A common problem that I run into is that people think that it costs a lot of money to go green. In some cases this may be true, but there are a lot of small things we all can do to save a little energy. I’ve put together a list of things that cost under $30 that will save you energy.
1. Programmable Thermostat: Using a programmable thermostat can save you hundreds of dollars over the course of a year. The basic idea is to not heat or cool your home when you are not there. These can easily be purchased at your local hardware store and are fairly simple to install.
2. Caulk: It’s amazing what a $4 tube of caulk can do! Fill in all those leaky cracks around windows, doors and foundations and you can really cut down on your energy usage.
3. Furnace Filter: If your home is heated using a forced air furnace, than you need to replace your furnace filter on a regular basis. When they become clogged up this will cause your furnace to work harder, which uses more energy. Also choose your filter carefully, as a thicker filter may make your furnace work harder!
Today it’s Earth Day, a day intended to inspire awareness and gratitude for the environment. And could you find a better way to celebrate the Earth than becoming a climate activist? No, I think not.
“We’re mobilising 3 million people to join our fight for the climate, to force governments to act against runaway climate change. Help us reach our goal! Become a climate activist by signing up for free so we can send you action alerts and, about once a month in most countries, our newsletter.”
It wasn’t that long ago that I was a student, and I was using green ideas as a simple way of saving money. As a student, money is really tight, so you need to be economical in order to survive with the smallest amount of debt. So here are my top ideas that I used when I was at University.
Make your own meals in bulk
If you can learn how to cook easy meals such as Spaghetti Bolognese, Chill Con Carne, Chicken Curry, Beef Stew, you can make them in bulk and freeze the leftovers. I found that I could make at least 4 portions per meal, sometimes as many as 8. These meals typically scale very well. So when you make the meal, you get a fresh meal that evening and freeze the rest. When you’re feeling lazy, you just need to re-heat one of your frozen left-over meals. You just need to cook the pasta or rice to go with the meal!
You save money by buying the ingredients in bulk as well as saving packaging that you would otherwise get from microwave meals. I still use this tip to this day, giving myself a nice cooked lunch for work.
Here are 14 applications and groups for Facebook, a social networking website, which will easily help you to save our environment and climate. If you know about any others please let us know by making a comment.
They say it’s hard to teach an old dog new tricks, and this is never so true as in the case of adults who find it hard to change habits and characteristics that have been formed over a lifetime. And this is why it’s imperative that we teach our children the importance of good habits right from childhood, when they’re at a more malleable age and tend to listen to adults. Saving the environment may not be child’s play, but it is a child’s place to get involved in the process.
I used to be one of those people who would weed and weed and weed. I liked there to be so much space between plants that you could easily see how hard I had worked on that weeding! I liked the look of the piles and piles of mulch that I had spent hours spreading. I edged every time we mowed the lawn (with a reel mower, of course).
Totally anal, you know?
But I have grown a lot as a gardener and now I can even say that my laziness is totally good for the planet and its inhabitants.
Right now if you walked behind my house, you might notice that the persons who tend this yard aren’t anal … at all.
When I sit and have a glass of wine with friends in the evening, I have to resist getting up and chopping things down. Though, as time goes by, my resistance takes a whole lot less effort.
“Every day millions of StumbleUpon users discover great web sites and give them a “Thumbs-up”. Starting this Earth Day, we want to harness the power of our community and the “Thumbs-up” to plant trees for the National Forest Foundation.”
Turn off your lights for one hour at 8pm March 29 (that’s tomorrow) “to deliver a powerful message about the need for action on global warming.”
Households and businesses around the world are urged to turn off their lights and non-essential electrical appliances for one hour in an international event called Earth Hour 2008.
Earth Hour started out in Sydney, Australia between 7:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. on 31 March 2007. That year it was a local event in Australia, this year they are going bigger than ever. Over 11,900 businesses and over 200,000 individuals have signed up to take part in this event. Cities worldwide like Dubai (UAE), Bangkok (Thailand), Örebro (Sweden), San Francisco (USA), Toronto (Canada) and many others will also participate.
The primaries have come a long way since then and there are now only a few candidates left. But there are still no real discussions about climate change. There are no hard questions coming from the press regarding climate change and what the different candidates plan to do about it. Is family values really that more important for Americans than the future of our civilisation? I hope not.
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