Cut Carbon Emissions by 10% by 2010!

Signed up to 10:10 today pledging to cut my carbon emissions by 10% by 2010.

Actually at home (I work from home) we already do our bit – most of our lighting uses compact fluorescents. The rest are low-voltage halogen luminaires which could be replaced with LED lamps. All of a sudden it seems LED lighting for the home has made a dramatic technological leap in terms of lumen output making them comparable with compact fluorescents (could this possibly be because of the EU ban on incandescents – hmmm?). Apart from having a life time of up to 10 times that of a compact florescent, LEDs do not contain mercury.

I have yet to see LED lighting in action in an interior domestic situation where it is required for brightness and not mood lighting – my only experience of serious LEDs is with my Petzl MYO XP headtouch which I use when I’m out in the mountains and a Cateye light for cycling – the output of both is phenomenal.

There is a great deal the construction industry can do to cut carbon emissions, not just in the embodied energy of materials & the process of construction itself but in designing buildings that minimise energy use over the building’s lifetime. To use a clichéd phrase – it’s not rocket science. Dwellings that rely only on the heat output of human bodies and lighting for heating do exist.

And it’s not just energy usage – we also need to to be addressing other issues such as toxicity of materials & water usage.