The latest London scoop!

Emma and I have settled into life in Bethnal Green, our flat is pretty small and well insulated so we are not going to have high heating bills! We have switched our electricity supplier to Ecotricity which is a green energy supplier. We took up the opportunity of getting a free subsrciption to Ecologist magazine by following this link to sign up:

www.ecotricity.co.uk/ecologist

The ecologist magazine is a really good British magazine that is very up-to-date on current environmental initiatives, philosophy and advice thier website is http://www.theecologist.org/

As we mentioned in our first blog posting, we are also now only using Ecover cleaning products, shopping for our food at the market and have locally grown, organic fruit and vegetables delivered to our door weekly by Abel and Cole (www.ableandcole.co.uk) for the very reasonable price of c.£20 per week.




However the 'greenest' thing we have been doing is trying to reduce our need for material items, we are questioning all the adverts we see that try and get us to buy things. We are trying to meet our basic non-material needs in more authentic ways (not by buying material goods and services)... so far it is working, our consumption is right down and we are very happy! Probably the biggest impact on this is that we decided not to have a television in our flat, we therefore do not get too exposed to advertisments and don't spend our evenings watching boring TV programs!

I am currently snowed under writing up my PhD so nothing much as happened so far in terms of Local Footsteps London, but we are hoping to have our first meeting in January so both of us have been telling people about it and we've had a fair bit of interest already.

I thought I'd include here a brief book list for people who want to read a bit more about the direction that Environmentalism seems to be going at the moment, here it is:

1. Capitalism as If the World Matters by Jonathan Porritt
2. Environmentalism (Short Histories of Big Ideas) by David Peterson del mar
3. Bonfire of the Brands: How I Learned to Live Without Labels by Neil Boorman
4. The High Price of Materialism by Tim Kasser
5. Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future by Bill McKibben
6. Affluenza: When Too Much Is Never Enough by Hamilton and Denniss

The Conservative party has a Quality of Life Policy group and they last week launced a 'Blueprint for a green economy' It can be accessed here:
http://www.conservatives.com/getfile.cfm?file=blueprintforagreeneconomy&ref=GENERALFILE/3585&type=pdf

Stay Happy & Green
Morgan and Emma

In the beginning...

Here begineth the first entry for 'Local Footsteps London'...even though we are actually still in Jamaica at the Footsteps 11 conference, which makes it all the more strange! As the some of the participants write their presentations which will create the basis for their LF group, I start to think of what steps Morgan and I will be taking in London, both for LF London and in our own lives...

The aims of the group are probably the hardest thing to put into a succinct statement, but here's our initial effort:

'RAISE AWARENESS OF HOW; AND PROVIDE OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE TO MEET THEIR NON-MATERIAL NEEDS IN NON-MATERIALISTIC WAYS'

Moving into a new flat provides a rare opportunity for a fresh start and rather than fall into old habits, we're going to 'green' up the place a little.

1. To start with, the electricity supplier will be swapped to Ecotricity (a company who provides power from renewable energy sources at no additional cost to a normal supplier) As there is no other form of energy used in the flat this will cover off all of our heating also.
2. The kitchen is going to get an overhaul as Supermarkets will be bumped off the shopping list and replaced with a veg box scheme which will deliver local, seasonal produce straight to the door. Meat, fish, bread and cheese will be bought at the local butchers, fishmongers or at the local producers market on Saturday mornings. This way I hope we can support the local businesses and the smaller artisan producers who struggle to stay in business in the face of the Supermarket onslaught (if you get the chance, 'Shopped' by Joanna Blythman is a bit of a life changer when it comes to seeing supermarkets for what they really are!) In all cases the food miles will be taken into account, but we're already streaks ahead of the supermarket as nothing will be air freighted.
3. All household cleaning products used will be from Ecover who manufacture non-toxic, plant based solutions. Ecover also provide a refill scheme which means all packaging can be re-used as it's sent back to the factory - if only more companies were taking note!! The effect of the chemicals we pump from our houses into the water system (bleach, heavy metals etc) isn't thought about enough. The more we pollute it, the harsher the water treatment will become with stronger chemicals and the cumulative effects on us can only be detrimental.
4. No TV! I know this caused a few laughs and shaking heads in the seminar, but I've already lived without the TV for a month and it means I fill my time with something much more beneficial and productive.

LF London HQ!

Spreading the word and engaging more like-minded people will be one of the most important steps over the next 2 months. We'll start with trying to get as many friends, family and work colleagues involved as possible. Word of mouth will be very important throughout as first hand recommendations are more persuasive than any advertising can be. Saying that, I will also try my best to work on promoting some of the future events through regular London-centric event newsletters and sites...we'll see how far I get!