Consumer efforts on the reduced carbon front can be viewed as insignificant in isolation. My general observation is that for any "average" Canadian household, there exists the ability to reduce electricity, water and fossil fuel consumption by about 30% relatively easily. By easy I mean using commercially available products to replace existing household items and minor habit changes. Realistically, that's a 5 year or more type change for people, just replacing items as other ones wear out or become obsolete. Sometimes you might ask yourself why... but in an ideal situation, if each Canadian made the same steps, we'd have a country that operated significantly better on a resource consumption side as a whole. If each person on our continent could make a 30% change, the aggregate numbers are even more hugely meaningful.
Mom and dad recently took a step in a different direction for them with their latest vehicle. The new car has an engine displacement of only 40% of the prior vehicle, which is a pretty big step change for someone used to driving a larger car. The utility of the new car hasn't left them disappointed.
A Takagi is in the works, which is a pretty impressive step change in hot water heating technology from having two 40 gallon tanks in the basement.
Dad has helped out with our yard that has shown the neglect of my working hours lately. So my thoughts were on the garden side this weekend. Who needs internal combustion to assist their "green" activity of growing plants in their yard? Seems contradictory. Mowers and gas weed whackers don't consume a lot of fuel, but pound for pound their emissions are noticeably bad. Also, who needs an 80 decibel internal combustion engine ruining the tranquility of the yard?
Tori and I have been going internal combustion free on our yardcare, so I've attempted to bring mom and dad into the fold. We'll see how it works out. A Neuton cordless electric mower was the first step. It's incredibly light, mom or dad could push this thing around easily. It's a bit narrow in terms of cutting path, but considering you can mulch grass and leave it on the lawn, and walk quickly very easily since it's light, I'm sure the grass will still be trimmed. The secondary tool for when they both want to tackle the lawn at once is a Gardena reel mower. The tertiary tool is a Black and Decker cordless electric weed whacker.
Time will tell!
