There are many ways to participate in the Dime-A-Gallon project. If you want to start personally measuring and reducing your fossil fuel use, you can download the form we use to calculate our usage. If you would like to come to our Strawberry Creek Quaker meeting, we meet every Sunday at 10AM at the Berkeley Alternative High School. If you have questions or comments you can e-mail us at "dimeagallon@pacbell.net".

7 Witnesses and One Joyful Suggestion

Here are some suggestions of things we have found useful. Some of these are much easier than others. Rather than feeling guilty about all the changes you have not made - take as many steps as you can and appreciate that they are all positive changes. The following ideas are easy and effective ways to enhance your harmony with creation. (There are many possible actions for each major topic; we offer only a few.)

1. Transport Smart - Travel Light

• Drive only when necessary (walk, bicycle, use public transit, carpool, trip share)

• Inflate your tires to recommended pressure

• Get regular tune-ups

• When your car has to be replaced, get the most energy efficient one you can (hybrid, biodiesel, electric if possible)

2. Review Your Food Choices

• Be aware of where your food comes from, at what cost in petrochemicals (transport, fertilizer, pesticide, fungicides, artificial ripening, etc.)

• Buy foods as locally grown as possible, through farmers’ markets, CSAs • Grow as much food as you can, and share/swap the excess.

• Join a food buyers club

3. Conserve Household/Office Energy

• Turn off lights and appliances when not in use

• Replace incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent (our Dime-A-Gallon project)

• Put pluggable electronic equipment (TV, VCR, music systems ) on switchable surge outlets, and turn all off when not needed ('phantom power' is a growing energy drain)

• Use fans in summer ( for cooling ), sweaters in winter ( for warmth )

• Clean furnace filters on schedule, and vacuum refrigerator coils ( for heat exchange efficiency )

• Install a programmable thermostat

• When appliances have to be replaced, choose the highest rated Energy Star model

• Weatherize your home: weather-strip doors and windows; make sure you have adequate insulation

• Get a home energy audit

4. Conserve Materials – Preserve Earth’s Resources • Repair, share, swap, buy second hand, reuse wherever & whenever possible

• Recycle and buy with an eye to what can keep cycling through recycling

• Buy recycled products to enhance the market for recycle materials

• Choose alternatives to petroleum-based products wherever possible (alternatives to plastic packaging include glass, cardboard, paper; clothing alternatives to polyesters and other synthetics include organic cotton [conventional cotton is produced with large quantities of pesticides {10 lbs. pesticide used to produce 1 lb. of cotton }], silk, hemp, linen, and of course reused)

5. Use Water Mindfully -- Preserve Drinking Water as if the Well could Go Dry

• Use only the water needed for hand washing dishes, clothes, hands, teeth

• Use highly efficient cleaning machines and run full loads

• Ensure that your plumbing works well (no "running" toilets, leaking pipes)

• It may not be necessary (or even healthy) to bathe every day

• Garden with native plants which are drought resistant, needing little summer water

• Use rainwater collection and greywater systems in the garden

6. Raise Your Voice

• Witness to friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, any and everyone

• Build relationships with your government representatives from local on up. Let them know your concerns and kudos about these (and other) matters

• Speak Truth to Power – Address corporate power over consumer issues and work to change it. Make socially and environmentally responsible investments

7. "Become Native to Your Place"

• Make friends with the wildlife in your yard, neighborhood, watershed, and bio-region.

And perhaps the most powerful idea –

Visualize a Joyful Future and Take Action to Make it Happen!