Press coverage, and a question

Hello everyone. Firstly, I thought I'd let you know that the Carbon Diet got a little writeup in the CAT newsletter, Clean Slate. I did a talk about it at the members conference in August, and it was one of the ones which got written up in the magazine, so that's nice.

Secondly, I have a question for you all. Since I've been tracking my petrol usage on the Carbon Diet, I have realised that in the last 6 months, I have only used 3 tanks of fuel. The car is a 2-seater, basically just for me, no use for the family, and these days I never use it. I spent more on tax, insurance and servicing than fuel in the whole of the last year. It hardly seems worth having it.

So, considering I live out in the countryside where the buses don't run at useful times, commute just once a week to the station 10 miles away, but want to be able to go 20 miles to Guildford and back reasonably quickly from time to time without leaving my wife without a car, what can I replace my car with that is more environmentally friendly? Ideas, anyone?

Version 0.4

Yes, that's right, I've uploaded the next version of the site today. This one has a fair amount of new stuff in it. As well as improving the workflow and look of the site, I've added the last major domestic emissions source - cars. You can now track your fuel purchases and factor your vehicle usage into your CO2 calculations. That is the most important contributors covered (as far as the site is concerned). Other sources, like heating oil and flying will be added later on after the 1.0 release.

I've also added a tour, so that you can see what the site is all about before you sign up. This is one of the things that really had to be done so that I didn't have to explain everything to every user individually. We're getting to the point now where I can start thinking about opening the site up to a wider audience... maybe after the next version :)

Incidentally, the main thing for the next version is to add CO2 reduction suggestions, so watch this space for more details soon!

Oh, and I must namecheck LibraryThing for the very nice design of their tour, which I'm afraid I've blatantly copied. LT has been a very big influence on the Carbon Diet; I've been trying to keep my design as simple and as usable as theirs. I don't think I'm there yet, but with any luck (and skill) it should be OK in the end!