I haven't been posting any pictures on the blog, because it's much better to have them right there on the website. Where people can see the concrete actions that they and others are taking to live greener. I'm using Flickr with a plug-in that allows me to feed my photo stream directly into the challenge page.
For example, check out the results of the Change a Light Bulb No-Brainer Challenge here.
Sweet. We changed 132 light bulbs, which will save around 60,000 kWh over their lifetime.
Real Action!
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Friday, October 30, 2009
350
Oil is Dumb had a lot of fun at the 350 event in Austin last weekend.On October 24, 2009, people gathered in hundreds of iconic locations throughout the world to take action on climate change. The goal? To create history's largest living petition, sending a message to world leaders as they prepare to draft a new global treaty on cutting emissions this December in Copenhagen, Denmark. This day will be perhaps the world's largest ever single concerted effort to take a stand on climate change.
Here are some more fun pictures.
Bryan and Tracy | Oil is Dumb poses in front of a Hummer SUV limo
A human 350 sign in front of the capitol.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
July, 2009 No-Brainer: Cancel Your Junk Mail
Let's be honest. Junk mail is the devil.
Very few people actually read their junk mail. Here are some facts:
Do It.
This month's challenge is sponsored by the Austin Chocolate Festival.
Send this link to all your friends. When you do the No-Brainer, let us know how many friends you sent it to, and we'll start giving out free Oil is Dumb t-shirts to the people who sent it to the most friends.
Enjoy getting less mail in your mailbox!
- Chuck
Very few people actually read their junk mail. Here are some facts:
- One study says Americans throw away 44% of bulk mail unopened, yet still spend 8 months per lifetime opening bulk mail. (Consumer Research Institute) 1
- Fifty-five percent of Americans “dislike” and 26% “despise” getting internet disks in the mail, while 1.9% “really appreciate” them. (June 2002 Opinion Research Corporation International Poll commissioned by New American Dream) 1
- Junk mail accounts for more than 1% of the total oil used by cars in the United States.
- $320 million of local taxes are used to dispose of unsolicited mail each year 2
- The production and disposal of direct mail consumes more energy than 3 million cars. (New American Dream calculation from U.S. Department of Energy and the Paper Task Force statistics) 3
Do It.
This month's challenge is sponsored by the Austin Chocolate Festival.
Send this link to all your friends. When you do the No-Brainer, let us know how many friends you sent it to, and we'll start giving out free Oil is Dumb t-shirts to the people who sent it to the most friends.
Enjoy getting less mail in your mailbox!
- Chuck
Monday, March 9, 2009
March, 2009 No-Brainer: Use Reusable Bags
Plastic bags are dumb. They use up oil, they fill up our streets, landfills, and lakes, and they aren't even necessary because we have other options. And paper bags are even worse. So what's this month's challenge? Don't use em. Oil is Dumb is doing our biggest drawing yet, of three prizes: $100, $50, and $25. In addition, Oil is Dumb will give out $5 right away to every participant just for saying you'll do it. As an added bonus, Oil is Dumb will give the first 50 participants, free of charge, a high quality 1 Bag at a Time reusable grocery bag to start you off right. Contest ends Tuesday, March 31, 2009. The contest is here.
The thing I'm most excited about in this month's No-Brainer is that we have our very first sponsors. One of the things I like about the way Oil is Dumb is structured is that getting genuine, good for the environment, solid businesses to sponsor our contests is very important. We don't just sell ad space on our website. We actually have an interest in connecting people with green businesses that we want to support. So we research our sponsors carefully to make sure they actually do good things for the environment, and do it well. So I'm proud to introduce our first two sponsors.
1 Bag at a Time is committed to supplying the highest quality reusable bags available and to promoting awareness about the full impact of disposable bags. We believe in the power of consumer and corporate responsibility as a positive force in the world.
Energy Action is dedicated to increasing conservation awareness one house at a time. If you want to save energy by improving your house, or if you are selling your house and need an energy audit, we are here to help you.
I recommend both these companies. If you are taking part in this month's No-Brainer then getting 1 Bag at a Time bags will get you extra entries into our drawing, so if you were thinking of making the switch to reusable bags, you might as well do it now, and 1 Bag at a Time is a great place to get them. I also recommend Energy Action, which is right here in Austin. Have you ever considered doing an energy audit on your home, to find out how to green up your life? Now is a perfect time, and Energy Action is the company to call.
The thing I'm most excited about in this month's No-Brainer is that we have our very first sponsors. One of the things I like about the way Oil is Dumb is structured is that getting genuine, good for the environment, solid businesses to sponsor our contests is very important. We don't just sell ad space on our website. We actually have an interest in connecting people with green businesses that we want to support. So we research our sponsors carefully to make sure they actually do good things for the environment, and do it well. So I'm proud to introduce our first two sponsors.
1 Bag at a Time is committed to supplying the highest quality reusable bags available and to promoting awareness about the full impact of disposable bags. We believe in the power of consumer and corporate responsibility as a positive force in the world.
Energy Action is dedicated to increasing conservation awareness one house at a time. If you want to save energy by improving your house, or if you are selling your house and need an energy audit, we are here to help you.
I recommend both these companies. If you are taking part in this month's No-Brainer then getting 1 Bag at a Time bags will get you extra entries into our drawing, so if you were thinking of making the switch to reusable bags, you might as well do it now, and 1 Bag at a Time is a great place to get them. I also recommend Energy Action, which is right here in Austin. Have you ever considered doing an energy audit on your home, to find out how to green up your life? Now is a perfect time, and Energy Action is the company to call.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
We Saved Water
Congrats to all the participants in the February, 2009 No-Brainer. We did great. There were 36 participants, and we received 26 photos of signs people made to remind them to use the 5-second rule on their faucets.
And a special congratulations to Farah E., who was the winner of our $50 bonus drawing! And last but not least, the Oil is Dumb Team wanted to give out some additional $10 awards to our favorite photos:
Squeaky Cleanest Faucet: Mary H., Littleton, CO
Most Creative Sign: Geoff O., Austin, TX
Most Artistic Sign: Nicole S., Austin, TX
Together, here is what we saved:
Oil
Electricity: ................. 514 kWh
Natural Gas
Water: ........................ 2,016 gallons
Paper
Carbon: ...................... 0.35 metric tons
Landfill Waste
Sulfur Dioxide: .......... 1.6 lbs
Nitrous Oxides: ......... 0.59 lbs
Mercury: .................... 0.015 lbs
Cost: .......................... $360
Here are the assumptions we are making for these numbers. First, that by using the 5-second rule, and therefore having to turn off the faucet when doing things like brushing your teeth and shaving, we save roughly 4 gallons of water per day. Second, we assume that if people say they're doing it (and if they went to the trouble of making a sign), then they are doing it, at least for two weeks. We also assume that the electricity it takes to pump, process, and treat water at a waste treatment plant is 0.13 kWh per gallon (this makes 262 kWh total). Plus, we assume 13% of total home energy use goes to water heating, 15% of our water use is through the faucet, and 73% of that water is hot. That means we saved an additional 7 kWh per person, or another 252 kWh. So that brings us to a total (conservative) estimate of a savings of 514 kWh.
The big surprise here is how much electricity was saved. We weren't even trying to save electricity. We were just turning off the faucet. But since it takes energy to treat and pump that water, plus the fact that it takes energy to heat the water, we ended up saving a whopping 514 kWh. That is about half of what a household uses in a month.
Here are some photos from the contest (the full photo post is on Facebook, and it'll be on our new website soon):
And a special congratulations to Farah E., who was the winner of our $50 bonus drawing! And last but not least, the Oil is Dumb Team wanted to give out some additional $10 awards to our favorite photos:
Squeaky Cleanest Faucet: Mary H., Littleton, CO
Most Creative Sign: Geoff O., Austin, TX
Most Artistic Sign: Nicole S., Austin, TX
Together, here is what we saved:
Oil
Electricity: ................. 514 kWh
Natural Gas
Water: ........................ 2,016 gallons
Paper
Carbon: ...................... 0.35 metric tons
Landfill Waste
Sulfur Dioxide: .......... 1.6 lbs
Nitrous Oxides: ......... 0.59 lbs
Mercury: .................... 0.015 lbs
Cost: .......................... $360
Here are the assumptions we are making for these numbers. First, that by using the 5-second rule, and therefore having to turn off the faucet when doing things like brushing your teeth and shaving, we save roughly 4 gallons of water per day. Second, we assume that if people say they're doing it (and if they went to the trouble of making a sign), then they are doing it, at least for two weeks. We also assume that the electricity it takes to pump, process, and treat water at a waste treatment plant is 0.13 kWh per gallon (this makes 262 kWh total). Plus, we assume 13% of total home energy use goes to water heating, 15% of our water use is through the faucet, and 73% of that water is hot. That means we saved an additional 7 kWh per person, or another 252 kWh. So that brings us to a total (conservative) estimate of a savings of 514 kWh.
The big surprise here is how much electricity was saved. We weren't even trying to save electricity. We were just turning off the faucet. But since it takes energy to treat and pump that water, plus the fact that it takes energy to heat the water, we ended up saving a whopping 514 kWh. That is about half of what a household uses in a month.
Here are some photos from the contest (the full photo post is on Facebook, and it'll be on our new website soon):
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Carbon
One of the things I really want Oil is Dumb to do that hardly anyone else does is to account for our energy and resource use comprehensively.
Here's what I mean. It's becoming increasingly popular these days for companies (and people for that matter) to think about their carbon emissions. We're very aware of our carbon use, and how carbon emissions contribute to global warming by being a greenhouse gas. But here's the thing. Carbon is not the whole story. There are a lot of other emissions that are important, like sulfur dioxide; and we also need to think about our consumption of resources, like paper, which are also a major strain on the environment. Not to mention how much energy we use in the first place.
As an example, a company that operates a manufacturing plant for scientific instruments might use mercury. Let's say they're concerned about the environment, and they've decided to assess and offset their carbon emissions from the energy they use in their manufacturing. So they can be carbon neutral, but as a byproduct of their manufacturing they still dump mercury in a river. So do they get to claim that they're an environmentally friendly company? I think the answer is obviously no. Mercury is toxic, and call me crazy, but if you dump poison into the water supply, I think you're doing something bad for the world.
So these are my thoughts on carbon. Carbon is a great proxy for how environmentally responsible your company is. It is correlated to many other things. If I cut my electricity use dramatically then less coal needs to be burned and less carbon goes into the air. Or if I use less paper, then not only am I saving trees, but less paper needs to be made, which saves electricity and water, both of which in turn save coal, which in turn reduces carbon. So they are all interrelated.
But while this is true, they aren't completely the same thing, as in the example about the mercury. I think tons and tons of companies fall into this category. You can't be carbon neutral and dump mercury into a lake, and still think you're doing something good for the environment. So being carbon neutral is good, but it doesn't mean I am good to the environment.
So here's what I'm doing. I'm going to go all out, and comprehensively account for all of my resource use, and all of my emissions. A while back, when I first started Oil is Dumb, I made this decision. And I decided to keep accounting records for all these things just like I keep accounting records for money. I've been doing this for a year and a half. I decided that for us to consider ourselves solvent as a company, we had to take in more money that we spend, but we also had to conserve more resources that we used, offset more emissions that we emitted, and in general to actually leave the planet in better condition that we found it.
Here is the list of accounting records we keep: oil, electricity, natural gas, paper, water, landfill waste, carbon dioxide, sufur dioxide, nitrous oxides, and mercury. Why doesn't every company do this? We think they should. And here is my favorite thing about Oil is Dumb: as a company, Oil is Dumb has conserved more oil that we have used, used a net negative amount of natural gas, paper, and water; have produced a net negative amount of landfill waste, CO2, SO2, NOx, and mercury, and the business has conserved more electricity than it takes to run itself. It's really amazing. But the most amazing part is how easy it proved to be. I couldn't believe how easy it was. Honestly, I think if other companies even tried, many could do it. We call this being eco-negative, and we call this business model Upside-down business.
Here's what I mean. It's becoming increasingly popular these days for companies (and people for that matter) to think about their carbon emissions. We're very aware of our carbon use, and how carbon emissions contribute to global warming by being a greenhouse gas. But here's the thing. Carbon is not the whole story. There are a lot of other emissions that are important, like sulfur dioxide; and we also need to think about our consumption of resources, like paper, which are also a major strain on the environment. Not to mention how much energy we use in the first place.
As an example, a company that operates a manufacturing plant for scientific instruments might use mercury. Let's say they're concerned about the environment, and they've decided to assess and offset their carbon emissions from the energy they use in their manufacturing. So they can be carbon neutral, but as a byproduct of their manufacturing they still dump mercury in a river. So do they get to claim that they're an environmentally friendly company? I think the answer is obviously no. Mercury is toxic, and call me crazy, but if you dump poison into the water supply, I think you're doing something bad for the world.
So these are my thoughts on carbon. Carbon is a great proxy for how environmentally responsible your company is. It is correlated to many other things. If I cut my electricity use dramatically then less coal needs to be burned and less carbon goes into the air. Or if I use less paper, then not only am I saving trees, but less paper needs to be made, which saves electricity and water, both of which in turn save coal, which in turn reduces carbon. So they are all interrelated.
But while this is true, they aren't completely the same thing, as in the example about the mercury. I think tons and tons of companies fall into this category. You can't be carbon neutral and dump mercury into a lake, and still think you're doing something good for the environment. So being carbon neutral is good, but it doesn't mean I am good to the environment.
So here's what I'm doing. I'm going to go all out, and comprehensively account for all of my resource use, and all of my emissions. A while back, when I first started Oil is Dumb, I made this decision. And I decided to keep accounting records for all these things just like I keep accounting records for money. I've been doing this for a year and a half. I decided that for us to consider ourselves solvent as a company, we had to take in more money that we spend, but we also had to conserve more resources that we used, offset more emissions that we emitted, and in general to actually leave the planet in better condition that we found it.
Here is the list of accounting records we keep: oil, electricity, natural gas, paper, water, landfill waste, carbon dioxide, sufur dioxide, nitrous oxides, and mercury. Why doesn't every company do this? We think they should. And here is my favorite thing about Oil is Dumb: as a company, Oil is Dumb has conserved more oil that we have used, used a net negative amount of natural gas, paper, and water; have produced a net negative amount of landfill waste, CO2, SO2, NOx, and mercury, and the business has conserved more electricity than it takes to run itself. It's really amazing. But the most amazing part is how easy it proved to be. I couldn't believe how easy it was. Honestly, I think if other companies even tried, many could do it. We call this being eco-negative, and we call this business model Upside-down business.
Friday, February 6, 2009
More Money
Congratulations to Geoff O., of Austin, TX, who was the winner of the $50 drawing for his picture of his clothes washer set on cold. Thanks for taking concrete steps towards making our nation energy independent.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Results of the January, 2009 No-Brainer
The first No-Brainer contest to be posted on this blog was a success. We had 8 people send in pictures of their washers on cold, and 17 participants total. That is a company record. The challenge was to set your washing machine on cold (or cold/cold) and leave it there for the rest of the month. I offered to pay $10 for each entry. And I am also doing a $50 drawing for the people who sent in pictures. All the awards payouts will go out this week.
Thanks to everyone who participated in this very successful No-Brainer.
Here was the impact of the January, 2009 No-Brainer:
Oil
Electricity: ................. 553 kWh
Natural Gas
Water
Paper
Carbon: ...................... 0.37 metric tons
Landfill Waste
Sulfur Dioxide: .......... 1.732 lbs
Nitrous Oxides: ......... 0.630 lbs
Mercury: .................... 0.15691 lbs
Cost: .......................... $170
There are assumptions that go into these numbers. Here are a few: I assume everyone who says they will do it actually does it (for two weeks anyways, though I see that some folks are planning on doing it for another month...); washers comprise around 7% of the total household energy use; around 90% of the energy required for washing goes into heating the water; and I assume the average household electric bill is 1,000 kWh each month. Also, however, this data does not take into account natural gas use (around 20% of clothes washers run on natural gas). The actual electricity saved will be a little less, and we will have saved some natural gas, but the emissions will be roughly the same. Nevertheless, I wanted to give a rough report on the impact of this contest as soon as possible. The full report will be posted on the new website sometime soon.
Putting this into terms that make sense (i.e., I'm not going to talk about hot air balloons), 520 kWh is a lot of energy compared to a person. Since I am a light bulb running at 100 Watts, this contest saved enough energy to run me for a little over 7 months. There are many other wonderful things to say, but I want to keep it simple for now.
As I go along, there are many other intuitions I want to develop, such as how much mercury this is compared with how much mercury is toxic to a plant or a person, and also how these numbers compare not only to a person, but to a small company like Oil is Dumb. But that will have to wait for another post.
By the way, the cost I just paid per kilowatt-hour was around 30 cents. This is about 3 times the cost of traditional electricity, and roughly the same cost as solar power.
Thanks to everyone who participated in this very successful No-Brainer.
Here was the impact of the January, 2009 No-Brainer:
Oil
Electricity: ................. 553 kWh
Natural Gas
Water
Paper
Carbon: ...................... 0.37 metric tons
Landfill Waste
Sulfur Dioxide: .......... 1.732 lbs
Nitrous Oxides: ......... 0.630 lbs
Mercury: .................... 0.15691 lbs
Cost: .......................... $170
There are assumptions that go into these numbers. Here are a few: I assume everyone who says they will do it actually does it (for two weeks anyways, though I see that some folks are planning on doing it for another month...); washers comprise around 7% of the total household energy use; around 90% of the energy required for washing goes into heating the water; and I assume the average household electric bill is 1,000 kWh each month. Also, however, this data does not take into account natural gas use (around 20% of clothes washers run on natural gas). The actual electricity saved will be a little less, and we will have saved some natural gas, but the emissions will be roughly the same. Nevertheless, I wanted to give a rough report on the impact of this contest as soon as possible. The full report will be posted on the new website sometime soon.
Putting this into terms that make sense (i.e., I'm not going to talk about hot air balloons), 520 kWh is a lot of energy compared to a person. Since I am a light bulb running at 100 Watts, this contest saved enough energy to run me for a little over 7 months. There are many other wonderful things to say, but I want to keep it simple for now.
As I go along, there are many other intuitions I want to develop, such as how much mercury this is compared with how much mercury is toxic to a plant or a person, and also how these numbers compare not only to a person, but to a small company like Oil is Dumb. But that will have to wait for another post.
By the way, the cost I just paid per kilowatt-hour was around 30 cents. This is about 3 times the cost of traditional electricity, and roughly the same cost as solar power.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
I Am a Light Bulb
What if I told you that you could save 3 tons of CO2 if you just flipped a light switch? Wow!
Wait, what if I said it was 100 tons? Would you know the difference?
Here's a quiz. How much is a kilowatt-hour? Is it a lot of electricity or not very much? What if I said that if you put all the barrels of oil we use in a year end-to-end it would reach to the moon? How about the sun?
I'm convinced that most facts we hear about the environment are dumb. Because they don't mean anything to us. Here is a great one I recently read on an eco-minded website: "If everyone put an insulation jacket on their hot water tank, we'd cut CO 2 emissions by 900,000 tonnes - enough to fill around 182,000 hot air balloons."
What does that even mean? I'm pretty sure nobody knows.
Facts like this are basically pointless. How are we supposed to live in a way that's more energy conscious, and ecologically friendly, when the world is presented to us in this way? It's not that the data aren't there. It's just that they don't mean anything because they aren't tied to things we know. (Who has a good gut feeling on the size of a hot air balloon?)
So I'm going to start over. I'm going to wipe my mind clean of anything I think I know about energy and the environment, and I am going to start with something I am familiar with. And I'll make it the center of my understanding about energy and the environment. I'm going to start with the human body. I am one, so I have a feel for what it is.
Now here's a genuine and honest question. If I asked you to compare your human body to a household appliance, in terms of the energy it uses, what appliance would you say uses a comparable amount of energy? Most people say refrigerator. Or freezer. And some people say dishwasher. So here is the simple (and amazing) answer:
I eat about 2,400 Calories per day.
There are 1.163 Watt-hours per Calorie.
So I use 2,781 Watt-hours during each 24 hours.
And so my power is about 116 Watts, or just a little more than a light bulb.
Women use fewer Calories, requiring only about 90 Watts. So I'm going to kind of take an average, and just say that people's bodies use about 100 Watts.
So I am Chuck.
And I am a light bulb.
And that is my first energy lesson to myself.
Wait, what if I said it was 100 tons? Would you know the difference?
Here's a quiz. How much is a kilowatt-hour? Is it a lot of electricity or not very much? What if I said that if you put all the barrels of oil we use in a year end-to-end it would reach to the moon? How about the sun?
I'm convinced that most facts we hear about the environment are dumb. Because they don't mean anything to us. Here is a great one I recently read on an eco-minded website: "If everyone put an insulation jacket on their hot water tank, we'd cut CO 2 emissions by 900,000 tonnes - enough to fill around 182,000 hot air balloons."
What does that even mean? I'm pretty sure nobody knows.
Facts like this are basically pointless. How are we supposed to live in a way that's more energy conscious, and ecologically friendly, when the world is presented to us in this way? It's not that the data aren't there. It's just that they don't mean anything because they aren't tied to things we know. (Who has a good gut feeling on the size of a hot air balloon?)
So I'm going to start over. I'm going to wipe my mind clean of anything I think I know about energy and the environment, and I am going to start with something I am familiar with. And I'll make it the center of my understanding about energy and the environment. I'm going to start with the human body. I am one, so I have a feel for what it is.
Now here's a genuine and honest question. If I asked you to compare your human body to a household appliance, in terms of the energy it uses, what appliance would you say uses a comparable amount of energy? Most people say refrigerator. Or freezer. And some people say dishwasher. So here is the simple (and amazing) answer:
I eat about 2,400 Calories per day.
There are 1.163 Watt-hours per Calorie.
So I use 2,781 Watt-hours during each 24 hours.
And so my power is about 116 Watts, or just a little more than a light bulb.
Women use fewer Calories, requiring only about 90 Watts. So I'm going to kind of take an average, and just say that people's bodies use about 100 Watts.
So I am Chuck.
And I am a light bulb.
And that is my first energy lesson to myself.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Cutlery
So I went into the grocery store today to get some lunch at the cafe they have. Part of my lunch was a bowl of fruit. I asked the person at the counter for a fork, to eat the fruit with, but she said they didn't have just a fork, and hands me a plastic wrapped set of plastic utensils. Here's an exhaustive list of what was in the package: a heavy duty plastic spoon, a plastic knife, two individual packages of salt, and one of pepper, two thin napkins, and of course my plastic fork. All wrapped generously in clear plastic.
So then the whole time I was eating my fruit, I watched the opened plastic wrapper with the rest of the stuff in it, sitting on the table. It was a nice day so the sun was coming in the window and I was relaxing and enjoying myself while I ate, but the concept of the plastic bag being sealed up so you have to open all that stuff even if you just want to get one of the utensils out was still bouncing around in my mind. You can't return the rest of it, because even if you convince them to take it back, because it's unused and you're environmentally minded, they'll throw it away as soon as you turn to leave. And I can't take these home anymore, because my drawer at home is already filled with plastic knives and forks wrapped in plastic from just these kinds of occasions. But I don't think I've ever used any of them.
So then the whole time I was eating my fruit, I watched the opened plastic wrapper with the rest of the stuff in it, sitting on the table. It was a nice day so the sun was coming in the window and I was relaxing and enjoying myself while I ate, but the concept of the plastic bag being sealed up so you have to open all that stuff even if you just want to get one of the utensils out was still bouncing around in my mind. You can't return the rest of it, because even if you convince them to take it back, because it's unused and you're environmentally minded, they'll throw it away as soon as you turn to leave. And I can't take these home anymore, because my drawer at home is already filled with plastic knives and forks wrapped in plastic from just these kinds of occasions. But I don't think I've ever used any of them.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
January, 2009 No-Brainer: Wash Your Clothes on Cold
Okay. I just posted the January, 2009 No-Brainer. This is the very first No-Brainer that I'm posting on the new blog.
I'm asking people to commit to washing their clothes in cold water for the rest of the month. I'm gonna pay $10. Plus I added an extra that says if you take a picture of your laundry machine on the cold setting and send it in, I'll enter you into a drawing for $50. Seems like a good contest.
The contest is here.
I'm hoping to get a lot of people to take pictures and send them in. I think it would be cool to have a page on the site where you can see a lot of people's washing machines all set on cold.
I'm asking people to commit to washing their clothes in cold water for the rest of the month. I'm gonna pay $10. Plus I added an extra that says if you take a picture of your laundry machine on the cold setting and send it in, I'll enter you into a drawing for $50. Seems like a good contest.
The contest is here.
I'm hoping to get a lot of people to take pictures and send them in. I think it would be cool to have a page on the site where you can see a lot of people's washing machines all set on cold.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Simple
A thing about the name Oil is Dumb. We complicate all this stuff. But we don't need to. We need to conserve and live smarter. That's all. So that's why I call it Oil is Dumb, because it's a simple statement, that expresses a simple truth we all know - that our fixation on oil as our energy source, and our incredible waste of it, and our incredible waste of many of our other resources, is dumb. It avoids a complex assessment or gets into a deep debate about the exact right thing to do. Those things are important, of course, but that's not what I'm focusing on. What I'm saying is: there are certain things that don't require a complicated solution. We need to change our habits to conserve more and waste less.
So my goal is to be simple and dumb.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Oil is Dumb
Howdy folks. So I decided to start a blog. Because I have an idea.
For a while now, I've been frustrated about how our country uses energy, and how we waste precious resources like oil, and mess up the environment. At the same time, I'm excited about what opportunities we have for energy conservation and renewable energy. So I started a website a while back called Oil is Dumb. There are lots of environmental-ish websites out there, but I found that they mostly offer tips and tricks for doing things to conserve energy or live greener, which is great. But guess what I also found out? Nobody does this stuff.
Okay, not nobody. But the more I looked into it, the difference between what people know and what people do amazed me. Our awareness of environmental issues, our energy use, and our waste of oil and the problems it causes, are at an all-time high. And yet research shows that if you ask people whether or not they're willing to do such-and-such in order to use less or change our ways, they say no. It's very strange. To me, it seems like there is a bigger problem. Something awareness can not fix. To me the problem is action. But I believe in people, and I think we can do it, we just need a push.
So here's what I'm gonna do: I am going to pay people money to take action.
I'm doing a monthly contest called a No-Brainer, where I pay people cash to do a simple thing like cancel their junk mail, or fill up their tires to the correct pressure. I research these things to make sure I'm focusing on the things that give the most impact for the least amount of effort. And so it's fun. My entire goal is to make this a sustainable business model, and then get people doing it. So that's what I'm trying to do.
My website is www.oilisdumb.com. I'll keep posting here to tell you more, and let you know how it's going.
Chuck Michelson
Writing from oil country in central Texas
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