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April 18, 2024, 07:34:02 PM
Funfani.com - Spreading Fun All Over!INFORMATION CLUBInformative ZoneMiscellaneous101 Ways to Save Environment and Live Green
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Amitkumar
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« Reply #6 on: June 29, 2010, 04:42:44 AM »

50. Get a truly 'green' lawn: One hour of mowing your lawn with a gas-powered mower produces as much pollution as driving your car for four hours. For a truly "green" lawn, consider using a push mower or hiring a lawn service that uses solar-rechargeable electric mowers.



51. Share your swim space: Swim at your community pool or fitness center instead of installing a pool of your own. If you already own a pool, consider allowing your neighbors access and share the expenses. A pool's circulating pumps cost as much to run as your home air conditioning system.

52. Buy tickets online: Airline, movie and event tickets can be purchased online or by telephone and printed at home and you'll save time and paper waste. Print-at-home tickets use plain copy paper, which is easier to make into recycled paper than the paperboard used for printed tickets -- and the ink and magnetic strips make printed tickets even more difficult to recycle.

53. Reuse hotel linens and towels: You probably don't change your sheets and towels every day at home, so why do it while you're away? One towel change per week ought to be plenty.

54. Pack light: Every additional 10 pounds per traveler requires an additional 350 million gallons of jet fuel per year, which is enough to keep a 747 flying continuously for 10 years.

55. Research your trip online: Print out only the pages or maps you'll actually need. Close to 1 million guidebooks are printed annually, but just 18 percent get recycled. Map paper is particularly difficult, if not impossible, to recycle because of all the ink used. You'll save time, money and paper waste. Use old maps as gift wrap and you'll save a bundle.

56. Rent hybrid cars: Try a hybrid or more fuel-efficient car. A hybrid rental can go three times as far as a standard sedan on a single tank of gas.

57. Refill water bottles: Use a refillable bottle or thermos or canteen when you travel.

58. Give small gifts: Gift cards, concert tickets, restaurant certificates and movie vouchers are great alternatives to holiday presents heavily packaged and wrapped in expensive and hard-to-recycle paper. You'll also reduce the time, stress and energy associated with traffic, crowds and long checkout lines. How many gifts do you give a year? If you average $2 for wrapping paper, ribbon and labels for each, think of how much you can save, not to mention the recycling costs.

59. Get the holiday LED Lights: Next time you replace your holiday lights, save both money and energy by choosing LED types. What's more, with a 100,000-hour life span, your LED lights could last until the next century.

60. Go for glass Instead of Cans: The energy required to produce a single 12-ounce aluminum can from virgin ore is enough to produce nearly two 12-ounce glass bottles. So the next time you buy a six-pack of beer, opt for glass bottles over aluminum cans.

61. Reduce sports gear: Consider renting or leasing sports equipment on a per-use basis as opposed to wasting money and cluttering up your garage with stuff you likely won't use more than once or twice a year. Or purchase used equipment. You'll reduce the energy needed to produce an additional piece of equipment and decrease the amount of waste eventually sent to the landfill.
Green Health & Beauty Tips

62. Use bars of soap versus liquid wash: It's less expensive, and it saves packaging waste. Not to mention that body wash is primarily water, so the fuel costs for transporting it are higher because it weighs more.

63. Skip the treadmill: If the weather's right, consider giving the treadmill a rest and taking your walking or jogging routine outdoors.

64. Slash trash: Cut waste by selecting products with less packaging. Three ways to do it: Choose products that come with minimal packaging, buy larger sizes, or buy refills or in bulk which typically have less packaging.

65. Get two for one: Consider using a two-in-one shampoo and conditioner instead of buying each separately. If one in seven U.S. households replaced its shampoo and conditioner purchase with a single two-in-one bottle, the amount of plastic saved per year could fill a football field 27 stories high.

66. Avoid pore pluggers: When you buy deodorant, try to avoid antiperspirants, which use aluminum salts to seal up your pores. In addition to being a potential health toxin, aluminum takes a tremendous amount of energy to mine. If you buy one stick of aluminum-free deodorant, the energy saved could power your laptop for 30 minutes.

Green Car Tips

67. Tyre Pressure: Keep the tires at the correct PSI (air pressure) at all times: driving around without proper air in the tires wastes gas.

68. Air conditioning and heat: Minimize the use air conditioning and heating when possible, roll down those windows and breathe some fresh air when the weather permits.

69. Weight matters: Having extra weight(tools, sports equipment, etc.) in the car hurts gas mileage.

70. Gas-saving driving: If you must drive, at least ensure that you're using less gas by doing so. Some common recommendations to do so: ease up on the gas pedal and brake pedal, be sure your tires are inflated and your engine is running smoothly, don't have your car on idle for too long, and get a fuel-efficient car.

Other Tips

71. Get your bank statement electronically: If you're worried about computer hackers, don't. Most banks send you an e-mail with a link to a secure Web site where you can check your balance

72. Cancel the canceled checks: If you still get paper bank statements that include canceled checks, at least cancel the canceled checks. You can reconcile your account just fine without all those extra slips of paper.

73. Donate clothing and household goods: Donate clothing and household goods to the environmental nonprofit of your choice. Many charitable groups, including those dedicated to saving the planet, will take such gifts.

74. Direct-deposit your pay: Most employers and banks can handle your request. In fact, they probably prefer the method. Your paycheck will always be in the bank, not in the mail, and there's no environmentally wasteful paper paycheck to worry about.

75. Pay your bills electronically: Once you're online looking at those charges, it just takes a couple extra clicks to make the payment.

76. Buy a hybrid vehicle: The advantages of these combination gas/electric autos have become well-known since pump prices have stabilized around $3 for the last couple of years.

77. Invest in 'green' funds: Ramp up that good eco-investing feeling by choosing stocks or mutual funds that that buy environmentally friendly assets. This type of investing goes beyond the usual eco-suspects, such as organic farms or environmental services firms. Green investing also means buying into mainstream companies that encourage sound environmental policies, such as energy efficiency, renewable energy and green building.

78. Skip the receipt at the ATM: Most of the time you just take a glance at it and tear it up. Why not see your balance on the ATM itself instead of requesting a receipt.

79. Use cloth diapers: Another huge thing a parent can do to live green is to use cloth diapers as opposed to disposables. Disposable diapers take up an enormous amount of this countries landfills, don't break down easily, cost a lot of money, put chemicals directly on the bottoms of our children, and in many cases delay potty training.

80. Go Solar: Pick up some solar chargers, generators, or other solar powered tools.

81. Compost waste: Compost waste if you have a garden, saving on fertilizer cost and giving your plants a treatment they'll love.

82. Buy only what you need: Buy what you need when you're shopping. The supermarkets exist to tempt us into buying more than we need with constant special offers, designed to load up our houses with unnecessary extras. Take a list when shopping and stick to it. You'll throw less food away and have a clearer kitchen as well as a clearer conscience.

83. Other alternative energy sources: Thermal heating, photovoltaic cells, solar shingles, hydro power (water), Wind power (wind mills and wind turbines), can also take your house of the electric grid and gas line without hurting the environment.

84. Go For Natural Fibers: Buy products with natural fibers, like cotton and wool, that are naturally fire resistant.

85. Dispose Properly: Dispose of old paint, oils & chemicals properly- Never put paint, oils, batteries or antifreeze in the trash! Use proper toxic disposal sites.

86. Look for PVC-free Toys for your Kids: PVC (aka polyvinyl chloride) seems to be everywhere we look. Some beach toys, teethers, dolls, and even (gasp!) rubber duckies are cheaply manufactured with the environmentally dubious material. A dioxin-producing powerhouse, PVC releases toxins into the environment all the way through its life cycle from manufacturing to disposal.

87. Donate, not discard: Don't throw something away just because you've outgrown that particular style—thrift stores such as Goodwill or the Salvation Army will be more than happy to take items in serviceable condition. You're also likely to find takers by posting on Craig's List or Free cycle. Call it a win-win-win situation for you, the new owner, and the earth.

88. Grow Your Own Food: Start a small vegetable garden. Even if you don’t have a garden at all, herbs and salads can be grown in a window box, and sprouting seeds is an easy way to grow some fresh food too. Complete self-sufficiency might not be realistic, but any food you can grow at home will be an important contribution to cutting food miles, and reducing our dependence on fossil fuels. It will also taste delicious.

89. Home Brew your Coffee: The local café is great. It’s got your friends, good food, free wireless. But if you think you can be greener in your own kitchen, give it a try. When you do it at home you know where the beans and leaves are coming from and also where they go when they’re spent. Plus, you can’t forget your mug, you can choose organic milk, and never toss out another paper sugar packet. Try a bit of quick math on the cost savings of making your morning cup-o-joe at home.

90. Buy vintage or used: People unload clothes for all types of reasons, and you know that adage about trash and treasure. From Oscar-worthy vintage dresses to Free cycled denim, you can likely find the piece you’re looking for second hand. You’ll be giving a cast-off garment a second life, and possibly supporting charitable work in the process.

91. Compost the roast: Tea leaves and especially coffee grounds make outstanding compost. Coffee’s high nitrogen content has made it a fertilizer of choice since days of yore. Composting leaves and grounds helps keep organic waste out of landfills, makes great soil, and keeps waste baskets dry. If you don’t have a heap to toss it on, just spread coffee grounds on the top of your plants’ soil.

92. Clean up your Pets poop: Scoop up your doggie doo in biodegradable poop bags so your buddy’s No. 2 isn’t immortalized in a plastic bag, while deep-sixed in a landfill somewhere for hundreds of years. Cat owners should avoid clumping clay litter at all costs. Not only is clay strip-mined (bad for the planet), but the clay sediment is also permeated with carcinogenic silica dust that can coat little kitty lungs (bad for the cat). Eco-friendly cat litters avoid these problems; a happy cat is a cat that doesn’t claw your face off.

93. Buy Recycled: The essence of recycling is the cyclical movement of materials through the system, eliminating waste and the need to extract more virgin materials. Supporting recycling means feeding this loop by not only recycling, but also supporting recycled products. We can now find high recycled content in everything from printer paper to office chairs.

94. Harvest rainwater: Adding a rain barrel is an inexpensive and effortless way to capture mineral- and chlorine-free water for watering lawns, yards, and gardens, as well as washing cars or rinsing windows. By harnessing what's literally raining from the sky, you'll not only notice a marked dip in water costs, but also a reduction in storm water runoff, which in turn helps prevent erosion and flooding. Pop a screen on top of your barrel to keep out insects, debris, and bird missiles, and make frequent use of your water supply to keep it moving and aerated.

95. Recycle your water: If you're a homeowner, consider rearranging your plumbing so that rainwater or wastewater from your shower and tub is used to flush your toilet. If you have a garden, water it with leftover bathwater or dishwashing water (as long as you use a biodegradable soap).

96. Packaging Material: Styrofoam peanuts, those non-biodegradable, everywhere-flying, petrol-based, little packaging devils can be brought back to most packaging stores for reuse as long as they’re clean and dry.

97. Buy only Certified sustainable wood: Whether a piece of furniture is made from wood, cloth, metal, plastic, or whatever else, there are earth-friendly options.

98. Low-toxicity furniture: When you buy a piece of furniture, bring it home, and set it down in a room, it doesn't just sit there. No matter what it's made out of, chances are, it's off gassing (or releasing substances into the air). Almost everything off gasses, which isn't necessarily bad, but synthetic materials or those treated with synthetic substances can off gas chemicals which are toxic. Everyone should be conscious of the kinds of chemicals they bring home, but especially if you have kids, pets, or other family members who are low to the ground and prone to licking things.

99. Find the Time to Volunteer: Your first reaction to the thought of volunteering your time may well be: what time? But you can’t help others until you help yourself. So ask yourself the following: Do you need more time for fitness? Then volunteer to do something active. Don’t over-commit, but ask yourself how volunteering could be the value-added time you will anyways dedicate to goals of your own. Worried this approach seems selfish? Don’t! The most effective volunteers are those who do things that match their pace.

100. Put Your Money to Work: So you really, really don’t have the time? Or maybe you are volunteering already and see clearly that there is no point in dying rich? Then consider offering some funds toward good green causes. To select where your money goes, we suggest using the same techniques mentioned above for choosing an organization with which to spend your time.

101. Spread the Word: Bring awareness to wasteful people around you not only by telling them to Go Green but by leading by example. By being Green in your life and showing people how easy it can be...they gain confidence that they can follow suit. Suggest ways that they could be more eco-friendly and point out how much they save.

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