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Welcome to Drawdown EcoChallenge!

Watch the short video below to learn the basics.
You'll be an EcoChallenge expert in no time!

EcoChallenge.org
Drawdown EcoChallenge
April 3 - April 24, 2019

Addy Davidson

Climate steps

"Create new, better, planet-healthy habits."

Points Total

  • 0 Today
  • 0 This Week
  • 1,544 Total

Participant Impact

  • up to
    1
    documentaries
    watched
  • up to
    40
    miles
    travelled by bike
  • up to
    4
    people
    helped
  • up to
    3
    donations
    made
  • up to
    220
    gallons of water
    have been saved
  • up to
    125
    minutes
    spent learning
  • up to
    204
    pounds of CO2
    have been saved

Challenges

Land Use

Buy Bamboo

#35 Bamboo

When they are available, I will purchase products made from bamboo instead of wood, plastic, or metal.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Transport

Stay on the Ground

#43 Airplanes, #63 Telepresence

Instead of traveling by plane, I will find an alternative way to accomplish the goals of an upcoming trip (i.e. telepresence, vacation locally).

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Land Use

Forest-Friendly Foods 2

#5 Tropical Forests

I will replace or remove the palm oil, coffee, and cocoa products in my current diet that are known to contribute to deforestation.

COMPLETED 21 OF 22
DAILY CHALLENGE

Buildings and Cities

Go by Bike

#59 Bike Infrastructure

I will commute by bike 2 mile(s) per day and avoid sending up to 1.47 lbs of CO2 into Earth's atmosphere.

COMPLETED 20 OF 22
DAILY CHALLENGE

Materials

Launch a Recycling Program

#56 Industrial Recycling

I will set up a recycling center at my workplace or school.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Materials

Recycle Everything I Can

#55 Household Recycling

I will recycle all materials that are accepted by local haulers or drop stations in my community.

COMPLETED 20 OF 22
DAILY CHALLENGE

Materials

Mulch the Base of Trees and Plants

#46 Water Saving - Home

I will prevent water runoff and increase absorbency by mulching the base of trees and plants in my yard.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Materials

Install a Toilet Bank

#46 Water Saving - Home

I will reduce the amount of water flushed and save up to 11 gallons (41 L) of water per day by installing a toilet tank bank.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Food

Keep Track of Wasted Food

#3 Reduced Food Waste

I will keep a daily log of food I throw away during the EcoChallenge, either because it went bad before I ate it, I put too much on my plate, or it was scraps from food preparation.

COMPLETED 20 OF 22
DAILY CHALLENGE

Transport

Research and Consider Switching to a Hybrid or Electric Vehicle

#26 Electric Vehicles

I will spend at least 60 minutes researching and weighing my options to see if a hybrid or electric vehicle makes sense for my lifestyle.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Transport

Explore Other Transport Solutions

All Transport Solutions

I will spend at least 30 minutes researching other Drawdown Transport Solutions.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Food

Donate

#21 Clean Cookstoves

I will donate to nonprofits that install clean cookstoves in low-income countries.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Food

Explore Other Food Solutions

All Food Solutions

I will spend at least 30 minutes researching other Drawdown Food Solutions.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Women and Girls

Give a Microloan

#62 Women Smallholders

I will give 4 microloan(s) to women who need help starting a business.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Land Use

Support Indigenous Peoples' Land Management

#39 Indigenous Peoples' Land Management

I will donate to The Nature Conservancy, which works with Indigenous Peoples to secure land tenure and resource rights, support improved governance and local institutions, assist in natural resource mapping, planning and management; and strengthen livelihoods and sustainable economic development.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Electricity Generation

Support Microgeneration in Low Income Countries

#48 In-Stream Hydro, #76 Micro Wind, #78 Microgrids

I will make a donation to a nonprofit that installs microgeneration in low income countries.

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Electricity Generation

Watch a Video about Methane Digesters

#30 Methane Digesters (large), #64 Methane Digesters (small)

I will watch a video about methane digesters (also commonly known as anaerobic digesters).

Completed
One-Time Challenge

Feed

  • Addy Davidson 4/24/2019 9:28 AM
    We do a lot of these things already, from prior years' activities.  But the ecochallenge did require me to donate more which I think is a good reminder.
    Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Transport Stay on the Ground
    What was your process like for restructuring your trip? How can you avoid more air travel in the future?
    Addy Davidson 4/23/2019 10:23 PM
    We are curtailing our notion of retirement travel.  It's a big, wonderful world, but how much pollution of it should we create in order to enjoy it?  I think there are things to enjoy nearby, even if we never make it to Tierra Del Fuego.
    Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Transport Explore Other Transport Solutions
    What did you find out? What is the most interesting fact you learned?
    Addy Davidson 4/22/2019 9:32 AM
    In the U.S., we're arrogant. NPR had a segment talking about subway/rail, and how our building of this infrastructure is always, ALWAYS more expensive than in other developed countries.  Countries with Unions.  Countries that pay a living wage.  Study after study can't seem to figure out why.  Well, one of the interviewees had a "why".  He said, we aren't sent to other countries to figure out what they do better or right.  We think we know the answer already.  The other factor was too many layers of government fighting.  We're seeing that in California right now.  The Feds, the State, the regional authorities -- everybody throws up a roadblock.  Everybody has a "better" idea than the other guy.  We're too arrogant to get out of our own ways.
    Read More
  • Addy Davidson 4/21/2019 2:37 PM
    Uh-oh!  Just realized that Almond Milk contains Vit A Palmitate, which might be a Palm Oil derivative.  Ugh.
    Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Land Use Buy Bamboo
    Are bamboo alternatives readily available in your community? If not, what are other sustainable alternatives?
    Addy Davidson 4/21/2019 11:37 AM
    Bamboo Spoons!  We do have bamboo alternatives for many things.  I need to commit to buying bamboo toilet paper/paper towels.
    Read More
  • Addy Davidson 4/20/2019 12:00 PM
    Trying to catch up on some of the "one-time" challenges today.  Mulching trees.  Uh!  Office recycling should be easy since we own the office.  I have to prune the vinca major as well.  Dunno if plant mulch counts as mulch, though it serves the same purpose.
    Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Materials Mulch the Base of Trees and Plants
    Name some of the human activities impacting the health of water systems, both locally (your watershed) and globally (freshwater and oceans). What can you do to improve the health of water systems?
    Addy Davidson 4/20/2019 11:58 AM
    I feel, here, where we are asking about the "health" of water systems, we have to look at industrial-sized solutions.  I'm always unhappy about that because -politics- raises its ugly head.  I am happy to make personal changes (we collect our rainwater, we do laundry-to-landscape grey water recycling).  I find political solutions so very frustrating.  But, since you asked, support for the restoration of wetlands, specifically in the SF Bay area, where I live.  Reduction in all things chemical going down the drains.
    Read More
    • Addy Davidson 4/21/2019 10:15 AM
      Glad to hear you are helping with the mangroves in your area, Noel L.  That would be a very interesting ecology I don' know much about.  Re the laundry-to-landscape, we were lucky on the configuration of our house, in that we could pipe it.  Have a line that runs from the washer exhaust out to the garden.  We just move the hoses from tree to tree, and let gravity do the rest.  (Photo is of the laundry manifold.  Water comes from under the house [raised foundation] down the fence in the black pipe to the white pipe which has an air gap, then black pool hoses feed the water out to our trees.  Normally all of this is covered up by 2 ft high Vinca Major, but I went to town yesterday pruning it.)
      Laundrymanifold.jpg 2.28 MB
      Read More
    • Noel L 4/20/2019 10:32 PM
      Also, I only just set up a bucket / tub to collect my laundrey greywater for gardening.  Hopefully no more tap water for my 40+ plants.  
      Read More
    • Noel L 4/20/2019 10:31 PM
      Totally agree Addy.  Politics and greed are so horrible.  We have a federal election in 4 wks.  My local Senator does not believe in climate change, he has been in Senate for 25 yrs (think Trump wanna-be).  This election has been called the climate election.  I am hoping his time is over.  Polls are looking good, but who knows.  Locally, our mangroves are starting to be looked after a bit better.  I volunteer with a few group to try and improve things.  Fingers crossed.
      Read More
    • Addy Davidson 4/20/2019 2:25 PM
      Well, Stephanie, I'm afraid to say that an awful lot of money goes into supposed industrial-sized solutions with very little to show for it (which is one of the reasons I'm a big pessimistic, above).  My daughter works with aquaculture and wetland conservation.  It's a very important cause, gets too little attention, and (IMHO) isn't progressing anywhere near fast enough because too many people are still trying to figure out how to make a fast buck out of the bay, rather than helping the bay survive as a flourishing and balanced ecosystem.  Multiply that by several hundred bays and several hundreds of thousands of fast-buck seekers, and I just want to retreat into my shell and protect my own small plot of ground.  But of course, we can't do that.  We have to fight and write and march and donate and arm-wrestle just about everybody to wake them up!  Glad to hear you are in on the fight.  
      Read More
    • Stephanie Goulet 4/20/2019 12:53 PM
      I have such a strong agreement about your point that we need industrial-sized solutions. It's awesome that you are supporting the restoration of the wetlands. I was listening to the Project Drawdown podcast recently and learned that wetlands and peatlands are a couple of the only places where there's no limit to the amount of carbon it can capture. They're so vitally important, and we have to protect them!
      Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Land Use Support Indigenous Peoples' Land Management
    Indigenous speaker and activist Winona LaDuke says that, "most indigenous ceremonies, if you look to their essence, are about the restoration of balance — they are a reaffirmation of our relationship to creation. That is our intent: to restore, and then to retain balance and honor our part in creation." Why is balance important to sustainability?
    Addy Davidson 4/20/2019 11:29 AM
    Balance is natures greatest interest.  Anything out of balance is headed to destruction in some way.  I went to the Irish National Stud, where they had the skeleton of their great racehorse Arkle, and I'll never forget the placard nearby, where they said the horse was thoroughly studied after death to find out how he had been so dominant (for future breeding reference).  What they found was that Arkle was right in the middle on every measurement.  Nothing was too much, too long, too short, too narrow, too anything.  Everything in that horse was 100% in balance, and _that_ was the reason he was so dominant on the racecourse.  Nature loves balance.   For agriculture: Too much production depletes the soil.  Too little, chemicals are poured into the land, which poisons natural biota.  Too many people means too much clearing.  Too little clearing, animals can't graze.  Nature wants  things to be right in the very middle.  Nature is MOST productive when everything is in the middle.
    Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Food Explore Other Food Solutions
    What did you find out? What is the most interesting fact you learned?
    Addy Davidson 4/20/2019 11:23 AM
    The information about reforestation and farmland restoration was very interesting to me, because desertification is such a concern and I didn't know much about the efforts to turn that around.  I've donated to one of the groups working on this one, since many of the efforts take place on the other side of the globe.  Good work, but not something I can lend a personal hand to.
    Read More
  • Reflection Question
    Electricity Generation Watch a Video about Methane Digesters
    What does your vision of a sustainable community look like? What would need to be changed in order for such vision to become reality?
    Addy Davidson 4/20/2019 11:05 AM
    It seems like methane digesters and the usable biogas is an excellent possibility for 3rd world countries to embrace (countries where they don't have country-wide solutions already).  But what about 1st world countries?  We waste like *mad*, don't rely on wood to cook, allow methane to attack the atmosphere, and consider ourselves too "modern" for such a system.  In the U.S., we have to stop thinking we know everything.  That's what would need to be changed for any sustainable community vision to become a reality.
    Read More
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