Living greener

[tracilicious]

Inspired by the Gore thread, I thought that perhaps we could all share tips for living a greener/more simple life. What do you do that puts a bit less strain on the earth?

My favorite living greener tip is get rid of your cleaners. White vinegar and baking soda can clean nearly anything. Vinegar disinfects too! Use vinegar for wipey jobs and baking soda for scrubby jobs. Yes, vinegar smells, but so do commercial cleaners. The vinegar smell evaporates rather quickly. To make the smell a bit more pleasant, and boost your cleaning power, add 20 drops of tea tree oil and 20 drops of lavender to your vinegar/water solution. It's dirt cheap, you aren't spraying pesticides onto your counters and contributing to environmental pollution, and you aren't using a new plastic bottle everytime you refill your solution. Here are more uses for vinegar and baking soda. The only cleaners we buy are laundry detergent, dishwashing soap, and glass cleaner.

I'm sure I'll think of more later.

[€uroMeinke]

I use public transit to get to work - today it was an American Airlines MD-80. Tomorrow, I will carpool.

[Alex]

Most of my environmental tips boil down to one underlying principal:

Don't confuse "discomfort" as a synonym for "anything less than complete, perfect comfort." Much of our energy inefficience comes from never wanting to experience any inconvenience or discomfort where anything less than perfect comfort is labelled as uncomfortable and anything less than perfect convenience is labelled as inconvenient. Thus we want every gadget to do everything that might concievably be wanted and we want it to do it immediately. Therefore we frequently end up making purchases based on the less than 1% outlying anomolies than for the 99% standard uses.

God knows I'm not an anti-car activist (I've driven 50 miles just to have dinner and then drive home) but people are really stupid an wasteful in choosing their cars. For most people, 95% of their driving falls into
a single type and need. Go buy a car that fits that need and then figure out how to get by when the other 5% comes up. Existing electric cars would be ideal for 90% of all driving but people won't buy them because sometimes they want to drive 300 miles to Vegas. Or 400 to Disneyland. Ok, so buy the electric car and then rent a car for long trips. Or buy a small car and then rent a truck for the day when you need to haul a couch. You're never going to be trying to outrun an invading alien army so you don't need a car that can go 185 miles per hour.

If you live in the city and near your job then ride a bike and rent cars for weekend travel.

You don't need air conditioning every time the temperature rises above 75 degrees or a heater every time it falls below 70.

Don't run the dishwasher half full. Don't do small loads of laundry. If you have the space consider line drying your clothes, at least for the bulkier stuff that takes the longest in the machine.

Every once in a while just walk to where you're going. Even if it is kind of far away. Amazingly it isn't as hard as you probably think, you'll eventually get where you're going, and you'll form a stronger bond with your neighborhood.

But mostly, while the all the little things are good, until people begin to behave rationally in their transportation choices the inefficiency most people have there far outweighs any gains (for most people) elsewhere in their lives.

So I think the two biggest things you can do are:

1) Drive the most efficient car that meets 90% of your needs (and be honest about what you're needs are). Lani and I are fine with a "compact" car since we hardly ever have other people in it. We got a hybrid set up for highway travel (as opposed to the Prius which gets better city mileage) since most of our car miles are highway miles) and didn't worry about the low horsepower because 80 miles an hour is really the fastest I ever need to go.

2) Live where you work or work where you live. Once it became feasible we moved so that Lani's commute is only 3 miles each way instead of 30.

[tracilicious]

Originally Posted by Alex Stroup

Most of my environmental tips boil down to one underlying principal:

Don't confuse "discomfort" as a synonym for "anything less than complete, perfect comfort." Much of our energy inefficience comes from never wanting to experience any inconvenience or discomfort where anything less than perfect comfort is labelled as uncomfortable and anything less than perfect convenience is labelled as inconvenient. Thus we want every gadget to do everything that might concievably be wanted and we want it to do it immediately. Therefore we frequently end up making purchases based on the less than 1% outlying anomolies than for the 99% standard uses.

I think this is an extremely good principle.

The transportation thing is frustrating to me. I would love to have a newer hybrid or electric car. But being four people living on one income, it isn't going to happen anytime soon. I drive my gas guzzling Jeep Cherokee because that's what I have. It's what I could afford at the time and it isn't getting replaced anytime soon. Same with solar panels. As soon as I get a spare $10,000 I'll pop one right onto the roof.

Our public transportation system is ridiculous. It takes several hours to get 15 miles away. Totally not an option. Michael will be getting a motorcycle in the next few months though, which will be much more efficient for him.

I think the more effort thing definitely applies to the way people eat. Organic locally grown produce has huge environmental benefits (not to mention health benefits). It costs a bit more, but all you need to do is give up packaged food in most cases to even out your grocery bill. The busiest person can set aside a few hours a week and prepare meals and freeze them. It's all time management and priorities.

[Gemini Cricket]

I take the subway as often as I can.
We only drive our truck on Saturdays to do shopping.
We follow the "if it's yellow let it mellow, if it's brown flush it down" rule in our house.
Ralphie makes me recycle.
Ralphie shops at TJs.
We use the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch card.
We reuse grocery bags to pick up Frodo's poopage.
I brake for endangered otters and I don't shoot whales.

[Moonliner]

Short term I suppose those are all good ideas but they are not going to win the battle.

What we need is a true leader for this country that understands not only that "it's the economy stupid" but that we are getting to the point that the economy depends on the environment. Environmentalism is no longer just a "Feel good" issue but is now a real world life/economy issue. What this country needs is NOT more people on public transit or for everyone to stop using air conditioning. What we need is an Apollo style incentive program to get this country off fossil fuels and onto some combination of clean energies (hydrogen, solar, wind). Until that happens we are just using umbrellas to ward off a hurricane.

[Alex]

Support a massive push into developing nuclear power.

[Moonliner]

Originally Posted by Alex Stroup

Support a massive push into developing nuclear power.

I used to believe as many did and many still do, that all we really needed was workable nuclear fusion (not fission) and all our energy worries would be over.

Now I think that's a pipe dream, at least in our lifetimes. If fusion ever works at all it will be so expensive to create a plant that it will leave us right back at the hands of big corporations who will set the price per/kilowatt as they see fit.

They technology I'm banking on is fuel cells powered by Hydrogen created from solar cells on my roof. Right now all the pieces are in place to use this technology to create all the energy I need to run my house and cars except one. The solar cells that use light energy to efficiency separate hydrogen out of water. Right now that technology works, but it's only effective in the ultraviolet range of light. As soon as that range can be moved down to visible light (where 90% of the suns energy is) then we are in business. There is some promising research in that area going on right now.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Originally Posted by Moonliner

I used to believe as many did and many still do, that all we really needed was workable nuclear fusion (not fission) and all our energy worries would be over.

Now I think that's a pipe dream, at least in our lifetimes.

I think Alex meant conventional nuclear power. In many ways it is cleaner than other power plants.

But I'm with you on the personal solar power thing. At least in places like sunny CA, it's become a real alternative.

[tracilicious]

Originally Posted by Moonliner

...Until that happens we are just using umbrellas to ward off a hurricane.

Living green is about more than fossil fuels. I'm sure you are right, that none of the small changes we make are going to make an immediate significant impact on the planet, but I'm concerned with more than fuel. For one thing, waste production is huge in America. Everything is disposable or so cheaply made that it has to be replaced right away anyways. We're dumping loads of pesticides into the ground, and into our bodies, and our farming practices are such that the soil gets depleted and has to be fertilized. Etc.

The reason I try to live "greener" is simply because I think we need a paradigm shift. Put forth a bit more effort, buy some things used, recycle what you don't need, be more conscientious in general. Americans are the ultimate consumers. We use use use use use because we seem to feel like it's our god given right or something. I'm not sure why.

I'm going to serial post now because there's lots I want to respond to and this post will get too long.