The Attitude: Increased energy consumption leads to more pollution.

How many times do we see a light sitting idly on, helping no one to see, but nonetheless causing pollution? What causes this foolishness? We know of the economic benefit to reducing our own energy consumption: lower power bills.

We also have made it easy as can be to flick a switch or press a button to turn lights on and off. The amount of time and energy it takes is negligible.

Happy Earth Day from us at EnviroHumanImpact. We are striving to make every day of your life a little more Earth-friendly, but especially today, take some time to think about what you can do to have a more positive envirohuman impact.

While you’re thinking about it, do some browsing around our site to find some simple ways to reduce your negative envirohuman impact. We have a collection of articles explaining many different little aspects of your life you can change for a huge benefit.

Here’s an Op-Ed piece By Paul Krugman of the New York Times, published 4/21/08 that speaks to limited resources for our planet. We thought we would share, as it is relevant to our main focus on how human actions change the environment, and how the result will force us to change again. Excerpts with commentary follow:

Commentary: Every new phone, camera, and MP3 player we purchase adds yet another charger to our own increasing array (knot, tangle, etc.) of cords we must track. Some even come with a charger to plug into a USB port or our vehicle’s cigarette lighter; and if not, we can go out and buy those, too! Yippee!

What if there were one standard charger that fit all new devices, say, produced after January 2010? Or maybe there could be an agreed upon five standards, for which we can all own an adapter that allows us to use the correct piece for the specific device, similar to adapters allowing appliances from one country to fit the electrical outlets of another. Perhaps it could look similar to a power strip with several adapters available for your growing multitude of rechargeable devices.

Looking to make your indoor environment cleaner? Sure, you can use greener household detergents and cosmetics. You can use greener paints with lower or no volatile organic compound (VOC) output. But there will always be toxins in your air from the outdoors, everyday products, your carpet, paint, cosmetics, leather treatments, etc.

To help your home to have cleaner, less toxic air: buy some houseplants. In addition to beautifying your home, houseplants reduce levels of toxic elements in your air, because like humans, they respire air and in turn remove some toxins.

These are our product reviews of greener products and are part of my own journey toward a more sustainable lifestyle. I’ll provide you with the straight-up truth about these products’ worth and usability.

No, I don’t consider myself to be, “green,” quite yet, but I’m changing my habits and products and I want to share the products I’ve tried that get the job done (sometimes even better than their non-green counterparts). This will help you to try greener products with confidence.

EHI There! What green products are you using that you love? What products are you trying to replace? Got an idea for a product you would like to be reviewed?

Envirohumanology may be the start of a movement that cures the issue that could be our greatest downfall and makes it into our greatest triumph. Environmental degradation as a result of human actions has the potential to cause disruption of food supplies, ecosystems, and the normal weather and geological conditions that now make life relatively hospitable.

This situation could lead to mass starvation or death due to environmental disaster (think natural disaster, without that “natural”), famine, disease, and the ensuing battles for increasingly limited resources.  In many places, these conditions have already appeared, partly as a result of human action and/or inaction on myriad issues.

We care specifically because the the condition of the environment directly effects the human condition. This is the key of envirohumanology.

Envirohumanology tackles environmental degradation as:

A Moral Issue: When we pollute, degrade the environment, and generally show disregard for the envirohuman impact of our decisions, others suffer, in small and large ways. It is immoral to not do what is necessary to improve our envirohuman impact, protect the environment, defend biodiversity, and work toward a sustainable future for the Earth. Small steps to reach great heights.

A Quality of Health and Life Issue: By improving our EHI, we are helping everyone have a better chance to breathe clean air, drink clean water, and eat clean, natural foods, all of which contribute to longer, healthier, and happier lives.

A Personal Responsibility Issue: In order to make consistent strides toward a more sustainable future, we must all personally make small sacrifices, display personal leadership, and give considerable effort toward smaller negative envirohuman impacts from each individual. Each of us is a small part of the bigger problem and likewise can be a part of the solution.

A Government Responsibility Issue: The large governments of the world hold much financial ability to invest into more sustainable technologies and practices, with little risk, that both individuals and large companies do not enjoy.

Politicians have a responsibility to work together to use that ability for the good of everyone to influence industry through investment and regulation to improve the envirohuman impact of large and small industries and to empower individuals to make their own EHIs positive.

A Corporate Responsibility Issue: Corporations have the responsibility to encourage for progressive regulation which keeps the playing field more fair for all participants when specific companies decide to invest into research for greener technologies and practices.

They have a responsibility to put more money into research and less money into lobbying for laxer regulations. Increasingly, a company’s envirohuman impact will become a cost of doing business, and corporations will do themselves, investors, and the public (their customers) justice by staying ahead of that cost and improving their EHI before regulation and costs force it upon them.

An Emotional Issue: Many people care about the environment, and at varying degrees. Some people passively recycle, some go out and petition people for signatures about key issues, other write letters to Congress or blog about the issues, while many more volunteer in meaningful ways.

But the opportunity to share that passion and encourage one another shows the human side of this issue. We care most specifically because the the condition of the environment directly effects the human condition. Our own. Our friends and family. Our future.

A Forward-Looking Issue: No matter if you are an individual, a company, or a government, facing the fact that improving envirohuman impacts is a matter of responsibility we all share is the first step. By doing so, we will be seen by future generations as having great foresight instead of great excess. Great willpower instead of weakness. Great hope instead of great despair. Better to deserve appreciation rather than blame from future generations.

A Community Issue: Our collective care for the environment, particularly because it can and will effect our current and future communities in myriad ways, is what will allow us to put differences aside on these issues and find a way to make continuous progress toward a more sustainable future, a future where improved envirohuman impact is not an issue, but a fact of life.

The attitude: Reducing your envirohuman impact can keep you in better physical condition.

So, you’re asking, greener can keep me in shape? Sure! Yesterday we left off talking about how taking the stairs at work can give you more exercise while making elevators work a little less. But there are all sorts of activities you could participate in that both improve your envirohuman impact and build more exercise into your day.

What if you are reusing the water you rinsed your lettuce with on your garden? Big deal? Well, carrying that bucket of water outside counts for burning some calories. The fact that you’re gardening counts as burning calories. Yes, these are great in that they improve your EHI, but they also are great in that they give you the exercise that never seems like a priority.

Two floors down or one floor up, use the elevators. That’s the rule. It used to go for reducing congestion at elevators. But now it also would mean reducing your negative envirohuman impact, because when an elevator has to move you from floor to floor, a motor is moving both your weight and that of the elevator car, cables, and other mechanisms.

I made this decision originally because I was making ten to twenty trips per day between the two different floors my company occupies in a high-rise. At the beginning of the year, I decided that in order to shed a few extra pounds, I would take the stairs a majority of the time.