My City My Responsibility: Going Efficient!

Dear All,

Wish you all a Happy and Prosperous 2018!!!

For me 2017 was an amazing year. I joined Samuchit Enviro Tech, made new friends and made lots of new connections nationally and internationally. Last but not the least, I learnt to be more Sustainably responsible.  So I already feel like a global citizen. 

Earth rising over the Moon
Source: https://www.theverge.com/2015/12/18/10585198/nasa-new-earthrise-photo-earth-moon-apollo-8

Recently, I came across a beautiful quotation 'In Nature nothing exists alone' by Rachel Carson a marine biologist, conservationist and author of the book Silent Spring (1962) which initiated the environmental movement. Lifecycle Analysis is thus crucial to understand, since, everything in nature is interlinked and interconnected and we are an integral part of Nature. I hope all of you agree with me. 

Now that we are aware of being completely dependent on natural resources for our survival, can we look at using our resources efficiently. By efficiently I mean using them wisely. I remember the days when I was in 1st grade and there was an advertisement on Doordarshan. The advertisement was about saving water while brushing, by turning the tap off when not in use. I am sure, some of us could relate to it. However I used to wonder, why such an advertisement was being shown on a national television. As I used a glass of water to brush teeth back then, so it was difficult for me to understand the importance of saving water and my action. While I was studying Environmental Science, I  learnt the importance of Water as a natural resource and that there is only 2.5% to 2.7% of freshwater available for us to use, out of the total water that Earth is surrounded with. I felt proud about my action of saving the water since childhood unconsciously. 

Coming back to leaving the tap water running while brushing, a tap releases 6 litres of water in a minute and while brushing if we keep the tap running for say five minutes, we are wasting around 30 litres of water. That is roughly two buckets of water! These figures mean a lot when you multiply it with the world's current population of approximately 7 billion people. Isn't it too much??? This is indeed a whole lot. Therefore, being efficient is very much needed for our survival. And will ensure to make the use of available resources in a way that suffice all our needs.  

Likewise, we can also use other natural resources like food and energy in a wise manner. There are many actions which many people take and are efficient but they themselves are unaware of it. For example I got to know about a lady who boils drinking water for the day and puts the vessel of boiled water in a larger vessel filled with cold water. The heat is transferred to the cold water making it warmer. Thus, the boiled water quickly cools down to room temperature and becomes available for drinking through the day, while she also gets warm water for bath when her morning chores are done. Another such example is while reading a book at night you don't need the entire room to be lit, a lamp light focused on the book can be sufficient. Even better if the lamp is a solar lamp.
  

The key is to be conscious of our actions. We can save our resources in everything that we do in our day to day lives and still get the desired output in terms of quality of life. Its all about being efficient and being responsible. 

You can write to me about any such actions in your daily practices. All of us are undertaking such acts but never realize that we are already contributing to making the world a better place.   

Pournima Agarkar.