Simple Solutions Want To Do Something For The Environment? Park That Suv For A Minute And Consider These Seven Easy Steps

Two-thirds of Americans consider themselves environmentalists.

So how come our roads are clogged with 14 million gas-guzzling, pollution-spewing sport-utes?

“Do we really need to wrap ourselves in a vehicle designed for elephant hunting to go down to the quickie mart?” asks John Ryan. “Do we need to haul 4,000 pounds of metal around to bring home a one-pound burrito or 16-ounce latte?”

Ryan, a Seattle author, doesn’t think so, and offers an alternative vision in his new book, “Seven Wonders: Everyday Things for a Healthier Planet” (Sierra Club Books, $12.95).

The book is based on a 1994 article written by Ryan’s boss, Northwest Environment Watch executive director Alan Durning. That article, first published in Utne Reader and picked up by newspapers, suggested things that “solve everyday problems so elegantly that everyone in the world today … could make use of them without Mother Nature’s being any worse for wear.”

Durning’s original list included bicycles, ceiling fans, clotheslines, telephones, public libraries, interdepartmental envelopes and condoms.

He also cited behaviors around the world that Americans could learn from: efficient Dutch public transportation; the rice-rich Chinese diet; recycling in India; energy-efficient Swedish buildings; Danish wind power; irrigation in Bali; and grassroots activism in the Indian state of Kerala.

Ryan’s book tweaks the original list and offers more thorough explanations of why each item deserves recognition.

“From that article and our (1997) book `Stuff’ ” Ryan says, “we learned that everyday things are an effective vehicle for talking about bigger issues in a way that gets people excited - or at least intrigued.”

In his book, Ryan combined interoffice envelopes with public libraries to emphasize the importance of reuse.

And he dropped the telephone in favor of pad thai, an Asian food that exemplifies the merits of eating low on the food chain. (“It also happens to be a personal weakness of mine,” Ryan confesses.)

That left one vacancy on his “seven wonders” list, which Ryan filled with the ladybug, symbolizing biodiversity.

Here, then, are Ryan’s seven wonders for a healthier planet, and his justification for their inclusion:

The bicycle

“Pound for pound,” Ryan writes, “a person on a bicycle expends less energy than any other creature or machine covering the same distance.”

Bikes are the most widely used transportation vehicle in the world. In this country, though, less than 1 percent of U.S. trips are made via bikes - despite the fact that nearly half of all our trips cover three miles or less.

Bike are inexpensive to maintain and good exercise. Operating them doesn’t require fossil fuels, doesn’t generate pollution and doesn’t cause traffic jams.

The condom

Half a billion couples around the world wish to avoid or delay pregnancy, but, other than abstinence, lack the means to do so. More than half of all U.S. pregnancies are unintended.

Invented centuries ago, the inexpensive condom fights three of the most serious problems facing humans at the dawn of the 21st century: unwanted pregnancies, population growth, and sexually transmitted diseases, such as AIDS.

The ceiling fan

On hot summer afternoons, air conditioners consume 43 percent of the nation’s peak power load. According to the Rocky Mountain Institute, air-conditioning an average U.S. household sends about three tons of carbon dioxide up power-plant smokestacks each year.

Fans cool by creating light breezes that evaporate moisture from the skin. The gentle circulation from a ceiling fan makes a room feel 9 degrees cooler. And running a fan at high speed 12 hours a day costs just $1.50 a month, compared to $20 or more to run an air conditioner.

Other options for keeping cool: plant shade trees around the house; kick off your shoes; sip a cool drink.

The clothesline

Two years ago, when activists at a Vermont college wanted to protest nuclear energy, they encouraged students across New England to hang their sheets out on clotheslines. Their message: sustainability can begin in our own back yards.

Every hour and 15 minutes, the Earth receives as much energy from the sun as all humanity uses in a year. Capturing a tiny fraction of this abundant resource - through photo-voltaic panels, windmills, passive-solar water heaters and clotheslines - would go a long way toward meeting the world’s energy demands.

Pad thai

What makes pad thai a sustainable wonder? Like most Asian food, it consists mainly of rice and vegetables, is nutritious and low in fat, and producing it is much less harmful than producing typical meat-centered American meals.

“In almost every category of environmental concern associated with agriculture - water and energy consumption, erosion, overgrazing, pollution, even methane emissions - grains and vegetables are hands-down winners over livestock,” writes Ryan.

The public library

By sharing books, periodicals, CDs, videos and other materials with the entire community, a library reduces consumer demand for thousands of personal copies.

Other efficient forms of reuse include renting, buying secondhand, and repairing items instead of throwing them away.

The ladybug

Beneficial insects such as ladybugs provide billions of dollars’ worth of pest control, pollination, soil building and other services for farmers and gardeners.

Unfortunately, nature’s hardest workers are being killed off by harmful - and increasingly ineffective - pesticides. What Rachel Carson wrote almost four decades ago in “Silent Spring” still holds true: “The chemical war is never won, and all life is caught in the crossfire.”

Ryan chose to limit his list to seven, playing on the idea of the seven wonders of the ancient world. But he could have gone on.

Items that didn’t make his final cut included front porches (“they build community and encourage pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods”); clean tap water (“one of the leading causes of death in the world are diseases spread by dirty water”); plus all sorts of foods that skimp on meat, such as chicken noodle soup, baked potatoes or burritos.

“We thought about including the ballot box as having environmental benefits,” Ryan says, “but that depends on how it’s used.

“Public schools also have tremendous potential for environmental benefits.”

During a recent telephone interview, Ryan also mentioned everyday things that encourage repair, such as duct tape and the needle and thread. He cited, too, the elevator - “something that makes efficient, compact urban development possible.”

“And some people would say that e-mail and the Web have positive environmental impact by reducing mail shipments,” noted Ryan.

Donella Meadows, a Dartmouth professor and syndicated columnist (iisd1.iisd.ca/pcdf/meadows/default.htm on the Web), applauds Ryan’s list, and adds a few suggestions of her own:

The root cellar - a way of storing fruits and vegetables without moving parts, canning jars, boiling or freezing.

The basket - lightweight, strong, beautiful and reusable, baskets are made by skillful hands all over the world out of renewable, biodegradable material.

The olive tree - lives hundreds of years in hot, dry climates, reducing erosion, turning carbon dioxide into oxygen, and producing tasty, healthful olive oil.

The sari (also the sarong and the shawl) - made of uncut, unsewn cloth; graceful, comfortable, cool, adaptable, never out of style, easy to wash and dry, and one size fits all.

Meadows also pays tribute to the compost pile, the knitting needle and the canoe.

But William Budd, chairman of Washington State University’s Environmental Science and Regional Planning Program, is skeptical of Ryan’s “Seven Wonders” list.

“There is a prevailing view,” says Budd, “particularly among Americans, that these types of technological innovations can provide the solution to all human woes in the world today and into the future.

“For me, all the devices and toys of human ingenuity are meaningless without changes in human behavior.”

Ryan tends to agree with Budd.

“One point I try to make in the book is that sustainability can’t be reduced to seven everyday objects,” Ryan says. “But a key task is to get more people excited about the seven key issues and acting on them, and these everyday objects are a good way to make that connection.

“I don’t expect anyone reading the book to immediately start using all seven wonders all the time, or to feel guilty if they don’t.

“But I would hope that readers could look at their own lives and find ways they could use one or two of these things, and to realize that each of us has tremendous power in the face of these global problems.

“With this book and with `Stuff,’ we wanted to connect people to these big issues - to give people the ability and, perhaps, the inspiration to do practical things in their own lives that really do matter, and to give people a sense of hope.

“It’s easy to feel overwhelmed and become apathetic,” says Ryan. “But solutions are all around us - we just need to start using them more.”

See related story under the headline: A few tips for simple life in Paradise