What’s the Big Deal?

What’s the Big Deal?

What’s the Big Deal?

Fortunately, even while renting, we’ve got more control over our living environment than we may think. Whether we’re changing out our light bulbs, applying weather stripping, painting with low VOC paints, or growing salads and herbs on our windowsill, every little effort we make takes us a step closer to sustainability. And who knows, by keeping good relations with our landlord or lady, we might even persuade them to insulate that loft after all.

What’s the Big Deal?

What’s the Big Deal?

What’s the Big Deal?

Newspapers, radio, television, magazines, blogs, podcasts, in fact any media you can think of, has awoken to the issue of Climate Change or Global Warming. When mainstream publications, the likes of Sports Illustrated and Vanity Fair, cover the topic you know there is something going on. Not to mention that a documentary full of graphs, statistics and grainy photos of glaciers can scoop an Oscar. And thousands of eminent scientists, the world over, sign a document concurring that there was 90% certainty that the planet has a temperature and it is a human induced fever. To reduce the patient’s prognosis of increased convulsions; such as hurricanes, droughts, floods, heat waves, etc; experimental treatments are underway.

One of these is carbon offsets. Carbon dioxide, a significant greenhouse gas, is emitted into the atmosphere as a result our intensive use of fossil fuels like oil and coal. In simplistic terms this is ‘bad’. One means of doing ‘good’ is by paying to balance (or offset) the equation, by funding projects that reduce our emissions of carbon (and other greenhouse gases). If only it were as simple as it sounds.

What’s the Big Deal?

The last time you walked into a bookstore it probably didn’t feel much like a forest—but for all the trees used in those pages, it could be. According to bizstats.com, there are more than 6,000 companies in the US that publish books, and when you include “self-publishers,” there are literally tens of thousands. The global impact of this is rather mind-boggling. For instance, if a publisher sells a million copies of an average 250-page book, it takes 12,000 trees to produce books for this one title. Alternatively, if the publisher chooses to print the books on 100% post-consumer waste recycled paper, no trees are cut. Reflect on the zillions of books you saw in the bookstore.

Publishers can lead the way to help reduce the impact on endangered forests, fight the climate crisis, conserve resources, and protect public health. Each time publishers of all sizes choose to use environmentally friendly methods and technologies, they decrease the impact of the publishing business on the planet and help transform the industry as a whole. In the long run, better publishing practices might even mean we need fewer books about deforestation, chemical toxicity, and climate change, and wouldn’t that be nice?