“Think globally, act locally” is a phrase that has been said when we talk about saving the environment. It means that everyone can, in their everyday life, affect global warming just by doing smaller tasks that cares for our planet. To act locally might be rather hard when you are about to travel. Tourism is one of our biggest environmental villains and here follows some guide lines on how you can make your vacation as environmentally friendly as possible.
How you can affect depends of course on how you travel, if you travel by car you might want to reconsider to travel by train, but if not, maybe you could use some renewable fuels like, ethanol, hydrogen, RME etc. and try and bring as many people as you can on your trip so that all the seats are taken. And if you are flying do the same and also choose a company that uses better engines where carbon per passenger is reduced.
Carbon emissions are one of the biggest causes of global warming and flight traffic stands for about two percent of that but in about thirty years this will have been increased by one percent and that is completely in the wrong direction. We are working together for an environmental sustainability and for that to happen you will have to fly only when you must; when traveling overseas for example. When you are traveling somewhere you just as easily could reach by train but thinking flying will take shorter time, try and rethink. Train is more eco-friendly plus you don’t have to check in and check out from the gate which also takes a lot of time.
You might think that traveling by boat is the best way to go, but in fact it is not. The seas are without a doubt the most exposed target for environmental degradation. Huge emissions from oil tanks and factories use the ocean as a carpet they sweep their crap under and hope that no one will notice. Traveling by boat is not the best choice for you but if you have to, make sure that you choose a ferry that doesn’t travel that fast and has something that calls Nox which is a cleaning system that reduces the effluents from the boat that leads to acidification.
When you are about to pick a hotel which are eco labeled and while you’re there try not and change the towels every day. You do not do it at home, so why now? Reconsider having the air conditioner on, open the windows and have some fresh air but if it is too hot to stand, see if the hotel has a ventilator.
For yours and the local areas sake, try not and rent a room in one of the big hotel chains. Rent a room in a bed and breakfast, local farm, inherent, pension or something similar. This way you will get a closer look at the locals and the money you pay to live there goes to the local economy and not to the already rich brands.
I know, some of these things sound rather boring, but every detail that you need to find is online.
These are just some options you can do. Remember that we want to make the world a better place for the children of our world!