Environmental responsibility

Why it’s important that we value nature Our forests, rivers, oceans and soils provide us with the food we eat, the air we breathe, the water we irrigate our crops with. We also rely on them for numerous other goods and services we depend on for our health, happiness and prosperity.

Here are the top 9 things you can do to save the planet, with or without a green cape:

• Stop eating meat (or at least reduce it).
• Stop eating dairy.
• Change your car driving habits.
• Notice how you use water.
• Reduce the amount of paper in your life.
• Use a refillable water bottle and reusable lunch containers.

• Respect the environment, making rational use of natural resources and taking steps to prevent pollution from the different processes involved in our industrial operations.
• Promote the sustainable use of raw materials and natural resources.

Citizens are one of a nation’s greatest resources for enforcing environmental laws and regulations. They know the country’s land and natural attributes more intimately than a government ever will. Their number makes them more pervasive than the largest government agency.

Governments can make a difference by supporting small local producers who, unlike large factory farms, employ sustainable practices, care about land restoration, benefit nearby communities, and make animals and crops more resilient to climate change.

Governments are responsible for providing services that individuals cannot effectively provide for themselves, such as military defense, fire and police departments, roads, education, social services, and environmental protection.

Government research and development programs, such as the Advanced Research Project Agency-Energy, can drive progress in clean energy technologies and bring them to commercial use. Voluntary programs, like the Natural Gas STAR program, work with businesses to reduce emissions, often with public recognition.

Here are a dozen easy, effective ways each one of us can make a difference:

• Speak up!
• Power your home with renewable energy.
• Weatherize, weatherize, weatherize.
• Invest in energy-efficient appliances.
• Reduce water waste.
• Actually eat the food you buy—and make less of it meat.
• Buy better bulbs.
• Pull the plug(s).