Green Options

What are you going to change about Christmas 2009 to reduce your GHG emissions? Have you thought about the issues that effect your carbon footprint? Now that Christmas has passed and we get back to less festive times, its maybe time to look at things.

I was prompted to post on this by an evening drive I took with my family to Lawley Street (-25.780785°  28.242231°) in Waterkloof, a suburb of Pretoria, South Africa.

Lawley Street is some 1.8 km long and is the address for approximately 90 large suburban houses, many of them are diplomatic corps & embassy residences. This normally quiet suburban road was filled with cars crawling up and down its length, all their to see the houses glittering in Christmas lights installed  each year by the house owners.

Lawley Street Christmas Decorations

A simple calculation, admittedly involving many assumptions, gives good estimates of the carbon footprint of “The Lawley Lights”.

The buy local and help the farmer movements are expanding nicely for organic foods and all kinds of earth-friendly products. Yet the traditional Christmas tree without pesticide sprays is still a challenge.

Last month, I did a little research to find out if I was breaking any “green laws” with my yearly real Christmas tree. It may seem counter-intuitive, but I discovered that many environmentalists are pro-real Christmas trees over artificial trees. Why is it considered more environmentally friendly to cut down trees than have an artificial tree that can be used year after year?

• Most Christmas trees are grown on tree farms - they are considered an agricultural product. They are sustainable, and for each tree that is cut, at least one more tree is planted.
• Tree farms are usually planted on soil that doesn’t support other types of agriculture.
  In the US there are about 1 million acres dedicated to tree farming. Each acre provides enough oxygen for 18 people.