Conference in Japan.

Recently, I assisted my good friend Anthony on his global warming PowerPoint presentation that was presented last week in Kyoto, Japan. Our Japanese teacher selected Anthony to be a part of the International Youth Conference on the Environment in Kyoto. His job was to represent the United States at the conference and talk about actions that can be taken to stop the climate crisis. I met Anthony, Leah (another Japanese student helping out with the presentation) and teacher John Abbot mid-July to give them suggestions.

Anthony divided the presentation into five sections:
1. Home
2. School
3. City
4. State
5. Country

We came up with ways to help the planet in your home, school, city, state, and country. Most of these methods are obvious to any environmentally conscious person but I'll summarize them anyway.

Home:
- Recycle
- Maintain a garden/ plant trees to help reduce your CO2 output
- Upgrade to more energy efficient light bulbs
- Unplug all appliances when not in use
- Conserve water
- Use environmentally friendly cleaning products (ex. Method)

School:
- Reinforce recycling in schools
- Upgrade to more energy efficient light bulbs
- Solar power
- Make environmental studies part of the required curriculum to spread awareness to the next generation

City:
- Fund volunteer environmental projects. . . such as planting trees
- Have multiple recycling receptacles on streets
- Keep city streets clean
- Encourage the use of hybrid vehicles and public transportation

State:
- Reinforce company policies that prevent them from dumping and burning toxic waste
- Strengthen environmental laws that are neglected by the federal government
- Environment Massachusetts
- "Monkey see monkey do." If one state takes action on improving the environment, other states will soon catch on

Country:
- RATIFY THE KYOTO PROTOCOL!
- Educate the public about the dangers of global warming
- Support National Parks
- Strengthen Federal Environmental guidelines
- Form organizations to confront the issue and aim to improve

Those are some of the main points in the presentation. I will elaborate on some of these points later.

When I was on my way to meet Anthony that day, I was stopped by a man from Greenpeace who asked me if I would be interested in helping to stop global warming. I laughed and said, "I already am!"

I will have an interview with Anthony about his trip posted soon.

au revoir :)