been in. where do i go?
I got mine at Lowes, but Home Depot should have them too. They really are decent reading light.
I remember our BIG drought back awhile ago. You literally turned on the tap and had pebbles delivered with some brown looking water.
People were arrested for watering their lawns or for “stealing” their neighbors water. Some folks resorted to spray painting their lawns green. I still cringe when I see folks “hosing” down their walkways. I want to scream and tackle them and knock some sense into them.
My fair city spent $6mil on a de-sal plant only to shutter it after one run that made one run of bottled water that was ultimately sold to tourists. The residents had voted for “State Water” so felt they were in the clear. I, by the way, voted NO. The State can’t legislate how much snowfall the Sierra’s are going to get so I figured they had no way to support their claims of being able to provide so much water.
Unfortunately, our society has no clue as to how things work. Trash “magically” disappears instead of being dumped somewhere in landfills, electricity “magically” is always available if there is a light switch to be turned on (power plants? what are those?), toilet water just “magically” disappears elsewhere (who needs to worry their pretty little head where the “ucky stuff goes”). The mentality is “if there is a tap, there’s going to be water.”
We also have this warped mentality of “free markets”, if you have money to pay for it, it will be available. This is just not so.
We’ve become so detached from reality and mother nature. Until we are able to grasp “science” at it’s most basic, we are going to be in deep, deep do-do.
My apartment complex lacks per-apartment water meters. For years, water charges were built into our rent, and rent was raised every year.
Then one year the owners, not wanting to admit to a rent increase, decided to do something our state permits them to do: bill for water per apartment, prorated based on square footage and occupancy. Our clever state of Texas billed this as a “conservation” measure.
If you think for two seconds about it, under such a scheme, as a tenant, the only way you can be sure of getting your share of the water you pay for is to use as much water as possible in your apartment, so that you equal or exceed the average usage for your level of charges. Now that’s some conservation measure, isn’t it.
Yes, of course, the measure was passed by a Republican-dominated legislature and signed by a Republican governor; need you ask? Irrationality, thy name is Republican.
That was the drought I was talking about, Jill, because SB started building the plant in reaction and everyone had a hissy fit over San Diego mayor Maureen O’Connor’s water bill.
San Diego pumped it’s treated sewage out under the Pacific, when the water could have been used for irrigation. They just don’t think.
Steve, the market might be able to control water usage if politicians and utilities would stop cutting special deals for large users, often making it cheaper to use more water than less. No one should be able to grow rice in California in an economically realistic fashion, but subsidized water makes it possible. Conservation is for other people.
Heh. And I still got called a prig and admonished to actually “do something” after posting the entry you linked to, Bryan. I’m beginning to get a sense that many in the environmental movement are the movement’s (and their own) worst enemy. They’re so fervent and so righteous (and admittedly, the issue is of some concern) that they just can’t help making, if not exactly enemies, at least un-friends wherever they go.
Sure, it would be great if I could afford to buy a hybrid car, or to buy a house closer to where I work so I could walk or bike in a reasonable amount of time without needing to take another shower after I arrived. But there’s literally no way to make that happen on my current salary, and while my boss likes me and likes the work I’m doing, I don’t think he likes me enough (or has enough money in his budget) to give me the kind of raise that would make that happen, either. Public transportation? Hollow laugh. I’ll be retired before that arrives in any meaningful fashion.
Meanwhile, I’ll continue turning off the lights in rooms when I’m not in them, being careful about how much water I use, and hoping that the city will start offering recycle bins to apartment-dwellers. I’ll hang my shirts up to dry, and wash as much laundry in cold water as possible. I have no illusions that I’ll be able to save the world on my own, but at least I can contribute some effort in that direction.
The individual can’t make the impact needed, but can learn to live within their “carbon needs.” It took the government to pressure industry into delivering energy efficient appliances. It took the government to convince automakers to get serious about fuel efficient vehicles.
If Reagan hadn’t sabotaged the direction the country had started to move in, we would be a hell of a lot less dependent on oil and gas, have reduced our greenhouse gas emissions, and generally be in a lot better shape than we are today. Gasoline didn’t get cheap because they discovered so much more oil, it got cheap because demand went way down.
You do what you can and demand action from the Federal government, because corporations don’t respond to their customers anymore, they only listen to stock analysts.