The Twelve Days of Christmas

It’s getting to that time of year once more- a time for family, delicious food and excessive partying but also a time, perhaps, for reflection and a look ahead to the coming year.

Here at SE2 we’ve been putting together our annual Christmas newsletter; our chance to share some of our favourite projects from this year and take a closer look at the exciting things we’ll be working on in 2013.

Before it’s finished however, and in the midst of some particularly nasty weather (-6°C and icy winds and snow to look forward to next week!) we realised we needed something positive to give us that warm fuzzy glow. There’ll be more of our usual energy related chat and a look at the good things happening in our industry later in our newsletter, upcoming blogs and New Year Seminar on The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of 2012 (watch this space!), but for now we’d like to present you with an alternative 12 days of Christmas: 12 particularly positive environmental titbits from 2012! We hope they make you feel good as you’re gearing up for this festive season, and don’t forget to check back next week for numbers 5-8!

On the first day of Christmas…A free range chicken in an apple tree.

Or should that be a cherry, damson, medlar or quince tree? In May 2012 our local university- Greenwich- came top of People and Planet’s university Green League, and the cultivation of a traditional orchard on an old discus pitch was just one of the projects praised by judges. Other positive, environmentally-friendly schemes include the establishment of beehives (which have produced over 100 pots of honey so far!) and raised beds for growing veg. Caterers at the university have also worked with the charity Sustain to source free range eggs and organic milk for a minimal change in cost, and use sustainable fish and ethically sourced meat. The university has also reduced its carbon emissions by 22% since 2005; you can read more about their inspiring work here.

On the second day of Christmas…Tonnes more toddling tortoises!

In June of this year conservationists were saddened by the death of Lonesome George, the famous centenarian tortoise from the Galapagos Islands. Believed to be the last of his kind, his passing was thought to mark the extinction of the Pinta Island subspecies. Since then however, at least 17 more tortoises with similar genetic traits to George have been discovered on the Islands, and some may even be from the same genus. Perhaps George was getting around faster than originally thought…

On the third day of Christmas…Three fantastic fishy facts

The last few months have been especially positive in the fight for more sustainable seafood. In November Tesco announced that it would be putting local species including cuttlefish, witch sole and black bream on its shelves in response to customers’ rising demand for more environmentally-friendly marine life, and this week Sainsburys followed suit,  with its announcement that from 2013 all of its own brand Maldives tuna will be 100% sustainable.

 Fish also had another reason to love November, as the prestigious James Dyson design award was gifted to a specially designed ‘humane’ system that aims to make commercial fishing more sustainable. Invented by Dan Watson, a young British designer, it incorporates a series of illuminated rings which allow non-target and juvenile fish to swim free uninjured.

On the fourth day of Christmas…Fresh food forever?

In Britain we throw away an estimated 7.2 million tonnes of food and drink annually- a figure which is further exacerbated around Christmas time.  In the last few years there has been a big push towards cutting food waste however, and in 2012 some clever technology was introduced in a bid to reduce this figure even further.

  If you bought a pack of strawberries, tomatoes or avocadoes over the summer and noticed a little black square of cardboard at the bottom then you may have been a lucky recipient of an ethylene-absorbing strip. It may not have looked particularly revolutionary, but ethylene is the hormone that causes fruit and veg to ripen, and one supermarket chain has estimated that these little black squares could save 1.6 million packs of tomatoes and 350,000 packs of avocados from being thrown away every year!

 Elsewhere, a US firm has developed technology that it claims can keep a loaf of bread fresh for 60 days without use of excess preservatives or irradiation. Although initially developed as a useful technique for getting fresh food to war zones, many have been quick to point out the food waste such methods could reduce. Yum!