Cutting climate change through cutting waste

Making simple changes around the home and garden can make a real contribution to helping to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, Environment Minister Marian Hobbs said today.

“By changing the way we deal with our kitchen and garden waste, we can all help reduce one of the most potent greenhouse gases and the biggest New Zealand contributor to climate change – methane,” Marian Hobbs said.

Methane from landfills is created as organic matter breaks down.

“About 40 per cent of New Zealand’s landfill waste is organic, including food scraps and garden waste. By reducing the amount of organic waste we send to landfills, we can all help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect the New Zealand environment that we all love,” Marian Hobbs said."If your household puts out one bag of rubbish per week, you probably throw away enough kitchen scraps and garden waste in a year to make over seven bags of compost. By simply composting garden rubbish and food scraps, a typical household can reduce the contents of the average rubbish bag by nearly 50 per cent.”

The Climate Change Office is currently running a new public awareness campaign, aimed at raising awareness climate change issues and of helping New Zealanders reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which fuel climate change.

“All New Zealanders can get involved and play a part in protecting our environment from greenhouse gases. It is not only businesses and agriculture that can help reverse climate change trends - every household and individual can make a difference,” Marian Hobbs said.

For further information on reducing waste, see: http://www.climatechange.govt.nz/sectors/waste.html http://www.reducerubbish.govt.nz http://www.4million.org.nz

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>