Some Environmental Ideas

Consider looking into National Environmental Days as a focus for club or community initiatives. If not for the actual day, then make it an activity for the month. Each ‘Day’ event has loads of ‘’easy to access” web resources. A few examples are:

January:          Veganuary

March:             The Great British Spring Clean

April:                Earth Day

May:                 World Bee Day; Compost Awareness Week; No Mow May 

June:                 World Environment Day;  End Plastic Soup; Wildlife Trust  Challenge - 
                          30 Days to take a Walk on the Wild Side; National Refill Day

July:                 Plastic-Free July;  Love parks Week; Keep Britain Tidy

August:            Great British Beach Clean

September:     World Rivers Day; Seed Gathering Season;  Recycle Week

October:          ‘Unblocktober’–making simple changes in daily habits;
                          Walk to School  Day

November:      No Disposable Cup Day; Clean Air Day

December:      World Soil Day;  Wildlife Conservation Day

The Woodland Trust offers free tree packs to community groups and schools for planting events    https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/plant-trees/schools-and-communities/


Operation Pollination – a Rotary Collaboration Project recognising the importance of pollinators, it involves restoring and maintaining their habitats on public and private land. 

Memorise or write down the eight ‘R’s before you throw away and replace with new:
Re-fuse,  Refill,  Reduce,  Repair,  Re-use,  Re-home,  Recycle, or  Rot

Buy things you can re-use, or which will bio-degrade in compost. Avoid single-use plastic. In fact the target is to reach ‘zero waste’ and throw nothing away at all. Keep all thin-film wrapping like ‘clingfilm’ out of your rubbish and only dispose of it at a dedicated Co-Op collection point.

It is useful to assess what recycling opportunities there already are in your local community (eg halls and churches, shops and supermarkets), and raise everyone's awareness that this public-minded action constitues the 10th most useful thing which individuals and communities can get on with themselves in reversing climate change (see main Environment page).

A company called TerraCycle  takes ‘hard to recycle’ things in cardboard collection boxes, ie stuff that usually goes in the general rubbish and is destined for landfill sites. It collects crisp packets in schools and even collects empty medical blister packs in pharmacies. (There are 4 drop-off points for these in our district: at Superdrug pharmacies in Newcastle, Sunderland, Chester Le Street and Ashington. Profits from Superdrug’s recycling go to the Marie Curie charity. More info at The Medicine Packet Recycling Programme  TerraCycle. . Collection boxes for this and other causes can be purchased from Terracycle and placed in other shops or schools by Rotary. Information keeps changing online so try ringing if you have a specific type of item in mind.

A ‘Sustainability Kept Simple’ Chart – is promoted by Rotary District 1070  https://www.rotary-ribi.org/districts/page.php?PgID=256992&DistrictNo=1070


Carbon Footprint Calculators

·         Easiest: with app and questionnaire: from WWF
  https://footprint.wwf.org.uk/#/          https://footprint.wwf.org.uk/#/questionnaire

·         Middling: https://www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx

·         Bit more thorough and fun: https://bulb.co.uk/carbon-calculator/

·         Flight calculator: https://www.esrag.org/flight-carbon-offset-calculator

Save the Planet - list of individual action reminders by Rotary Club of Manchester  https://www.rotary-ribi.org/clubs/page.php?PgID=834382&ClubID=299 

Webinars and Videos

BBC Four Podcasts : 39 Ways To Save The Planet

YouTube talks: Speak Up For Our Planet