Zero Emissions Life

Before I started this blog, I had not thought much about clothing. I usually just buy replacement clothing when I identify the need to replace an item of clothing (or my partner tells me an item needs replacing). Whilst I was aware of the idea of fast fashion, I had not been making conscious decisions to make sustainability a key criteria in selecting clothing. The fashion industry is responsible for 10% of annual global greenhouse gas emissions. Many clothes are made with polyester or other synthetic fibre, normally made from coal or oil. Hence, reducing the amount of clothes made with polyester or other synthetic fibre directly reduces the greenhouse gas emissions. Clothes made with polyester shred microfibres which go into the waterways and eventually into the fish we eat. Hence, it is much better to have clothes made from natural fibres like cotton, flax, hemp, jute, wool and silk. But just choosing natural fibres is not enough. It is important to choose clothes made from fibres t

As noted in my previous post on flying , traveling by train produces less emissions than flying. I and my partner have just completed a train trip from Adelaide to Canberra. We wanted to catch up with my sisters in Adelaide for my birthday and an early Christmas. We decided to fly one way from Canberra to Adelaide and then return using trains, thereby reducing our carbon emissions on one half of the journey. On Thursday 22 December we traveled by train from Adelaide to Melbourne and stayed overnight in Melbourne. On Friday 23 December, we caught the XPT train from Melbourne to Yass, before transferring to a bus for the final journey to Canberra.  We had considered using trains for both directions. However, the Overland train only goes from Melbourne to Adelaide twice a week (Monday and Friday). This would have meant leaving Canberra on Thursday 15 December for Canberra to Melbourne, staying in Melbourne overnight and traveling from Melbourne to Adelaide on Friday 16 December. However,

Burning gas at home directly produces greenhouse gas emissions. The best way to eliminate these emissions is to not burn gas. When we purchased our current house, the following were running on gas: Heating - a ducted central heating system Hot water service Cooktop in the kitchen All have been replaced with items running on electricity.  Within a typical Australian home, the following accounts for the household energy use: Heating and cooling – 40% Heating hot water - 23% Lighting - 7% Cooking - 5%  Appliances and technology (including the refrigerator, dishwasher, washing machine, dryer, TV, computers and mobile phones) - 25%.  As a result, highest priority was given to upgrading heating and cooling, followed by heating hot water and replacing the cooktop was the lowest priority. Reverse cycle air conditioning Heating is a major consideration during the cold Canberra winters. We have taken steps to improve the energy efficiency rating of the house but we still require heating to stay

The last two posts on this blog focused on reducing emissions generated from transport. This post and the next one look at how we have reduced emissions generated at home. This post looks at how we have reduced the energy used in the house and thereby reduced the greenhouse gas emissions. The next post will look at how we have replaced all gas appliances with electric appliances, to reduce direct emissions through no longer burning gas. My partner and I live in a 61 year old five bedroom home in the Canberra suburb of Ainslie. We have four children who no longer live at home. We have kept living in this house because we have not found a suitable smaller alternative. The house faces north with lots of windows on the north facing wall and almost none on the east and west.  Double Glazing We have installed double glazing on windows and doors. We have a lot of windows and doors! We used Magnetite to retrofit double glazing to the existing windows. This was significantly cheaper than repla