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Recording 16

Let’s find out just how environmentally aware you are.

Question one. How many trees do you think it would take to offset the CO2 emissions from a long-distance flight?

Well, it’s estimated that for each mile 1.6 kilometers that a jet flies, half a kilo of CO2 is added to the atmosphere. So a round trip of 10,000 miles would emit about one and a half tonnes of CO2 per passenger.

The amount of CO2 tree can absorb depends on factors such as its type, location and age. The company. Future Forests, says that, on average, it would take two trees 99 years to counter the effect of this trip, so the answer here is C.

Question two. What is the most environmentally friendly way to wash your clothes? Well, the solvents used by most dry cleaners are damaging to the environment. In a washing machine, the vast majority of the energy − about 90 per cent of it - goes into heating up the water, not running through the cycle.

Washing clothes in hot water, even by hand, uses a lot of energy to heat the water. Keeping washing temperatures low and always washing a full load is the best policy. So the correct answer is C.

Question three. Do you need to always turn off your electric lights to save energy? It is a common myth that fixing the lights on and off uses more energy than leaving them on.

In fact, an ordinary bulb only has to be turned off for three seconds to outweigh the cost of turning it back on.

For energy efficient and other fluorescent bulbs, this rises to five minutes. Energy efficient light bulbs use 75 per cent less energy than ordinary ones - so if you have those, but leave them on as you tidy, you will probably still use less energy than if you switch your standard bulbs on and off. So the correct answer is B.

Question four. What is the most energy efficient way of cooking a baked potato? A microwave uses just a third of the electricity required to operate an electric oven, and of course the potato will take much less time to cook, so the correct answer is B.

Question five. What is the best way to help reduce your CO2 emissions throughout the year?

Well, it’s estimated that one person taking the train for a year, rather than driving a car, would reduce their CO2 emission total by 2.9 tonnes. Hanging out your washing rather than using a tumble dryer would cut CO2 by 0.9 tonnes and working from home one day a week would cut 0.88 tonnes. So the correct answer is A.