Spring Break at Home!

For Spring Break, I worked. I work every school holiday. My co-worker, who has seniority, gets off.

But, 2 weeks or so ago, I went to Disney World.

Disney World is great, it is almost perfect, how get it not be. One big artifice . . . flowers just so, layout perfect, everything happy, happy.

Ok, so the lawns smell of chemicals and the towels do not get reused, even if you are willing to reuse them.

They do use biodiesel (made from their own used cooking oil) for their trains and some of their rides (saving 200,000 gallons of petroleum diesel per year), have recycle bins everywhere, use recycled plastic for their shopping bags, greened the xgames and have a conservation fund.

They also move lots and lots of people through the use of a transportation system, that by far should be better than the car emissions the alternative would cause.

They aren't there yet, can do lots more, but they are making an effort.  

They are trying to cut emissions by 50% by 2012, as well as use more recycled materials and decrease waste.

Eco-Tourism labels

Just like everyone else, the tourism industry tries to label their products (mostly for marketing purposes), which has given rise to a slew of eco-tourism labels.

As with anything - labels don't mean all that much if no one cares or pays attention to them. They become even more meaningless if no one can understand them.

Of course, trying to provide a meaning and understanding for these labels is the sticky part, mostly because different companies - countries - organizations, adhere to their own standards of environmental beliefs and ideas. This makes it really hard to know who to support and believe in.

When I first started in the travel business (long, long ago in 2007, ha ha ha). I was taking a certification class by the Adventure Travel Council (the travel industry is big on certification) and across my path blew Sustainable Travel International.

STI gave me a kind of standard I looked at when evaluating a potential supplier. Though not every supplier I use is a member (sometimes memberships and certifications can be cost prohibitive to small operations with great programs) they offer guidelines to at least consider and ask questions about.

STI has recently teamed up with Green Globe (which has it's own programs and certifications), and are going to make a tag team effort. This may have some sway on setting overall sustainability standards - making the labels, make sense (unfortunately, it probably won't make certification/membership costs go down).

Green Travel

I work in the travel and tourism industry . . . and everything about it screams go green!

The #1 reason a person travels is for the destination!  

People do travel for other reasons like work or family obligations, but most travel because they have heard about, read about or dreamed about a particular destination.

So, preserving destinations is one of the most important aspects of the travel industry.  If destinations disappear so does their economic potential, which hurts every part of the industry. So not only is it good for business to become sustainable, it is a necessity.

Tour operators (suppliers) sell a destination as their product, and many have realized that the upkeep and protection of these places is valuable, not only to their longevity, but to their personal value, since the destinations are often seen as representative of their company.  So, it is in their best interest to practice sustainability.

Travel Agents (resellers) must look to these suppliers (tour operators) to lead the way by selling products that are environmentally and socially sustainable.

Of course, there is a lot still to be done.

Hydrogen Cars

In 2004, while I was in Barcelona, I had a chance to attend an event called Forum (Universal Forum of Cultures).  It was a sort of cultural, environmental and economic fair.

It had some fantastic exihibits about environmental waste, water use and depletion of resources, as well as some great new concepts on how to fix things.

But one of the coolest exhibits was by Toyota, where they had on display concept cars using Hydrogen.

Some pictures of the cars:

Sporty and fun, but not a lot of luggage space!

Room for one. A bit scary on the highway!

About Meatless!

So, one person read my first entry and already had a question . . . so I thought I would explain.


Using animals, for food, uses tons of resources. The land they use to graze, grains they are fed, the fuels used to transport them, the processing and packaging. They also produce methane gas. I read somewhere that meat consumptions produces about 18% of greenhouse gases, globally.

That being said. I really am not an advocate for vegetarianism, and would not expect, nor press upon someone to be. In fact, if you are going out for a steak dinner, invite me so I can enjoy the smells, while eating my lettuce.

It is just a personal choice, because every little bit helps. What doesn't hurt me, will make me stronger!

Footprints

So, we start with the Ecological Footprint . . . ouch!


I know my footprint is larger than it should be, because I love to travel, and I travel a lot! (How else will I promote my message of World Peace?!) No, really, I do travel by commercial jet a lot, so maybe I could give it up. Well, that really isn't an option, because I LOVE to travel!! Travel is my life and work. So my next option is to reduce in other ways . . .

I have noticed that most airlines are now offering a carbon offset option, so by paying more for your flight, they are contributing a portion of that money to some type of entity that is working on reforestation, renewable energy or some such.


Ok, so maybe that's the ticket . . . but how is it working? And do I trust giving extra money to an industry that is notoriously in the red (and most of the time are even unreliable to keep the very schedules they publish) to do the right thing and give the money to a worthy 'green' project? And then, is that project worthy in my eyes? I am undecided, at this point.

So back to what I can do, personally, to reduce my footprint . . .

Here is my answer, at least for now. I have given up meat (all livestock, fish, etc.), not so easy for a meat and potatoes kind of girl, but I have now made it (working on) 23 days. So far, so good! Wish me luck!!