Hopefully I miscalculated somethings and thats why the numbers are huge but most likely this is what I used this past week.
Electricity: 135.12 total weekly CO2 output, 531.348 kWh weekly
Water: 123.71 gallons per week
Natural Gas: 585.50 weekly CO2 output
Vehicles (Gasoline) : 196.3 weekly CO2 output
Bus Travel: 53.44 weekly CO2 output
Edit: never mind, I misplaced the decimal points
Sorry it’s late, I just got home
Consumption:
Food: Eggs and bread, ham sandwich, pizza Water: showered 4 minutes, nothing else Electricity: computer, bedroom, iPod Gas: n/a Money: none
Reduction: I pretty much reduce water food and everything else to finish off the week. I reduced more electricity than usual. Haven’t had a need for gas either. My dads too cheap to turn on heater.
Sustainability: I don’t think I can keep not using gas or electricity during the winter because it’s dark and cold obviously but summer and spring arrives I can definitely reduce my usage. Now is not a particularly good time as I enjoy being warm during the cold.
Following:
Since today is the last day people have been telling other people like friends and family how they should reduce too. I realized that if everyone doing this project managed to convince someone to not use water for a day, it would save about over 4000 gallons of water
Deuces
It’s Friday only one more day of madness personal reflection and it’s done!!
1. Consumption:
2. Reduction:
Reduced and did not reuse much today. I scaled back as much as possible, so basically I did nothing fun today. Also the food part I kind of went overboard with but I reduced electricity usage, water( note: I just realized I always forget to include toilet flushing/ teeth brushing; I do both of those twice each day). It was fairly easy to do because I mostly slept and it was great.
3. Sustainability:
Unfortunately I cannot stay in bed all day and do nothing as much as I want to, so I think today is the last absolute sloth day. Though my water usage has been coming along, so I think I can place some limits on that. Lately I haven’t been using water all that much except for the basic necessities. I should consider the fact that winter is almost here and it’s going to be freezing pretty soon. I’m beginning to think that weather plays a crucial role into our water use.
4. Following:
I noticed people turning off their heat and using sweaters and blankets for warmth. Some people who have fire places have been using them and it’s good. I have a fire pit and I might want to use that.
Got a nice relaxing day off today so I did not consume or waste a lot but it still sucks being in a boot.
1. Consumption: 2. Reduction: I reduced a significant amount in my opinion, but then again I stayed home. Less activity = less resources. I mostly spent the day in bed sleeping because of my ankle injury. My mother brought me food so I could not complain much about eating since I needed the strength but overall I feel good about myself. Most likely won’t be at school tomorrow again too. 3. Sustainability: I think one change I can make is not going on social networking sights. Lately from what I have been hearing Facebook is now P**nbook. I already think Twitter is a complete waste of time along with Tumblr (haha). I think I can reduce this permanently especially if it gets to the point of no return for Facebook. The reason obviously speaks for itself. Also I hear Congress is thinking about censorship and frankly that puts a bummer on most things. 4. Following: Since today is considered no technology Thursday, people have been turning off their electricity usage and devices. Except their computer in order to do the blog posting. I’m already on board with it and I have not played my 360 in over 5 days. I think at one point I was going through withdrawal.
For the next few days I am gonna step it up to the next level.
1. Consumption:
2. Reduction:
I kind of failed at my reduction. I was hungrier than usual so I consumed a lot of food. But I saved a lot on electricity and somewhat on water and gasoline. Though the money correlated with my hunger.
3. Sustainability:
It seems like each day my sustainability has been going down for some reason. I’m going to have to step it up quite a bit. I’m not going to school tomorrow so that should be taken into account of my consumption rate. When people are inactive they tend to reduce more than usual.
4. Following:
Almost everyone has been getting into this experiment with a full throttle. It inspires me to do better of myself. I’ve noticed that people have been taking this water audit very seriously and have been finding new ways to either not take showers, dehydrate themselves or not sweat a lot which is not hard to do since winter is around the corner.
To be honest everything is getting to be redundant unfortunately. I feel as though this “Try Harder Tuesday” resulted in me doing squat, in all matters. It’s basically the same ideals. Use less resources, find more ways to use less resources. I’m finding this little experiment to be too much of a chore than I’m comfortable with, but hey this whole thing is meant to make us all feel uncomfortable.
1. Consumption: 2. Reduction: If doing nothing equals reduction, then I pretty much succeeded in that regard. Disregarding the extremely long shower I took when I got home and the money I owed to some people. Today was more of a sloth day because using less resources = less energy/effort. 3. Sustainability: I can definitely see myself doing this for the rest of the week. It easy, simple and efficient. Though I doubt I could do it on Thursday (football), Friday ( cuz it’s Friday) or Saturday ( the weekend). Those days might be a bit hard to lessen my consumption because of higher activity and the simplicity of using resources to make my life easier. 4. Following: Lately I see people trying to walk to school. Frankly it’s good and all but I’m beginning to think its a perfect excuse to walk in late. From my house it’s possible for me to ride my bike, so if it’s warm out, I might consider doing that depending on the time I get up.
It’s only Day 2 and already I feel like crap. But that’s mostly because of the load of work I have to do this week for school.
1. Consumption:
2. Reduction:
I reduced a lot more than usual today, I didn’t spend anytime on the computer except for homework, I ate a smaller amount of food but I drank a lot of water today. I did not watch any TV or play any video games. Basically today was pretty depressing. I would have used my cell phone but my little brothers covered it with mayonnaise.
3. Sustainability:
Realistically and optimistically living like a person from a third world country could vary in different ways. It all depends on where you live. If what I did today was like a boy from Eastern Russia lived like, I could possibly do it but it probably would not last. For a week? Maybe…I’m just used to the life I used to have before Sunday. It was easy and something I could depend on 4. The people who I follow on Tumblr have amazing ideas. I applaud them for their creativity. Some of the fellow experimentees have been forcing including their family members to try it out so it could be a whole household thing. Other people have been just doing the generic things like cutting back water, facebook, twitter, and cell phone usage. None of my peers could resonate me because so far it’s just been blaah, I think I’m going through withdrawal it’s either that or sleep deprivation (hint to teachers: cut back on the work) hard to tell which at the moment. I most likely will not adjust to seeing my peers.
At last Day 1 of “living” like a third world boy has come to end. Here is how my day of hell charity and goodwill began:
1. Consumption:
2. Reduction:
Today was a bit of a lethargic day, I only did some major resource consumption due to my mother incessant complaining. But I feel as though I really made a better person of myself. Not counting of skinny dipping in my neighbors pond of course but it was for the good of the world. I even caught a toad that I plan on eating later in the week. I did not use my 360 which was a killer, so I just watched some TV which I admit I could have avoided doing.
3. Sustainability: I suppose all of the things I did today I could envision doing in the long run but I most likely could not because of certain restricting laws in Boston. Also not to mention not eating as I usually love to do. But overall the general idea is to lessen the consumption usage of my everyday live. I simply choose not to
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