To be green is a simple concept reduce, reuse and recycle. This seems like common sense I know but how to apply to our lives in various ways may be abit more tricky. So I'm going to break it down with some ideas!
Reduce
1. Buy local- anything from produce to furniture. This is one way to reduce gas omission.
2. Have your own garden. It can have herbs, vegetables, fruits and other various plants. This is another way to be more local and increase oxygen production.
3. Reduce the times and the amount of water that you use on yards and water in the morning or later evening when it cooler and more can be absorb in the ground verses the atmosphere.
4. Plan your meals ahead of time hence when you going shopping for food you don't buy excess amounts of food and also don't going shopping when your hungry it makes you more vulnerable to impulse shopping!
5. Make sure to turn all lights off when going out , use timer for outside lights and limit your use of lights during the day time and use eco friendly lights!!Hence reducing electricity.
6. Carpool,take the bus or public transit, walk, or ride your bike to places you need to go. This may seem like a difficult one to do especially depending if your live in the suburbs or country in which things are more spread out but this is the perfect time for trying the walking or bike riding and getting some exercise. Plus in looking at it theres many positive outcomes like exercise, being more locally based in your traveling, more social and doing a good thing for the environment and saving some money on gas.
7. Don't speed it just uses up gas and money!Also check air pressure in your tires the flatter they are the further they move equaling more gas being used.
8. Re-wear clothes, reduce about of clothes for laundry, use cold water for washing , don't do tons of small loads, allow your clothes to me wind dried or use dryer in off hours when electricity use isn't so high.
9. Air conditioning and heating - monitor and keep constant don't change it constantly. Also don't make your house freezing in the summer and bursting hot in the winter- be realistic and save money!!
10. Don't wash your hair every day - firstly because it doing more damage to your hair it drys it out plus my doing this your reducing your shampoo use and conditioner use and having more for longer= $saving money.
11. Don't shower multiple times a day and if possible shower ever 2-3 days depending on hygiene level and temperatures outside. This may be tricky for people who exercise or do sports in the middle of the day but an easy fix is to exercise in the morning or either evening when you don't plan on going out anywhere or have to shower normally during that time anyways.
12. Go bare- don't use make-up or blow dryer or straighter or limit the amount in which you use these items. I personally don't wear any make-up for daily events and i don't blow dry my hair ever. Try having bare days and when purchasing make-up think about the amount you already have at home and may not use and try to use up all make-up before buying new make-up hence limiting waste of materials. This way your saving space in your make-up bag, saving money , reducing electricity and being more natural and not using water to clean off the make-up. Also pony tails, clips, braiding styles are great ways to help with the wind dry hair and still look presentable.
13. Unplug- reduce phantom power because even though your electronics (television, computer, chargers, radios, stereos and anything else you plus in)are off if there still plugged-in they are using electricity to keep at a constant. This may be tricky if you have many wires that plug in to outlets esp for computers with fax machine, printers and scanners the easier way to resolve this is to use a power bar with a switch to turn off and on electricity flow to these devices. Also when getting devices get multifunctional ones like a printer scanner built-in one it saves space!
14. Limit your time on facebook- this is saving electricity and your wasting less of your life on a gossip site and you may actually go out and see your friends more too!
15. For the gamers- limit the amount of time per day on games. This is more for my brother who spends literally all day sometimes on games which uses tons of electricity, heats up areas, make one lazy and less social.
These are some of many ideas in how to be green! Tell ways you reduce and what you think of the post!
These are great tips. I try to reduce as much as possible. Most of the grocery stores by us even give you a discount if you bring your own bags, it is a great way to make people save :)
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