7 am: In the bathroom
Two thirds of water used in our homes is used in the bathroom, with about 50 litres used per person for personal washing every day. Ideally, 50 litres should be enough for all our daily water needs.
Your morning shower or bath will wash away many litres of water contaminated by grease, grime and if you use shampoo or gel hundreds of synthetic chemicals.
Across the world, there are 12,000 cubic kilometres of polluted fresh water. That's enough to fill the ten largest river basins. Fifty per cent of our major rivers are seriously polluted or depleted.
A power shower can use just as much water in less than five minutes. Even a standard shower uses 35 litres in five minutes, which would easily fill up seven buckets.
What you can do:
Stand under a standard shower and keep washing time to a minimum. If you like the energetic jet of a power shower, you can get a water-saver showerhead fitted. It feels like a power shower but uses half the water.

7.20 am: What to wear
Synthetic fabrics have a huge impact on the environment. Most synthetic fabrics are non-biodegradable. This means they do not get broken down by bacteria and decompose naturally. Nylon production also attributes to global warming with the release of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide.
What you can do: 
Swap clothes with your friends and siblings, and if you are feeling creative, recycle old or worn outfits into attractive original designs.
Look for clothing made from organic textiles (including organic cotton and hemp) and avoid synthetic fibres.

8 am: To work
There are more than 400 million cars and light trucks on the world's roads today. These are responsible for producing greenhouse gas.
Each litre of petrol used in a car produces 2 kilograms of carbon monoxide. By 2020, vehicles will discharge as much as 1,800 million tones of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in a year.
What you can do:
You can save fuel by not accelerating or braking too harshly, and switching off the engine when at a signal. Air-conditioning burns fuel, so, use it only when necessary. Any extra load increases fuel consumption so, remove junk from the dicky.
Car pools is the future of travel. The more people who go in one car, the fewer cars there are on the road.

12.30 pm: Lunch
Fast food boxes, sweet wrappers and snack packets are our fastest-growing litter problem. Discarded fast food has helped to swell the world rat population by millions. More than half of the waste plastic generated every year is from packaging, including chips packets and sandwich cartons sold in non-biodegradable plastic bags.  
What you can do:
Avoid pre-packaged foods. Buy fresh, unpacked food, instead. Make sure you take along a bag to avoid using plastic bags dished out by the shopkeeper.

1 pm: Phone a friend
In 2006, worldwide sales of new mobile phones topped 1,000 million. It is estimated that there are 5 billion handsets in existence 1 between every 1.3 people.
Mobile phones contain a variety of highly toxic substances that have been linked to cancers and other disorders in humans. An old battery contains enough cadmium to contaminate 600,000 litres of water.
The plastic covers of mobile phones last for hundreds of years in landfill sites.
What you can do:
Do you really need an new mobile? If your phone still works, give it another six months, or even a year, before you trade it in for the latest model.
Don't leave your phone charger switched on, say while you sleep. It wastes energy and is a potential fire risk because even when not connected to a phone, a charger continues to draw electricity.

What's a carbon footprint?
The carbon footprint is a measure of the impact an individual has on the environment through the emission of greenhouse gas that eventually lead to contributing to global warming. Your carbon footprint is made up of: the primary footprint (shows emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases for which you are directly responsible, such as those produced by the travelling and using electricity).

The secondary footprint is a measure of emissions for which you are indirectly responsible (produced by the manufacturing of goods you buy).  The size of your carbon footprint depends on how you spend time in front of the TV. If you fly when you go on a holiday, your footprint will be larger than if you were to use the railways.

For more practical tips, pick up a copy of You Can Save the Planet, available at major bookstores for Rs 395