Green Living - Tips For Home

All of this information on global warming can be terribly overwhelming for most people. And understandably, it's a serious looming issue that we're going to have to do something about fast. Unfortunately, it's becoming pretty apparent that we can't necessarily rely on our governments to act quickly enough. So what can you do yourself to help the problem? Let's go through some of the simple things individuals can do to help ebb the tides (both literally and figuratively) of global warming.

Ensure your home is well-insulated. You can save almost 50% on heating bills when you have thick insulation between the outside and your walls. Not only will this save you an arm and a leg each year on heating costs, it also saves half the fuel or natural gas that you use normally to heat your home.

Adopt alternative methods for powering your home's appliances. Solar shingles are one fairly simple way to do this. You can also attach a solar array to the top of your house, or solar thermal collectors. There are many ways that solar technology can be used to help make life easier. Plus, after the initial investment it's free energy!

Petition your local government to increase building standards on home and commercial insulation. As is, North America and Britain have some of the least harsh building standards when it comes to energy efficiency. This type of change could cut our energy consumption by almost forty percent.

Flush less. If you can't afford a green toilet (one that has a built in compost-system) one very simple way to reduce the amount of energy and water you use in a day is to follow the slogan: "If it's yellow, let it mellow; If it's brown, flush it down." That's pretty self-explanatory, and not utterly unsanitary either, as urine is sterile once it leaves the body so it poses no harm to just leave it in the toilet. Flushing a toilet is actually a pretty energy and water-intensive thing, believe it or not. Every time you flush the toilet uses five to seven gallons of water! So while the motto may be a little silly, limiting your flushes does make a difference.

Put a bottle in the tank. Another step you can take to make your toilet more efficient is to put a small plastic bottle (with the label removed) in your toilet's tank, making sure that it doesn't interfere with the flushing mechanism. Over time, this will save quite a lot of water. It might stop the power in your flush, but a lot of it is overkill anyways.

Save while you brush your teeth! The bathroom is actually a pretty energy intensive place when you think about it. Turning off the water while you brush your teeth, and taking shorter showers are other methods of limiting the energy you use in the bathroom.

Buy food in bulk, not single-serving packages to reduce the amount of waste you produce. A lot of what makes our landfills so big (when that land could be used for agriculture or development) is that modern lifestyles are increasingly disposable. Whether it's little yogurt tube containers, or the latest cell phone model, everything is disposable. Using things like tupperware for your kid's lunch, or cloth diapers, or taking a mug from home to coffee are all ways to keep your share of the trash to a minimum.

Do only full loads of laundry and dishes, unless you have specific settings on your appliance. Because otherwise, no matter how big the load, the same amount of energy is used to wash both dishes and clothes, so you might as well get as much as you can from the energy output.

That's all we've got for now folks! If you've got any more tips and tricks you think we should add to this list (and I'm certain there are many!) email them to us at veronika@envirohub.net