No Impact Man

by Colin Beavan

The Adventures of a Guilty Liberal Who Attempts to Save the Planet, and the Discoveries He Makes About Himself and Our Way of Life in the Process

A guilty liberal finally snaps, swears off plastic, goes organic, becomes a bicycle nut, turns off his power, and generally becomes a tree-hugging lunatic who tries to save the polar bears and the rest of the planet from environmental catastrophe while dragging his baby daughter and Prada-wearing, Four Seasons–loving wife along for the ride. And that’s just the beginning. Bill McKibben meets Bill Bryson in this seriously engaging look at one man’s decision to put his money where his mouth is and go off the grid for one year—while still living in New York City—to see if it’s possible to make no net impact on the environment. In other words, no trash, no toxins in the water, no elevators, no subway, no products in packaging, no air-conditioning, no television . . .

What would it be like to try to live a no-impact lifestyle? Is it possible? Could it catch on? Is living this way more satisfying or less satisfying? Harder or easier? Is it worthwhile or senseless? Are we all doomed or can our culture reduce the barriers to sustainable living so it becomes as easy as falling off a log? These are the questions at the heart of this whole mad endeavor, via which Colin Beavan hopes to explain to the rest of us how we can realistically live a more “eco-effective” and by turns more content life in an age of inconvenient truths.

Genres: Nonfiction, Environment, Memoir, Sustainability, Biography, Book Club, Green

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Trena · Rating 4 out of 5]

I expected to kind of hate Colin Beavan, but actually the book really sucked me in. He recognizes that one of his main challenges as a person is a tendency toward self-righteousness, and this consciousness helps him temper the tendency when it crops up. He comes across as earnest and likeable, just doing the best he can and making it up as he goes along like the rest of us.

It was an interesting experiment and he and his family fully committed to it. It's also interesting that it's basically an experiment that will work either in the country or in NYC, but pretty much not anywhere else. When he turned off the fridge he just popped by the farmer's market 3 times per week. Everywhere was walkable. DC comes close, but I don't have a daily farmer's market for sure.

It was a little frustrating that he seemed to put little thought into it before starting--like, it didn't occur to him until the project had already begun that they'd need an alternative to disposable diapers? Really? He spent an entire day looking for the perfect reuseable grocery bag and, not finding it, just got takeout instead? Really? These anecdotes might be meant to humanize, but they actually sound totally contrived.

Also, I am always wary of white people who think they are Eastern philosophizers. Much of his philosophizing ran to "we spend so much time working for conveniences, the conveniences don't even make us happy and kill the earth, therefore we should give up the conveniences and work less." While the major and minor premise are probably true, his lack of a real job gives him a blind spot when it comes to the syllogistic conclusion. For most of us it's a choice of having a full-time job or having no job. I can't work less at my job, even at a proportional pay cut, because it would reach the point of diminishing returns for my organization and the small contribution I could make during reduced hours would not be worth it. If I want a truly part-time job, I would have to leave my profession and go into retail. But the pay cut would be so large I would have to work twice as many hours as I do now. So, shutting off my electricity and giving up my TV (the latter of which I have already done) and my car (ditto) doesn't actually do anything to free me from the shackles of work.

Criticisms aside, I really devoured this book and I appreciated the lengths he went to for the experiment. We are all in need of a radical lifestyle makeover (by "we" I mean westerners) and he modeled it as a sort of preview so the rest of us could try on what will work for us.

I always meant to check out this guy's blog, but never remembered to do so. I was glad to see it come out in book form, because it's a lot more readable than going through someone's blog archives.

Final note: Seriously, dude, just tell us what you did instead of toilet paper.

[Ciara · Rating 1 out of 5]

it's kind of amazing to me that this book doesn't have more one-star reviews, considering how insufferable it was. i went on a jag a couple of months ago, where i read every eco-gimmick book out there, almost all of which were dreadful. i put this one on hold at the library during that time & then forgot about it & moved on to better books. when the library let me know the book was in & waiting for me, i felt a pang of dread. i didn't go in expecting the book to be any great shakes, but i was not prepared for it to be so boring! other reviewers have summed up the main problem with the book: it's less a memoir of this one guy & his family attempting to reduce their carbon footprint to zero over the course of a year as it is this one dude spending 225 flipping out about climate change. there are many excellent scientific books already written, detailing the potentially disastrous long-term consequences of climate change, many of which are actually written by scientists (as opposed to "guilty liberals" like this guy), many of which end up in beavan's bibliography. i didn't come to this book wanting to read twenty pages of beavan wringing his hands over drowning polar bears & starving sea turtles. i was looking for more about the changes he & his family implemented, the problems they bumped up against, & the conclusions they came to about what they need to be happy & healthy. i am one of those people that beavan seems to take to task at the end of the book--the folks who think over-emphasizing small individual changes as a solution to the climate change issue possibly does more harm than good to the environmental movement, but that doesn't mean i don't enjoy occasionally reading about the foibles of people who try to live with refrigerators.

but this was just shit. on the very first day of the project, beavan wakes up & wants to blow his nose. but--oh no! he's not supposed to produce trash, & how could he possibly blow his nose without using a paper towel? he explains elsewhere that he was trying to start the no impact project from where he was, but seriously, dude. it's called a handkerchief, look into it. he finally figures it out & starts using handkerchiefs all the time, but...am i supposed to think this is any kind of breakthrough? i can't even remember the last time i used a tissue for blowing my nose, even in the depths of the flu. handkerchiefs are where it's at.

ten minutes later, his toddler needs a diaper change, & beavan reaches for his supply of handy plastic diapers. seriously? seriously?! this dude wants to make "no impact," which means composting in a new york city apartment & getting a worm tub, & it didn't occur to him until the first day of the project, the first time his kid needs a diaper change, that maybe part of making no trash means switching to cloth diapers? the mind boggles. i don't even know how i can take him seriously at this point, & we're like ten pages in (we would be about two pages in, but eight pages of ink were spilled summarizing better writers' ruminations of the role of trash in producing climate change).

later in the book, he is seeking a solution to the problem of his wife's forty-minute walking commute. it occurs to him to buy her a collapsible scooter. so he does. he calls the company & has a scooter delivered the next day & is pleased with himself for helping make his wife's commute faster & more fun. nowhere does he acknowledge that the delivery person probably did not ride the scooter over to beavan's apartment from the warehouse. it probably came in a box & was delivered via truck, hence contributing at least a smidgen of pollution & trash packaging. this is also a textbook example of buying something to make life simpler--throwing money at a problem. it's great that she liked the scooter & everything, but jesus eff. taking the train would have been lower impact, since the train runs everyday, whether beavan's wife is on it or not. no delivery trucks would have had to come to their neighborhood with new scooters (that are not manufactured using rainbows & happy unicorns, by the way) in big cardboard boxes full of packaging.

& then there's the whole issue of deciding to wean his family off toilet paper. he mentions this repeatedly throughout the book & his feelings are hurt when he is profiled in the "new york times" & the toilet paper issue ends up in the headline. never in the book does he answer the most-asked media question about the no impact project: 'what did you do instead of toilet paper?" he just insists that this question is somehow puerile & "embarrassing". but i can tell you that in the feminist movement, it's pretty common for women to discuss what they use in lieu of mass-produced dioxin-leaching pads & tampons. menstruation is a more taboo topic than pooping & peeing, & beavan himself had no qualms about suggesting that his wife switch to the diva cup or some other more environmentally-friendly menstrual product. every single person in the world goes to the bathroom several times a day, & many many many of those people employ toilet paper in the process. here we have this guy not only acknowledging that toilet paper isn't the most environmentally-friendly product in the world, but actually saying that he & his family found a way to go without. most people, even ones who care a great deal about the environment, are hard-pressed to imagine what would substitute for toilet paper. throw 'em a bone, beavan! it's hypocritical & ridiculous to get up on your high horse & refuse to discuss it while getting in everyone's face about living in the suburbs & having long commutes & how hard life is for you because people in your family have died.

i could go on, but suffice to say that this book was even worse than i expected it to be. a lot of these crappy eco-stunt memoirs are at least kind of funny, if nothing else. this one bored me half to death. i hated everything about it, right down to the cutesy little rounded corners & the tiny font in the appendix & the three glaring misspellings in the first 125 pages (my corrections: "municipal," "eked," & "demurred") & the fact that the whole thing was cooked up with the dude's literary agent over a nice lunch. yuck.

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you stop to read about the environment or even just to think about the way we use the world, the thought that we're totally screwed is unavoidable. In our lust for power and comfort, we have created an unsustainable system of consuming. I don't even need data support this* - if you burn and destroy and throw away, eventually you're going to run out of stuff to burn, destroy, and throw away.

This guy Colin Beavan realizes this and furthermore realizes that he is a hypocrite for realizing this and continuing to live his consuming lifestyle. So he decides to change his life in the most dramatic way he can imagine - to live a year without any environmental impact, which yes, is very hard to do, especially if you live in New York City and have a family to support.

Spoiler alert: he fails. Ten minutes into his year-long project he blows his nose and realizes he just used a dead tree as a snot-disposal device.

So it's hard. It's very hard to make no impact on the environment. But the point of the No Impact Project is not to get everyone to join in and make no environmental impact whatsoever for the rest of our lives. It's simply a gimmick to prove a point - that we are wasteful creatures living in disharmony with the earth. Just use some common sense in your life, be thoughtful about what you're doing. Does it make sense to throw away a paper cup after every cup of coffee you drink rather than drinking out of a reusable mug?

Beavan has an optimism that I find charming but naive. He believes that through grassroots organization, we can change the world, that by saving one coffee cup at a time, we can stop the destruction of Earth's precious resources. That just isn't true, but I appreciate the sentiment. In some existential way, I believe that even though we're all going to hell in a handbasket, we are each responsible for the way we live. It's a lot like voting. In the American system of electoral colleges and corporations buying the loyalty of candidates, your ballot means nothing. But you still have a responsibility to cast it.

"No Impact Man" is really a misnomer. After all, every living thing makes an impact on the world and they are not wrong for doing so. But every other organism on the planet gives and gets. Why is it that humans seem to be the only ones to get without giving back? Instead of being No Impact People, let's just shoot for No Waste People.

*But statistics are powerful, so here is one good one: In the past 50 years, humans have consumed more resources than in all previous history. (U.S. EPA, 2009. Sustainable Materials Management: The Road Ahead.) If this doesn't blow your mind or if you have trouble seeing the problem with this kind of rampant destruction of resources, I worry for your mental health.

[Erica · Rating 1 out of 5]

Simply awful, pretentious and obnoxious. Colin Beavan is milking the environmental movement, trying to make a quick buck off the green buzz. If the author is any indication of the caliber of person currently trying to change the world, please, thanks, but no thanks.

[Todd Martin · Rating 1 out of 5]

No Impact Man falls within the genre of books I’d characterize as “author experiments with a lifestyle for a year and chronicles the results”. In this case Beavan attempts to minimize his environmental footprint while attempting to maintain his normal standard of living in New York City. As part of this effort he has to figure out low impact solutions for every-day issues such as: how to travel, what foods to buy, how to heat and cool his home, how to eliminate trash, and blow his nose. The solutions are banal: travel is by foot, bike or scooter, foods are bought from local farms and carried in bags brought from home, trash is composted and he carries his snot around with him in his pocket using a handkerchief.

Ho-hum … while the ideas are nothing new there’s a deeper problem with the book … the writing. Beavan seems compelled to dispense nauseating little nuggets of what I can only imagine he considers to be “wisdom” that he’s supposedly garnered from his experiments. These trite excrescences litter each page like bird droppings from a seagull whose fish has been laced with magnesium hydroxide. At the risk of initiating a gag reflex, here are a few examples of these “gems” found within a few lines of each other.

Way back when I first discussed this project with my agent Eric I said that I wanted to convince people to treat each other with a little more love and kindness. But how can anyone bring more love and kindness into the world if they can’t find more love and kindness in themselves.

and

What we need is not to draw lines between people. We need to draw lines around them.

and

Knowing how to live is not something we need to teach children. Knowing how to live is something we have to be careful not to take away from them.

If a stale fortune cookie had sex with a horoscope, I’d put money on Beavan as the hybrid offspring.

Here’s the thing … if you are truly interested in reducing your environmental footprint on the planet the single most effective step you can take as an individual is to not have children (particularly if you live a highly consumptive western lifestyle). This one decision eliminates a lifetime’s worth of consumption, however, Beavan, as a parent, fails to address this point). Instead, he relies on self-deprivation and voluntary measures which have never solved a single global problem and are unlikely to do so in the future. If Beavan were truly interested in practical solutions to environmental issues he firstly wouldn’t be selling a paper version of this book, but more importantly he’d examine such issues as population reduction measures and legislative initiatives that could be applied at a national and global scale.

Fortunately, I took the book out from the library (which I reached through walking) so its reading had zero impact. Those who purchased a paper copy of the book may wish to use its pages as toilet paper so the poor trees won’t have died in vain.

[Erika · Rating 1 out of 5]

What a disaster of a book. Conceived by its publishers, the book is meant to discuss the author's year-long project in personal environmentalism. Rather than a helpful how-to, or even an informed philosophical treatise, it is (as the title suggests) a series of personal rants and revelations by a person who has recently found a cause. Lacking any sort of expertise or credibility, Beavan comes off as both obnoxious and pretentious, leaving readers to wonder at the narrator's apparent immaturity and deep self-involvement, or alternatively, to slog through dry segments of barely strung together scientific data. The book is interesting only in that you get a glimpse inside the lifestyle, the culture, and even the marriage of a particular segment of modern society (rich, guilty liberals, I guess). Reading this book makes you feel worse for Beavan's wife (whom he tries to control through eco-guilt) than you ever do for the environment. Skip it and go to The Good Human blog if you are really interested in either the science or the how-to behind low-impact living.

[Margaret · Rating 2 out of 5]

No Impact Man by Colin Beavan was a required summer reading text for my university honors program. While this is a good introduction to examining the consumerism and materialism that currently pervades American consumption culture, the science and claims made in this book are shaky.

That being said, the data for anthropogenic climate change and the unsustainable practices of the modern industrialized society as conducted by the United States are facts. There is plenty of scientifically collected data that supports this, and serious environmental scientists have no doubt that the data supports this claim. This book examines how these issues are created at an individual level, with the author's attempt to make no garbage and no net carbon footprint, among other things.

The way the author presents the data, however, makes his claims less reliable and more frustrating. Statements that could be easily described and supported by data, like the link between high levels of pollution in the Bronx and a high rate of childhood asthma, have no citation in the back of the book. Many of the citations are from popular press articles, and sometimes, like with the 2003 EPA report that 36 American states would in 5 years be experiencing water shortages if then current usage continued, were 5 years old.

This is in no way a hard science book, and the research into environmental issues shows this clearly. The experiential anecdotes related are in no doubt important in illuminating the larger cultural issues, like the use of throw away diapers, that make reducing waste and carbon dioxide difficult. However, they are anecdotes from one source. This makes for intriguing reading but poor science writing.

Overall, No Impact Man: The Adventures of a Guilty Liberal Who Attempts to Save the Planet, and the Discoveries He Makes Himself and Our Way of Life in the Process is an curious and enlightening memoir, though in no way a fine example of science writing.

[Helen (Helena/Nell) · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew this book would make me uncomfortable. I was right.

It was uncomfortable in a good way, though. It made me think, which is what Beavan intended. And it will do more than just make me think: I know I’m going to change some things in my life as a result of reading it (how often do we say that of a book?).

Obviously the drawback to the huge challenge of sustainability is that when faced with the reality, we feel overwhelmed. What’s the point? What difference can we, as individuals, possibly make?

At work recently, my colleagues and I did one of those exercises for measuring our carbon footprints. Mine was the best. I was only using 2.7 planets’ worth of resources. Yeay!

But wait a minute. We’ve only got one planet. I don’t really understand the whole carbon footprint thing, but even if I did, I can see that using 2.7 planets is no great shakes and that brushing my teeth without running the tap is not enough to solve the problem. Cue Colin Beavan, who took the whole thing much more seriously.

What Beavan (and his family) did was to attempt to live for one year in New York city without any impact on the environment. Their aim was to create no waste. None. They were determined not to contribute to carbon dioxide emissions (no driving, no flying). They put no toxins into the water (think about washing powder, bleach, shampoo) and they got almost all their food locally. They reduced power use to almost nothing: they switched off the electric supply to their apartment. No TV. Very little light (a solar panel on the roof collected a bit of sunshine-powered electricity) but evening reading was done by candlelight. They did keep a gas supply which allowed them to run a cooker and bake bread. They used no tissues, no toilet paper, no new clothes – no new anything!

Beavan writes about this experience in a very entertaining way. There’s lots of wry comedy here, especially the marital challenge. It is Beavan himself who is No Impact Man – but his wife and children are part of the package – and sometimes they are reluctant companions. As he says himself, “Coming up with philosophies is one thing. Coming up with practicalities that wouldn’t end up dissolving my marriage is entirely another.”

The book very cleverly charts the personal experience of this no-impact year, all the thrills and spills (because at times the resolve does crumble) while weaving in a lot of information the reader really needs to know. We need to know the background stuff because it’s what makes sense of the Beavan experiment. We need to know that “A thousand miles off the coast of California, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, there is a swirling soup of floating trash twice the size of the continental United States. The ‘garbage patch’, as it’s called, contains six times as much plastic, by weight, as bio-matter. Way out there in the Pacific Ocean, a thousand miles from the nearest human, plankton, jellyfish, and fish are outnumbered (by weight) six to one by plastic bags, water bottles, and other throwaway plastic knick-knacks.” There’s more about sea turtles, mammals and birds who die annually after consuming our plastic waste. That’s one reason why Beavan has given up collecting shopping in plastic bags. That’s why we all should.

We need to be reminded that “Before 1900, most households didn’t even have a trashcan The rag-and-bone man came to your door and paid you to give him, among other things, your old clothes for paper-making, your meat bones for button-making, and your cooking grease for soap-making. What was left, you burned in your stove for heat.”

We need to know that sustainable eating means, for those who live mainly on takeaways, learning to cook (that stuff involving wooden spoons, chopping things into little pieces and simmering).

We need to know it’s possible to live -- and to live well, in fact – on seasonal foods in most places, provided you learn how to cook and relish them.

But the most interesting thing about the book is not really the sustainable lifestyle thing. It’s the way the change in Beavan family life starts to pose bigger questions: what is the purpose of our lives? what makes us happy? what are we here for?

Once you stop watching TV, you have a lot more thinking time. Beavan talks about slowing his life down. Travelling by bicycle, for example, instead of by car – it takes longer – and you notice more. And if there’s very little light in your apartment, you stay outside in the summer and play with your kids in the park. And when it gets dark, you read by candlelight, or you go to bed and sleep till the sunlight wakes you up. And while you’re cooking or shopping (because you need to shop more often when you have no fridge or freezer), you talk to people. You get more social. Your human interactions become more meaningful.

This is a very interesting book. There’s a lot of thinking in it. At first I thought it was going to be a bit too facile: just a piece of trickery really – a method of attracting attention and making money. (The formatting didn't help here -- I hated the way key quotations were picked out in pull-out boxes.) But it’s more than that. I believe this no-impact year really did change Colin Beavan and his family – for the better. We can learn from his experience, and change for the better too.

And at the back there’s a huge range of references for further reading. I believe Beavan took on the challenge and also did the homework. No Impact Man focuses on a way to live that’s moral and meaningful. You could even call it spiritual, if you wanted to. . . .

[jess · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has been hot in the eco-blogosphere for a while now. I missed the documentary when it came to Olympia, but I thought I should read the book anyway. There was a long wait at the library, so I experienced plenty of build-up and hype. This book brought out some strong feelings and opinions that I didn't realize I was harboring. I spent some time working through my assumptions. I was really irritated - what an arrogant, presumptuous, hyperbolic, self-serving premise for a book! Doesn't the act of publishing a book inherently cause an impact on the planet? The subtitle grates me the wrong way. "The Adventures of a Guilty Liberal Who Attempts to Save the Planet, and the Discoveries He Makes About Himself and Our Way of Life in the Process) ." BARF! But in the end, I felt like the project redeemed itself.

I would not say this was a great break-thru learning experience, but I read those self-sufficiency memoirs fairly often. So there are all the trademarks you expect from one of these publicity stunts-as-books -- earnest, sincere, impossible expectations for themselves, a specific time frame, conflict (like, coffee and electricity), interpersonal conflicts, struggling to talk to people about the project without seeming judge-y, attempt to focus on the benefits instead of the martyrdom, etc, etc. If you read these books you know what I'm talking about.

With that said, here is what's different about this book:
1. This family does not live in the country. They live in NYC. They have no plans to move to the country, or even an apartment building with a yard. They do not get chickens or goats or a rooftop garden. Half the world's population lives in cities, and if everyone went "back to the land," we'd get an eviction notice from Earth. This family is working under the belief that people living in densely-populated areas have the potential to have lower carbon impacts through easier, more effective public transportation, lower physical footprint on the land, ability to pool resources in a myriad of ways, and so on.
2. This family is not well-versed in "green" or "simple" living. They are not hippies; they are Mainstream Manhattanites. They don't ride their bikes, grow food, use alternative energy, eat locally, reduce, reuse, recycle. The only real "alternative feature" of their lives before the project is that the dad is involved in his kid's life and appears to be an equal caregiver for the child. A lot of dads aren't. This family is virtually at square one. The only thing they have that anyone else doesn't is a desire to make no impact on the planet.
3. The author hopes that the media blitz from this project, book, documentary and blog will encourage other people to take steps toward sustainable living, and he says it. He is living by example, certainly, but he also comes right out and says "You need to be doing these things too. What you do matters. What all of us do matters." I have come to expect a sort of neutrality and shoe gazing from these self-sufficiency memoirs, as if the authors' experiences should do the talking, like "look how easy it was for me to raise pigs, butcher chickens, give up electricity, invent the composting toilet and bike everywhere. HMMM!" without a call to action. It's always implied but Colin comes out & says it. I appreciate that transparency. Of course now he's made a career out of it & built a foundation around it, so... but I think that was his intention.

I wish Colin had found a way to talk about community more, and specifically about people working in concert to make lower/no-impact changes in the world, but it was outside the scope of his project. Instead of starting collective, local, community and solution-oriented projects, he volunteered with larger organizations. Don't get me wrong, I love NPOs, but I am not convinced that they have the secrets of our eco-salvation. That whole 'give back' part rang a little hollow, like a tacked-on afterthought. It is impossible to totally eliminate your carbon impact so you should plant trees or something to cancel it out.

One of my favorite paragraphs was the issue of cloth diapers versus disposable diapers. Yes, there was a study (funded by Proctor & Gamble, who make disposable diapers) that said disposable diapers are not "worse" than cloth diapers, and that the water and soap used to wash cloth diapers means they are not really "green." At six diapers a day for (at least) two years, that's 4,380 plastic diapers. Plastic diapers are made from oil that is extracted in one part of the world, shipped somewhere to be refined, then shipped to China where the diapers are manufactured, then shipped to the US, where you drive to the store, drive the diapers home, use them for a few hours and then they are driven to a landfill and buried. Forever. I'm certain that whole carbon footprint did not end up in P&G's study. Compare that to washing 24 cotton diapers every four days, or 183 times in those same two years. It's an incredible, nearly inconceivable leap of stupidity to pretend that this is even a controversial topic up for debate.

The No Impact project had defined stages, all with the intention of ending up at the "no impact" equilibrium -- create no trash, reduce consumption, get carbon-free transportation, eat locally, use no power, reduce water use, be mindful, give back. It didn't happen all at once. The project and the family's experiences came across as earnest and a little naive, but not pompous or ignorant. The spirit of the project was infectious. I think the strength of the book was the fundamental question the author returns to. Don't ask, "Do I know enough to be fully self-sufficient? Can I eliminate my carbon impact entirely? How will I solve all these nuances of problems? Can I get through all the greenwashing, misrepresentation, fear-mongering, profit-margining capitalist interests and actually save the world?" Those are the wrong questions. These are the questions that overwhelm and convince you not to even start. The right question is, "Do I want to be the kind of person who tries?" So they try. They find other ways to live their life. It's hard. It's exciting. People cheer them on. People ask rude questions. They host parties. They seem to rediscover the "romantic side" of marriage, and spend more quality time with their toddler.

I would recommend this book as part of the growing canon of persons interested in walking lightly on the planet. It's not a how-to road map, but there are valuable insights and, if you can get past the irritation of the subtitle and hyberbolic expectations, if you can forgive him the letter-pressed, recycled cardboard eco-book aesthetic, this is an enjoyable read. Colin is either a good enough writer, or the beneficiary of a fine editor or writers group, or maybe both? The human moments of the story - angering your mom, make your sister cry, having a miscarriage - carry the reader through the infrequent preachy religious reflection and dull self-absorbed moments. It's a balance of content and momentum that worked for me.

[Charlene · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining look at one family's attempt to live for a year without having an impact on the environment in NYC -- transportation by foot, bike or skateboard only, no packaging, no paper plates, trying to eat local, very limited electricity available by solar power, etc. The changes to lifestyle, particularly with food, were told in a light hearted way but still makes one think.
Author skips politics, tries to demonstrate what one person can do to cut down on waste and therefore highlights just how much trash, etc., we all create. Author has blog, was followed by NY Times during the "no impact" year.

[Camilla · Rating 1 out of 5]

One and a Half Stars

Man, I really wanted to love No Impact Man. As soon as I started reading I knew the author's grating false-casual tone would get to me. Still, I kept reading. Despite being annoyed by the author's voice and random text blocks throughout the book (like a magazine might have), I was genuinely intrigued by the concept of someone taking environmentally conscious living to its limits. Colin Beavan may be annoying, but his message is good, right?

Wrong. Beavan is a creepy, controlling husband who more or less insists on his wife following along his project, and his daughter too. He makes all sorts of exceptions to the rules for himself, but gets controlling and angry if his wife "breaks a rule," as if it's her responsibility to follow his arbitrary rules. The way he describes his wife, I'm not even sure if he likes her. It really ruined my enjoyment of the book and made me uncomfortable.

Besides that, Beavan is an egomaniac. Nothing he's doing save a few things here or there (like no electricity) are that extreme, especially in a city. Many actual environmentalists probably live very similarly to how he lives during the course of the project. The difference is that they don't seek praise and fame. The whole thing reeks of self promotion and the kind of smug pretension that would make someone use his wife's tragedy to further his own cause, or quote Zen masters to add credence to his message.

That said, I have to say I enjoyed the other parts of the book. As much as I say it's old stuff, I did learn a few things, both facts and ways to be more environmentally friendly in day to day life. In the back of the book, there's an absolutely excellent resource list of other, probably better books.

[Stringy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Less a how-to or an examination of environmental science, this is more of a why-to, an exploration of what's in it for you. Beavan's one-year stunt isn't about an earnest hippy going that extra mile, it's about your average concerned citizen realising that he's got to walk the walk as well as talk the talk.

So he gives himself, his wife and daughter a huge challenge, realises it's a bit insane, and forges ahead anyway. It's about his efforts to reduce his hypocrisy as well as his eco-footprint.

Along the way he rediscovers his love of life, ditches the coffee (27 cups between two adults in 4 days? wtf?), gets fit, and meets great people. And, more importantly for us as readers, he discusses the difficulty of changing our entire culture to make it more sustainable, and the limits and possibilities of individual action.

I'd recommend this to anyone who says they're concerned about the environment but wonders if there's any point to taking action when it seems like it's not enough.

I'm going to get a bike.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

So really two things are happening here - the Project and the Book. I give the Project an A. Learning to live without so many of our modern conveniences - most of which depend on waste or environmental devastation of some sort - is fascinating. Can we live comfortable lives without harming the earth and contributing to climate change? Beavan's experience reveals that comfort and happiness are possible - even abundant - in a life free of waste, except that things start to suck when you give up electricity and can't use a washing machine.

Unfortunately, Beavan's excessive philosophizing and intense self-reflection bring the Book down. I get the point - he's trying to humanize his crazy experiment, let readers know that he is really one of us, just trying to figure out the meaning of life and his place in the world. But it's too much. It's honest, and at times insightful, but he actually makes the premise less accessible when he starts drawing complicated connections to events in his life that bear no relation to the Project.

[Kendrick Hardaway · Rating 4 out of 5]

I avoided this book for a long time.

After reading it however, I was pleasantly surprised with the approach he took in the story. Instead of harping on the actual actions as much as I was afraid, the parts I enjoyed in the book were the reflections. In grappling with no impact, the author begins to recognize the philosophy that underlies our relationship to “the environment.” Too often, anthropogenic climate change is reduced to technical or economic terminology, but I think—as the author suggests—it is ultimately a philosophical question that must be continuously pondered, reconsidered, and revised both at the individual and collective level.

[Alayna Williams · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really don't understand why anyone would want to read this book for fun. Reading this book was one of the most painful experiences of my life. I had to read this book for an environmental class and if I wasn't borrowing this book, I would've used it as kindling. Colin Beavan annoyed me so much. I had second hand embarassment from some of the things he did and said. I really don't know why this book doesn't have more 1 star ratings.

[Andrew Welsh-Huggins · Rating 5 out of 5]

We made changes to how we consume food after reading Michael Pollan that made us feel like we'd awakened to a new, more responsible way of living. This book showed me, in a positive, inspiring way, how far I have to go still. So this week's goal: no paper coffee cup acquisitions. Reusable or bust.

[Lance Kuhn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sam, you should read this. Beavan did what a lot of people would probably like to try, if it weren't so hard. But he learned lessons that don't necessarily require being a No Impact Man. In his quest to try to have zero impact on the environment, he discovered that environmentalism is not really about how many paper plates you use or how often you fly across the country. OK, it is, but that's not the way to make the world a better place. Environmentalism that has a chance at being sustainable (now there's a twist) is about people. It's about making a better life for us but probably even more for other people. If we could make that stand, if we could somehow get people to see each other, work together, understand that what each of us does affects millions of others directly, then environmentalism would be straightforward. Apparently, since this was published in 2009, we're slow. But his conclusions ARE valid, and we need to find a way to approach things with this in mind.

[Cristina Mureșan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it, an interesting experiment. I think it's a good book for those who are just starting to question themselves about what they could to to help the planet.
I enjoyed the little daily dramas, that people are usually reluctant to share to others, and I liked that it basically states you need to just try, and you might surprise yourself .

[Wendy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not at all preachy, this book is about a man who talked the environmental talk and walked the sustainable walk for a full year. Filled with references cited from reliable resources, this book creates a needed sense of urgency without being off-putting. It should be required reading.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

highly engaging report of a year author, his wife, and his daughter lived in NYC trying to have absolutely minimal environmental impact -- eating only locally grown foods, creating no trash, not using electricity, no TV, not traveling by plane or car or train, not buying anything new, not taking the elevator, etc. etc. etc.

Interesting from the points of view of..

(a) problem solving -- e.g., some trial and error on how to keep his daughter's milk cold without using refrigerator

(b) interpersonal relations -- he was the main driving force, though his wife got into it to varying degrees (enthused about giving up TV, unable to stop drinking coffee [none of which is grown near Manhattan], reluctantly compliant with not flying to visit her family until a few days after the year-long experiment is over). Author does a nice job exploring the range of reactions (some guilt, some anger) he has to her reactions.

(c) role modeling -- I already take public transportation to work, recycle, take the stairs if it's a manageable number of floors, and so on, but seeing someone outline in detail what CAN be done made me ponder additional steps I could take to have a lesser impact. Generating zero trash is well beyond me for now, for instance, and I don't plan to cut off all the lights either, but certainly some reduction in each area is possible. For the most part, author comes across as a humble guy trying to figure it out as he goes along, not a scolding snob looking down his nose at regular Americans, which I believe helps in creating this modeling effect.

(d) mix of small and big pictures. He does incorporate research and discursive segments on pollution, green energy, and the like, but always tied back to his own efforts in daily life. More readable, I believe, than an entirely-macro analysis of, say, what is the matter with the Chesapeake Bay.

[Manda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Now I scrammed this book off my brother, because it seemed fairly interesting. One man, one family, trying to be as eco friendly as they can be, without fully taking everything out of their life. The entire book was actually a revelation or revolution change in my mind, since Colin is trying to be that one person who goes beyond the statement, if no one else does this, why am I? There are plently of people who try to cut down on produced waste and using less plastic and taking certain foods from only such miles away. But what doesn't dissapoint me is that he isn't just ending this experiment, he is possibly giving into a few things but he's still going to have no television and ride a bike. When they went die-hard, and tried to use no electricity he should know that he was as if imitating what some people have. And I remember reading a little bit about, what certain people do and do not have and how they cope. But that's the thing, people like me or people like you, people with some money to their name can afford what it buys. And we produce gases, we make the atmosphere around us, die. And if we could all just stop doing this or that, certain aspects wouldn't even begin to happen.
I feel like that I can write much more on a review for this book, so I will hold off for a bit and then come back and accumulate what I feel. I just really loved what he and his family did though, it's something no one wants to deal with and no one really thinks about.

[Maya · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's my own fault. I picked this up thinking I would hate it because of the title, yet I checked it out and read it anyway. I almost gave it two stars because I want to shoulder part of the blame, but that doesn't excuse how bad this book was.

Author just annoyed the hell out of me through the entire book. If you're actually encouraging people to make these kinds of changes, why not explain what you're doing instead of using toilet paper rather than getting angry about it when people ask questions? There were so many things about this book that didn't make sense to me - the Zen koans scattered throughout the book, obsession with the rules at times, random exceptions at other times, closing with his wife's miscarriage?

This book was conceived during a meeting with a publisher and it comes across as a total gimmick. I hated it even more because I read it right after the thoroughly researched and incredibly thoughtful "Eating Animals." Read that, and Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Mineral" instead of this. Genuine people making genuine changes in their lives.

[Sarah · Rating 1 out of 5]

I got about halfway through and then decided to check in with good reads before potentially wasting another minute on this. As someone who doesn't own paper towels, gave up meat 15 yrs ago, tampons 10 years ago, started vermicomposting 5 years ago, and would have never even considered disposable diapers, this book was ridiculously elementary. As I read through his major philosophical breakthroughs I kept half expecting him to have a Eureka! moment where he realizes he should turn off the lights when he leaves a room.

Other readers are right: he doesn't explain how he makes changes, preferring to waste the ink on long diatribes. He is embarrassingly sentimental and his rhetorical pleas are as nauseating as his science and math are dubious. His wife sounds insufferable and despite a disarming beginning, he ends up being as annoying as people make guilty white liberals out to be.

I believe this is one for the Marley & Me/Tuesdays with Morrie segment of the population, for whom a modicum common sense and a analytic thinking are all but entirely absent.

[Susie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not going to lie, I never would have picked this book up had it not been for the fact my college required it (as a common reading assignment for all incoming first years). I appreciate what the author did and how he tries to motivate his readers to do the same (but less extreme version). At the very least the author managed to make me uncomfortable with my life style, but that is not why I gave this book three stars. Three stars because frankly I just hated the writing style. I wished for more detail but didn't get much. The ending would change topics five times in one page, and what on Earth is up with the Zen master references?
If you want facts about global-warming and how we are all doomed in another 20 years this is the book for you. If you're one of the nuts who doesn't believe in global warming (but seriously, do some research for your own sake if you fall into that category) or you are looking for an exciting read this probably ins't the book for you (unless of course you're starting at my college this fall too- then you could always watch the movie).

[Lex · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this book to read after watching the documentary of the same name. Both are excellent and different enough to check out both. While the documentary shows more the personal and emotional aspects, the book goes deeper into the family's background, personal difficulties, and breaks down the stats of climate change into easily digestible facts and figures. It is also frank about successes and failures of all sorts. Beavan makes no secret that he purposefully went as far extreme as he could to see if it was possible, livable, and what he could learn from the experiment. If you too are a "guilty liberal" and/or you like reading about going green and getting ideas about what you yourself could do, this is definitely worth a read. With Beavan's easy style and sense of humor, it goes quickly.

[Bioteo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ci sono moltissimi saggi che parlano dei problemi ecologici globali. Tuttavia l'autore affronta il problema da un punto di vista inedito. Colin Beavan è una persona qualunque che vive in una delle più grandi metropoli del mondo. La sua sensibilità e le sue riflessioni nei confronti delle problematiche ambientali lo portano ad intraprendere un percorso verso l'affrancamento dagli sprechi comandati del nostro sistema economico. Ben presto si rende conto che il benessere della natura e il benessere psico-fisico della persona coincidono. Il suo nuovo stile di vita prevede certamente molte rinunce ma gli permette di riscoprire le bellezze di una vita più semplice a stretto contatto con i propi affetti.

[Lindsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic! In this narrative Beavan takes on the challenge to live with ‘no impact’ to the environment for 1 year. What he doesn’t realize is just what it will include and how much it will impact him.

Truly a fascinating experience that goes into the first steps of becoming a person who is working to save the environment. Although some of the things he does may seem drastic, he offers ideas and solutions to every-day tasks that will help the environment rather than hinder it. I found a lot of great suggestions in this book that I can begin to apply to my own lifestyle and habits!

I highly reccomend this fun and informative book to anyone who has ever wondered how they can make a difference! It starts with YOU!

[Emilee · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were some things I really liked about this book- it emphasized environmental action that is sustainable/customized for each individual or family that is trying to live eco friendly lives.

But there were also some things I didn’t like. I didn’t appreciate the way Beavan spoke about his wife—it felt very condescending and belittling. Additionally, he made negative comments about some women’s weights in the book that only detracted from the book and my view of him as a person.

[Gabriel · Rating 5 out of 5]

An emotional roller-coaster for anyone who constantly worries about climate change and the environment. This book helps give your ordinary environmentalists (common citizens worried about global warming) hope for the future as well as an education on how individual action is not meaningless and can promote change thus eventually, making a difference.

[Ellie Hutchison Cervantes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Colin Beavan embarks on a journey, with his wife Michelle and young daughter Isabella in tow, of living for an entire year without making any negative environmental impact (or off-setting the unavoidable negative impacts with positive ones). Living in the heart of New York City, the No Impact Project was born out of Beavan’s concern with rising global temperatures, frustration at his own environmental inaction, search for a more meaningful way of living, and practically, his need to write another book. Throughout the course of the No Impact year, Beavan and his family progress through six stages of eco-living that build on one another: creating no trash, leaving no carbon footprint, eating and consuming sustainably, not using electricity, and finally, giving back. In each stage of the experiment, Beavan informs the reader on the reality of the current environmental situation as well as provides personal stories and reflection on how these changes have impacted his lifestyle and resulting quality of life.

Right away in the first phase of the project, Beavan does something so contrary to our way of life – he resolves to no longer produce trash. In this stage, Beavan scrutinizes our culture of convenience, all of the disposable products we use, and their resulting catastrophic impact on the earth’s forests, bodies of water, and sea life. He identifies that the problem isn’t so much consumers’ wants and needs, but of how our systems and manufactures deliver the things we want.

When Beavan takes on carbon output, he offers a brief but informative and dire picture of the current state of affairs when it comes to climate change and greenhouse gasses. He stresses the inefficiency of our car-dependent society in the U.S., yet doesn’t offer many practical solutions. Cutting out carbon-producing transportation is much simpler for him, as he lives in the dense center of New York City, but for the rest of us who live in the suburbs or more rural areas, we are left feeling helpless with few alternative options for transportation.

In the sustainable eating phase of the project, Beavan researches where our food comes from, how it is produced, and the negative environmental impact of agricultural practices in the U.S. Beavan commits to eating only local, unpackaged food, and begins to discover a more relational way of food consumption – one that connects the consumer to the farmer and the animals, and a way that fosters community. Once again, however, living in the city in close proximity to farmers markets made this phase very doable for Beavan, while it might be much harder for those living outside of the city or far from such markets.

The fourth stage of the project looks at consumption. Beavan criticizes the idea that to be American is to shop, consume, bury ourselves in debt, and boost the economy. He pushes up against this because he believes the GDP growth we are working towards is unfortunately dependent on the industries that are using up the earth’s resources in an unsustainable and ultimately devastating way. Beavan finds this problematic, asserting that we should be able to run an economy without simultaneously destroying the planet. Practically he changes his shopping to buying less and buying second-hand, habits anyone can easily adopt.

The stage of the project Beavan seemed to find the most difficult, and the one I find to be the most impractical to implement, is the no electricity phase. As Beavan and his family cut out the lights, dishwasher, washing machine, and refrigerator, they searched for alternative options but found very few available. For Beavan, the lack of sustainable options reveals to him the need for high-level economic and political change in the area of fossil fuel use and renewable energy. Maybe there are genuinely no easy solutions in this area, but Beavan could have suggested more options that are available outside of the city – such as solar panels – even though they did not apply to his context.

Beavan ends the No Impact project with an effort to create positive change by giving back, volunteering with several organizations in New York City dedicated to cleaning up the water and planting and caring for trees. Through these experiences he is empowered as he realizes he has the ability, as an individual, to make a difference on behalf of the environment. He inspirationally shares his philosophy that environmentalism is not just about using less but working towards more: a better quality of life for humans and the environment.

Throughout the book and while reflecting on the No Impact project, it is clear that as strong as Beavan’s desire to live in a sustainable way is his desire to shine a light on the true brokenness of our lifestyle – a lifestyle that destroys the planet and doesn’t even manage to make us happy. For Beavan, there is a strong connection between how we use natural resources and our quality of life, between our gratitude and our stewardship, and this is a consistent theme throughout the book. As much as the project is about reducing environmental impact, it is also about questioning the way we are accustomed to living and seeing if there is a better way out there – one that brings us true meaning while, simultaneously, not trashing the planet.

No Impact Man is not a how-to guide in eco-friendly living, but rather the journey of one man’s revelations, success, and failures as he swims against the cultural currant and creates a new, sustainable way of life for his family. Although the highly personal aspect of No Impact Man makes it an entertaining and inspirational read, Beavan missed the opportunity to go beyond simply modeling the No Impact life. The reader could have benefited from more practical tips on how to change their own lives, in their own contexts (not just in cities). No Impact Man inspires a changed way of life and a change way of viewing the resources we have and how we use them, but does not equip the reader to execute this change. The last line of the book, “So, what are you going to do?” is meant to be an rousing call to action, but it left me feeling a bit lost and overwhelmed. Beavan leaves it to the reader to figure out what to do next and how to translate the changes he made in his life to their own. However, maybe this was intentional. Maybe Beavan wants the reader to reflect on the larger themes of the book – stewardship, quality of life, slowing down – and build those into their life in a way that works for them and their family. Regardless, No Impact Man is a book that makes you reevaluate how you live, causes you to think about things you have never considered before, and models an alternative, more meaningful way of life, and for that, it is worth the read.