There is a lot we can do as individuals to reduce our carbon footprint.
In many ways, everyone commuting to work is already being changed. Many workers can now work from home, on occasions, some all the time. One former colleague worked one week in the office, followed by one week at home. Another colleague, worked 2 days a week from home. Office space in London is very expensive, and my last office, deliberately had insufficient office space, on the basis that some people are on leave, or out sick, or visiting elsewhere, and some working from home, and ‘hot-desking’ the rest. Meetings used skype or lync with various different locations. This technology is already happening, and is improving all the time.
Obviously, there are loads of occupations for which this cannot be achieved (doctors, nurses, teachers, shop workers, cleaners, police, to name a few), but I see a future where more and more ‘office’ style jobs can be worked from home, thus reducing both the need for commuter transport, but our commuting time. However, this takes time to achieve.
Similarly, we now operate in a global economy, with food being transported around the world. It would be better for our carbon footprint, if we tried to eat mainly locally grown food, rather than food imported from around the world.
However, this means the type of food being restricted to what can be grown in this country, and seasonal food as well. I believe we only produce about 80 percent of our food, and I am not sure whether this takes into account food exports, or the fields left empty under EU payments. This also does not take into account that some countries have vast economies of scale, making their produce much cheaper than our own. We do not want to go back to the Corn Laws, where imported grain was restricted. So, although I say that maybe we should try and eat mainly home grown food, this clearly is impractical, and would probably be more expensive.
We can, however, all do own own bit, by reducing our own carbon footprint, by, say, reducing the number of showers we have? Walk, instead of using the car, etc. Is this feasible?
We can also reduce the number of flights we take. Over the last 50 years flights have become much cheaper, and some people take several holidays abroad each year. However, pricing restrictions, always seems to disproportionately affect the poor, who would not be able to have their one holiday in Spain each year. So, I am not in favour of this at all.
And to the poster who said we should downgrade our economy – this means our country would become much poorer, and our Government have less money to try and include some of the much wanted green policies.
Stopping ordinary people trying to get to work by public transport is not the answer, in my opinion.