Alice note: I wrote this last week, saved it as draft and forgot about it. After all the heat wave headlines this week, even more reason to consider it...
I went low-tech today and hung my laundry out to dry the old-fashioned way--on a clothesline. Why? Mainly because the Al Gore movie message is still bouncing around in my head.
What other low-tech things do we tend to forget about as options, in our libraries? And what are we doing to make our libraries *green*?
While I'm thinking about it, have you thought of making your libraries a temporary respite for telecommuting workers who don't have A/C?
Or who need a place to meet up with other workers once in awhile?
Advertise your library as a central meet-up place once a week--and then have wi-fi, plenty of plugs and moblie phone reception, and closed rooms where people can talk freely without disturbing others...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
I do such stupid little things. I walk around the library all day hitting the energy saver button on copiers. I turn off my printer when I'm not using it, and my monitor and light when I leave my office. My PC when I leave for the day.
At home it is much easier to be green. I hang up my laundry on a regular basis, not just to be green, but because I prefer the way it smells when it is clean. Compact fluorescents in every light, energy star appliances, multiple heating zones, no car, etc.. On the other hand at home there are multiple computers on almost all the time, so the footprint is probably still pretty big.
Well Deborah, if the two of us are doing the stupid little things, then I bet there's a heckuva lot more people out there ALSO doing the stupid little things...which can lead to some big results. Bravo for your energy (non)usage and I challenge us all to look around our libraries (and homes) and see what other little actions we can take...
I'd like to think that libraries are opening themselves to more than just telecommuters with no air-conditioning.
Those without air-conditioning are most often the poor and the elderly, and while I suppose serving them isn't as hip as setting up telecommuter lounges, I think it's just as important.
Libraries in Chicago have for several years been working with the Chicago Department of Human Services to act as cooling centers. I blogged about it last summer. A current link to information about Chicago's warming and cooling centers program is here.
Post a Comment