Give your Home a Splash of Green this Earth Day

With the economy in its current state, there has never been a better time to follow the good old Earth Day adage- Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.

Here are some tips for how to follow the Three R’s around your home this year.

Reduce

Reduce consumption and save resources and money.

Energy Use: Set your thermostat a few degrees higher in the summer and a few degrees lower in the winter to reduce the amount of energy you use for heating and cooling. Also, when you can try to wash your clothes in cool or cold water as 85% of the electricity used for washing clothes is used for heating the water.

Water Consumption: Take shorter showers and turn off the water while brushing your teeth. This will help reduce your water usage. Also, installing low-flow shower heads and faucet aerators help reduce the amount of water needed for bathing and hand washing.

Emissions: If you live close enough to your place of employment or the grocery store walk or ride a bike if you can. If not, start a car pool at work and take turns driving to cut down on fuel costs and emissions being released in the environment.

Reuse

Before throwing out- think about what normal items can be used again around your home.

Glass: One of our home insurance consultants recommends saving glass bottles and jars as they can be used to store food in the future. For example, glass pickle jars make great pasta salad containers and glass spice jars can be used to hold anything from safety pins and buttons to spare hardware.

Paper Scraps: Instead of just throwing out unneeded paper waste, turn them over and cut them in half to make perfectly sized scrap paper for list making and other uses.

Gift Packaging: Do you get a lot of cards especially around the Holiday times that just get thrown in the trash after sitting on your mantle collecting dust for a few weeks? Save them and cut out interesting shapes from the decorated side of the card to make homemade gift tags for birthday, holiday and every other kind of occasion. Also, save that wrapping paper, tissue paper and ribbon- it can all be reused!

Recycle

Your trash may be someone else’s treasure- or has the potential to be recycled into paper, plastic and other materials. Make sure it gets where it needs to go!

Trash: If your community has a recycling program- get involved. Most city-run trash programs offer free recycling programs. Request a recycling bin from your trash company and recycle everything from tin cans to soda bottles and old newspapers.

Furniture and Building Materials: Before heading to the dump, find out where you local Habitat for Humanity home store is located. They will accept your old furniture, lighting fixtures, appliances and building materials (extra tile, old windows, toilets, etc). Donating these items not only reduces landfill waste but also helps families who cannot afford to buy new. (And donations are tax deductible- so save your receipts!)

Electronics: Keep your electronics as long as possible and when it comes time to get rid of these items- do so responsibly. Donate them or find out if there is an e-waste recycling program in your county. E-waste (like computers, cell phones and other electronics) can be dangerous to the environment as they contain mercury and other toxins. Most communities have cell phone donation bins where you can donate the phones to be refurbished and used second-hand.