New Delhi: Eat together, cycle or walk to nearby places, take stairs not lifts, play outdoor and not spend much time on gadgets, avoid remotes, prefer yoga over treadmill, give books to juniors, and avoid flights and use video conferencing. Do all this, and you could save at least ₹ 10,000 annually on your electricity bills, besides helping the cause of environment by avoiding release of thousands of kilograms of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year.

These are just some of the measures among the dozens that the Union environment ministry has suggested in its low-carbon lifestyles toolkit unveiled on Tuesday. It contains a list of practical climate-friendly suggestions that can be adopted by individuals, educational institutions and workplaces, with detailed calculations on how these simple actions can reduce annual CO2 emission and create savings.

Prior to the Paris climate change conference in December, India had pledged a 33-35% cut in carbon emission intensity by 2030, and adopting a sustainable low carbon lifestyle was an integral part of the efforts that India had promised to undertake to cut down carbon emission intensity.

“Low-carbon initiatives lays emphasis that each of us needs to play a strategic role to help the country achieve its targets... It seeks to demonstrate that simple individual actions when adopted can have a significant overall bearing. It arms trainers and users with a wide range of climate-friendly examples and everyday actions which, when aggregated across a larger population, will have significant impacts and contributions towards CO2 reduction for countries and communities to meet their INDCs (intended nationally determined contributions)," the document said.

The toolkit provides a quantitative estimation of the reduction in CO2 emissions at a micro-level and cost savings accrued by implementing the above-mentioned actions.

It suggests people “go out and play instead of watching TV or playing on a device" and emphasises that it can reduce annual electricity bill by ₹ 159-643 and reduce annual CO2 emissions by 22-89kg.

Eating together and heating food at one go can reduce unnecessary use of the microwave oven and in turn reduce electricity bill by ₹ 217 and annual CO2 emissions by 30kg.

Similarly, doing yoga for an hour everyday instead of running on a treadmill can reduce annual electricity bills by ₹ 3,238 and annual CO2 emissions by 46kg.

Maintaining textbooks well and handing them to juniors can result in reduction of annual CO2 emissions by 11,250kg, while sending paper for recycling rather than disposing it in garbage can result in reduction of CO2 emissions by 2,700kg every year.

Taking stairs and reducing 50 lift moves between the ground and third floor can reduce annual electricity bill by ₹ 13,317 and annual CO2 emissions by 1,221kg, the document said.

Using energy-efficient devices for lighting and star-rated electrical appliances, solar appliances like solar water heater, drying clothes in the sun, conserving rainwater, energy and water audit, inflating tyres regularly, managing and reducing food waste, walking to schools and other places nearby and avoiding long flights are among other suggestions.

Last year, in the run-up to the Paris climate change conference in December, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had enthusiastically taken up the cause of sustainable lifestyles and sustainable consumption across the globe to tackle climate change.

Later, when the new global climate deal was finalized, the agreement recognized that “sustainable lifestyles and sustainable patterns of consumption and production, with developed country parties taking the lead, play an important role in addressing climate change".

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