Six years ago when I had the good fortune (or misfortune depending which way you look at it) to enjoy a brief flourishing as an 'it' girl and then write a book about it (not even on recycled paper, these days I’d insist!), thoughts of Green living weren’t at the top of my agenda - although I vaguely felt I was doing my bit.

By Julia Stephenson

Yes, I bought organic food from the farmers market, which I admit was as much about catering to my middleclass rus en herbe faux rural Marie Antoinette fantasy as it was about saving the planet.  Indeed my local farmers market in Chelsea was, and is still full of Goldman Sach wives wafting about carrying trugs, which they carefully deposit into the backs of their SUV's before whizzing off to yoga at the Harbour Club. 

But over the years I've become much greener.  90% of my diet at home is organic, locally grown and seasonal.  I've drastically cut down on my personal rubbish mountain by refusing packaging, recycling and keeping a worm compost bin on my roof terrace (more on this later).  And I gradually found myself replacing my interest in the social whirl with the political world, representing the Green Party in countless elections in Kensington and Chelsea.  Political parties are the parties I'm now most interested in, even if I do keep losing my deposit. 

 

Reports of the imminent global devastation that lies ahead unless we cut our carbon emissions make me keen to do as much as I can.  So last year I sold my car (14% of our carbon emissions are created by driving) and bought a bike which is a great relief as I live in central London and don't need a car.  A happy side effect is that I'm saving a fortune and avoiding the hideous bureaucracy and stress that owning a car now entails.

 

I try and buy as much English produce as possible and eat in season (better to eat non organic fresh local vegetables than organic food shipped round the world incurring huge carbon emissions).  I've installed a water filter so I don't have to buy expensive over packaged mineral water shipped from half way around the world.  Leave Fijian water for the Fijians!

 

I'm currently converting my loft into an extra room – the greenest option would be avoiding building work completely but I want the extra room, so as a compromise I'm doing it in the most eco friendly way possible, using organic paints and reclaimed materials. 

 

I'm cutting down further on my energy costs (well financial energy costs at least), by employing my inamorato who is conveniently a builder and currently being indoctrinated in my green ways.  It'll be cold on the roof this winter but they'll be no gas guzzling blow heater in my green house – he'll have to make do with a woolly hat covered in cling film.  I don't think he's looking forward to working for me very much - he insists my initials JS actually stand for Joseph Stalin - but I expect he'll come round and adapt to the Siberian conditions eventually. 

 

I'm also installing solar panels, 3 wind turbines, the first waterless unisex urinal in the UK, a rainwater harvesting system and learning to grow my own vegetables.  I plan on being self sufficient in my energy needs and hope to have enough electricity to sell back to the national grid within 6 months.  The Good Life in Chelsea! 

 

Even if you can't afford the time and expense of installing turbines and solar panels you can still source your energy from the sun and wind by switching your electricity over to a supplier that sources its energy from natural power like Ecotricity (www.ecotricity.com) or Good Energy (www.goodenergy.com ).   

 

But I've a long way to go before reaching eco nirvana for I undo my carbon brownie points with my extensive travel habit.  Although I now take trains when I travel to Europe I occasionally still fly (although I have cut down by 90%) and when it's raining and dark I take taxis.  To be honest, I take them even when it's sunny. 

 

Some aspects of greenery are easier to embrace than others.  However when it comes to rubbish I'm top of the form.  Every 2 hours the UK throws out enough rubbish to fill the Albert Hall, something that gives me nightmares.  If we don't want to sink under a sea of our own rubbish, or even worse, have to breathe in the toxic air created by the hundreds of new incinerators due to be built to deal with our over packaged throwaway culture, (incinerators emit dioxins, some of the most dangerous chemicals known to man) we have to take action now. 

 

Local councils faced with growing bills for using decreasing landfill sites, (scheduled to be almost completely filled by 2010) are slowly stepping up to the plate and providing most of us with facilities for recycling glass and paper but unfortunately there is little autonomy and great swathes of the country have difficulty recycling anything else.  Recycling plastic bottles, kitchen waste, batteries, old clothes and electrical equipment remain a recycling lottery depending on where you live. 

 

Fortunately these two informative websites are a godsend for any recycler - www.recycle-more.org will give details of your nearest recycling facilities countrywide, while www.wasteconnect.co.uk is an excellent resource for tracking down the closest place to recycle specific items.

 

But although recycling is currently seen as the holy grail of eco living it's important to remember it should really be a last resort.  The vital thing is to re-use and reduce our consumption in the first place.  Recycling is often a huge waste of resources.  The energy used to make a glass bottle or plastic cup, using it once then destroying it again to reassemble as exactly the same product is a vastly extravagant use of energy. 

 

Even worse, many of our recyclables now get shipped across the world to developing countries where the underpaid labour force, often made up of children, risk their health sorting through our toxic waste mountain for us.

 

And much of what we so diligently recycle ends up in landfill.  While 80% say they recycle regularly (though some of them may be exaggerating a bit!) a paltry 11% actually buy recycled products.  This means there just isn't the market for much of what we diligently recycle so it's vital to close the recycling loop by buying as many recycled products as possible.  Kitchen paper, toilet roll, envelopes and computer copy paper, for example, are now easy to buy.  Look out for recycled glass products, buy vintage/second hand clothes, and buy your furniture from auction to save the carbon emissions and environmental toxins created from making new furniture.  

 

EBay is very eco friendly, creating an endless market for our unwanted stuff.  If you can't sell something advertise it on the innovative site - www.freecycle.org - a worldwide free organisation that puts people and unwanted stuff in touch with each other, saving it being sent to landfill.

 

My council, and maybe yours too, doesn't take kitchen waste so I've bought a worm compost bin which I keep on my small patio. This magically transforms all my kitchen leftovers and lots of cardboard and paper into gorgeous crumbly compost that houseplants adore. 

 

The only trouble is that it takes up too much space on my terrace so I've sneakily dumped it onto my adjoining neighbour's flat roof.  He is an elegant balding banker and I have dreadful visions of my weighty bins collapsing through his roof and landing on his head.  I hope I can convince him that a worm toupee is a small price to pay for doing his bit to reduce the nations waste.  I find the idea of worms transforming kitchen leftovers irresistible.  Recently I've been getting delusions of grandeur a la Napoleon.  What's to stop me colonising all the unused flat roofs in my terrace and setting up miles of worm factories on them?  I fear could quite easily turn into the Bernard Mathews of worm farming.  

Finally, much of being green is about not doing rather than doing.  Just cutting down – for example, on loo flushing, travelling and shopping; refusing plastic bags and employing a waste-not-want-not wartime mentality - will make a real difference. 

Sometimes people ask what's the point of an individual doing anything when the planet is in such a terrible state?  What possible effect can one person buying recycled loo paper have on the world?  But taking action, even on the small personal level, is invigorating and inspires those around you to do their bit too. 

Far better to light a candle than curse the darkness and, as Edmund Burke wrote, 'Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could only do a little.'

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