Easy Green Living Tips

Heating and maintaining the temperature of water in the home is one of the most expensive bills for any household as it uses up a lot of energy. Almost 20% of every home’s gas emissions comes solely from hot water systems so as well as saving you money, saving energy on your water heating can also benefit the environment.

Temperature
Typically most people have their boilers set to produce very hot water, which has to be mixed with cold water to ensure it does not scald us when we use it for cooking, washing and cleaning. This is a waste of energy, and it is much more cost and energy efficient to turn the boiler down so that it only heats water to a comfortable temperature, and this means you will not have to add lots of cold water to get the right temperature for washing and cleaning. Every time you turn your boiler down by 10ºF you are actually saving as much as 5% on your overall energy costs and this can add up at the end of the year to a substantial amount of savings.

Cleaning and Washing
Although it is nice to have a lovely, long hot shower or bath it is not particularly good for the environment, so treat yourself to now and again to this indulgence, but try and take quick showers or have a stand up wash (with a bowl of warm water and face cloth) for the rest of the time, and you will save a lot on water and energy costs. When it comes to cleaning and washing your clothes modern detergents are so effective that they will work in cool temperatures just as well as hot ones, so instead of filling your mop bucket with hot water you can use cooler water just as well, and turn down your washing machine so that it the wash cycle is under 40 ºC.

Heating System Installation
Water can lose a lot of heat as it travels from the boiler to your taps, so make sure laggings on external pipes are in good condition and replace them every couple of years, and also buy a boiler insulation blanket as this will significantly reduce heat loss from the main tank.

Fair trade goods have become much more popular in recent years and are now available in most supermarkets and larger stores, and this is a very important step in the fight to improving working conditions and poverty around the world. Western civilizations have an inexhaustible need for a whole number of products and materials including cotton, fruit, coffee, tea and precious metals, and in the past the most important thing had been where to get these consumables the cheapest, and this has lead to bad working conditions and low wages in many countries around the world which supply these products and materials on the global market. Fair Trade is all about providing farmers, miners and other workers with a fair wage for their work, and also ensuring that their working conditions are also fair and to an acceptable standard. When you think that over 35% of the worlds working population has to try and exist on just $2 a day you can appreciate just how important it is that shoppers, as the primary consumers, also play an active part in ensuring that working conditions and wages around the world are fair, by choosing fair trade products when we are out shopping which we know will have come from reputable sources.

Fair Trade and the Environment
The Fair Trade movement is also working to help save valuable habitats and resources around the world, and because farmers and other workers are paid better wages they are in turn able to put in place measures that are much better for the environment, which can mean using less chemicals to grow crops and also replanting trees and creating valuable ecosystems on land that has been previously used for commerce and farming. By working with different countries to educate and support good environmental stewardship we can help to prevent the overuse of chemicals in the natural world, halt the spread of global deforestation and also conserve many fragile ecosystems.

In modern times we have become too used just to jumping in our cars and driving miles to find the best bargains and deals, and the average shopping expedition could involve a round trip of 30 miles or more. Although you could be saving money on your purchases you are at the same time expending an unnecessary amount of resources in terms of both time and fuel in order to buy just a few items in some cases, so it is important that you stop and think about more eco-friendly ways of shopping, to help save the valuable resources of the planet and also to support your local traders and community.

Local Shops
Local traders are under threat from out of town developments and this is not only bad for them but also the whole community, as local shops are a wonderful way of getting out of the house and mingling with other people that live in your area and are also very convenient if you have run out of a few items and don’t want to have to drive 10 miles to get them from a supermarket or mall. Local shops can be a bit more expensive than larger brand name stores, but if you spread your shopping evenly between the two (one big shop every one or two weeks and smaller items locally), then you should be able to support your local shops without worrying about your household budget.

Internet
You can get any number of amazing deals on the Internet now, and the choice of products on offer on the thousands of online stores is far greater than you would find in any big out of town shopping mall, so before you get in your car and head off for a long shopping trip have a look online and see if you can get any bargains this way. It is much more energy efficient for you to get products shipped out to your home, as one delivery lorry can cover a large area and drop as many as a couple of hundred items off on one trip, which requires much less fuel than a hundred or so shoppers getting in their cars and making the same journey separately.

Modern appliances have taken much of the chore out of washing clothes, but they are excessive in their use of detergents, water and energy and so unfortunately although they make life much easier, they are not particularly good for the environment. There are some more eco-friendly ways in which you can wash your clothes though, and some of these will also save you money on energy and shopping bills.

Pre-wash treatments
With our busy modern lives we may not have a lot of time to devote to washing, and tend to just throw everything in the machine on the hottest wash to make sure it is clean and stain free. However if you take the time to pre-wash stained items by hand you can save the costs of running the machine on a high temperature and still get good results. Green pre-wash methods include:
· Neat white wine vinegar can be applied carefully to deodorant and other small stains, and left to soak for a few minutes prior to washing.
· A paste of baking soda mixed with cool water can also be applied to spot stains for a few minutes before the main wash.
· If you have heavily stained items you can soak them in a mix of one tablespoon of Borax per gallon of cool water for 30 minutes before washing.

Cool Wash
The cooler the wash the more energy you will save, so try and wash all everyday items on cycles no higher than 30 degrees (most washing machines will allow you to adjust the wash cycle temperature manually). With the advances of modern detergents you can wash clothes effectively in cold water, but if you are using laundry tablets or powders you may need to dissolve the product in a little warm water before adding it to the detergent tray just to ensure it is dispersed evenly during the wash (otherwise you could get clumps which do not wash out and stick to clothes).

Load Size
Make sure you only put on your washing machine if it is full, as it will use the same amount of energy and water regardless of how much you put in the drum, and you will just be wasting resources by doing several small washes throughout the week, rather than one or two big washes. If you do need a particular item washed urgently then buy a hand wash detergent and wash it separately. Some machines do let you adjust water levels to allow for smaller loads, but will still use a lot of energy during the wash.

Laundry Balls
This product claims to wash your clothes without the need for any chemicals, but there are mixed reports on how effective they are, so it may be the case that it depends on your local water quality or the type of washing machine you have as to whether or not laundry balls will work for you. They are not very expensive to buy so it might be an idea to test them out and see how well they work in your machine, as this could potentially save you a lot of money and is much better for environment.

Recycling is often used as a blanket term to describe the reuse and repurposing of different materials, but the way in which you can recycle materials does vary, and there are many different types of recycling all of which have been given their own terms, such as downcycling and upcycling.

Downcycling
When you recycle some products the integrity of the material is lost through the reclamation process, which means it cannot be reused to make the original product again and typically it must be downcycled into a product of lesser quality or value. For example some plastics (resin code 1 or PET) can be recycled and used again for the same purpose, but resin code number 2 or HDPE plastics which are used for food products (milk cartons, water bottles etc) cannot be used again for food-grade products as the integrity of the plastic is unbalanced during the reclamation process, and so they are often downcycled into items like outdoor furniture and rubbish bins (this process also requires a lot of energy). Additionally HDPE can only be recycled a finite number of times, and then it will have outlived its usefulness and will have to go into landfill. Top quality writing paper is another product which has to be downcycled, as it cannot be used again for the same purpose and this paper is downcycled instead into cardboard, inferior grade paper and toilet paper.

Upcycling is the opposite of downcycling in that it converts waste products into new materials generally of a better quality, and there are a number of ways you can upcyle at home. For example plastic bags from supermarkets and shops are very practical, but they are only meant for a few uses and can easily tear and break. Instead of just throwing them away you can make new bags out of broken and discarded plastic bags by cutting them into strips and then literally knitting them together, and this creates a much stronger, more durable bag that you can use time and time again for shopping and carrying around your belongings.

Recycling is an important way to conserve our planets resources, but not all recycling is equal so it is important that you learn more about this topic to ensure you are finding the best ways to reuse and reclaim waste materials.