But carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring gas. Humans might have nothing to do with the increase. We’ve heard that too. It was in an oil industry -funded ad that proclaimed “Carbon dioxide: They call it pollution, we call it Life”. Each year, the burning of fossil fuel results in more than 24 billion tons of CO2 emissions worldwide. CO2 levels are higher today than they’ve been at any point in the last 650,000 years.

Global warming? Scientists can’t even agree-where’s the proof-Virtually every credible scientific organization and study has concluded that the Earth is heating up, and that higher CO2 levels affect global temperature. 600 Scientists worldwide have utilized many methods including ice core testing & researching the data that’s been compiled over the last 150 years. Global warming is seen as a shift in climate patterns over several decades, not day-to-day change. In other words what we do today will be seen in the next10-15 years.

Fine, but if global warming leads to milder winters, better farming, and longer summer vacations, why fight it? It sounds pretty good. Rising sea levels, stronger hurricanes, and more frequent droughts don’t sound good to us. The real concern is how quickly we’re making the climate change. Rapid shifts don’t give species-including homo sapiens (that’s us)– time to adjust, and we’re not heating up the Earth to the highest temperature in human history-we’re doing it faster than ever before.

Is it hazardous to my health? Yes, we’ve already seen pollen double which is a burden for allergy sufferers, a more powerful poison ivy is growing at double the rate, famine, infectious and water-borne diseases will increase due to drought and rising sea levels not to mention heat related illnesses & deaths.

I keep hearing the term “carbon footprint”-what is it? Everyone –including you—leaves one. It’s an invisible trail of greenhouse gases created by our daily activities like driving the car or turning on the lights. The size of this footprint depends on the amount of energy you use. There are online calculators which will pretty much do all the work for you. Some of these are www.safeclimate.net, www.climatecrisis.org,, or www.carbonfund.org. Make sure to have your monthly gas and electric bills handy before you start.

Hey, What difference can I make-I’m just one person? We’ve been told by scientists that humans are the biggest contributors to global warming–if that’s the case then it stands to reason that we’re also the solution. The collective power of each small individual action we ordinary citizens take today will create a huge positive shift that will be felt on a global level by future generations.

SAVE MONEY AND REDUCE CLIMATE CHANGE When you cut your greenhouse gas emissions by saving energy, you’ll also save money on energy bills. An average household can save several tons of green house gas, especially carbon dioxide (CO2), and hundreds of dollars each year. Here are just some of the ways :

Watt!? Replace Some Lightbulbs Replace 10 frequently used light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs. They use 2/3 less energy and last 10x longer. Save 2500 lbs. of CO2 and $250 per year. They can be recycled & disposed of through Kane County-simply call the City of Elgin at 1-800-449-7587. If every American did this we would save the exhaust of 8,000,000-yes, million-cars. Pull The Plug/ Phantom Power Even when electronic devices are turned off, they use energy. Unplug items like your cell phone charger, hair dryer, coffee pot, TV and computer-save over 1000 lbs of CO2 and $260 per year. Make it easy on yourself-use a power strip. If 1 million did this we’d save 150,000 tons of CO2 per year.

Check Your Water heater Keep your water heater thermostat no higher that 120 degrees-reset it from your normal 140-save 550 lbs of CO2 for every 10 degree reduction. and $60 per year. Wrap it in a blanket and save another 1000 lbs. of CO2 and save $50 in heat loss and up to $400 a year in demand costs. Or switch to a tank less model-your water will be heated as you use it rather then keeping a tank of hot water-save 300 lbs. of CO2 and $390 per year. Adjust Your Thermostat & Change Your A/C Filter Move your heater thermostat down 2 degrees in the winter and up 2 degrees in the summer.– save 2000 lbs. of CO2 and $150 per year. Save another 350 lbs. of CO2 and $150 a year by cleaning/replacing dirty filters as recommended. If every American home did this we would keep 36 billion lbs. of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. The Washer and Dryer… Your clothes dryer is one of the worst offenders for CO2 emissions (1400 lbs of CO2). Most European countries don’t even have them. Line-dry your clothes-save 700 lbs. of CO2 and $75 per year. Wash your clothes in cold water 2x week, spot clean & let modern detergents do the rest –save $300 a year.

Keep The Door Closed-Make Life Easy For Your Fridge Your fridge joins the dryer on the worst-offender hit list. Make it easier to stay cool by putting it in a cool place and letting hot food cool down to room temperature before you put it in. Clean your coils, check your seals, clear clutter off the top and defrost on a regular basis-save 680 Lbs. of CO2. Then get rid of that 2nd one in the garage that’s just holding a six pack and wasting power and your hard earned $$$. Shake & Bake Efficiently-Don’t Peek! One peek from every American costs us 7000 tons of extra CO2 Preheat less, keep your oven clean, use glass/ceramic instead of metal, adjust the racks before your turn the oven on and you’ll save $10 & 185 lbs of CO2 from being wasted. Ovens have to heat up 35 lbs of steel & 4 cu.ft.of air before they start to cook. A microwave is 75% more efficient-a toaster oven 66% more efficient. Cook l/3 of your meals in the microwave, 1/3 on the stove & 1/3 in the oven-you save $13/year & 254 Lbs of CO2 from being wasted.

Weatherize And Insulate Your Home Caulk and weather strip your doorways and windows-save 1700 lbs of CO2 and $275 per year. Make sure your walls and ceilings are insulated, you’ll save another 2000 lbs of CO2 and $245 per year. That’s $520 a year.

Switch to Double Pane Windows Double pane windows with a low-e coating is one of the most effective retrofits. These can reduce energy usage by as much as 30%-you can save 10,000 lbs of CO2 and $436 per year.

Take Shorter Showers or Install a Low-Flow Showerhead

Showers account for 2/3 of all water heating costs. Shorter showers will save 350 lbs. of CO2 and $99 per year. If you install a low flow showerhead you save 350 lbs of CO2and $150. If everyone did this we’d save 160 billion gallons of water & $2 billion in heating that water.

A Moment of Silence for Cheap Oil & The CO2 Monster Generally your car will emit as much carbon dioxide (CO2) in one year as your entire household-12,000 Lbs. So what to do...SLOW DOWN-go 55mph instead of 65mph - save $75 and 720 lbs of CO2 from going into the air. Keep the tires on your car adequately inflated-check them monthly-save 250 lbs. of CO2 and $840 per year. Check your car’s air filter monthly– save another 800 lbs. of CO2 and $130. If residents in Elgin & Dundee tuned up their cars regularly we’d keep 90 million lbs. of CO2 out of the atmosphere.

Manufacturing a big car creates more greenhouse gases & that big car keeps creating more until it hits the junkyard. So subsize your next purchase to a fuel efficient model –rated 32mpg or more and save 5600 lbs. of CO2 a year, or buy a hybrid and save 16,000 lbs. of CO2 and $3750 a year. Or just leave the car home 2x week-walk ,bike, or carpool-and save another 1590lbs CO2. Recycling Is Here To Stay Americans throw away 40,000 plastic bottles every MINUTE! Recycling doesn’t use more energy than making a new product in the first place. Recycling aluminum saves 95% of energy use, plastic saves 6075% & paper 55-75%. Right now we are recycling 4x more but throwing out 33% more trash. Recycling just 2 lbs saves 130 lbs of CO2 from the air. If California meets its goal of 50% recycling by 2008, they will have put $2 BILLION –yes, Billion-into their state economy and created 45,000 jobs. How To Fight Overpackaging & Win Less packaging could reduce your garbage by 10%-save 1200 lbs. of CO2and $1000 per year. Say No To Styrofoam -Ok it keeps your coffee hot, but a 1000 years later your empty cup is still around. The challenge isn’t just cups & peanuts– it’s all the overpackaging. Unpack your products in the store & hand the pesky packaging to the manager. Make your own peanuts out of air popped popcorn-feed the birds with the leftovers. Reuse The News One household recycling newspaper for one year saves 4 trees, 2200 gallons of water & stops 15 lbs. of pollutants from going in the air.

Send Your PC Packing PC’s are here to stay, and they enable many other environmentally friendly practices like freecycling and telecommuting-but they do require tremendous amounts of fuel-usually coal– burned to power its manufacture. So, it’s important to think twice before you dump it for a new one. You may be able to upgrade, give it to someone else-be sure to erase your data first, or recycle it thru the manufacturer, where you bought it, or Kane County at recycle@co.kane.il.us.

Reuse It Bring your own garment bag to the dry cleaners & return your hangers. Bring your own mug to your favorite coffee shop and to work. Bring your own bags to the grocery store, reusable containers for takeout food from restaurants, or bring your lunch to work in one. Pass your magazines on to a friend, hospital or nursing home. Advertise your trash-one man’s eyesore is another's treasure– go online to Craigslist, for free stuff to www.freecycle.org , for clothing www.clothingswap.org & www.swapstyle.com and check for local deals.

Count Your Food Miles Food typically travels 150022,000 miles before it gets to your table. Each of those miles involves the emission of CO2. Support our local agriculture; buy into a CSA, visit the farmers market, look for regional produce at the grocery store (ask that they provide it) or create a garden of your own. Become a “locavore”.. If you eat locally grown, unprocessed food lx week you can save 5000 lbs. CO2 Choose The Right Bag...Paper? Plastic? ……. Neither! Skip the in-store moral dilemma and BYOB-Bring Your Own Bag. We throw away 100 billion plastic bags a year-400 per person(less than 1% is recycled). They come from petroleum and the manufacturing of just 14 of these uses the same amount of oil that it would take to drive a car 1 mile. Paper bags are even worse. Their production uses 4x the energy of plastic ones per the EPA. They generate 5x the amount of solid waste –they could biodegrade in as little as a month, but due to bad landfill design– actually decompose at about the same rate as plastic. 14 million trees were cut down in 1999 to supply us with paper bags-BYOB-Bring Your Own Bag!

Rethink Where Things Come From How they’re made & where they end up when we throw them away. Everyone buys toilet paper. It comes from virgin Canadian 100+ year old trees-untouched by man.. Trees, which absorb CO2 can’t do that when they’re cut. Is it necessary to destroy endangered forests for toilet paper? If every household replaced just 1 roll with a recycled post consumer roll, 424,000 trees would still be standing. In fact, plant 1 tree and provide cleaner air for us to breathe and save 2000 lbs. of CO2—Heck, plant 20 and save 40,000 lbs. of CO2 and cooled the planet a little more.

Research & Vote With Your Dollar Read labels on items before you buy petroleum based products. Look at how far they traveled to get to you. There are alternatives. There are several websites you can go to for more information such as www.climatecrisis.org. Education is a powerful pool. The best energy saver is the one you don’t buy in the first place, but, if you have to buy -do it wisely. Manufacturers make their decisions according to what we buy. Would they make different choices if they knew their customers-you and I – were refusing to buy their products? We vote with our dollars.