Climate change is an issue which bombards our ears each day with politicians jumping on new statistics to sensationalize political debate and draw public support. Gordon Brown recently gave us a limited time to live as the malignant cancer of big carbon footprint consumer consumption drains the plant of it resources and eats away our precious and protective atmosphere.
Guy Laliberte’s PR journey to space to promote global water storages highlights the impact of many climate change conference which, in reality consume enormous resources and produce masses of “hot air”. These events gather the converted to pat each other on the back while they present their latest findings and do little to offset the environmental cost of their journey and less to benefit the planet or the global poor.
As individuals we can make a real difference. We recycle and install low energy bulbs, but let’s be honest we are massive consumers and let’s be even more honest we want to improve our income so that we can consume even more, this is why it is important to make lifestyle choices when we consume.
Take the simple example of my product. It is not unique or particularly new, but for each 120 people who choose it a single tree remains in the forest and nearly 3000 litres of water are saved. This single tree provides environmental benefits such as long term storage of carbon dioxide in other forms of carbon, recycles water and prevents soil erosion reducing flooding and mud slides.
Bede Products is a suite of low cost paperless language dictionaries which can be installed and utilized on devices you already own. Designed for travelers and language students, the software translators are supported on a wide range of mobile phones and PDA which supports java applications and popular games consoles which can be installed with freely available java runtimes.
This week the Kindle, an eBook reader from Amazon, was released into the English market. It can be used to store a library of books and is aimed to give the owner a paper feel when they choose eBooks over paper. I don’t think you can replace the feel of paper with an electronic book, which weighs pretty much the same as a book, but again it is about making these lifestyle choices. The eBook market in Japan makes up nearly 40% of publication sales. On the Bede Products website we are building a library resource of references to freely downloadable eBooks to compliment the suite of language software.
These products are not going to save the planet alone, but just like the use of low energy bulbs and turning off the tap when you brush your teeth we reduce our consumption of resources and leave more for our children and our planet.
Bede Key PhD.