Yes

by Nathan Creitz

Created on: July 18, 2008

There are some things for which I cannot trust the government to ever solve. One of those issues is environmental sustainability. I'm grateful that these issues of sustainability are important to our elected officials, but there is only so much they can do. It is up to the consumer to make the difference.

I'm no treehugger, but I know there are some things that every one of us can do right now to make our society more self-sufficient. There are hundreds of ways we can reduce, reuse recycle, but I want to narrow the list down to 10 things that not only help the environment but might actually save us time, money and effort as well. In other words, these should be no-brainers, and yet the majority of people in our country have yet to see the value of the following ideas. Implementing just a few of these could save a consumer literally hundreds of dollars a month. So without further ado, these are my top ten ways consumers can create a more sustainable society:

10. Change a lightbulb. According to GE, "If every household in the U.S. replaced ONE light bulb with a GE Energy Smart bulb, we would save a combined national total of $600 million a year in energy costs. We would also save enough energy to light more than 3 million homes for a year and prevent greenhouse gases equivalent to the emissions of more than 800,000 cars."

9. Walk or bike instead of driving those short trips.
The bicycle manufacturer Trek has a few stats on their website:
- 60% of the pollution created by automobile emissions happens in the first few minutes of operation, before pollution control devices can work effectively.
- 24% of all trips are made within a mile of the home, 40% of all trips are made within two miles of the home, and 50% of the working population commutes five miles or less to work.
- The U.S. could save 462 million gallons of gasoline a year by increasing cycling from 1% to 1.5% of all trips.

8. Stop Drinking Bottled Water
According to the Refill not Landfill Campaign:
- Making all of the bottles for the US requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually. That's enough to fuel 100,000 cars.
- Americans send about 38 billion water bottles a year to landfills. (According to Brita)

7. Shop Locally
There's no reason to buy a tomato from Brazil. Many places have local farmer's markets that you can go to and buy fresher, cheaper ingredients that weren't frozen, packaged, shipped, unpacked, and put on the shelf. To shop locally is to conserve energy, support your local community, and to improve your diet.

6. Plant a Tree
The Forest Service has identified a backlog of more than one million acres of America's national forests that need to be replanted. And each year, with every wildfire, storm, or insect epidemic, the backlog steadily increases. Healthy forests filter water, remove air pollution, sequester carbon, and provide homes for wildlife. Do it on Arbor Day or purchase a tree in honor of someone.

5. Donate
A lot of what you consider to be trash might be what someone else is looking for. Consider the success of ebay.com for example. Donating old cell phones, computers, and even cars is a good way to make it last just a little bit longer.

4. Do a Yearly Service Project
Does your church organize a missions project each year? Is your family going on vacation? Why not do a Service Trip instead? Better yet, rather than jet off to some exotic location, why not find a "volunteer vacation" somewhere close by. Vacation is a state of mind anyway so make it a good one this year. Check out sierraclub.org for ideas.

3. Think About What and How You Drive
Some of the tips for hypermiling out there are a bit extreme, but there are a lot of great ideas for saving money on gas. Mostly it has to do with not driving so aggressively, keeping the pressure in your tires, cleaning the air filter, not driving recklessly, etc. With just a few small adjustments in how I've been driving, I've been able to increase an average of nine more miles per gallon. Obviously, the priciest thing you can do is trade in your 20mpg SUV for a 60mpg hybrid or electric car. However, It will be the best option in the long run.

2. Go Online
Sure, it uses some electricity, but think about all the paper you are able to save by doing things online. Most online billing is free. Also, rather than print out a paper copy for your files, just keep it archived on an external drive.
According to Lime.com, "paperless billing [can save you about] $400 on stamps and late fees each year it also has immense benefits for the environment. In fact, research shows that if every American signed up for online banking, 18.5 million trees would be spared annually."

1. Recycle
You can take cans to a recycling center and get money for it. You can use newspaper for your gift wrapping instead of buying paper. You can simply put your glass, paper, and plastic products out by the curb if your city offers that. And if it doesn't, you can petition them until they do. Lots of ideas here and it's simply ridiculous if you don't make an effort to recycle.
- WasteManagement alone recycled enough paper last year to save 41 million trees.

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