WHAT IS IT? By purchasing carbon offsets, people can zero out, or offset, all or part of the carbon dioxide they emit through daily activities. This is done by reducing the emissions or increasing the carbon dioxide absorption of another party. Offset activities can vary widely; the most frequent are planting trees, followed by various energy conservation activities.

WHY DO IT? This reduces net greenhouse gas emissions with the aim of combating global warming. By offsetting the emissions of an activity or person this Effectively makes that activity/person "carbon neutral" and it doesn't contribute to Climate change.

HOW TO DO IT? This is very easy. A variety of products exist online and a web search for Carbon Credits will give you a range of options. Just make sure they are legitimate and certified. We have researched two alternatives, links below that we recommend.

Climate Friendly
Climate Friendly is proudly endorsed by WWF-Australia. Projects are independently verified using the highest international standards, including the Kyoto-compliant Gold Standard.
www.climatefriendly.com

Greenfleet
Greenfleet is a not for profit organization which provides a simple way to reduce a vehicle's impact the environment. For a fee, Greenfleet plant native trees to create a forest, which as it grows, will absorb the greenhouse gases a car produces.

According to Greenfleet, their approach not only absorbs a car's greenhouse emissions, but tackles salinity, improves water quality and provides essential habitat for native Australian species.
http://www.greenfleet.com.au/

APPROXIMATE COST: 75 cents a week will offset an average car for a year. Approximately $4/week will offset a household of 4 people, 2 cars, and an international flight for a whole year.

NET RESULT: A household of 4 people, 2 cars, and an international flight will offset approximately 24.6 tones of CO2/year

WHAT IS IT? By making this switch, your electricity provider must produce your electricity needs through the use of clean, renewable energy sourced from the sun, the wind, water and waste, instead of burning coal.

WHY DO IT? This action reduces the amount of greenhouse gasses your household produces. An added benefit of this action is the direct influence your choice will make on your electricity provider. They, like any company, are driven by market demands and wont change until consumers demand alternatives. By switching to a certified green power they are required to provide more sustainable power source and move away from coal.

APPROXIMATE COST:

% Accredited Green Power	Approximate costs
	Per week	Per quarter	Per year
10%	$0-0.70	$0-25	$0-35
20%	$1.50	$50	$75
50%	$3	$110	$150
100%	$5	$180	$300

That's the cost of 2 cups of coffee a week!

HOW TO DO IT? It is generally as simple as contacting your power supplier and requesting to be switched over to a green power alternative.

In Australia, the government organization Green Power is a nationally accreditation program that sets stringent environmental and reporting standards for renewable energy products offered by electricity suppliers to households and businesses across Australia. For contact details in your region visit www.greenpower.gov.au

NET RESULT: For an average household, this would account for approximately 7.7 tonnes of CO2/year

WHY DO IT? In Australia, the transport sector accounts for a whopping 77.2 million tonnes (or about 14%) of our total net greenhouse pollution. Of this greenhouse pollution 56% from transport comes from cars (and a further 34% from trucks and buses). Australians are big drivers: in fact per capita we own more cars than any other nation except the US.

With average use, an Australian family car will travel about 15,000 km a year, generate about six tonnes of greenhouse pollution and cost its owners $7,700

RESCOURCES: In Australia the Federal Government has a great site that compares cars or provides a list of cars in order of their fuel consumption or emission rating.

www.greenvehicleguide.gov.au

APPROXIMATE COST: This should be a considerable net savings. Smaller cars are generally cheaper to buy and run.

Why? Animal products make up the biggest part of your Eco Footprint. 34% to be exact. Meat, particularly beef, has a very high environmental impact, using much water and land to produce it, and creating significant greenhouse pollution. In fact if you reduce your intake by one 150g serve of red meat each week, you'll save 10,000 litres of water and 300kg of greenhouse pollution in a year.

Most conventional meats are resource intensive, but feedlot beef is particularly wasteful. Producing 1 Kg of feedlot beef, on average, requires 4.8Kgs of grain and over 19800 liters of water. It also results in the erosion of over 2 Kgs of topsoil.

What can I do? You don't have to go vegetarian to make a difference. Switching to organic or free-range meat would be great, but you can have a measurable impact by simply replacing one steak, plate of spaghetti and meatballs, beef lasagna or a trip to the local fast food joint with a meat free meal once a week.

Choosing locally grown meat with low Food Miles will also make a large difference.

What we do matters!

A Sydney university study calculated that reducing your meat intake from the Australian average of 300grams per day to 150 grams, saves the equivalent of reducing your annual car travel by 4700kms every year. The energy savings each year would power the average household for nearly a month.

What about free-range meat/poultry? What about meat I've hunted myself? Choosing meats that are raised free-range can benefit you and reduce the energy used in production. Grass-fed beef or even Kangaroo meat for example are lower in total fat and calorie content and higher in Omega-3 fatty acids content (good fat). The choice of grass feeding over grain will save the resources, energy and therefore footprint devoted to producing and transporting the grain.

In Australia, kangaroo Meat may also be a viable alternative. Even more so than free range beef or lamb which requires the clearing and modification of natural bushland.

“A far-reaching conservation benefit of a growing kangaroo industry is that it may let graziers reduce the numbers of sheep they are running, or do away with them altogether.

Reducing sheep numbers has the potential to undo some of the damage done on the rangelands over the last two centuries. Unlike soft-pawed kangaroos, sheep have hard hooves, which over time have broken the ground, exposing the soil to the elements. What hasn't been blown or washed away has been compacted, totally changing the drainage properties of the soils. This has had a marked effect on the vegetation of the region, which in turn has impacted on much of the native wildlife.

Removal of the sheep could give the soil a chance to settle, which would see the return of vegetation, followed by the small marsupials that have left the area over the last two hundred years. Given that the sheep rangelands account for around 22% of the area of the continent, or 17 million km2, the benefits to Australia's biodiversity will be significant.”

http://www.abc.net.au/science/features/skippysizeme/

Tip:

Kangaroo mince, is an easy and healthy substitute for beef mince, especially for someone wary of trying something different. Mince is generally used with other ingredients and any flavor differences between the two meats is quickly hidden. Used in things like Chilies and lasagnas, it is a very lean and cheap alternative.

Rabbit Meat and Free range Chicken Meat is also a viable alternative. They are highly efficient at converting plant proteins into animal proteins (their conversion rate is double that of cattle, for example).

The whole point of meat production is to convert plant proteins of little or no to use people as food into high value animal protein. In efficient production systems, rabbits can turn 20 percent of the proteins they eat into edible meat. Comparable figures for other species are 22-23 percent for broiler chickens, 16-18 percent for pigs and 8-12 percent for beef.

Replace existing incandescent bulbs with Compact Fluorescent bulbs or the newer LED bulbs.
Most homes could probably reduce the amount of energy they use, and dollars they spend, for lighting by at least 50 percent by doing this. Compact fluorescents (CFLs), use only one quarter to one fifth as much energy, therefore producing only about one quarter of the greenhouse gases, compared to incandescent bulbs to provide the same light level (if powered by coal). CFL's can be purchased to fit into existing light sockets and the technology has improved from early versions, such that you can now achieve a warm incandescent look. Your house doesn't have to look like a 7/11.

Remove all POWER VAMPIRES.
Even though home electronics aren't typically the biggest electricity users in a house, vampire power can cost a typical household up to 11% of your electric bill. Turn off any appliances or chargers at the wall that you aren't using. Things like video recorders may need to stay on to keep the clock settings, but TV's and sound systems can be turned off at the wall. Turn your computer off when not in use. In some cased a computer in Standby mode can still draw as much as 3-4 incandescent light bulbs.

Switch to a Solar hot water System if you have an electric hot water system.

Producing hot water can easily account for one third of an electricity bill. Any flat plate solar hot water system should save in excess of 3.5 tonnes of greenhouse emissions a year, not to mention a healthy saving on your energy bill.

Switch from electric to gas appliances whenever possible.
Cooking with a natural gas stove causes 60-70% less CO2 than cooking with an electric stove.

If you are buying new appliances, choose the product with the best Energy Star Rating that you can afford.

NET RESULT: A household can easily reduce its electricity consumption, and subsequent greenhouse emissions by over 70%. This will also reduce electricity bills by the same amount.

Everything above will make a difference, but compared to what industry produces, it is a drop in the bucket. People need to let these people know that they need to change.

Communicate your concerns with industry and government. Political leaders are greatly influenced by public opinion, and manufacturing companies are lead by market demands. Don't go unheard.

Suggestions:

• Encourage change by contacting your elected representative.

• Email a letter to the editor of your local newspaper.

• Face-to-face encounters with your elected officials can move him or her from taking a passive to an active interest.

Follow this LINK for information on writing letters and contacting elected officials.

Be aware of what you are buying and who you are buying it off. Think carefully about the environmental impact of the products you buy as well as how you are going to dispose of them. In other words, be a conscientious consumer.

Companies are driven by Market demands. Reward a company with your business for doing the right thing. Abandon them for doing wrong, but make it known to them why they have lost your clientele with a letter or email (see hints on writing letters).

For example: Buy a product based on the best energy star rating you can afford. Buy environmentally-preferable cleaning products (or make your own). Buy food that is locally grown. Buy recycled paper products for the home and office.

All of these simple purchase decisions increase market demand for more acceptable product choices. If the demand increases, then a company reacts and will move away from less popular/friendly alternatives.

Be cautious of Green washing however, but if an effort is actually being made by a company to improve, no matter how small, it needs to be rewarded or acknowledged, otherwise further attempts to go greener may be abandoned as a failed experiment.

For more information on being a conscientious consumer, visit this website. http://www.newdream.org/consumer/index.php . It is American, but most of the overriding philosophies are relevant everywhere. To learn about sustainability-friendly products follow the LINK

Why?

"since its peak in 2000, the global wild fish harvest has begun a sharp decline despite progress in seagoing technologies and intensified fishing. So-called efficiencies in fishing have stimulated unprecedented decimation of sea life. Long-lining, in which a single boat sets line across sixty or more miles of ocean, each baited with up to 10,000 hooks, captures at least 25 percent unwanted catch. With an estimated 2 billion hooks set each year, as much as 88 billion pounds of life a year is thrown back to the ocean either dead or dying. Additionally, trawlers drag nets across every square inch of the continental shelves every two years.

Fishing the sea floor like a bulldozer, they level an area 150 times larger than all forest clear cuts each year and destroy seafloor ecosystems. Aquaculture is no better, since three pounds of wild fish are caught to feed every pound of farmed salmon. A 2003 study out of Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia concluded, based on data dating from the 1950s, that in the wake of decades of such onslaught only 10 percent of all large fish (tuna, swordfish) and ground fish (cod, hake, flounder) are left anywhere in the ocean."

See Link To Article

What can I do? Be aware of what you are eating. For example, Never choose the slow-breeding Deep sea perch (also known as orange roughy or sea perch). In just 30 years many populations of orange roughy world-wide have declined by more than 70% according to a WWF/TRAFFIC report (PDF 2.0MB). They live for more than 100 years and don't start reproducing until they're almost 30 years old. They are extremely prone to over fishing.

Avoid Farmed Salmon . Follow the following LINK to find out why, or do a google search for salmon farming to see for yourself. The side effects of salmon farming are horrendous.

If you are in America Check out one of the online seafood guides to sustainable seafood, like SeaChoice, State of the Catch, Ocean Wise or Seafood Watch to help inform your choices.

Eat locally caught, fresh seafood that shows up on the green list on the seafood guides.Atleast it hasent traveled thousands of kilometers and has lower Food Miles

Ask your fish store or server about the seafood they sell. Be aware

Larger groups are aware of the most pressing issues and have the resources to keep on top of things better than you or I. Unfortunately, groups like these often get a bad wrap, but the truth is that most of them highlight and study important issues that governments and companies would otherwise ignore or cover up.

If you are not interested in supporting the more traditional action based groups like WWF and Greenpeace, there are other project based alternatives such as Land trusts and specific conservation efforts.

Browse through the following links and see if any of their campaigns interest you. Otherwise think about what concerns you and do a web search (i.e. Protect your favorite animal, Keep your favorite beach clean, ect). You will often be surprised by the admirable ideas and projects that deserve support.

Note: it is alright to question where your money is going. Reputable organizations will have full disclosure of their spending. Do some research before you commit if you are at all concerned.

Australian Bush Heritage Fund is a national non-profit organization that protects Australia's unique animals and plants and their habitats. Since 1990 Bush Heritage has been raising money from the community to buy and manage a network of conservation reserves across Australia.
http://www1.bushheritage.org/

AWC acquires land, and works with other landholders, to establish sanctuaries for the conservation of threatened wildlife and ecosystems. AWC now owns 14 sanctuaries covering 917,000 ha (2.3 million acres) in places such as north Queensland, the Kimberley, western NSW and the forests of south-western Australia
http://www.australianwildlife.org/index.asp

Here is a great resource that lists a variety of conservation organizations.
http://www.paradigmexpeditions.com/big_picture.htm

Teach what you have learnt to friends, family and help to influence your place of work. For example, try to get yor place of work to offset its carbon, recycle, and convert to low energy lighting. Educate your extended family and get them to change their ways.

The more people you influence, the more difference you will make. You will be surprised at how many people are interested in helping the environment, but just don't know how.

Through long experience, I have learnt that you cant preach these things. Confidently tell people your views in a logical, moderate manner, tell them what they can do to help. No one can argue with common sense, and people that do are twits.