[ateng]

> 5. Collect rain water and/or use less water

Not sure about that -- With modern pollution rain water is not likely to be safe to drink (depends on your location)

> 9. fuck sugary drinks

Massive yes! Amazing for your own health too.

[fodkodrasz]

I guess not for drinking. OP is planting trees, so assumably has land where some kind of forestry/agriculture is in being carried out. That needs quite some water. (eg. freshly planted trees need irrigation to have a fair chance of survival)

Also washing, showering can be done with rainwater if you are really a minimalist.

[aziaziazi]

Or at least car/patio washing if you’re almost really a minimalist.

[perlgeek]

> With modern pollution rain water is not likely to be safe to drink (depends on your location)

There are lots of "grey water" uses that don't require drinkable water, like watering plants, flushing toilets.

[vram22]

>There are lots of "grey water" uses that don't require drinkable water, like watering plants, flushing toilets.

Yes. I've heard/read grey mentioned many times in permaculture articles.

I like the fact that permaculture takes a systems or holistic approach.

Another nice, small but useful example of permaculture design is the concept of guilds, when it comes to planting crops around a house.

They plant by category, in concentric bands called guilds, with the guild nearest to the house having most commonly used plants such as herbs, then vegetables, then grains, then fruit trees, etc.

So you have to walk less to tend to or harvest them.

Edit: I may have used the term "guild" incorrectly.

The Wikipedia article on permaculture uses it differently, under the section "Guilds".

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild_(ecology)

[Maxion]

>> 5. Collect rain water and/or use less water > > Not sure about that -- With modern pollution rain water is not likely to be safe to drink (depends on your location)

Water availability is also very different from country to country, region to region, and even town to town. How your water usage affects the environment depends on so many things.

[NovaDudely]

I collect rain water but use it on the veggie garden. So either it is safer because I ma not drinking it directly OR it is worse because the planet are bio-accumulating it. I don't know.

[stef25]

At my parents' house rain water was collected in a well and that was used for things like flushing toilets and watering plants. This was already in place 30+ years ago mainly cause it's "free water" (apart from the cost of building the well and the pump)

[c00lio]

Over here, your water bill has 2 components, the price of the fresh water and the price of the waste water. Waste water is at least as expensive per m³ as fresh water, sometimes more than double. If you are using rain water, you save on the fresh water price, but you have to still pay for the waste water. And since waste water price is calculated from your fresh water consumption, you either have to have a second meter for the rain water (expensive) or you pay for an estimated amount of rainwater calculated from the roof area you are collecting from. Also very expensive, because the estimate is always not in your favour.

So not really "free" at all, and rather expensive enough that nobody does it...