Less Red Tape, More Green Action.

Fofi, Ally and Brendon from Style Plantation Design Studios went to the Phillips Sustainability Discussion: Less Red Tape, More Green Action last night at Customs House, Sydney.

The panel discussion covered the ups and downs of sustainability implementation, lessons learnt and projections for the future.

ABC Radio National's Alan Saunders lead the debate, with speakers Ross Gardam, Judy Hollingworth, Dr Usha Iyer-Raniga, Mark Kelly, Olivier Piccolin and Tone Wheeler.

We're thinking now as a group on what more we can do for a sustainable future.
Consider the following with us:

- A capped price for energy consumption: Increase power costs on a tiered level: the lowest users of energy pay very little or even get free energy, low users pay only a small amount, medium level users - the price increases, higher users have a trebled bill and so on. This is about 'waste' - and hitting users where it hurts more - in the hip pocket.

Consider this: Users who have the lowest usage don't pay: who wouldn't then want to strive to be in the category? People who do nothing but leave lights on and use clothes driers all day will be paying more and more - encouraging lower usage levels.

Of course, this could also apply for water use and so on.

Could this idea also be used for garbage and waste? Instead of having a weekly garbage collection for three bins - could it be a fortnightly collection in a smaller bin for non-recyclable rubbish? For households that need more - a user-pays price would apply. How quickly we would slow down our 'chuck it in the bin' habits.

City of Sydney council has adopted a program in inner-city Chippendale where residents can dispose of food scraps in community compost bins - and make use of kerb-side gardens with strawberries and mint and other herbs.

Your suggestions and comments are always appreciated.