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What It Takes 2007:
The Green Adventure
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What It Takes to Make Global Warming CoolAlison Gannett, champion freeskier, grassroots environmental activist
As told to Kalee Thompson
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"Pretty much everybody is aware of global warming now. They know they need to make a difference. But a lot of people are having trouble taking action. If you can involve outdoor sports—skiing and surfing and fun things—people become more motivated. They have a personal, emotional connection with a sport that might possibly go away in their lifetime.
"I'm traveling around, talking to people about what they can do during the day and giving a presentation about my global adventures at night. My presentation is promoted more as an adventure sports show and less as a climate change show. I think that's the ticket because otherwise you're just preaching to the choir. If I'm in a surf town, I talk a lot about surfing. I try to tie in the predominant sport in the area. That way, people realize, hey, this is going to affect me. This is affecting my wave, my wildflowers, my snow. I better get on it.
"What I'm really trying to do is to motivate people to be systematic in being green. I encourage people to start small and work up. The methodology I came up with is called CROP. It stands for Calculate your carbon footprint, Reduce your carbon footprint, Offset your carbon footprint, and Produce your own power. In that order. It's very easy to calculate the impact of your whole life: your transportation, your purchases, your home. And then there are great tools you can use to reduce your carbon footprint. I try to teach people to do the easy things first: Change your lightbulbs, get an energy audit, inflate your tires.
"We need to get in gear. It would be nice if we had time on our side. But we literally have five or ten years and the tipping point could be reached; we're going to be headed into catastrophic weather patterns. We're not going to be having this conversation about skiing or surfing—we're going to be talking about survival."
Take Action: Calculate your carbon footprint at www.climatecrisis.net, then visit sites like green.yahoo.com, www.treehugger.com, and www.idealbite.com to find ways to start reducing.
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