A bit about us: Cat (left) is a PhD Electrical Engineer and Solar Photovoltaic System Designer, and Ota (right) is a PhD Environmental Scientist. We are both educators and former teachers who are drawn to inspiring ourselves and others. Specifically, we are passionate about solving the climate crisis through behavioral change and popularizing new technology. And having fun doing it!
We were living in Los Angeles and decided to move to Colorado because Cat loves the Rockies and Ota suffered a chemical injury 10 years ago that left her unable to tolerate air pollution, even in minute amounts. Finding a mountain house with fresh air straight off the Continental Divide was a win-win for us.
We were already making some climate-friendly lifestyle choices while living in LA -- Cat was biking to work and Ota was working from home and making her own soap -- but in making this move we decided to go all out and try to live as fuel-free as possible. So we bought a small, off-grid, highly insulated house at 9000 ft in the Colorado Rockies, close to the activities we enjoy, and set about demonstrating to ourselves that we could create a lifestyle we love, save money, AND generate as little greenhouse gases as possible.
This climate action map documents the elements of how we created our climate-friendly home. We hope that it inspires you to do the same, though of course not all of the steps we took will be relevant to your context. Our lifestyle is a work in progress, as yours is. The important thing is that we are all working to reduce our emissions as much as we can, and helping each other do so!
Please don't hesitate to contact Cat if you'd like to create a similar map for your climate-friendly lifestyle project. We'd love to showcase a variety of people's projects on our site, which is a totally non-profit labor of love for the planet and all her creatures.