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Green Home Living
10 Things You Can Do
To Go Green Today

Everyone wants to be eco-friendly and help the environment, but a lot of people think that in order to do so they have to drastically change their lifestyle or fork out a lot of hard earned cash. This couldn’t be further from the truth and there are a lot of things you can do right now that won’t cost you much, and might even save you money! While these might seem like little things, all these little things add up and if we all did just a few of them, it would have a large impact environmentally.

Here are 10 “green” things you can do that won’t crimp your style or your wallet:

1. Use recyclable cloth grocery bags instead of plastic – plastic bags take eons to degrade and can be harmful to wildlife. Cloth bags only cost you $1 and some grocery stores even give you a rebate every time you use them. Not only that but they fit more groceries, can be used over and over again for anything and are easier to carry!

2. Buy reusable coffee filters – you’ll never run out!

3. Put your kitchen scraps in a compost pile – you’ll have great organic fertilizer for your garden and be making good use of your scraps.

4. Use cloth kitchen towels instead of paper towels.

5. Buy used items – need a new sofa or TV? Try looking at your local consignment store or in the classifieds – you can get like new items for a fraction of the price and it keeps those items out of the landfill.

6. Don’t print – do you really need to print that out? Think hard before you print stuff on your computer – you’ll save a ton on ink and paper.

7. Get your news online – instead of getting a newspaper delivered to your house, just go online and read your local news. Almost every newspaper has webpage these days where you can get late breaking news.

8. Work from home – if your company allows it, try to work from home 1 or 2 days a week. You’ll be producing less carbon emissions and saving on gas (plus you’ll probably get a lot more done without your boss staring over your shoulder!)

9. Buy local – flying and trucking food all over the world creates a lot of pollution so if you have a local farmers market, try to support your local farmers and buy as much food as you can there. It will be healthier for you and the environment.

10. Turn down your water heater – most people have their water heater up too high – turn yours down to 120 degrees and make sure you but an insulating sweater around it. This will help it run more efficiently and save you on heating your water. For even more savings, insulate the pipes coming out of the water heater.

There’s plenty more you can do to help the environment but it can be overwhelming to try to implement too many things at once. Try some of the tips above and, once you have them structured into your daily routine take on more green living activities – before you know it you’ll be living a fully eco-friendly lifestyle!