I am a climate hypocrite
I finally recorded the first episode of the second season of my podcast. 2 more lined up for today and 5 more for next week. 💪
I am thinking of renaming it from Epic to Not My Problem- so that the newsletter and podcast are consistent. Would love to get your thoughts on that.
Moving onto this week’s content. So today, we have-
😔I am a climate hypocrite. A big one…
I actively write about climate change. But my life is surrounded by fossil fuels. Clothes I wear, food I eat, transport I use. Everything
I think about climate change most of the time. I write about it regularly. But mostly, I am doing the wrong things.
Things that are doing more harm than good. And it’s because I am part of a system. A system that has fossil fuels at its core.
And as a result, we cannot avoid that. That’s why we need systemic changes.
Individual changes can only take us so far.
What’s your thought on individual vs systemic change?
👖Making clothes swapping the new normal
It’s not that simple…The fashion industry has devastating social and environmental impacts. More than 90% of fashion brands are not paying garment workers a living wage. Also, fashion production currently makes up 10% of humanity's carbon emissions. But at the same time, sustainable and ethical clothes are expensive, especially when compared to fast fashion. So if we want to do the right thing, it hurts our pockets.
Enter a social network…Founded in 2018, UK-based Nuw has brought an accessible and affordable alternative to fast fashion. It’s a social network to share clothes with people in your network. For a flat monthly membership fee, Nuw allows you to borrow as much as you want. To become a member, you would have to start by listing 2 of your own clothes.
Once you list your underutilized clothes, you earn coins.
You can use those coins to choose from 1000s of clothes uploaded by others.
You can coordinate with the owner to deliver the clothes/pick them up from their place.
It’s different…This is not a traditional rental system where the meter starts the moment you rent the clothes. But this is based more on sharing your unused clothes in the wardrobe with others in the community. Nuw charges only £/€ 0.99c for each swap. Every time an item is borrowed or swapped on Nuw, it offsets 25% of the resources that would have been used in the production of a new item.
☀️Allowing users to soak up the sun in style
Aesthetics matter…The Department of Energy in the US has estimated that there are 13 million homes across the country that aren’t adopting solar energy because the panels look ugly on their roofs. Can’t blame them- the panels are not really attractive. Your house is probably your biggest investment in life and you wouldn’t want to add this unsightly addition to it.
Camouflage for your roof…US-based Sistine Solar is solving this through SolarSkin, a graphics layer that allows solar panels to have a customized look to match your roof. So if you have a red Spanish tile pattern on your roof, the SolarSkin would make the panels look the same. Think of it as a graphic film that can cover your solar panels without impacting their efficiency. This is how it works-
Customers send photographs of their roof design, along with the make and model of their solar panels.
Sistine Solar fabricates the skin, in a modular fashion that mirrors the individual panel sizes of the solar array.
They have installers nationwide who can install the product in a few hours.
Tried and tested…SolarSkin can withstand a wide temperature range- anything from abundant sunlight to intense snow and these skins come with a 10-year warranty. Customers can even get their customized logo or artwork printed on these skins if they want.
🏭 Air pollution is killing people across the planet.
👂What I’ve been listening to?
Thanks for reading today’s edition. If you have any thoughts or questions, feel free to write to me by replying to this email.
Have a great weekend😊
Individual change is a start. It's the whole drop in the ocean logic. One sufficiently angry individual can make a large enough impact on the people around them, which has the potential to force systemic change. It's a hope at best. But all it takes is enough people making a fuss and being loud enough for governments to change policies and companies to be responsible. Waiting around for the policy-makers to actually make right decisions would be waiting too long. I think it's the individuals who drive change.