Living Green in the Emerald Isle

We had visitors recently from America, who seemed very impressed with all the "green" measures we follow here. Well, it's necessary isn't it, when you're a small country with no oil source of your own, little spare room for landfills, and as for solar energy...well, let's not talk about our lack of sunshine, ok?

But our family does feed ourselves from a large kitchen garden, and as a nation we do recycle, evidenced by the often-overflowing row of bottle banks in every village. I used to think of this as a chore: after all, I have to rinse and de-label and toss away the lid and sort them separately at home, then remember to haul a jeepload of tinkling glass and plastic to the local bottle banks. Then with a flash of inspiration I brought the kids and used it to teach them colours and sorting--and let them enjoy making some noise. What kid doesn't like to destroy things, or see and hear something smash? So the bottle banks are no longer an obligation in our family, but rather free entertainment for the kiddies.

Another big incentive to recycling is the high...ridiculously high...cost of simply tossing a bag of rubbish. In our rural area, we need to purchase special printed bags to fill and set by the side of the road for the collection company, at a cost of five euros and up, per bag--that's about eight US dollars these days. Imagine if you had to pay eight dollars per bag to dump your trash; would you recycle more then, and eliminate more waste from your lives? You betcha.

Or, if you were very very rural, as we are, you might be tempted to do as many of our neighbours do, and avoid charges altogether by burning or burying your own garbage in an out-of-the-way corner of your own land. It's unclean and unsafe, and I can't help but wonder if the disposal rates were more reasonable, we'd avoid more of it.

As for electricity, we use very little in our house: the expense of it is simply prohibitive. But, you get used to turning off lights, running appliances only when needed, and choosing electrical goods with an eye on their energy rating. I still have all the 'mod cons' any other industrial nation is used to, including the laptop I'm writing this blog on; I simply use them more carefully than if electricity was a cheaper commodity. I must admit, that just as our American visitors were impressed with our conservation efforts, I was impressed by the size of their kitchen appliances...I could have set up home, I think, in their tumble dryer. But those big refrigerators, big ovens, and big washing machines all come at a price in energy consumption.

The source of that electricity is a near-constant source for news in Ireland; just the other day we heard of the SeaGen turbine going on-grid in Strangford Lough (See the thread about it in the Green Living forum). We're also full of windfarms, which aren't really so unattractive as long as they're far away...from a great distance they look as if someone's put wee whirlygigs on top of the mountain for fun, and indeed when I first saw one I thought it was a mad sort of art installation. Then, one day we drove round a particular bend in a mountain pass, and WHAM there was a giant turbine up close--it's colossal. I couldn't bear to live near one.

Unbearable nearness is also a stumbling block to another energy solution available to us, one that also addresses the problem of waste disposable. Incinerators have been proposed for all parts of the country it seems, but they never quite make it, and I can understand why....who wants to live on a street where convoys of rubbish trucks are going to be filing past you every day? And who knows the real story of the noise or smell such a plant would generate? Yet, the two-for-one advantage of incinerating rubbish to help power the grid can't be denied.

In the end, energy conservation really does come down to individual choices and family lifestyles. A national radio show demonstrated this fact earlier this year, by asking everyone across the country to simply turn off their lights during a single hour of the day, all at the same time. It sounds like an insignificant thing to do--although the kids enjoyed doing it--but the energy savings reported from the suppliers were huge. So don't tell yourself that just your efforts don't make a difference...they really do.

SEI (Sustainable Energy Ireland) offers grants to Irish homeowners willing to make a switch from fossil fuels to alternate energy means, which is a great help, especially in a country as expensive to live in as ours. And the media keep us constantly aware of our 'carbon footprint' through articles, ads, and blogs...and that probably helps us achieve an average 'carbon footprint' that's about half the average American carbon footprint. That's right, half... that's the difference that can be made by recycling, cutting back your electricity, eating locally-produced food, using public transportation, vacationing closer to home, and other methods of energy conservation. Do you know what your carbon footprint is? Visit www.carbonfootprint.com and try their calculator, then look around the site for ways to reduce it.