Ryan MacMillan

A friend complained to me the other day that her housemate never lets her turn the heating up, suggesting she just wears a jumper instead. Did this no-nonsense solution stem from her housemate’s rugged origins on his dad’s farm or a concern for the environment, I asked her. “No, no,” she replied, “I really think he has a thing for jumpers.”

A penchant for woolen knitwear may seem to be one of those harmless peccadilloes, in the same league as metal detection, and swinging, but our friend could be sadly misguided. In a brave attempt to steal a march on the openness procession, the clothing brand Patagonia provides shoppers with the Footprint Chronicles of a few of its popular products. It’s hard to see how Patagonia expects to generate more custom by exposing its eco-faults in this way but I’m encouraged by their efforts. Take the Wool 2 Crew top for instance, which generates 21 Kg of CO2 but weighs only 200g. I don’t really know what those numbers mean either – it’s for the environment, so there – but rest assured, our sweater hugging chum will soon be receiving an earful about his fashion beliefs.

So in fashion as the issue is, there is an unending list of tools and tricks for us to employ to reduce our so-called carbon footprint. Some work better than others. The new travel networking site, Dopplr, (which I’m afraid is still in invite-only beta form - wink wink) has introduced its own carbon offset tool which calculates the total carbon production of each member’s entire network of travellers. A lonely soul, I only have two “friends” on my network but between us we have produced 40Kg of carbon this year, totalling an offset bill of $1,750. Of that, I personally owe a whopping $36.95, which is good, right? I don’t get out much.

What if carbon offset calculations were applied to our bigger networks on more established sites? Forget it Facebook, there’s no point sending out the invoices.

Some really silly figures and pseudo-science have arisen from the recent focus on climate change; some great tools have been made, many poor ones too. If we were talking about a new operating system, I would say stand back for a couple of years and let everyone else do the testing. Sadly, we can’t afford be so reticent on this issue. My advice if it’s cold at home this winter then? Stay in, crank the thermostat up a notch, invite all your mates round, get close and get good old naked.

Oh, and err, hello everyone, it’s nice to be on the team!