The constant quandary of documentary film making and attacking mother nature with a carbon baseball bat

This blog is based on 40 minutes of research, so do forgive, I’m still ironing out the details.

A few months ago our film came under criticism by some folks dubbing us 'Dryer Nazi's'...

http://tammybruce.com/2009/10/crossing-the-clothesline.html

In the article and comments its suggested that in making our film we are in fact destroying the planet anyway, Their opinions were somewhat uninformed to the point where I got the feeling they believed we had our own nuclear reactor on shoots to run the camera off, but despite them missing the point there is some merit in what they say.

So I’ve worked out (roughly) that if I ran my dryer for 1 hour a week I would clock up 104kilograms (228 pounds) of carbon a year.

So far a generous estimation for our carbon output for this film is something like 2 tons.

I am not an environmentalist, if I had not spent the last year and a half working on this project my dryer usage would most likely have carried on at roughly 1hr per week.

Plans are in place to offset our carbon emissions, probably by planting a tree or growing a banana in the sea, but it’s not really enough is it? We could very easily be dubbed hypocrites being an environmentally aware documentary that is destroying the planet in doing so.

Carbon offsets seem like a grand idea really, giving you the chance to give back to the planet that we are apparently screwing up (according to what I read) but I think a much more fun idea is to lead by example, To my mind paying off your carbon footprint is like paying your neighbour not to tell the police what you’re doing in your basement, your still doing it, but you've just found a way to cover your tracks so you can continue your weird basement experiments trying to cross a biscuit with a dog.

So I came up with a novel idea to help us 'cover our tracks' even more. I declare that I and my producer will from this point onwards go on a 10 year ban of the dryer, to basically offset the carbon we are creating in making our monster film.

At 228 pounds a year this means we must go without the dryer for at least 10 years on the assumption that our film could clock up a whopping 4tons of Carbon output from conception to completion. I have a sneaky suspicion it could go above depending on circumstances. On top of that what about all the people that drive there cars to come see our lovely film screening? Or a million other facts that could add to our polluting the atmosphere with the documentary.

well we could go on forever working out this stuff but best be safe and loose the dryer altogether. It won’t save the planet, and offsetting carbon footprints seems a bit odd anyway, since we have already polluted the planet with our flights and driving but it’s nice to give a good impression.

1. Off set our carbon footprint at the completion of this film (no matter how penniless we are)

2. 10 year dryer ban (with potential for a lifetime ban) just for good merit. Adam spent his life without a dryer and I haven’t touched the thing in 6 months so it’s really not going to be a culture shock. It just means in the future I might turn up to a meeting or two with a slightly damp shirt. I’ve still got to run this by my producer and make sure he’s willing to commit.

However if anyone sees our film and changes their own dryer habits then even better. In the words of some British super market 'every little helps'.

Steve