Humming the Song of Life: Life Style Management for Carbon Neutrality
“Reach high, for stars lie hidden in you. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.”(Tagore)
Let me share a small story of myself. It was a bright, sunny morning of early spring, the deciduous trees of the neighboring areas crying to shade their leavers as nature’s call, birds were twittering, the beautiful flowers were dancing in the nearby pride trees. I was in front of my laptop to prepare a presentation to explore the art and science of a sustainable environment for budding citizens. My son belongs to Computer Science has returned from his workplace due to scarcity of water. He asked me about the El Nino issues for this unprecedented catastrophe in the high-tech city. My son “Dad, you are going to talk about sustainable environment but the most emerging issue is the use of water in a sustainable manner to avoid the unprecedented next world war due to water scarcity. Can you add a little bit idea about the life style management for carbon neutrality to avoid the global catastrophe due to emerging problems and it is unavoidable?” We started our conversation by giving rest to paint the portrait for the children. Let me share the conversation of that between myself with my son. See my son, Gandhiji said, “The Earth has enough resources to meet the needs of all but not enough to satisfy the greed of even one person”. In connection with the relevance to the discussion of development both resources and development go hand in hand. However, the present context of globalization and the market economy has driven people to exploit natural resources and welcome ecological and environmental disasters perennially. Let me give some examples before the exploration of the idea of magnitude of the ongoing issues. Around 1850, the CO₂ concentration was 285 ppm and by 2020, it had reached up to 415 ppm and it had increased the average surface temperature by about 1.2 ℃ over the period 1850–2020. The earth has become a glass house due to over increase of the surface temperature as a part of the human’s greed and another increase of temperature to 1.5℃-2 ℃ from its pre-industrial level. It has been observed that the sea level has varied by about 200 m, while temperature varied by 10℃ and if the temperature is subjected to increase by 1–2 ℃, the fate of the different metropolises can be easily determined if this is going to be allowed to happen. Ecological disasters are not only restricted to the so-called fancy books and ideas, it has become responsible for droughts, floods, wildfires, and mass extinction of valuable genetic resources along with the untold global issues and the modern people armored with AI and %G cannot escape from it. The debate between environment and development is not a fancy one but it is mostly being addressed among the intellectuals, politicians, industrialists and lawmakers and everybody has agreed to address it. The sustainability goals as nourished by UNESCO are one of the reflections of thought in this regard. Carbon neutrality (impossible?) and sustainability are the two hands for driving the vehicles of the forthcoming days. Carbon neutrality generally refers to the net-zero carbon dioxide emissions attained by balancing the emission of CO₂ with its removal to stop its increase in the atmosphere that causes global warming. After listening to this episode, with a little bit of a break with another sip of coffee, my young son asked me “ Dad, do the common people like us can contribute in this endeavor in large scale without the common platforms of slogans, posters, campaign and the discussions among the intellectuals in four wall decorated discussion?”. Yes, you are right. I again continued by quoting “Think globally but act locally”. Rather I emphasized that not locally but the individual actions are much more solicited in this regard. To achieve carbon neutrality, we earnestly solicited the reduction of carbon emissions in possible many ways including (i) replacing fossil fuels with carbon-free renewable energies, hydropower and nuclear power, (ii) industrial carbon capture, removal, storage, and utilization maximum by considering the entropy values, (iii) reuse of solid wastes and (iv) reduction of energy consumption with an earnest urge to increase energy use efficiency. But these also deserve a wide span but at the grass root level, the following practices may be recommended in this regard and it would be the first step toward a sustainable future in which humans and nature can whisper the beauty of the pleasure of happiness harmoniously. We, the common people of middle class and upper economy domains generally worship fashion and appetite to increase wardrobes. The clothing sector generates 10% of all global carbon emissions and remains the second biggest industrial polluter following the oil industry. Not only that, 70 million barrels of oil are used each year to make polyester fibre, and 75 million trees are cut each year to produce cheaper fabrics. If we can avoid the mass market throw-away fashion and build up the habit of environmentally friendly apparel, it can significantly reduce our carbon footprint. The reduction of meat and dairy product consumption is another approach to reducing carbon impact on Earth. Livestock farming and the products require 32,000 million tons CO₂ /per year and 51% of all worldwide greenhouse gas emissions. You will be surprised to learn that a vegan diet-habituated person can save 1100 gallons of water, 20 kgs grain, 30 sq ft of forested land, 9 kgs of CO₂ and one animal’s life. Plastic and society have become the two sides of a single coin. Around 300 million tons of plastic are globally produced each year and if it is allowed to continue, 17% of the global carbon budget will be contributed by 2050. Use of reasonable shopping bags, food containers and utensils, reusable water bottles, bamboo ear buds and toothbrush, no use of disposable straws and stirrers, seldom use of unnecessarily packaged foods and use of free detergents, soaps and shaving creams may be some of the daily practices in household life can reduce the carbon footprints in our way of life. Eco-friendly cosmetics use can make your outer beauty more fascinating than the products from the big MNC and it will encourage the local knowledge to make much vocal in the market. You will be surprised to know that conventional transportation contributes 13% of all greenhouse gas emissions. You can minimize the use of cars at short distances, switch off the ignition at traffic lights, sharing of cars in the school or business houses and avoid large-scale use of flights can also contribute to carbon footprint reduction. Go green is a very common word but we seldom practice it in our everyday life. Non-conventional energy sources like wind and solar power can reduce the consumption of fossil fuels and green electricity is cheaper and more readily available. The choice is yours. You can think big but exercise a little. On the contrary, the tiny lifestyle management can expedite your endocrines for the big thought. Humming the song for a sustainable life in the context of carbon neutrality may be the lifestyle management of Gen X. Are you ready?
