1 Million Women

I once read a book called Three Cups of Tea. It's about an American called Greg Mortenson, who has dedicated most of his life to building schools in Pakistan.

The schools are built for both boys and girls, but educating girls remains his top priority. Greg believes that change in a society starts with educating its women.

As he puts it, ""You can hand out condoms, drop bombs, build roads, or put in electricity, but until the girls are educated a society won’t change."

I've always believed that despite the higher profile men have in society as decision makers, it's women who make a lot of the changes in a society.

So, this campaign appealed to me. It's called 1 Million Women, and it's basic premise is to find women willing to sign up to reduce their carbon emissions by one tonne over the course of a year.

I signed up, despite being a little apprehensive. One tonne sounds like a lot, after all. But I was presently surprised.

After signing up, you go through a page of commitments and basically tick boxes of things you think you can do in a year to reduce your carbon emissions.

The website then calculates the deductions.

I only made about four commitments and I was well over one tonne. Admittedly, I'm about to start commuting to work by train instead of driving thanks to the location of the new house, but still. Reductions are reductions.

Now, I just have to explain to Dan why the bar fridge he wants to set up on the back deck of the new house will have to stay unplugged.