A message from Captain Planet (aka Saurabh Arora) showing the effect of global warming and how we can take small steps everyday to avoid further worsening the situation.

Recently at the Agile Mumbai 2010 and Agile Bengaluru 2010 conference, we tried to make the conference as green (environment friendly) as possible. Following are the things we tried:

• We did not hand over any conference program, printed hand-outs & slides or any other printed material (except for what the conference sponsor handed over). All this info is already available on our website. To make it convenient for the conference attendees, we took 3 large (A2 size) printout and stuck it outside each hall (track).
• We also skipped handing over  notepads & pens. I my experience very few people use them. Also those who want to use it, it’s easy to carry a notepad and pen.
• Lunch and snacks were served in washable plates & steel spoons. Usually conferences use throw-away plates and plastic spoons.
• For drinking tea, coffee & juice, we requested the conference participants to carry their own mugs & water bottles. This did not work all that well. We had only 3 people carry their own mug. In future, we plan to hand out a mug to each participant. (For Bengaluru conference, since it was in a hotel, they took care of serving tea & coffee in porcelain cups. Water was served is proper washable glasses)
• Conserving Electricity: We tried to switch off projectors and Air Conditioners when ever possible. This is an area of huge improvement. We need to find more interesting ways to conserve energy.
• Originally we had planned to request the participants to return their lanyards so we could reuse it. This one fell through the cracks.

At both the conferences we had an enlightening talk from Captain Planet (aka Saurabh Arora) showing the effect of global warming and how we can take small steps everyday to avoid further worsening the situation.

Overall I think there are lot more things we can do to make the conference more environmental friendly.

I’m in Chicago attending the Agile 2009 conference. I’m getting really annoyed by how much energy is being wasted here:

• Everything (soda, water, lemonade) has a ton of ice in it. Just think of the amount of energy wasted having those coolers running 24/7.
• Central Air-conditioning: Every conference room, hall way, lobby is set at 60F (15.5c). You see people wearing full sleeves, pullovers, etc.
• Stair cases have been replaces with escalators everywhere.
• I have hot water in the taps 24 hrs a day
• People using treadmills instead of going out and jogging.
• The list can go on…

While the world is crying about Global Warming, Energy Crisis, and so on. Here I find energy being wasted wasting senselessly. I’m not sure if people don’t care or they are ignorant or they simply not aware of the implications.

P.S: I’m also annoyed by the amount of waste (plastic and paper) generated. The funny thing is, everywhere you have these different color dust-bins with recycle logo on it. But you’ll find people use 5 different plastic glasses if they want to drink 5 glasses of water. I don’t think they get the whole point.