WINNERS-Eco Writing Competition

As a conclusion to the Marlow Energy Group (MEG) Eco Writing Competition, three students, Isabella Murray, Ruby Cicchirillo and Olivia Coyne have been rewarded for their article. The students described how they believed Marlow’s citizens could achieve energy conservation and subsequently protect the environment. Multiple secondary schools were invited to participate in the competition.

The photograph shows our students being recognised with a cheque. Many thanks to Mayor Richard Scott, Jane Mann, John Laker, Ian Longthorne (photographer) and Martin Fry an energy consultant.

“What do you think you and the residents and organisations of Marlow can do to help reduce the effects of climate changes?” 

As Eco-Warriors at Great Marlow School, we have lots of ideas that we hope will inspire our community to take on. Did you know that the average household uses 33kwh of electricity per day, which is around 12000 kwh per year? That’s only the average, some households are above that! Are you one of them?

Here are some ideas to hopefully make a downfall in these rates (which will help in our community).

How do you feel about going electricity free? We propose that once a month we can go a few hours a day without electricity, we could do this by turning off all the electricity. The way this would work is that when the electricity is used most in the day it would be turned off. People in residential areas could turn off their lights and appliances, which would help with electricity costs and help the environment. On average electricity is used most when students come back from work and go on video games, so if the electricity could be turned off around 3 o’clock until 5 o’clock that would make a difference. Excluded would be important services such as police, hospitals and other important emergency areas. A few other acceptations could be made for appliances such as fridges and freezers so food is kept cold. Also, when the summer comes the ice cream doesn’t melt! In schools, we would find good alternatives to working without electricity. All classes in Year 9 could raise money to help buy other alternatives to create electricity for the school, for example, solar panels. Particularly for Great Marlow, they could put doors on the fridges in the canteen so that it uses less electricity, and the cold doesn’t escape unless the door is opened when needed.

However, not only is our electricity usage a problem, but climate change itself is a large problem that we must face. We could do this in many ways, at Great Marlow we have a litter picking team that goes out weekly. This should be enforced in other schools and once a month they should leave the school premises to litter pick in our local area to reduce the litter that is currently in the community. This is an important step since 399 kilograms of waste per person is collected by local authorities per person. However on a positive side, since 2010 the volume of waste that has been wasted has fallen by 6% percent. If we want to continue this downfall rate, we must act.

To add to the impact we make and help the climate to regain its former glory, every household (depending on the size or if you have one) should at least have 1 tree or other vegetation in their garden. If you live in a flat, a community garden or window box with flowers would help to implement vegetation and colour around the community. Another way that we could use this idea for more vegetation and colour around our community is to implement it into schools. We could do this by starting a vegetable patch in our school and growing our own vegetables maybe even making it into a healthy competition!

To conclude, we propose that these are a few small steps to lead to a better, healthier environment. As a school community we need you to help us make a bigger difference. Whether it is just turning off the lights or cleaning the streets of Marlow.

Written by Isabella Murray, Ruby Cicchirillo, Olivia Coyne.