6 Tips for Soothing Your Climate-Related Anxiety While Also Combating Climate Change

Are you stressed just thinking about current environmental and climate-related issues? Whether you're an avid gardener or simply a concerned citizen, there are several reasons you may be feeling stressed or anxious about climate change. The good news is that you may be able to relieve that stress while also fighting against climate change. Here are six ways to push back against both stress and negative environmental effects due to climate change.

1. Take Matters Into Your Own Hands by Opening Your Very Own Eco-Friendly Business

If you're feeling frustrated with the current availability of environmentally friendly products in your area, why not take matters into your own hands and start up your own eco-friendly company? This one move could prove not only empowering for you but beneficial for the planet.

In order to increase your odds of success in whatever industry you choose, you'll want to assemble a carefully detailed business plan. This plan includes company descriptions, service descriptions, structural specifications, and other details about how the business will be funded and what kind of financial issues or revenue you will project in the near future. 

2. Prioritize Relieving Your Anxiety and Practicing Soothing Self-Care Regularly

According to one study, being tuned in to the latest news about climate change may be correlated with a higher risk of developing anxiety disorders. If you feel more stressed and anxious when you think about environmental issues, make sure you're practicing self-care often to help relieve that anxiety. For example, try to:

• Take deep breaths and/or meditate

• Practice calming hobbies, such as reading

• Exercise a few times a week

3. Reconsider Your Current Approach to Transportation and Swap to Environmentally Friendly Options

One aspect of your everyday life that could be leaving a significant environmental impact is your method of transportation. If you're concerned that driving your car every day is producing too much pollution, for instance, you could consider switching to other, more eco-friendly alternatives.

For example, your area may offer public transportation, such as buses, trams, and subways. You may also be able to cut back on your footprint by carpooling to work and trying to fly less often.

4. Adjust Your Daily Menu and Make a Difference Through Your Diet

You may not have realized it, but what you put on your plate every day can make a difference in the environment. Clean Eating points out that just a few simple swaps to your usual menu could help reduce your footprint! For instance, you can easily switch to a more eco-friendly diet by:

• Eating locally produced fruits and vegetables

• Avoiding imported foods

• Reducing your overall consumption of meat and dairy, and especially of red meat, such as beef

5. Modify Your Home in a Few Key Ways to Make It More Eco-Friendly

Lastly, you can soothe your anxiety and make a difference simply by upgrading a few key home features to more eco-friendly versions. For example, at home, you could: 

• Switch to lights that automatically turn off when you're not in the room

• Reduce your total home energy use

• Switch to low-flow showerheads

• Install a recycling system in your home instead of throwing everything away

• Planting more trees in your yard 

6. Invest in Solar Panels

Solar panels are becoming increasingly popular as a way to generate renewable energy. In addition to being environmentally friendly, solar panels also have a number of other benefits. For one, they can help to lower your energy bills by offsetting the cost of electricity from the grid. They can also increase the value of your home and provide a hedge against rising energy costs.

If you're planning to install solar panels, the cost is based on the home's usage needs, the type and size of panels, and whether you're on the utility grid. Solar panels typically come with long-term warranties so you don't have to worry about repairs.

In today's world, it's common to feel stressed or even anxious about climate-related issues. Fortunately, there are several ways to soothe your stress while fighting against climate change, whether you're practicing self-care or making eco-friendly changes at home, like installing solar panels. Adopt these six tips as your quick guide to get started. 

Julia Mitchell

Image via Pexels

Ecopreneurship: Developing and Managing a Green Business and Marketing Plan

Being eco-conscious is a current trend in the business world. Most businesses work towards having eco-friendly practices and strategies, such as using renewable energy and reducing carbon footprints. Others also change the business angle by developing a green business idea into an established business. 

Ecopreneurship focuses on highlighting businesses and industries that sell eco-friendly products and services. Setting up such businesses requires an elaborate business plan. Governments and institutions encourage these green businesses through awards and sponsorships. Here’s what you need to know about eco-businesses. 

Come Up With Your Business Idea and Plan

Some of the most popular green businesses are local production of greens and herbs, operating a greenhouse, creating sustainable products, enhancing energy-efficient products and services, and hobby farming. First, you need to identify a gap in the industry or system. Then, refine your idea before you can draw up a business plan. 

Once you identify your business idea, draw up a business plan. Consider including the following sections in your project:

• A cover page 

• The executive summary

• Mission and objectives of the company 

• Types of products and services

• Operations, financing, human resources, and marketing strategies

When looking at financial options, consider options like getting grants, financiers, loans, or investors before making your final financial decision. Needing large amounts of capital will push you to get external funding. 

Grants work best in such situations, but you must keenly search, research, eligibility, and application. Look around for federal and private grants that suit your cause. Most grants target specific groups of people or industries, such as tech grants for tech startups. 

Think About Its Structure, Culture, and Marketing

Once you have your business plan, work around your business structure. Learn how to departmentalize the business, create a link between them, and think about your marketing and production plan. A green company should appeal to the eco-community and use friendly methods to get the results. Incorporating digital solutions for your green business will push your mission further to create an impact on society. It would help if you worked on a good marketing plan to promote your brand name and mission.

You can use different marketing options like infographics, social media marketing, etc. Get the necessary graphics to present your ideas. You can DIY using internet tools to personalize your campaign or get a professional marketer to promote your agenda. Working with people who have the same values and principles helps you get the best results. Vetting the employees will get your team united toward your business goals. 

Effective marketing for green businesses involves telling the story of how your business practices reflect your values. For example, you might discuss how you use cloud accounting tools for your business, mentioning that it allows your business to reduce paper use by going paperless in the office and operating more efficiently. Another idea could be to discuss using LED lighting and low-flow plumbing fixtures to minimize resource use. You want your customers to understand and respect how your green values appear.

Never Stop Growing and Inventing

Ecopreneurship success needs experience, knowledge, and understanding of the industry. Sustainability will require sound financial, production, and human resource management. It’s up to you to learn what your business needs and how to sustain it. 

Ecopreneurship demands continuous growth to succeed. With proper management and understanding of the industry, your business will thrive and improve the environment.

Julia Mitchell

For more information, please visit my website or contact me today!

PaleoTerran was launched in 2010 with two goals: (1) learning from the apparent superior health of our ancestors before the Agricultural Revolution and (2) limiting our global environmental impact. While these goals remain important, over time, PaleoTerran expanded its scope to cover topics such as science, nature, and culture. All while sharing a bit of joy along the way.

Must-Read Resources for Eco-Friendly Business Ownership

The climate crisis is one of the most pressing issues facing the world today. Many who would like to make their mark in the business world worry about how to start a business that factors the environment in from the start. After all, it’s easy for even a relatively small business to have a significant carbon footprint. 

Fortunately, there are several steps you can take to make sure your business does more good for the planet than harm. Paleoterran is proud to offer these resources business owners can use to create sustainable, environmentally friendly companies: 

Getting Your Business Started 

Business stability empowers you to make a bigger impact: 

• Make sure you have enough funding to keep your business going long enough to become profitable. 

• Consider working with a Colorado registered agent LLC formation service to give yourself legal protections and, in some areas, tax advantages. 

• Work with a financial advisor to ensure you’re using your money in the best ways possible. 

Reducing Negative Global Impact 

Some simple steps can limit environmental damage: 

• Whenever possible, go paperless in your business. 

• Reduce waste by making recycling and composting accessible in your office or shop. 

• Source ingredients, products, and materials from nearby sources to reduce your shipping footprint. 

Being an Agent of Change 

Businesses can have a powerful voice; here’s how to use yours: 

• Join your local chamber of commerce to promote environmentally-friendly business practices in your area. 

• Speak with local politicians and encourage them to enact climate-protecting legislation. 

• Connect with customers about the climate crisis in an approachable, action-oriented manner. 

Business owners can make a serious impact in a community. This means that your entrepreneurial journey can empower you to push real, measurable change in the fight against the climate crisis. We hope this article gives you the tools you need to create a business that helps protect the planet we share. 

Cheryl Conklin
https://wellnesscentral.info

Photo Credit: Pexels

If you read only one thing on our climate crisis, read this.

“Some climate cascades will unfold at the global level – cascades so large their effect will seem, by the curious legerdemain of environmental change, imperceptible. A warming planet leads to melting Arctic ice, which means less sunlight reflected back to the sun and more absorbed by the planet-warming faster still, which means an ocean less able to absorb atmospheric carbon and so a planet-warming faster still. A warming planet will also melt Arctic permafrost, which contains 1.8 trillion tons of carbon, more than twice as much as is currently suspended in the earth’s atmosphere, and some of which, when it thaws and is released, may evaporate as methane, which is thirty-four times as powerful a greenhouse-gas warming blanket as carbon dioxide when judged on the timescale of a century; when judged on a timescale of two decades, is eighty-six times as powerful. A hotter planet is, on the net, bad for plant life, which means what is called “forest dieback” – the decline and retreat of jungle basins as big as countries and woods that spread for so many miles they used to contain whole folklores – which means a dramatic stripping-back of the planet’s natural ability to absorb carbon and turn it into oxygen, which means still hotter temperatures, which means more dieback, and so on. Higher temperatures mean more forest fires means fewer trees means less carbon absorption, means more carbon in the atmosphere, means a hotter planet still – and so on. A warmer planet means more water vapor in the atmosphere, and, water vapor being a greenhouse gas, this brings higher temperatures still – and so on. Warmer oceans can absorb less heat, which means more stay in the air, and contains less oxygen – which leaves us with more carbon, which heats the planet further. And so on. These are the systems climate scientists call “feedbacks”; there are more. Some work in the other direction, moderating climate change. But many more point toward an acceleration of warming, should we trigger these. And just how these complicated, countervailing systems will interact – what effects will be exaggerated and what undermined by feedbacks – is unknown, which pulls a dark cloud of uncertainty over any effort to plan ahead for the climate future. We know what a best-case outcome for climate feedback looks like, however unrealistic because it quite closely resembles the world as we live on it today. But we have not yet begun to contemplate those cascades that may bring us to the infernal range of the bell curve.” 

David Wallace-Wells 

The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming (2019)

John Oró, MD, FAANS
paleoterran@icloud.com

If you read only one thing on the climate crisis, read this!

“Some climate cascades will unfold at the global level – cascades so large their effect will seem, by the curious legerdemain of environmental change, imperceptible. A warming planet leads to melting Artic ice, which means less sunlight reflected back to the sun and more absorbed by the planet warming faster still, which means an ocean less able to absorb atmospheric carbon and so a planet warming faster still. A warming planet will also melt Artic permafrost, which contains 1.8 trillion tons of carbon, more than twice as much as is currently suspended in the earth’s atmosphere, and some of which, when it thaws and is released, may evaporate as methane, which is thirty-four times as powerful a greenhouse-gas warming blanket as carbon dioxide when judged on the timescale of a century; when judged on a timescale of two decades, is eighty-six times as powerful. A hotter planet is, on net, bad for plant life, which means what is called “forest dieback” – the decline and retreat of jungle basins as big as countries and woods that spread for so many miles they used to contain whole folklores – which means a dramatic stripping-back of the planet’s natural ability to absorb carbon and turn it into oxygen, which means still hotter temperatures, which means more dieback, and so on. Higher temperatures mean more forest fires means fewer trees means less carbon absorption, means more carbon in the atmosphere, means a hotter planet still – and so on. A warmer planet means more water vapor in the atmosphere, and, water vapor being a greenhouse gas, this brings higher temperatures still – and so on. Warmer oceans can absorb less heat, which means more stay in the air, and contains less oxygen – which leaves us with more carbon, which heats the planet further. And so on. These are the systems climate scientists call “feedbacks”; there are more. Some work in the other direction, moderating climate change. But many more point toward an acceleration of warming, should we trigger these. And just how these complicated, countervailing systems will interact – what effects will be exaggerated and what undermined by feedbacks – is unknown, which pulls a dark cloud of uncertainty over any effort to plan ahead for the climate future. We know what a best-case outcome for climate feedback looks like, however unrealistic, because it quite closely resembles the world as we live on it today. But we have not yet begun to contemplate those cascades that may bring us to the infernal range of the bell curve.” 

David Wallace-Wells
The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming
2019

Keep up with the climate crisis by following SUSTAIN TERRA on flipboard.com. Better yet, download the FLIPBOARD app on your mobile device and search for SUSTAIN TERRA.

"An astonishingly fragile film"

Dr. Piers Sellers knows the Earth’s atmosphere. After obtaining a bachelor’s degree in ecological science and a doctorate in biometeorology in England, Dr. Sellers studied the interaction between the Earth’s biosphere and atmosphere at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. 

Dr. Sellers then became an astronaut and flew in three shuttle missions to the International Space Station stationed in the thin atmospheric layers 180 – 190 miles above Earth. 

With 80% of the atmosphere within 10 miles of the Earth’s surface, traveling a mere 60 miles an hour, we would drive through this rich layer in 10 minutes. As Dr. Sellers observed in Leonardo DiCaprio’s recent film Before the Flood, “an astonishingly thin layer” nourishes us.

John Oró MD

A River, Canyon, or Beach

Quote by Bruce Hill in Tools for Grassroots Activists published by Patagonia, 2016.

What does Quay Valley have to do with Hyperloop transportation?

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Image credit: Hyperloop Transportation Technologies

The WSJ published an excellent article on the competition to develop hyperloop transport systems that were stimulated by Elon Musk in his “Hyperloop Alpha” proposal posted by SpaceX on Aug. 12, 2013. Among the nuggets in the article is a description of a futuristic city planned for a site located in-between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Alexander Chee of the WSJ writes:

"In his Santa Monica conference room, Quay Hays of GROW Holdings is laying out the plan for Quay Valley, the city he hopes will be a model for California’s future. It sounds, at first, like any other affluent California community: retail space, resort hotels, a winery, a spa. Where Quay Valley stands out is its plan to be solar-powered with extremely low water use. With a town of 26,000 networked smart homes and apartments built green from the ground up, Hays hopes to give 75,000 residents the eco-friendly lifestyle that critics of clean energy say is impossible. “There have been advances in green design and smart growth over the years, and the idea was, put all these things together in one place,” says Hays, a former publisher and film executive whose first job was booking punk and new wave acts for the Greek Theatre in the 1980s. His first attempt to launch Quay Valley was thwarted by litigation over water rights and the financial crisis of 2008; the new plan is to break ground on the site, a 7,200-acre expanse halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, sometime in 2016. When that happens, the world will be watching, and not just for the promised sustainability—Quay Valley also plans to feature the world’s first working Hyperloop, built by Hyperloop Transportation Technologies at an estimated cost of $100 million to $150 million."

Learn more at The Race to Create Elon Musk’s Hyperloop Heats Up

Pope Francis at UN: Harm to the environment is harm to humanity

Photo by Mike Segar/Reuters

"First, it must be stated that a true “right of the environment” does exist, for two reasons. First, because we human beings are part of the environment. We live in communion with it, since the environment itself entails ethical limits which human activity must acknowledge and respect. Man, for all his remarkable gifts, which “are signs of a uniqueness which transcends the spheres of physics and biology” (Laudato Si’, 81), is at the same time a part of these spheres. He possesses a body shaped by physical, chemical and biological elements, and can only survive and develop if the ecological environment is favorable. Any harm done to the environment, therefore, is harm done to humanity."

Source: Full text of Pope Francis’ speech to United Nations

Giant indoor lettuce farm runs on custom LED lighting

"The statistics for this incredibly successful indoor farming endeavor in Japan are staggering: 25,000 square feet producing 10,000 heads of lettuce per day (100 times more per square foot than traditional methods) with 40% less power, 80% less food waste and 99% less water usage than outdoor fields. But the freshest news from the farm: a new facility using the same technologies has been announced and is now under construction in Hong Kong, with Mongolia, Russia and mainland China on the agenda for subsequent near-future builds."

Read more at WebUrbanist

The 2015 Corporate Leaders in Renewable Energy

Corporate interest in utility-scale renewable energy is heating up. According to CleanTechnica, six Fortune 500 companies reached purchase agreements for solar and wind power in 2015. Hopefully we are witnessing a race for renewable energy megawatts. The results so far -

These six companies ordered a total 710 megawatts of renewable energy this year, which by a current average of 164 homes/MW is enough to power approximately 116,000 homes.  Three of the companies are in the technology industry, one in the auto industry, and one in healthcare.  The current leader, Dow Chemical, is in the chemical industry.

Hearty congratulations to these companies for leading the way!

The year is still young. It’s time to hear from other Fortune 500 companies. 

The grandeur of North America’s Great Sand Dunes

Among the Earth’s many fascinating nooks and crannies, Great Sands Dunes National Park & Preserve stands apart for its rugged grandeur. Hugging the eastern edge of the Sangre de Cristo Mountain Range in southern Colorado, this 330 square-mile dune field contains the tallest sand dunes in North America. Protected as a national monument in 1932, this wondrous landscape became the Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve in 2004.

The extensive volume of sand comprising this park is believed to have originated in a vast lake, which was formed from glacial runoff at the end of the last ice age. As this lake dried, forceful winds picked up the sand that was left behind and deposited it along the eastern edge of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, where it accumulated over thousands of years.

These days drivers entering the Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve along its southern access are regularly astonished by the vista that greets them. Among its hundreds of dunes, five stand over 700 feet tall and more than thirty tower upwards of 600 feet. Hiking the Great Sand Dunes, either the smaller dunes at the edge of the park or one of the taller dunes, is an activity not to be missed. A round trip hike from the Dunes Parking Lot to the giant High Dune should last no more than two hours. And a 6-mile round trip hike to the colossal Star Dune will generally take around five hours.

Epic, almost surreal in their grandeur, the Great Sand Dunes stand as a testament to the mighty forces of nature, showing us how over time wind and water can build breath-taking mountains from the tiniest of stones. We’re fortunate to possess such a reminder of the power of nature and the fragility of its works, the appreciation of which may reveal to us anew the delicate beauty of this world in which we live.

John Oró, MD

How the Chevy Bolt helps Tesla

The all-electric Chevy Bolt was announced today. With an expected range of 200 miles per charge, the Bolt should be ready for purchase in 2017. While many have called this a "Tesla killer," Business Insider sees it differently:

“The greatest obstacle to Tesla’s long-term success is not rival electric cars, but a global transportation infrastructure that is built for gasoline-powered cars rather than battery-electrics. For Tesla to crack the mass market, it needs other major automakers to invest heavily in electric-vehicle technology, including a network of charging stations that would allow for long road trips in battery-powered cars. That’s why the company opened its patents to competitors last year. At this stage in its growth, Tesla wants more rivals, not fewer. So should everyone who believes that burning fossil fuels is bad for the environment.”

What does Tesla think about the Bolt - 

“We are always supportive of other manufacturers who bring compelling electric vehicles to the market. Tesla applauds Chevrolet for introducing the Bolt, and we are excited to learn more about the product.”

Well, maybe change is coming

“Within a few decades, large-scale, centralized electricity generation from fossil fuels could be a thing of the past in Europe.

That’s the word from investment bank UBS, which just released a new report anticipating a three pronged assault from solar power, battery technology, and electric vehicles that will render obsolete traditional power generation by large utilities that rely on coal or natural gas. According to Renew Economy, which picked up the report, the tipping point will arrive around 2020. At that point, investing in a home solar system with a 20-year life span, plus some small-scale home battery technology and an electric car, will pay for itself in six to eight years for the average consumer in Germany, Italy, Spain, and much of the rest of Europe. Crucially, this math holds even without any government subsidies for solar power.”

Source: Power Plants In Europe Could Go Extinct After 2020, Investment Bank Says

Barcelona leading in sustainability

Nativity façade, La Sagrada Família, Barcelona, Spain

"Barcelona has one of the lowest per capita greenhouse gas emission levels in the industrialized world, at under 4 metric tons of emissions per person per year (Houston is at 14.1 and Paris is at 5.2). And the city is still moving forward. 'In 2020 Barcelona could be a more environmentally conscious city,' according to Irma Soldevilla i Garcia of the Barcelona Energy Agency, 'in which careful energy consumption will be a regular part of people’s lives.'"

Learn more: Barcelona: Spain’s Ciudad del Sol

Extreme weather blackouts increasing

Image: David Shankbone. "New York skyline when half the city was in blackout due to a power failure during Hurricane Sandy. Midtown, with the Empire State Building, is in the background with the darkened East Village and other parts of downtown in the foreground." Wikimedia

"A tenfold increase in major power outages (those affecting more than 50,000 customer homes or businesses), between the mid-1980s and 2012. Some of the increase was driven by improved reporting. Yet even since 2003, after stricter reporting requirements were widely implemented, the average annual number of weather-related power outages doubled. Non-weather related outages also increased during that time, but weather caused 80 percent of all outages between 2003-2012."

Weather-Related Blackouts Doubled Since 2003: Report