As I will explain in class shortly, my PSP has led me to a simple conclusion: switching from disposable to re-usable water bottles is undoubtedly helpful to the environment, but it all comes down to scale.
If one person, who uses as many water bottles as I did were to completely shift from using disposable to re-usable water bottles, he or she would save the planet an equivalent of 5o miles of driving per year (in manufacturing emissions and environmental impacts) and the equivalent of a 1/12th of a cubic meter of lanfill a year. On a larger scale however, this could have a significant impact, especially with a behavioral trickle down effect.
What I realized during my course of these few weeks, is that every time I drank from a re-usable water bottle and was inconvenienced by it, I was reminded of my initial goal. In doing so, I automatically looked around the room to check if there were any unnecessary lights turned on, or whether my computer was on instead of on standby. In other words, it made me amore conscious of my surroundings and my everyday practices. In that sense, not only did I save a certain amount of water bottles, but I managed to unintentionally change my behavior to the better!
In conclusion, it all comes down to making a personal sacrifice. In my case, it was more rewarding than I thought, in the sense that it extended beyong the realm of my initial purpose – saving water bottles – and fanned out into the rest of my everyday practices: using paper towels, making sure the water doesn’t run too long, etc..
Thanks for a wonderful quarter. It’s been intellectually engaging, interesting and most importantly eye opening.
