Earth Hour every hour?

During the past two weeks, preparations of the conference have taken big leaps forward and soon we are able to come out with practical news about the content and more on what has been planned. Locally a big effort has been given to improving the use of local food in restaurants. This has meant that the logistical chain from production to table has been widely discussed.

For many of the restaurant owners, the immediate reactions to sustainability are linked to switching off lights when not needed, saving water and avoiding garbage. These actions mainly happen automatically for those that are committed. But for others they need to be reminded or made automatic. The same goes for the local food, it needs to be made so easy to get and use, that there is not anymore the arguments of "more work is needed" or it is not cost-effective. Even the most dedicated green thinkers use these arguments and not in vain, as at the moment you need to make a big effort in order to fill your plate with ingredients that are locally produced.

Campaigns like Earth hour are needed to showcase the power of decision in our daily lives. We need to rethink our systems so that the Earth Hour would be every hour for us all!

Conference bag

My closet is full of conference bags. I keep adding the new one beside the old unused ones. Mostly these are computer bags. And in all honestly, you only really need one. The one, that you anyway have with you when you go to the conference. I often see a pile of bags being left to the organizers as a objection to the idea. Hopefully we will see more of this happening in order to change the behavior.

The organizers of the conference very often assume that the participants expect to receive a bag from the organizers. Have they ever really consulted the users? I am sure many would say that they would rather not have the bag, but instead have a cheaper conference or compensate it with something totally new.

The most advanced organizations have changed to use bags that are made out of recycled materials or that can be recycled. Still these bags are not produced close to the event, so the logistical emissions remain.

It makes me still very sad to see that so many resources are put into producing, transporting and tailoring the bag, mostly in the other side of the world. There is no sustainability in that! The attempt is that nothing from the Solutions conference would not stay unused in the closet! You are able to see how we will succeed with it.