SUSTAINABLE LIVING
Having
devoted
my whole professional life to ecology, the environment and
sustainability, it is natural that I have also tried to apply my
principles in my own life. This page is my personal view of what
sustainability means for me, with the constraints and limitations of
where I live, what I can afford, and what is practical as I try to
balance many, often conflicting, priorities. It is also summarized in my suggestions for sustainable living.
We are trapped in a material civilization that does not always give us
many options. If we want to be of service to society, we may make
different choices than if we were thinking only of ourselves. We also
have different needs and possibilities at different times in our lives,
for instance with or without family responsibilities. We take
many things for granted, and have never questioned their relevance for
sustainability.
I am constantly asking questions about even the least significant
aspects of life and lifestyle, and experiment with changes that might
lighten my footprint upon the earth. There is no one right way to do
things that applies to everyone, but maybe my personal path to
sustainability will give you some ideas for your own. This page will
continue to grow and evolve along with my lifestyle.
My approach to sustainability has been profoundly influenced, first, by
my beliefs as a Bahá'í
and the vision of a sustainable future society that the
Bahá'ís are working to build, and second, by all
that I
have learned and continue to learn as an environmental scientist and
ecologist, working with governments and the international community to
achieve more sustainable development. Those views are expressed well on
the site of the International
Environment Forum
which I maintain. I give priority now to reducing climate change,
protecting ecosystems and biodiversity, and minimizing natural resource
consumption so that there will be enough for everyone. I am also trying
to learn to be more resilient and less dependent on those aspects of
our material civilization that would be most vulnerable in a major
international crisis or catastrophe, although the best protection is a
strong sense of community solidarity wherever you live.
General principles
The first foundation of a sustainable lifestyle is contentment with
little, getting off the consumer treadmill and focussing on what you
really need. Another essential principle is moderation, neither
over-indulgence nor complete denial, appreciating things without excess.
Housing
Many
factors can
make housing more sustainable, including location, size, quality of
construction, heating/cooling, lighting, materials, etc. In Geneva, I
have always tried to find housing as close to my work place as
possible, so for 15 years I have lived within a few minutes walk of my
office. When my office moved across town, I moved as well. Obviously
there are many things you cannot control in a rented apartment, but I
have installed energy-saving light bulbs wherever possible,
weatherstripped the windows, and have no appliances with standby. Since
I live alone, my little studio is very small and full of books, with
just enough space to circulate between work areas. I have always aimed
for an efficient use of space, and none is wasted in my apartment.
When I decided to stay in Geneva on retirement, I wanted again to be
able to garden, to rebuild something (restoring old houses has been a
hobby all my adult life) and to have some contact with nature. Housing
is very expensive in Geneva, so I decided to divide my living space
between a minimum urban residence in Vernier, a largely working-class
suburb of Geneva, and a small place in the French
countryside not too far away. I moved from what was then a two room
apartment into a smaller studio (29 m2), and
with the money I saved on rent I bought a small abandoned chalet (35 m2)
in a forest 40 km (40 minutes) away in the Jura mountains of Haute
Savoie, France.
For the
story of the chalet, its forest and my activities
there, see the separate chalet
page. In a
sense, I now have a residence in two halves, with my bedroom in Geneva
and my living room and garden in France. Each has complementary
sustainability
advantages.
While I was limited by the existing structure of the chalet, I have
completely insulated it, use a low-pollution wood heater for most
heating with wood from my forest (supplemented by electric heaters in
bedrooms and bathroom), collect rainwater from the roof for toilet
flushing, made an opening in the livingroom ceiling to benefit from
natural light from the roof window in the bedroom above, use low-energy
lighting, and in general try to keep a minimal ecological footprint.
Energy
My electricity is entirely from renewable sources: in Geneva I pay the
highest rate for ecologically certified renewable energy (86% of the
city's electricity is from renewable sources), and the chalet is
supplied by a local, publicly-owned utility with a hydroelectric dam
on the nearby Rhone River, not nuclear power as in much of France. I
have few electrical appliances, and most are highly rated for energy
efficiency.
Transport
Geneva has excellent public transport, with frequent trolley-buses and trams a
short walk from my apartment, so that is my first preference. I walk to
work, and restrict my use of a small old car to heavy shopping and
going to my chalet, where
there is no public transport, about
once a week. An energy audit suggested that it was best to keep
an old car until it wears out, before replacing it with a more
energy-efficient model, which hopefully will be far improved by then. I
have recently bought an electric bicycle for travel to my
chalet, but the 35 kilometers of hilly terrain will require more effort
for me to get sufficiently in shape to go all the way. I have a folding
bicycle, but do not have much
need for it. Still, I drive less than 5,000 km per year, so it will
take a long time to wear a car out.
I do not take travel vacations for pleasure. Going to my chalet already
provides a vacation experience as part of the normal variety in my
life. I already travel so
much that any opportunity to stay at home is a real vacation.
For trips, Swiss and French trains are excellent, and I prefer them for
medium distances. My big ecological sin is air travel. Whether in
international work for the United Nations, organizing and speaking at
NGO conferences, lecturing at universities, or occasionally
visiting part of my widespread family (combined with other service), I
cannot avoid extensive air travel. I try to ensure that the services I
can render to humanity on a trip compensate for the environmental
damage done. I do not have sufficient confidence in the present carbon
credit schemes for financially compensating for air travel to support
them directly, and prefer to invest in more fundamental changes in
society.
Food
Calculating
the energy cost
and environmental impact of food is complicated: vegetables grown
locally in a heated greenhouse may require more energy than those
shipped from far away, and bulk transport may use less energy than your
drive home from the supermarket. I eat little frozen or pre-prepared
food, favouring fresh produce, locally grown if possible. Cooking in
the microwave, a pressure cooker, or several things together in a
single pot, saves
energy. Breakfast is fresh fruit and a large bowl of swiss meusli
(mixed whole grain cereal with nuts and dried fruit) with low-fat milk.
Simple, wholesome
food, cheese or yoghurt and whole grain bread for lunch, with a little
meat (not beef) or fish at dinner, and at least 5 portions of
vegetables and fresh fruits, are the core of my diet. I only eat out
when I am with other people. At my chalet, I prefer cheese from the
dairy in my local village, presumably made with milk from the cows I
watch grazing, all within 2 kilometers. Food cannot be more local than
that, except from my own garden. My first attempt at a vegetable garden
was not too successful, although I have been eating my own potatoes for
a few months. I have planted a number of fruit trees, but it will be
some years before they bear much fruit.
In Geneva, I shop mostly at a big shopping centre a 15 minute walk from my
apartment, with a Migros
supermarket whose values I appreciate. It is a customer-owned
cooperative that sells no alcoholic beverages or tobacco products,
features its own socially- and environmentally-responsible items,
avoids the multiplication of branded products by stocking largely its
own brands, and maintains high quality at close to the lowest prices in
Switzerland. It is not a local farmer's market, but a reasonable
compromise for an urban area.
Water
The water in Geneva comes from western Europe's largest lake and is of
excellent quality, so I drink tap water most of the time, rather than bottled beverages. I run faucets
and the shower at low volume with water-saver attachments, and added objects to my toilet tank to
reduce the volume of each flush by 1.5 liters.
I do not
let the water run when it is not immediately needed. Too many bath and
shower valves require high flow to operate properly, but mine sticks so
that, with a low-flow shower head, I can take a shower with 15-20
liters of water.
At my chalet, where I have control of the plumbing, I have to pump
water from the spring-fed village supply up to my water tank (a
solar-powered pump is one of my future projects). The low-pressure
gravity flow from the tank to the house reduces water use to the
minimum. I turn on the 15 liter water heater only for showering, and
take a comfortable shower with less than 15 liters of water using a
low-flow pulsed shower head. The toilet is flushed with rainwater from the roof.
Clothing
Clothing is not a topic many people think of when it comes to
sustainability, but more with respect to social responsibility in its
manufacture. Yet washing clothes uses energy and water or dry-cleaning
chemicals and produces pollution. I therefore try to minimise the
weight and volume of my
clothing, to wear clothes requiring dry cleaning only when necessary,
and to wash full loads at an economy cycle with a simple no-phosphate
detergent dosed carefully. I do use a dryer because my apartment has no
balcony or possibility of hanging clothes outside, and is
too small to hang out clothes inside. I avoid clothes that require ironing, and do not mind a few wrinkles.
The origin of the fabric is a more difficult choice. Synthetic fibres
wash and dry more easily, do not require ironing (energy intensive),
and hardly wear out. Nor do they decompose in landfills, as I found out
when I dug up clothing buried 30 years ago in a trash heap on my
property, some of which was still wearable. But burning synthetics adds
to
greenhouse gases. Natural fibres like cotton and wool do not come from
petrochemicals and are greenhouse gas neutral, but cleaning them may
require more energy and water. Much cotton today is produced in
unsustainable agriculture with heavy chemical and energy use, and often
health
impacts on farm workers. Clothing from organic cotton is still hard to
find. I therefore use some of each. Nylon socks almost never wear out,
but cotton underwear is more comfortable. Blends of synthetic and
natural fibres are more practical for shirts and pants.
The choice of fabric is less significant because I try not to discard
any clothing until it is truly worn out. I also learned to sew as a
child (my mother's sewing machine fascinated me), so I can pull out my hand-powered
sewing machine or a needle and thread and repair things when necessary.
I pick conservative
timeless styles, and keep clothing until it comes back into style. When
1970s styles again became popular, I already had them in my closet. The
ads in the junk mail show me which colours are "in" and I select
accordingly
from a 40 year accumulation, adding a few useful items from half-price
end of season sales. The corollary of this approach is not to gain
weight, so that you can still wear your clothes of 30 years ago. I do
have some problems now slipping into old pants.
Household products
I have become increasingly suspicious of all the chemicals in household
products and aim for simplicity: simple bath soap without perfume;
vinegar-based toilet and bathroom cleaners; zero phosphate detergent
for clothes-washing (obligatory in Geneva to protect the lake); simple
shampoo with only herbal additives, etc. I try to use as little as
possible, and avoid things that may leave residues or release volatile
compounds into the air. My pesticide use is limited to wasp's nests,
and ants in the house, with cedar blocks in the woolens against clothes
moths. My garden is free of chemical industry products.
I also avoid automedication, and take medicines only when prescribed by
a doctor. A simple healthy diet and adequate rest seem sufficient to
keep me in good health most of the time.
Waste
Fortunately I live in places where recycling is well established, so I recycle everything I can. In
Geneva the recycling depot for paper, glass, plastic bottles, aluminum,
compostable organics, clothing, etc. is just a two minute detour on my
walk to the office. In France, it is just a short detour on the road to
my chalet. Appliances go back to the stores that sell them. At the
chalet, I have my own compost pile. I try to generate as little waste
as possible, reusing what can be reused, recycling what can be, and
avoiding throw-away products. I use cloth napkins and shopping bags, a
minimum of paper towels, and rechargeable batteries for most purposes.
What little trash is left is mostly plastic packaging, which in Geneva
is incinerated to make electricity.
Media/information
We are drowning in information, and bombarded by the media with
messages we did not ask for. It is another kind of pollution. I do not
have a television, having decided years ago that I did not like the way
it passively manipulated my thinking and emotions. I listen to the news
(France Info)
on the radio during meals, as much for the weather as anything, and
read two weekly periodicals: the Guardian
Weekly for general news, compiling the best articles from The Guardian (UK), Le Monde (Paris)
and the Washington Post
(USA), and the New
Scientist
for scientific and environmental news. This is enough for me to stay
well informed, and keeping up with these is already a challenge, since
I usually spend more time writing than reading. Admittedly, much of
popular culture escapes me completely, but...
I dislike advertising, and even remove the labels from containers
around the house to avoid having their brand names and messages in
front of me every day.
I do pay attention to the aesthetics of my surroundings: paintings on
the walls from artists that I admire (at least on the few walls without
bookcases), a few simple but beautiful objects from various cultures:
Chinese, Japanese, Pacific Islands, Africa, etc. or natural objects:
shells, stones; and always lots of green plants. My musical tastes are
mostly classical, apart from the bird songs around my chalet.
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