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Eco Hero: Julia Hailes

Anna Guyer | 08.03.10

If working for sustainability of our planet was an Olympic sport, Julia Hailes would be on the podium with a green medal. A tireless advocate for an eco-friendly lifestyle, she dedicated herself to environmental issues long before anyone ever knew it was important, or that we would need to think about it, or it became the fashionable status symbol that some consider it to be today.

The list of her contributions on social, environmental and ethical issues is too long to list here, but you might know her as the author/co-author of nine books on green living, including the best-selling Green Consumer Guide published in 1988, which sold over a million copies.

That book and it's 2007 sibling, The New Green Consumer Guide, serve as veritable bibles of how to live your life in a responsible and green way. Julia highlighted green issues and wrote about solutions before sustainability was a word on the public or boardroom agenda.

As a modern day Robin Hood, Julia leverages the grown-up salary she makes as a green consultant for some of the biggest companies in the country, so she can work for the smaller, less wealth-laden causes about which she is passionate. Currently, she's particularly fired up about supermarket refrigeration and resomation (an alternative form of cremation using water and with less impact on the environment).

I am work-shadowing her at the moment to learn more about sustainability - and on how to be superwoman. I've seen her turn up in comfy clothes, disappear into a public loo at a station, and emerge in smart clothes and quirky boots ready to take on the world. I sit, listen and learn while she tells clients or the minister or the councillor or whomever exactly what she thinks, how it is and what they need to do about it.

She connects people. She is pragmatic. She makes me laugh. She is an inspiration and she shows that you can stay true to your beliefs. She's my Eco Hero, and here are her answers to our Eco Hero questionnaire.

1. How would you describe yourself?

I describe myself as a campaigning consultant. Also, because I do lots of different things I summarise it by saying that "I wear many hats but they're all green.'

2. What is your mission?

Making a difference. When I co-founded SustainAbility with John Elkington, in 1987, we decided that the values of the organisation were like a three pronged stool, with all the prongs being equally important. They were to make money, make a difference and enjoy ourselves while we were doing it. I think that's still a pretty good approach to my work.

3. What do you care passionately about?

Saving the rainforests. It tears my heart out when I see chainsaws ripping through the forests, orangutans clinging to wrecked trees or swathes of tree stumps stretching into the distance. It was my concern for the rainforests that got me into the environmental field. Now I work on a huge range of issues and I'm passionate about many of them. For example, it might be strange to feel passionate about waste but I do. We've become such a disposable society where products and resources are consumed like there's no tomorrow. This has to change.

4. Why is green/eco so important?

Because it's all about the world we're living in. I don't want to live in a brown and dead landscape or in a society like the TV programme Survivors where everyone is at war with each other. Actually, I thought the film Avatar illustrated the contrast between an industrial and consumerist society vs. a green community that values nature. Most of us would prefer to be in the Avatar camp.

5. What is the next big challenge?

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Earth Hour 2010

Anna Guyer | 26.03.10

Earth Hour is such a fantastic project for raising awareness about climate change and protecting the planet.

We're participating -- it's Saturday, 27 March at 8:30PM. I hope you'll consider it too.

From the Earth Hour web site:

You can support Earth Hour by:

1. Turning off your lights at 8.30PM on March 27
2. Showing your support and adding yourself to our world map
3. Adding Earth Hour widgets, logos and banners to your blog or website to help us spread the word. You could even be our Earth Hour Online Supporter of the Day.
4. Talking about Earth Hour in your social network by updating your Facebook status, grabbing a Twibbon, tweeting about your support, and more
5. Get together with your friends and family, by hosting an Earth Hour party or holding your own candlelit affair
6. Rally your local council or community group to run an Earth Hour event for your community
7. Encourage your employer and workmates to take part in Earth Hour and make energy savings every day
8. Make an Earth Hour Lantern as a symbol of hope for the future
9. Be creative! Find a new way to mark Earth Hour and let us know all about it!

And here's a great video that shows how countries around the world are involved. Beautiful!
 

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environment, climate change, earth hour

Let’s Talk Trash, Mrs. Robinson

Kenneth Hill | 15.04.10

In 1967, The Graduate had Mr. McGuire giving Dustin Hoffman's character Ben a tip on what was then the great industrial hope:

Today, plastics are a major threat to the health of the planet, as discussed in stark terms in this Ted Talk by Capt. Charles Moore of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation. In a few short minutes, he delivers a stinging argument in words and images on why we need to find alternatives to plastic bags, bottles, packaging and all the rest:

Here are three handy lists with things we can all do to reduce our use of plastic:

10 Easy Ways to Reduce Plastic Waste  [The Naked Dish]

51 Ways to Reduce Plastic Use  [Squidoo]

Cut Your Use of Plastic, Plastic, Plastic  [LowImpactLiving.com via The Smithsonian]

 

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environment, plastic, capt. charles moore, ways to reduce use of plastic, algalita marine research foundation, the graduate, plastic bags, ted

Can you be an environmentalist—and fly?

Anna Guyer | 20.07.10

The writer and documentary filmmaker Pamela Nowicka recently wrote on flying and the impact that it has - and it got me thinking: how can we justify flying when we begin to understand the impact it has? Pamela wrote:

"I researched flying and its climate change impacts for my just completed half hour documentary, 'Climate Change? No Thanks'.

Average carbon footprint of a person in the UK is 10 tonnes. A long haul fight emits approx 1.2 tonnes of climate change (CC) gases per person. The CC impact of this is about three times as much as CO2 alone because of the altitude and mixture of gases released. See also in George Monbiot's 'Heat'. Flying is of concern as it is one of the fastest growing CC sectors.

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environment, pollution, climate change, flying, air travel, carbon, environmentalists, climate change no thanks