Burning fossil fuels to generate electricity is the single largest source of global emissions. Avoid contributing to climate change by switching your electricity source to renewable energy. Work on your carbon footprint and combat climate change from home with 12 things you can do to fight climate change.

A typical car emits about 4.6 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. Take the train or a bike instead.

A seat on a return flight from London to New York emits about 1.7 tonnes of carbon dioxide, from Hamburg to Palma de Mallorca this is 0.73 tonnes. Unnecessary flights need to be avoided.

Approximately 8% of the world’s carbon emissions are caused by travel and tourism. Travel sustainably, using these 10 tips for ways to do so.

Livestock farming contributes 18% of human produced greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. Consider a vegan or vegetarian diet: reducing the amount of meat or dairy products in your diet is both good for you and good for the planet.

If you do eat fish, make sure it comes from a sustainable source. Avoid supporting destructive large-scale fisheries and help local fishers instead.

Support your local farmers and fishers. Purchasing produce that is regional and in season helps reduce transportation costs, unnecessary packaging and emissions.

Perhaps the most important ocean action of all starts with the simple decision to refuse single-use plastic where possible.

Take a survey to see just how much single-use plastic is in your life and get tips on how to avoid plastic at home in the kitchen and bathroom, when travelling or in your free time from My Little Plastic Footprint and Friends of the Earth.

It’s often hard to avoid plastic but a little preparation can go a long way. Carry a bottle, shopping bag, cutlery and containers rather than accept plastic alternatives. Shops and restaurants are often pleased to fill up your boxes rather than use their own plastic containers.

Earth’s resources are not infinite and so we need to look after them. Establishing a circular economy with zero waste is key to restoring the ocean. A mobile phone is a good example, 80% of which is recyclable. Don’t just put your old one in a drawer, recycle it!

Join a local cleanup (it doesn’t need to be on a beach!) or start your own. Cleanup apps like Litterati can help you track what you collect.

If you are a diver, make every dive count with the Padi Dive Against Debris movement.

Whenever you see a piece of plastic where it doesn’t belong, pick it up, take a photo, and share it on social media using #IsThisYours and the brand name, tagging the company in question.

Conduct a brand audit with Break free from plastic’s toolkit to identify the corporations responsible for the unmanageable plastic waste in your community, school, or office. Then, hold them accountable by sending their plastic waste to their corporate offices or writing to them that while you want the product, you don’t want the plastic packaging that goes with it.

Call on your government to take a responsible stand on waste disposal, to stop waste exports, to establish policy on single-use packaging and washing machine filters, to provide better recycling facilities and to commit to the zero-waste movement.

Write to companies asking them to use social plastic and embrace an EPR programme.

Ask your local supermarket to offer plastic-free or unpackaged goods.

Between 700,000 and 12 million microfibres can be shed during one single load of laundry. Washing clothes less and at lower temperatures, and using a filter, bag or ball will catch microplastics before they enter the wastewater.

Minute plastic beads in shower gels or facial washes are impossible to filter out before they enter the ocean. Find out whether your bathroom products contain unnecessary microbeads with the Beat the microbead app.

Check your labels - the toxic chemicals included in household detergents end up in the wastewater and eventually the ocean. If it's poisonous for humans then it will kill marine life too.

Follow Hawai’i’s example and use reef safe sunscreen, find an SPF that uses physical UVA and UVB filters as opposed to the chemical ones with oxybenzone and octinoxate, which have been connected to coral reef deterioration.

Be careful what you flush - high levels of antibiotics, pennicilin and ibuprofen are already present in wastewater. Unused medicines should be disposed of carefully.