Conservation Techniques & You

Posted by Jabr Almarri.

A not-so-recent article in the New York Times focused on conservation techniques in Japan. However, like most environmentally friendly advice, the importance of the article does not expire. The author of the article, Martin Fackler, describes a Japan in which people are not felt by the energy crunch which has so often crippled the United States. In one case, he even mentions a man who has had his electricity bill go down. Such a statistic in our country would have people baffled.

There is something behind this lack of an energy problem; in short, conservation. This quotation about sums it up:

“It’s not just technology, it’s a whole mind-set,” said Hitoshi Ikuma, a specialist in energy issues at the Japan Research Institute. “Energy conservation is almost an obsession here among government, companies, regular citizens, everyone.”

Can you imagine anyone saying that in the United States? That conservation is their obsession? Instead, we are obsessed with cars, television, food, and any other product that creates waste, not aims to delete it.

It is nearly impossible to pin point one fail safe correction that would result in our energy crunch being solved. However, it may not take such a singular solution. If the country, at its lowest individual level, was committed to conserving rather than wasting, it is doubtful that we'd be in this mess at all.