Thursday, October 15, 2009

The No Impact Experiment

I think one thing I forgot to mention while writing my introductory post is that the more I live in the Triangle the more I seem to become a huge hippie. By this I mean I have started to use a bicycle as transportation, flirted with veganism (I am currently pescatarian), and recently started using mostly natural beauty products and toiletries. So when I heard about the No Impact Week put on by Colin Beavan and the Huffington Post, I decided to sign up and challenge myself to see just how far I was willing to go to be greener. In case you haven't heard of No Impact Man, it is a book and now a movie about one man and his family's year-long quest to live greener in the midst of New York City. I've been following his project for a little while, and feeling inspired by his dedication to his ideals and perseverance. At least, it certainly added to my enviro-guilt when I opted to drive a distance less than 2 miles instead of cycling or taking the bus.

I just took the pre-week survey for the No Impact Project, and since any good experiment starts with a hypothesis, I was prompted to write one. What I came up with was, "This week I will begin to take some steps towards forming daily habits that are better for the environment, my pocketbook, and my personal well-being." I'm hoping that dedicating myself to this completely for one week will make some of the changes stick around for while, or at least change my perspective (i.e. inspire more enviro-guilt).

A brief outline of the things I'll be working on each day of the week:

Sunday: Consumption
Monday: Trash
Tuesday: Transportation
Wednesday: Food
Thursday: Energy
Friday: Water
Saturday: Giving Back
Sunday: Eco-Sabbath

The week begins this Sunday, October 18th, and I'll be blogging about my progress here as my first series of posts on Science with Moxie.

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