There are many things a person can improve in their daily lives to be significantly more environmentally friendly. Here are some of the activities to alter that make the biggest impacts on the environment.
Correct Your Diet
One of the biggest improvements that can yield the best results in your daily life towards being more environmentally friendly is to correct your diet. With many sustainability ideas out there, it’s easy to get lost in the process. Luckily, altering your diet is one of the key aspects to be more sustainable and promote eco-friendly living. Everyone who wants to make a positive impact on the environment either seriously cuts back on meat consumption or quits eating meat altogether. Reducing meat intake is beneficial for the environment because if less meat is consumed, the lower the demand will be for products that require a lot of electricity, land, and water to be produced. Not to mention that it is the most humane way to the actual animals involved.
An additional thing to consider is that there are many alternative protein sources such as plant proteins and even cultivated meat (lab-grown meat). These have a positive impact on the environment. If quitting meat is not your thing, you can always opt for organic meat producers, as you go through strict organic regulations that ensure the environment is not polluted in the production process, and it’s ultimately much healthier. When meat is mass-produced, animals are often injected with synthetic steroids and antibiotics that, when flushed out in the wild, cause an increase in antibiotic resistance, a threat that many underestimate. These are some of the most compelling reasons why people opt to improve their diet to benefit the environment.
Fashion Sustainability
Fashion, or simply put, the way you dress, is a big part of anyone’s life. This is a great “target” that can be made more environmentally friendly. More than people realize. There are generally four things you can do to improve your wardrobe to be more environmentally friendly. Firstly you can go vintage and do things like shop second-hand and go thrifting. You can also buy clothes on sites like Depop and eBay. Secondly, you can buy fewer clothes in general. The fewer clothes are bought, the lesser the demand will be, which will decrease the production and thus decrease the water consumption and dye pollution that comes with it.
Another thing you can do is to look for eco-friendly materials such as natural fibers like cotton over polyester. Not only will it feel a lot nicer when you wear cotton, but it won’t contain microfibres and pollute marine life when the clothes get washed. Ultimately, a great way to improve your fashion aspect of life to be more environmentally friendly is to learn to DIY. It doesn’t take much to learn to patch a hole or to learn to hand-sew. This will not only be handy but will have you buying fewer clothes.
Recycle
The world today is much more reliant on computers and, generally speaking – on digital technology. It’s much easier to go a day without using notebooks or even a single piece of paper. The less paper is used, the less paper needs to be produced, and the more trees don’t get cut down but remain in the forests. In addition, by recycling about a ton of paper, about 17 mature trees get saved, according to the EPA. If it’s a crucial part of your job or education to use paper a lot, you can still make a huge difference by recycling the paper you do use. More than 40% of municipal solid waste is, in fact, paper and paper products.
Ultimately, recycling is one of the easiest and best ways to be more environmentally friendly. Furthermore, your focus aside from the paper is to recycle other materials such as glass and plastics. Plastics take ages (literally) to decompose and are one of the main ocean pollutants, as well as a big part of the waste found in landfills. Did you know that recycling plastics is imperative to be environment friendly, maybe most importantly of all other recyclable materials? Ultimately, recycling glass can reduce greenhouse emissions by limiting the need for its mass production since the process is much more efficient and eco-friendly from recycled glass.
These are some of the main aspects to alter in your daily life; of positively impact course, there are many more. If you need more resources on how to be more sustainable, there are ample resources online on how to do so, so be sure to check out the designated websites and blog posts.
