Cut back on your meat intake. - Livestock production absorbs 16 pounds of feed for every pound that pound that comes to the table. Meat production is a leading contributor to deforestation, soil erosion and desertification, water scarcity and pollution, loss of biodiversity, depletion of fossil fuels and global warming.
Buy regionally produced foods that are in season. - Shop at local Farmer’s Markets. Foods that have to travel hundreds or even thousands of miles to reach you waste precious fossil fuels. Read more about the importance of buying local food from local providers.
Drink bottled water only when you have to. - 70% of bottled water never crosses state lines, which makes it exempt from FDA oversight. Our water systems, on the other hand, are heavily regulated. In addition, bottled water produces over 1,000,000 tons of plastic. You can install a faucet-mounted or countertop water filter for drinking water instead of using bottled water.
Buy fresh food, instead of frozen. - Frozen food uses 10 times more energy to produce.
Buy organic food as much as possible. - Organic soils capture and store carbon dioxide at much higher levels than soils from conventional farms. If we grew all of our corn and soybeans organically, we’d remove 580 billion pounds of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere!
Avoid heavily packaged products. - You can save 1,200 pounds of carbon dioxide if you cut down your garbage by 10%.
Consider organic beer and wine. - Look for “biodynamic” wine.
Have a Bar-B-Que. - Outdoor grilling takes less energy than an electric stove. Stick with grills that use propane or natural gas as they emit less carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.