WE CONSERVE - new campaign to tackle climate change by Conservation Council of Ontario
Ontario group launches conservation campaign to tackle climate change - Agency will enlist help of community groups, government, businesses
Peter Gorrie, Environment Reporter - Dec 30, 2007
It has taken a quarter-century, but most people in Ontario now sort their trash into bins labelled "We Recycle."
Chris Winter wants them to move on to a greater step: "We Conserve."
The best way to reduce climate change, air pollution, destruction of natural areas and other environmental woes is to use less, says Winter, who heads the non-profit Conservation Council of Ontario.
The message of the recent Bali conference on climate change is national governments and international organizations can't be expected to act quickly. So the council is launching a five-year campaign to help individuals, businesses and organizations take the lead.
"We're opening a second front," Winters says. "It's like `We Recycle' on steroids.
"The shift to a conserver society is inevitable and is already occurring. The only question is whether we can make a voluntary and more rapid transition before change is forced upon us by external factors," such as global warming.
The aim is to get beyond the simple measures people are advised to take to reduce their environmental footprint – the amount of energy and other resources they consume – and provide widespread supports to make it relatively easy.
Changing light bulbs and inflating tires won't solve anything, Winter says. "There's a lot you can do. But to have a real impact, you need to go deeper."
The "We Conserve" campaign will enlist umbrella organizations such as municipal governments, business improvement associations and service organizations to help to spread the message of change to businesses and smaller groups, and then to individuals.
It will also make it easy for those who want to shrink their footprint – by planting trees or natural gardens, installing solar power, switching to car-share services, etc. – to find what they need.
Winter compares it to the Running Room retail chain, which offers advice, products and courses for people whether they're walking, jogging or training for marathons. The difference, he says, is that instead of being done by one company, "We Conserve" will have businesses, community groups and governments "all working together and offering different pieces of solutions."
Winter has seen how conservation works. His family of four uses 300 kilowatt hours of electricity a month, compared with the provincial average of 1,000.
"There's nothing in our lifestyle that I consider a sacrifice," he says.
If the campaign works, it will have another benefit, he says. Once people are acting on their own, they'll put more pressure on governments to provide regulations and incentives, like efficiency subsidies and a carbon tax, to support the move to a low-energy, low-carbon economy.