Preserving Our Planet Takes All of Us

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ASPA as an organization.

By Robert A. Hunter
August 29, 2025

For many years across our country and across our communities, the words “environment” and “environmentalist” were often ascribed to “those dang liberals.” More recently, with discussion of global warming, various pollutant inversions, the filling up of landfills, the purity of our water supply and a burgeoning population, people of all persuasions tend to pay more attention to environmental issues.

Not everyone agrees on what’s happening. Not everyone agrees on how seriously we should take these environmental concerns. Not everyone agrees on what the solutions should be. Not everyone likes to use the word environmentalism, still.

So let’s kick off the subject by using a different word, a more commonly acceptable word: conservation. It just makes sense to practice positive conservation. It doesn’t take much. That’s why a vast majority of communities now provide “blue cans” for recycling paper, cardboard, plastics and more.

In my home state of Utah, as in many other states, the Department of Environmental Quality and other such organizations have been established with the mission to safeguard public health and our quality of life by protecting and enhancing the air, the water, the land and the waste management processes.

These days, our air quality is a big issue in many communities. Cold weather will soon be with us. UCAIR (Utah Clean Air Partnership) reports that the biggest contributor to pollution during winter inversions is wood burning. Wood burning creates tiny, microscopic pieces of pollution that can enter the bloodstream and cause breathing and heart problems. Health impacts may include coughing, headaches, eye and throat irritation, asthma attacks, heart attacks and strokes.

One fireplace may emit as much particulate pollution as 90 sport utility vehicles. Pollution from one wood burning stove is equivalent to the amount of 3,000 gas furnaces producing the same amount of heat per unit, according to the California Air Resources Board. Even doors and windows cannot keep out the particulates in wood smoke. Up to 70 percent of wood smoke that exits a chimney re-enters nearby homes.

On bad air quality days (red or mandatory action days), wood fires are not permitted in most localities. However, households that use a wood-burning stove or fireplace as their sole source of heat are permitted to burn. Some state or local agencies may be able to financially help people who decide to exchange their wood burning stoves for gas units.

Some may say that government needs to “get off our backs.” In truth, government involvement in certain aspects of our lives helps protect and sustain our lives. There are just some things private interests can’t or won’t do and some things we cannot efficiently control or accomplish as individuals.

However, there are ways individual citizens can help conserve our precious physical assets. These are to reduce consumption of resources, reuse items we can creatively apply to another purpose and recycle paper, cardboard, plastics, glass and other items which would otherwise fill up our landfills.

We can take our own reusable bags when we go shopping, refuse bags for purchased retail items when we can simply carry them without a container, carpool whenever possible, plan our errands more efficiently, take public transportation whenever possible, clean up after ourselves when camping and picnicking, place climate-friendly plants in our yards, participate in community tree planting efforts, refrain from tossing waste inappropriately and refrain from idling our vehicles unnecessarily.

We can also urge the convenient placement of clearly marked recycle bins where we work and in the public places and businesses we frequent. It’s amazing how much recyclable material can be salvaged with the proper receptacles and friendly reminders at home and away. We can be examples for our kids.

As public, nonprofit and educational institutions, we must take it upon ourselves to improve the sharing of such conservation information with the populations we serve. We must find ways to better incentivize our constituents to be more individually responsible.

Little things mean a lot. From my teenage years, I remember a very prominent figure speaking to a crowd at a special ceremony in my hometown. He suggested that even the simple act of picking up a discarded paper from the hallway or the sidewalk is a contribution to a better environment. The one thing I recall from that speech—and I’ve held onto it all these years—is the line, “If not by me, by whom? If not now, when?”

Each one of us can play a significant role in protecting, preserving and enhancing the resources around us if we self-nudge. It doesn’t take much more than being present, being alert, being a bit more responsible and reminding ourselves daily that we are the “who” and now is the “when.”

Conservation! Yes, that’s how we can help.

---

Author: Robert A Hunter is a longtime leader in Utah’s political, educational, and nonprofit circles. He currently serves as public policy advisor to United Way of Northern Utah, other nonprofit organizations, and teaches Leadership and Political Life at Weber State University. He may be reached at [email protected].

(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
Loading...