Protection of the Atmosphere

People interested in proactively participating in protection of the atmosphere have a variety of methods available on the individual and local level including investment in new environmental energy systems innovations and alternative power solutions, changing consumption patterns, increasing and sharing awareness, and more. This page is about sharing what is available in this area for those interested in taking action.

OVERVIEW

• Environmental priorities and the atmosphere
• Alternative power solutions
• Transportation and new energy systems
• Industrial development and new alternative energy
• Preventing stratospheric ozone depletion
• Global atmosphere watch

ENVIRONMENTAL PRIORITIES AND THE ATMOSPHERE

Concern about climate change and climate variability, air pollution, and ozone depletion has created new interest in clean, sustainable practices implementable by people around the world at every level. We have the technology to create clean, safe, affordable, and efficient energy systems from renewable types of energy sources if we choose. Simply by reducing personal use and harnessing renewable sources of energy such as solar, wind, geothermal, wave, biomass, and others we can dramatically contribute to the maintenance and protection of our shared atmosphere for the benefit of all concerned.

Ideas for those interested in implementation

• Here’s a 101 ways to reduce your carbon footprint resource
• Here’s the EPA’s suggestions for home, office, school, and on the road reduction of carbon footprint
• Be careful what you burn, here is a great resource for what should not be burned and why
• Probably the biggest thing you can do is to perform a home energy assessment (here’s a great do-it-yourself guide), also known as a home energy audit, and you could save yourself up to 30% on your energy bill! Here’s a video overview of what a home energy assessment/audit entails:

• Become knowledgable on the diversity of alternative power solutions currently available (here’s a great overview of all of them)
• Plant trees (here’s 29 reasons why)(here’s a guide to benefits of specific trees and how to plant) and explore agroforestry (here’s a link to free downloadable resources) if you have land availability.

ALTERNATIVE POWER SOLUTIONS

Investment in a clean alternative source of energy is one path to local and individual involvement in protection of the atmosphere. This has the benefit of reducing or eliminating your power bill, eliminating any effects from disruption to the existing power grid, eliminating the need for new power plants, and supporting the environment.

Ideas for those interested in implementation

• See if there are tax credits and/or rebates available to you for investing in energy efficiency (here’s an amazing resource)
• Here is a resource with a massive list of do-it-yourself energy saving ideas and projects
• Become knowledgable on the diversity of new energy systems, and types of energy sources, currently available (here’s a great overview of all of them)
• Here’s a preview for a movie about someone who took conservation (power and everything else) to the extreme:

 
TRANSPORTATION AND NEW ENERGY SYSTEMS

People interested in transportation energy efficiency and alternative sources of energy have the opportunities to review existing transport systems and explore more effective designs, usage, and management both locally and individually.

Ideas for those interested in implementation

• Carpool! Here are a bunch of sites that organizes this for regular travel: Erideshare, RideShare Online, The Kind Ride Share, Shareride Internet Carpool, and Zimride. Here are a bunch of sites that organize for one time trips somewhere (called real-time ridesharing): Tickengo, Avengo, PickupPal, and Zimride
• Take the train or bus
• Improve your fuel efficiency (great driving and maintenance tips page)(fun overview of EVERYTHING fuel economy page)
• Consider the benefits of an electric vehicle (here’s a resource) or hybrid or keep your eye on what is happening with hydrogen engine vehicles and fuel cells vehicles
• If you have a diesel engine you can convert it to run on vegetable oil (here’s how)
• Develop or expand local bicycle and pedestrian codes (here’s a resource)

INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT AND NEW ALTERNATIVE ENERGY

People have the ability to build greener industrial development with new alternative energy sources and/or to encourage industrial development in ways that minimize adverse impacts on the atmosphere and environment in general by increasing efficiency in the production and consumption of all resources and materials, by localization, and placing further emphasis on implementation and development of new energy systems.

Ideas for those interested in implementation

• If you own a business, consider “greening” it (here’s a great greening your business tutorial and resource)
• Consider starting a green business of your own (here’s 5 ideas)(here’s a bunch of how-to videos)
• Educate yourself on how green major companies are (here’s a searchable database and ranking of 500 major companies)(here’s an article about the ranking process)
• Support localization of food purchasing (here’s a great local food buying resource and guide)
• Buy locally owned if possible: top 10 reasons why, another website why, and an info graphic showing benefits:

PREVENTING STRATOSPHERIC OZONE DEPLETION

Stratospheric ozone depletion has already been addressed by the global community but interested individuals can still take action on the individual and local level to do their part in reducing the sources of ozone depletion: CFCs, freon, and halons.

Ideas for those interested in implementation

• Be careful what you burn, here is a great resource for what should not be burned and why
• If you are disposing of a refrigerator built before 2005 it may contain CFCs, here is a resource including safety and disposal instructions
• If you have a yellow or green fire extinguisher, it probably contains halon and should be recycled properly (here’s a guide and information resource)
• If your car was built before 1995 it could be using freon in the air conditioning system (here’s an information resource)(here’s how to check if you have an AC leak)

GLOBAL ATMOSPHERE WATCH

For those interested, tools and resources exist comparing global atmosphere watch statistics over long periods of time.

Ideas for those interested in implementation

• Here’s a resource with maps and links to tables covering sulfur dioxide, particulate sulfate, particulate ammonium, total nitrate, nitric acid, and particulate nitrate
• Here is the National Park Service ozone and Meteorology Monitoring page including a list of active monitoring stations and a monitoring history database