Stuart Blackwood
Growing up in Jamaica, Stuart Blackwood had a very different experience with climate change compared to those of us who grew up in the United States or Central New York. In Jamaica, Blackwood grew up with floods, drought, and hurricanes that made him realize from a young age that these climate events can have a big impact on an individual’s life.
“I do remember having public service announcements all the time,” Blackwood said. “They kept telling us to not waste water and to conserve electricity. I grew up in a country where every week there was a power outage somewhere.”
It’s those memories of having to be environmentally conscious at a young age that Blackwood still keeps today. It’s made him more aware of the things Americans take for granted like clean running water, which is supplied daily, and a consistent supply of energy.
Being aware of climate change his whole life, Blackwood decided to take on the CCAA Carbon Challenge earlier this year. In joining CCAA and working through the Carbon Challenge, Blackwood learned that his job as a physician is a cause for his high carbon footprint. So, Blackwood set off to find ways to reduce his footprint and use his relatively higher income in more eco-friendly ways.
The first thing Blackwood turned to was food as he and his wife committed to reducing the number of cattle and dairy products they would consume. Now, the two eat vegetarian for at least one meal a week and will try to slowly increase that frequency. To have a constant supply of vegetables Blackwood said he’s been farming more frequently.
“This year we have grown maybe twice as much produce in our backyard,” Blackwood said. “Everything from watermelons, to pumpkins, to sugar snap peas, lettuce, tomatoes, you name it.”
In that same garden, Blackwood installed a system of hoses that would conserve water and he also would look out for rainy days to avoid overwatering his plants. Those plants aren’t put to waste either as Blackwood has started composting as well. Along with the plants, Blackwood has begun composting paper, cardboard, and even old clothes. Blackwood created a Hügelkultur, leaning on the German practice of growing plants on a thin layer of soil over a raised bed of actively composting material. Once those materials are composted they go back into the soil to feed Blackwood’s garden, creating a cycle where items that would usually be thrown out are helping to grow the food that lands on the Blackwoods’ plates.
Another benefit of composting that Blackwood noticed is that it has changed his spending patterns. Previously, he may not have looked at how an item is packaged, but now he finds himself buying things in glass or paper packaging, instead of plastic. Blackwood likes to use the glass bottle for storage and adds the paper to his compost bin.
Inside his home, Blackwood looked to his lights fixtures as his next step in the Carbon Challenge. Blackwood bought a kilowatt measurement device that measures how many kilowatts of energy each device is burning. After using the device, Blackwood noticed that the actual energy usage of some of his lights varied from what they were supposed to be, and said that was causing his energy consumption to increase.
“Every single lightbulb in the house is now LED,” Blackwood said.
The advantage of LED lights is that they are recyclable and reduce your carbon footprint by a third compared to incandescent lights. Likewise, investing in solar energy is a great way to make your home more efficient, which is exactly what Blackwood did. For almost a year now, Blackwood has had a 12-kilowatt solar system on his home.
“We pretty much cover almost 95% of all our electrical bills with that system,” Blackwood said.
In taking on the Carbon Challenge, Blackwood found that the website had a wealth of information that gave him ways to invest his income in more eco-conscious ways. A side effect that Blackwood found was that these carbon-friendly changes didn’t only help the environment but were also economical, like his LED lights, and healthy, like switching to eating less meat.
Having lived his life in two different countries, Blackwood has grown to understand the global scale of climate change. Blackwood now prides himself on being a “student of the world” and learning about what is happening in other countries. Ultimately, it has led him to emphasize the importance of reducing your carbon footprint and coming together as a world to solve climate change.
“Climate change affects everybody,” Blackwood said. “It’s not just an American problem, it’s an everybody problem.”
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