1
Apr
RAC Aware – Earth Day
Provided by: www.cotap.org and www.earthday.org
25 Earth Day Tips:
- Plant a tree or donate a tree.
- Join a local park, river or beach clean-up.
- Use environmentally-friendly, non-toxic cleaning products.
- Eat locally-produced and organic food.
- Change your car’s air filter regularly.
- Use cloth towels instead of paper ones.
- Read documents online instead of printing them.
- Set your office printer to print two-sided.
- Reduce your meat consumption to curb carbon emissions from the livestock industry.
- Compost kitchen scraps for use in your garden — turning waste into fertilizer.
- Form a “green team” at your office to find cost-effective ways to conserve resources and promote sustainability.
- Turn off and unplug electronics you’re not using. This includes turning off your computer at night.
- Turn off lights when you leave a room.
- Take the stairs instead of the elevator to save energy (and get exercise!).
- Lower the temperature on your water heater.
- Use reusable bottles for water, reusable mugs for coffee, reusable bags for shopping and reusable lunch bags.
- Contact your utility company and find out about renewable energy options.
REDUCE YOUR CARBON FOOT PRINT: - Increase your use of video-conferencing tools like Skype and Facetime. If you fly five times per year, those trips are likely to account for 75% of your personal carbon footprint.
- Reduce drafts and air leaks with caulk, insulation, and weather stripping.
- Buying used products and reselling or recyling items you no longer use.
- Making water-efficient choices when purchasing shower heads, faucet heads, toilets, dishwashers and washing machines.
- Replace inefficient incandescent light bulbs with efficient CFLs or LEDs. Reduces your carbon footprint by 450 pounds a year.
- Keep your tires properly inflated and get better gas mileage. Reduce your carbon footprint 20 pounds for each gallon of gas saved.
- Stop using disposable plastics, especially single-use plastics like bottles, bags and straws. Reduce your garbage by 10% and your carbon footprint by 1,200 pounds a year.
- Move your heater thermostat down two degrees in winter and up two degrees in the summer to reduce your carbon footprint by 2,000 pounds.