40 Ways to Go Greener at Home Besides Just Recycling
Ditch taxis and rentals for local public transportation to move around when you’re in a foreign city. This will decrease your carbon footprint considerably. If you love traveling and do so quite often, spend your nights in hotels that use renewable energy, and recycle or compost waste.
- When buying fish ensure that you check what kind of fish you’re getting.
- My tribe of happy shoppers love snapping up eco-friendly bargains thrift stores and flea markets.
- You should replace your window seals every 5-10 years since they expand and contract with the changing temperature over time and lose their air-tight grip.
- Ice machines increase energy use by nearly 20% when left running all day long.
- Items that could be recycled are frequently abandoned in home offices and bathrooms due to the hassle of having to transport them to distant receptacles.
- Wherever possible buy your groceries loose and pack them in your own reusable bags made from ‘eco-friendly’ materials instead of plastic bags from the store.
Up Your Recycling Game
Surprisingly, the amount of food waste generated and the cooking methods used each day also had a sizeable how to be more environmentally friendly at home impact. Working remotely can reduce carbon emissions, electricity costs, and water usage. Designer clothes require both materials and energy consumption to be created.
Renewable Energy for Electricity
Improvements in their technology are happening all the time and now more than ever is the right time to make the switch. Not only do they use less electricity, they don’t need to replaced anywhere near as often as regular, old fashioned light bulbs did. You can take some of that compost to nourish a garden. Cultivating herbs, flowers, vegetables, fruits, and other plants in your backyard or on a windowsill has many benefits. Plants clean the air and provide a habitat for pollinating insects that are essential to all ecosystems. Growing plants can also strengthen your relationship with nature, allowing you to better appreciate the splendor of life, and ultimately turn you into a stronger advocate for the planet.
Buy Energy-Efficient Appliances
Check EWG’s resources for healthier choices and look for Leaping Bunny cruelty-free certification. And don’t forget to replace those makeup wipes with a reusable towel, which will save a mountain of plastic-infused waste. “It’s especially important to properly dispose of expired pharmaceuticals and personal care products,” says Zimmer-Faust.
Times When People Had to Deal With Bitter Mishaps That Ruined Their Day
- This list is definitely a non-exhaustive one, as there are a tremendous amount of ways in which you can help combat climate change and its impacts.
- Being within green spaces has positive associations with mental health and wellbeing.
- So to find out where you can make the biggest personal changes, it’s worth calculating your individual carbon footprint using an online tool.
- You will be surprised at how many old items you can make use of.
Offsetting is where you donate funds to an organization to invest in an ecologically beneficial project. This can be planting trees or developing renewable energy, for the purpose of compensating for the carbon added to the atmosphere. So instead of flying business fly economy and donate the extra money. You also are reducing waste from food packaging materials such as man-made plastics and cardboard, that also travel hundreds and thousands of miles. When it comes time to replace an appliance, it’s best to choose an energy-efficient version if you want to achieve sustainable living.
- Your refrigerator also needs proper airflow to help keep it cool naturally (7.6 centimeters between the appliance and surrounding walls is ideal).
- Energy waste is reduced when the heating or cooling system is set to run only when needed.
- From rooftop gardening to shared community plots, urban gardening allows access not only to fresh produce but also builds community and shared responsibility for ecological stewardship.
Consider heating alternatives
Work with nature by planting varieties that are native to your landscape. They’ll inherently be better suited to the environment, requiring less maintenance and less water. A billion plastic toothbrushes are thrown away https://ecosoberhouse.com/ in the United States annually. Made with polypropylene plastic and nylon from fossil fuels, toothbrushes end up in waterways, gravely impacting marine life. To help curb this phenomenon, go for bamboo or wooden toothbrushes, or electric ones with replaceable heads. Electronic waste, or e-waste, encompasses any unwanted electronic equipment including old computers, televisions, smart phones, and used cables.
Is On-Site or Off-Site PPA Better for Green Businesses?
An energy audit will tell you which appliances and systems could be more efficient once modified or upgraded. While there is a long way to go at the government level, the federal and state governments in the United States have been taking steps to support sustainability. Put your money where your mouth is when choosing which companies to support. This can go a long way toward encouraging manufacturers to continue Sober living home or begin to build sustainable business practices, Kellogg says. Sustainable living is more than just a thing treehuggers talk about.
The next time you need a piece of furniture, consider recycled or reclaimed materials. That is why she now shuns the new stuff and goes for sustainable jewelry brands and products. Reducing the demand drives down the need for new mines to be created.
A well-insulated house will help your home stay cool in summer and warm in winter, meaning you won’t have to crank up the heating or air conditioning unit. Something as simple as adding thermal curtains or draft-stopper to your doors can make a big difference. You’ll be recycling perfectly usable items, you’ll be supporting your local economy, and you’ll be saving money. There are lots of little things we can do in our homes to play our small part in reducing landfill waste, cleaning the air, and preserving the natural landscape. But we double our efforts when we get our kids involved, helping them understand the why to our what.
Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, and iCloud are all trusted services. Saving money for the boss and the plant for the grandchildren. There are many small things we can all do at work that really start to add up and create a sustainable working environment.
0 comments on 40 Ways to Go Greener at Home Besides Just Recycling