National Geographic Society describes World Earth Day as “an annual celebration that honours the achievements of the environmental movement and raises awareness of the need to protect Earths natural resources for future generations.”
It is so important to mark and celebrate World Earth Day each year, it allows us to reflect on how our actions impact the world around us. We can look for ways to improve our behaviour to minimise the negative impact we have on our Earth, and ways to improve the environment.
We have put together a list of 6 things you can do to support World Earth Day. We believe these are relatively simple ways to make a good impact and we encourage you to try them out for yourselves.
1. Purchase a Sustainable Notebook.
Purchasing a sustainable notebook has very clear environmental benefits to it. By purchasing a notebook that is 100% recycled, you can help to reduce your impact on the environment. The nu: sustainable choices range has a wide variety of notebooks, of which are all FSC® certified. This means that the trees used to make the paper and covers are from responsibility farmed forests that promote forest restoration and support local communities. Our nu: evolve range is also printed using vegetable-based ink which is a natural, renewable and sustainable alternative to regular inks. We would recommend checking out the nu: evolve range if you are really wanting to make a change with what you purchase! These books are also bound using natural cotton fibre, non-coated silver wiros or paper tape to ensure the range is 100% plastic free. Click here to browse our sustainable notebooks including our evolve refill pad, project book and study planners!
2. Switch to Reusable Bags.
Our second thing we recommend doing in light of World Earth Day, if you aren’t already, is to swap your plastic bags for reusable bags. Are you one of those people that is guilty of picking up plastic bags at the supermarket? This can be so damaging to the environment and contributes to the plastic bag production and disposal. It’s estimated that we use 4 trillion plastic bags each year worldwide. This is a staggering number, and all of this ends up as litter in our land and oceans. Instead, purchase and take your reusable bag to the supermarket with you, which also saves you money as well! If you always forget to take it, put it somewhere that you will never forget them, doing your bit for the environment.
3. Use a Reusable Water Bottle
Using single use plastic bottles are such a bad habit many people have. It is said that 1,500 plastic water bottles are consumed every second! This is an awful figure because plastic bottles are horrible for the environment. Another figure which is really shocking is that 22 billion bottles end up in
landfill each year! To top this off, most people aren’t recycling these bottles properly, therefore, they are ending up in the landfill and take 1000s of years to decompose fully. By using a reusable water bottle, you are preventing waste and cutting down the harmful emissions caused from a plastic bottles production.
4. Turn Off Lights and Devices When Not Used.
This may seem like a very simple and easy thing to do but it is amazing how many of us simply forget to, or don’t realise the impact that it can have. When you turn off your lights after leaving the room, you save energy, which in turn helps the environment. It reduces carbon emissions and other greenhouse gases. It is also a great idea to turn off your appliances and devices to help reduce your carbon footprint, and thus contribute to saving our Earth. This is a great tip because it will also save you a lot of money on energy bills, so it is a win win situation!
5. Buy Local Food.
Buying local food comes with so many benefits. It is a great way to support your local farmers and communities, and it has lost of environmental advantages. When you purchase local food, you are reducing your carbon footprint. This is because the food doesn’t have to travel very far compared to food that has been transported to you, thus you are not contributing to the greenhouse gases that are formed during this movement. So, we challenge you to invest in local food across the next few weeks and hopefully this will become a long-term habit for you. Local food, on average, tends to have less packaging, and hence less wasted plastic and resources. And if that isn’t enough to sway you, it also tends to be fresher and contains more nutrients! So what are you waiting for!?
6. Walk or Cycle
Making a simple change in your transportation to walking or cycling can make the biggest difference to the environment. Whether this is in your commute or when you do an activity at the weekend, looking for an opportunity to make this change is valuable. By walking or cycling you are in fact creating less noise, less air pollution and creating fewer emissions! Noise pollution is unwanted sound that can affect the health and wellbeing of humans and animals. Noise pollution can actually make it impossible for wildlife to survive. It sometimes may seem like you making the change won’t make much difference, however, what if everyone did it?