With an alleged audience of 2bn and 7 simultaneous concerts around the world, Live Earth created quite a fuss. So we went along to check it out, see if it could really match its hype and hyperbole…certainly, entertainment wise it hit all the spots, an amazing line up with each artist restricted to a ‘best of’ 3-4 songs. The message and all the celebs wheeled out to support it were a little more self conscious as if they didnt want to be the party pooper with the serious message and stop all the fun. Some were almost apologetic about having to real off some fact around the amount of carbon saved by an individual action. Yet it’s important to bear in mind that that Live Earth is just the start, a start of a three year campaign by Al Gore and Live Earth to drive individual action and force an international governmental response. If only 1% of the audience of 2bn, that’s 20m people, took the message to heart over the weekend and start to take concerted individual action, that’s a phenomenal amount of CO2 saved there and then and makes a mockery of those who criticise the concerts for their carbon footprint. A good start, let’s hope they build on it…

Some findings from a poll being conducted by the UK Environment Agency in the run up to World Environment day (which is tomorrow!!):

41% of people surveyed in the UK say they are doing something to tackle climate change.

The remaining 59% of people not taking any action against climate change consists of:

- 37% who say they are not doing anything, and

- 21% who say they don’t know what to do…

Even in a country where global warming is so prevalent in the national press there is clearly still a long way to go to really unleash the power of individuals to make a difference. Again we say get on the EarthFireIce Map and pledge to make a difference. Its free. Its easy and it counts…

As we stood in the wind and rain on monday, stopping random passers by to interview them for our upcoming documentary, a strange realisation came across us….most people get it. in fact almost everyone gets it. (OK, so our sample was not statistically significant but bear with me…) We asked people whether individual action could make any difference against climate change. We asked loaded questions like ’shouldn’t solving climate change be the government’s responsibility?’ We asked ‘are individuals powerless’? We expected many people, at least half, to agree, to say it was governments’ problem to solve, that nothing individuals could do would make a difference. Yet person after person told us all the things individuals should be doing, how everyone’s little bit can count. It was an eye-opener. And it made us think that the problem is not so much willingness as just empowerment - showing people how they can make a difference, telling them what they should be doing. Some companies are starting to take a lead here, but most governments have not yet started this. This is tempered by the fact that this is the UK and climate change enjoys an amazing high media profile unlike the vast majority of other countries, US included, where is rarely registers. But if a couple from Texas who we interviewed got it and talked about what can be done, there is hope!!

I came across the Innocent Drinks website today - for those of us in the UK and other western european countries, you’ll be familiar with those very tasty fruit smoothies. The website is very cool, but what really stuck in my mind was the whole discussion they’ve encouraged on their site and on their blog around reducing the carbon footprint for one of their drinks. They openly admit they dont have all the answers, they’re open about what they are currently not doing or doing poorly. Plus they give practical suggestions, just like our very own pledges, for what individuals can do in their daily lives to start to make a difference. Awesome. It’s so refreshing to see companies start to approach it in this way and educate their users about individual action. Let’s hope more companies start to do this, it’s a complex area and companies have an enormous role to play in educating people everywhere.

Just saw today that Lewis Gordon Pugh, adventurer and swimming nut, is going to swim a full one kilometer at the north pole to highlight the fact that there is not ice where there should be…his swim would not have been possible just a few years ago. I completely relate to Lewis, not just because he is raising awareness like us, not just because like us he is highlighting melting polar ice caps, but also because i, like Lewis is about to, went swimming in arctic water….except that my scrawny body lasted all of about 3 seconds in the water, and it was not pretty….watch the youtube video here for the full gorey 60 seconds of drama. All i can atest is that what Lewis is planning on doing is 100% truely mental. Nutter!

Came across this very cool looking new tool, defintely one worth using if you live in North America, and hopefully it should soon work for European airlines - Real Costs
By using this plug in when on major airline and e-commerce travel sites, you get to see the carbon emissions of the travel you are buying and can compare across different modes of transport such as plane, train and car. To me this is key, individual action is not so much about any particular single pledge you may make. Rather the pledge is just a means to a state of mind whereby you are more conscious of the impact of all our decisions and consumer choices and purchases, where the carbon impact has a higher share of mind. Real costs is a very useful tool to help consumers get to that mindset.

Onwards and upwards, EarthFireIce have passed their first milestone, 1,000 pledges of individual action against climate change. A very long way to go still in our quest to get a million pledges, the hard work is just starting, but pleasing nonetheless. So thank you all those who have pledged so far! Please help spread the word, tell your friends and family and neighbour’s dog, and so forth. We signed all our charity papers this evening, which if we hadnt all been on the point of passing out with exhaustion would have been quite exciting - i think. Lots and lots of great ideas and plans for what we will do next, and some big things in the pipeline in terms of marketig activities, which is very exciting. As for now though…well sleep beckons. Good night, and sweet dreams.

Our 48 hours at the pole will live with me till I die. I am going to dull my grandchildren into submission with tales of the 2 days that I spent on the frozen drifting temporary ice mass that is the north pole. From the 2.5 hour flight in a soviet plane designed specifically to land on the arctic ice to the first steps on the frozen ocean at the pole, from the marathon itself to the perpetual battle to fight off the coruscating cold, from the helicopter ride to the actual geographic north pole in an old Russian M-8 to the burly bearded vodka-fuelled Russians who ran Camp Barneo as it is known, it was a surreal, unforgettable experience, laden with incredible images.

I write this on the plane home. I am exhausted, content yet still trying to get to grips with exactly what I saw and experienced. I am not sure how much has really sunk in. After 48 hours at the pole, I was very glad to be leaving that harsh landscape – the cold and the lack of sleep were simply too much and made it increasingly harder to appreciate where we were at. One thing is for sure, hot showers and heated bathroom floors that we had in Spitsbergen felt like manner from heaven. It is a relief not to have to worry about the cold, to have continuous feeling in my feet.

Yet, without wanting to get all preachy, if we as a human race let this wondrous breathtaking natural phenomenon disappear in the next 50 years, it will be a travesty, an unforgiveable act of negligence for which we all have to take responsibility.
Some Photos:
Just landed at the Pole
The True Geographic Pole
The View at the Geographic Pole

It may seem strange after all my moaning about the cold but peer pressure does strange things to you. So it was that yesterday, after a day out on the snow mobiles, Phil (another of the English guys doing the marathon) and I went swimming in the arctic sea completely naked. Outside temperature at the time? about -20C. Probably not the wisest thing I have ever done. Having been exceedingly gung ho about this earlier in the week, various talk about the heart stopping from the shock and the need to know where the town hospital was severely stressing me out. But once Phil went in I had no choice. It was brief, it wasn’t pretty and it sure was the coldest and one of the most excruciating things I have ever done (my hair froze the moment I stepped out) , but I survived. BIG thank you to Katie, Susan, Jon, Nick and Nick who redressed me in a manner befitting a formula one pit stop team (believe me I was paralysed by the cold and unable to do anything for about 3 minutes from the shock – without them I would be in hospital now recoverig from hypothermia). Hopefully the video clip we got of it will persuade a few more people to pledge….i hope……pleeeeease…..after all, if it wasn’t for global warming, that sea would have been ice and such buffoonary would not have been possible!
Before
After

A revealing articles in today’s independent, that basically most people still are not willing to make any changes to their life, or think that individuals cant make a difference - all the more motivation for us to help spread the word to a few more people. yes, people, each one of us can make a difference without making a huge change to our life! So get pledging…and spread the word…

WOuldnt it be nice if actually we didnt even need to make any effort for the effects of pledges like the ones we have here on earthfireice.com to be fulfilled. Well, maybe, just maybe, we are beginning to see this, and some long over due common sense prevail. Australia have just announced they are phasing out all old style lightbulbs over the next 3 years - huzzah! Now, why cant every government just do that? And make us have to worry about one thing less. That would be a good start!

Welcome. And thanks for stopping by. What, you may ask yourself, is all this EarthFireIce (EFI) stuff about? Good question, let me try and explain. EFI at its core is about climate change and it’s about individuals. It’s about why we as individuals care about the planet we live on. Everyone (we hope!) is aware of climate change. Much is made in the media about what governments should and should not be doing, which companies are polluting and which are making themselves carbon neutral. All very valid, but ultimately carbon offsetting and carbon neutrality will only get you so far. We as individuals need to take some responsibility. We need to reduce the amount of carbon we emit through our daily lives. Oh gosh, i hear you groan. here’s another one rabbitting on about how i need to radically alter my life, never travel again, and generally stop doing all the fun things. Not at all. All it requires is each and every individual to start doing simple things, such as turning out the lights in rooms they are not in, or avoiding products in supermarkets which have excessive packaging when you are presented with a choice, perhaps walking a little more often instead of always driving and so forth. And then we have a significant impact on climate change. So EarthFireice…basically, we’re using two of the most extreme marathons on the planet, in the Sahara and at the North Pole, to kick start our campaign to drive awareness around climate change and individual action using a funky (we hope!) Google Maps integration to encourage people to pledge to make small little changes in their every day life which will help our lovely planet. In addition, you can upload photos and text to show up on your marker on the map with your pledges, an encouragement to express to all why you care about this planet so much (cos we know you do!). So go on people, make a pledge, and take action - now!

Yes, today was the day. The day the masses were engaged, the day the scientists officially and finally realised they needed to talk the language of the masses and not the language of research reports, the day the individual was called to take action on an…INDIVIDUAL level. Yes, today saw the official launch of Global Cool - and their 10 year journey to get 1 BILLION PEOPLE TO TAKE ACTION AND SAVE A TONNE EACH / YEAR. Read more about it on their site and a full story here.

We love these guys, their message and what they are doing. And we want to help them as much as we can - which is why we’ve partnered with them and will be working closely - we’re looking at ways to promote them as much as we can through our events, and ultimately we’d like everyone who pledges on our map to be part of the bigger Global Cool community, be part of their BILLION.

my mission today: fit out the flat with energy saving light bulbs. the first of what I hope will be many mini-missions to make a difference and save a planet. a small move yes, an easy one yes… but by the estimates of stop global warming my 4 new light bulbs will save approximately 200kg of CO2 per year. On my rough estimates if every household in the UK did this we would save a mere 5 million tons of CO2 this year. Get moving support this site and save a planet! There’s a lot more that can be done…

Talking of CO2… some interesting talk from the UK government today: (1) a carbon credit card and (2) developments on carbon offsetting.