New Riot Site

The Riot for Austerity: 90% Emissions Reduction Project has a new home!

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Bloggers for Postive Global Change

Ages ago now Nikki tagged me with this Bloggers for Postive Global Change award thingy. It was really very sweet of her and it’s taken an embarassingly long time for me to pass it on.

My own efforts for postive global change, I feel, are rather haphazard and very small scale. I’d like to pass the meme on to Simple Living: Simplify + Reduce. Miranda and Sharon started the Riot for Austerity 90% Emissions Reduction Project which has bloggers participating from all over the world. That truly is blogging for Postive Global Change!

Meme Rules

It’s easy to participate in this meme. At minimum, you can proudly display the BPGC badge (it’s available in two varieties: Transparent GIF and JPEG with white background) on your blog and bask in the glow of our collective good will. If you are sharing the kudos, however, please make sure you pass this list of rules to the blogs you are tagging.

The participation rules are simple:

1. When you get tagged, write a post with links to up to 5 blogs that you think are trying to change the world in a positive way.
2. In your post, make sure you link back to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme.
3. Leave a comment or message for the bloggers you’re tagging, so they know they’re now part of the meme.
4. Optional: Proudly display the “Bloggers For Positive Global Change” award badge with a link to the post that you write up.

Yep, I Stuffed It Up

Thank goodness, but I mucked up my calcuation. That’s what happens when you post late at night. So the correct calculation:

9249.6 km divided by 100 then multiplied by 17.1 gives me 1581.6 litres of petrol.

And hey, that’s not so bad. Way under the American average anyway.

Some Numbers

I actually have some numbers already. Not too sure about them, but they’re a start.

Using the Energywise fuel economy guide and the numbers I gave Nikki (see the comments on the First Things First post), I worked out that my car’s fuel economy is a staggeringly awful 17.1 litres per 100 km.

I really hope I’ve stuffed up my estimates of both how much petrol I put in it and how far I drive it because using that fuel economy number to calculate how much petrol we used last year gives a really high number of litres used last year.

Remember the rule:

Average American usage is 1892.705892 (let’s say we round up to 1900) Litres PER PERSON, PER YEAR. So this would be 7600 litres for my family of four. A 90 percent reduction would be 190 litres PER PERSON, PER YEAR or a total of 760 litres of petrol for the next 52 weeks.

So where are we right now?

Using an odometer reading taken tonight and my WOF records I worked out that over the last year we drove 9249.6 km which sounds about right to cover the about town trips and two family holidays which involved a lot of driving. That doesn’t sound too bad, right?

Well when I use the figure of 17.1 litres per 100 km to figure out how much petrol was used, look what happens:

9249.6 km divided by 100 then multiplied by 17.1 gives me 15816.816 litres of petrol.

Which simply can’t be right. Not when the average American usage is 7600 litres. Please someone tell me where I stuffed it up. I must have stuffed it up. There is a reason I did a degree in Classical Studies and not Mathematics you know ;>

So now, while I’m reeling from that little revelation I guess all I can do now is start keeping a detailed driving log and try and figure out more accurately what my car’s fuel economy is.

Oh, and of course try not to use more than 14.6 litres of petrol per week for the next year!

By the way, Nikki has already posted her audit in all the categories already!

Ok, So My Car Sucks (Petrol)

how about yours?

Want to make a start on saving petrol? Reduce your CO2 emissions, save the world etc. etc. etc.? I’ve just discovered the Fuel Saver website.

Good news: it’s a NZ made website, so the information is relevant. Bad news: my model of car has a fuel efficiency rating of 1 1/2 stars out of 6.

Bugger. Now I have one more reason to hate the wretched thing.

Still, it doesn’t tell me the what the fuel economy of my car actually is. Thanks to Nikki’s comment on my last post I am not optimistic, but luckily I have found a set of instructions to follow so I can work it out.

Once I have some results I’ll work out what we can do about it. My favourite option right now is to move to within walking distance of my parents’ house. Preferably next door…

First Things First..

1. Gasoline.Average American usage is 500 gallons PER PERSON, PER YEAR. A 90 percent reduction would be 50 gallons PER PERSON, PER YEAR.
* No reduction in emissions for ethanol or biodiesel.
* Public transportation and Waste Veggie Oil Fuel are deemed to get 100 mpg, and should be calculated accordingly.

(Quoted from the rules for the Riot for Austerity 90% Emissions Reduction Project)

1 Gallon = 3.785411784 Litres so 500 gallons = 1892.705892 Litres.
100 mpg = 160.934 4 kilometres per 3.785411784 Litres

But what is the average New Zealand usage? How many litres do we (personally) use at the moment? Is it better or worse than the average? How many kilometres does my car get out of a litre of petrol? Why are we still averaging the same kilometres a week despite several weeks of Car-Free Tuesdays?

I’m really going to focus on this for a while. Mostly because that last point is really bugging me. Despite my personal efforts to not use the car, as far as I can tell we ‘re still driving about the same distance.

So the next step is to answer those tough questions. And if you happen to stumble across any useful stats re the average NZ petrol usage, let me know!

By the way, this is a new, local site about global warming which has a very handy page about other stuff you can do to reduce your personal emissions as well as what you can do after you’ve sorted yourself out.

Focus

Nikki suggested to me that I needed to find something to focus on and this might be it.

If you read the same sites I link to, then you are probably already aware of the Riot for Austerity 90% Emissions Reduction Project (is it too soon to call it a movement?).

I think to make it relevant to me, all the targets would have to be translated into New Zealand averages. It’s a lot to think about.

If you’re intrigued, have a look at the rules.

Then if you’re still keen, maybe we can do it together?