EcoFriendlyDaily.com

Saving the Planet One Community at a Time

Bart — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 17:49:29 +0000

There is no such thing as too small a gesture when it comes to trying to save the planet. Every plastic bottle you recycle, every time you choose a “for here” ceramic cup instead of a paper cup at the coffee shop, every bill you choose to have delivered electronically helps. Conservation efforts don’t stop at the personal level, though—they get carried out at the neighborhood, city, county, state and even federal level.

More and more states are deregulating their energy industries. This means that the people who live in that state are able to choose not just which company they want in charge of the power that is run to their house but the type of power that keeps their home running.

Residents in Texas (one of the deregulated states) for example, do their best to keep up with Texas electricity news. Keeping tabs on what’s going on helps them to make smart choices in powering their homes. Texas isn’t a state that most would associate with renewable or alternative energy but most residents there are choosing to have at least some of their energy supplied by these sources.

In New Hampshire, lots of cities are getting in on the Pay as You Throw program. This is a program in which, instead of paying a flat monthly fee for trash pickup, the trash companies issue trash bags via the local grocery store. They still do curbside pickup but will only pick up the bags they’ve issued. The goal is to get people to actually think about what they are throwing away. Recycling is still picked up for free. The communities that have joined the program have seen a drastic reduction in the amount of trash being taken to a landfill while the rates for recycling and composting have skyrocketed.

The other benefit of this program is that people are only paying for what they use as opposed to a flat fee where someone who only tosses out one bag of trash a week pays the same amount as someone who tosses out dozens.

Composting has also taken off. More and more families are building their own composting piles and starting their own worm bins. It’s not just happening at the personal level. Atlanta, for example, has a city-wide composting program in which each home is issued a compost bin whose contents get collected once a month by the city’s trash management program.

In New York City, there is the Local Organics Recovery Program. This is a program that has set up a bunch of local drop off points for organic and compostable materials. The program ensures that what is collected locally gets distributed locally once it has turned into compost. The program is relatively new, started only in 2012 but the people who run the program are hard at work to expand it and add more drop off locations to encourage people to do more composting.

These are just some of the efforts that are happening around the country. What can you do in your community to increase its sustainability and environmental friendliness?

Seeds for the Future

jareds — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 04:58:37 +0000

So, with the season of gardening upon us, I have taken it upon myself to devolve into a flurry of motion with the singular intent of making my garden shine. I have everything I need to make this year’s garden one for the record books, but I have begun to realize lately that many people are not in that same position. It has taken me years of work to put together my favorite seeds, my favorite methods, and my favorite planters into what I call my garden. However, not everyone has had the opportunity to get that far ahead with their gardening. Some people simply have not had the time or have been devoting their free time to other things. Neither one of these things should stop a person from indulging in the simple pleasure of growing their own food for themselves.

This container gardening set is one of the best things I’ve seen to give a beginning gardener a little confidence. The set that you get with this thing is very simple to use and it comes with a variety of seeds. It’s really great that you don’t need to be an expert on gardening to get a great garden going with these seeds. All you need is a little work ethic, some water, and a bit of sunlight to create veggies that you’ll be pulling out and eating in no time. Not only can this make you feel more self-reliant, but it can also help you save a nice chunk of change on your grocery bills at the same time.

Take Your Coffee Anywhere

jareds — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 04:49:09 +0000

If there’s one thing that I really love, it is coffee. I could drink coffee all day long and I was drinking it before the hipsters came in and took it for themselves. While I love coffee, it is one of those things that you need to be very careful with. Not only can coffee come from parts of the world where the farmers are not treated with dignity, but it can also be a terrible strain on the environment through all of the waste generated by the coffee industry. Of course, you always want to make sure that you’re getting fairly traded coffee from places that take a holistic approach to coffee agriculture, but what to do about all the waste? There are a lot of options out there for people looking to lessen their impact without lessening their daily caffeine intake.

The I Am Not a Paper Cup travel mug is a great example of how you can generate much less waste with your coffee habit. This takes the concept of a travel mug and changes it around a bit to fit more into modern sensibilities. One of the things that people love about the disposable mugs at coffee shops is the way they are designed. They are very simple, very neat, and they are very easy to clean. This is something that has been applied to this type of reusable coffee cup. Not only will it fit in all of the same cup holders that a regular disposable cup will, but it is also much easier to clean than most other reusable coffee mugs that use oddly complex mechanics just to dispense coffee. This means you won’t ever have to spend a half hour scrubbing into the cracks and crevices of your coffee mug lid.

Stabilize Your Booze

jareds — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 04:40:15 +0000

This is the season where the sun is shining, the leaves are coming back, the birds are singing, and people are flocking out to their favorite outdoor venue for rest and relaxation. The problem with going out to the outdoors like this is that it creates a number of unique problems when you want to bring food or drinks along. The outdoors is not exactly known for its wealth of comfortable tables and chairs, so you need to get a little creative with how you bring your food and drinks along.

One great way to keep your things together on a romantic day out at the beach or in the woods is by using this great wine and cheese set from Red Envelope. This thing absolutely exudes class and it just looks fantastic. It operates on a fairly simple premise. Let’s say you’re at the beach with some friends or your partner and you want to have a nice glass of wine. First, you’ll have to find a spot that is flat enough to safely rest your wine on. Then you have to go through the rigmarole of keeping it from falling over. This means you’re spending less time on your friends and more time on just making sure your wine doesn’t spill all over. When you get this handy wine holder, that whole scenario gets flipped on its head.

The set uses points that you run into the ground to provide complete stability. The unit becomes stable enough to support the weight of a full bottle of wine and a bunch of full glasses. You can even bring cheese to slice on the provided cheese board. All in all, this is a great tool to have for any of your outdoor adventures.

Stadium Cufflinks

jareds — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 04:31:07 +0000

For any sports fan, there really is no greater pleasure than owning a piece of history from a historic sports landmark. These pieces of history can come in many different forms. They can be a foul ball caught at a baseball game, they can be a jersey tossed into the seats during a hockey game, or it could be a genuine piece of a historic stadium. With these cufflinks, it is the latter.

The Reclaimed Yankee Stadium Cuff Links at Red Envelope are the perfect gift for any fan of the Yankees and make a subtle fashion statement. They are made out of actual reclaimed wood from the seats of Yankee stadium that has been repurposed to be used as a cufflink. This is a genuine piece of Yankee history from the famed Yankee Stadium and it really makes a unique gift.

You don’t just have to buy from the Yankees, either. There are lots of different stadiums and sports teams that you can buy similar cuff links from at Red Envelope. These stadiums change with availability, so you’ll have to check out the red envelope site from time to time and see what they have on hand. You may not be a huge fan of the Yankees, but their cuff links aren’t just limited to the Yankees. This way, everyone is able to get a little piece of history that means something special to them.

Red Envelope has a great selection of lots of different reclaimed and repurposed items that you can check out. Take some time to check out their line of reclaimed items.

Something Completely Different

jareds — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 01:53:41 +0000

This is a big purchase for sure, but it can be one that completely changes your life.

Imagine for a moment that you have bought a new piece of land for yourself and you want to put a house on it. The cost of building a new home is going up exponentially every year as materials become more and more expensive. It’s a huge undertaking to build a new home and it can take years to complete. That is, of course, if you have the money on hand to actually build the thing right away. Many people take up to five years to build their “dream house” and leave it sitting for winter after winter covered in plastic until they can afford to finish it. In the end, what they often end up with is a home that is big, cumbersome, and that leaks heat at a crazy speed.

This is why so many people are deciding to live in Yurts these days. This isn’t just for the “environmental crazies” either. Yurts have been growing in popularity for a number of years now. In fact, they have enjoyed an explosion of interest over the past couple years especially. People like the simplicity. People like the ease. Most of all, people really love the cost.

The cost of building a brand new Yurt on a piece of property is literally a small fraction of what it would cost to build a new home. Even to build a new home of equal space. What this means is that you’ll have more money to use in getting upgrades to your home and making it more environmentally friendly.

That’s another big consideration obviously: environmental sustainability. Since Yurts are made with a fabric frame, they create a much smaller environmental impact than a full-blown house does. They are also much easier to heat and their simplistic design allows them to be sealed and fixed very easily. All in all, Yurts may be a great selection for people that are trying to lessen their impact while also trying to start a life for themselves and their family.

Eco-Friendly, Upcycled Clothes

jareds — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 01:44:49 +0000

There are a lot of people dealing in upcycled fabrics and clothes. In fact, quite of few of these places have found a home on Etsy and other similar sites that put customers in touch with small craftsmen. There is a large market out there for clothing that is made out of recycled fabrics. They are quickly becoming one of the most popular overall fashions in the country and they are also lowering in price as demand grows. If you are interested in buying yourself some recycled clothes, you may find yourself being a little picky at times. After all, you don’t know who was wearing those old clothes last, and that can have a tendency to freak some people out. The best way to avoid worrying about something like this is to simply buy from a reputable dealer or a reputable clothing creater.

Zasra Shop at Etsy

There are a lot of great shops on Etsy that let you buy upcycled clothes, but the stuff being sold at the Zasra shop in the Etsy marketplace is taking it to another level. A lot of people simply make stuff that “looks” like clothes out of older clothes. They feel like they can bring in customers no matter what the clothes look like since the fabrics are upcycled and that’s what customers “really” want. Zasra doesn’t take this tact. This store actually provides you with clothing that will be something that you’d be proud to wear for more than just environmental reasons. The selection here is great and you’ll like what you see.

Anita Spero Design Shop at Etsy

Also on Etsy, you will find the Anita Spero Design shop to be a high-class operation with a lot of great upcycled clothes. The clothes here are stylish and they can be worn for any occasion from formal events to lounging around at home. This shop really makes it easy to shop with an environmentally friendly mindset.

Recycled Jewelry You’ll Love

jareds — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 01:35:25 +0000

In the world of recycled jewelry, there are a lot of comers and goers. This is because jewelry is often a fickle business that is started by people that are just bored and working out of their homes. This is not the case with all of the jewelry companies out there offering recycled jewelry and you need to make sure that you are buying from a place that has a good reputation. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t support local or smaller businesses when you have the chance. It just means that you need to be careful when you’re buying things of this type on the internet. These are just a couple of great ideas that you can look at to see if you’re inspired.

Hand Woven Telephone Wire Earrings

These earrings are made out of the cords from old telephones and they are a very attractive statement to put it mildly. If you are interested in finding something that will really help you to stand out and give you a story to tell at your next function, then you should really consider getting yourself a pair of these. They are a perfect circle, which means they are not very gaudy and won’t draw too much attention to themselves so you can wear them at very classy events if you would like. In the end, these are a great addition to any jewelry collection and they are even hand woven.

Recycled Hardware Earrings

Another pair of great earrings. These are made out of old pieces of mechanical hardware taken from cars, bikes, or anything else with moving parts that need to be held together by nuts and bolts. These tread a very fine line between simple and ostentatious. They dangle down slightly, but not so much that they really draw too much attention to themselves. In all, they are a great way to invest in environmentally friendly jewelry without spending an enormous amount of money. At the very least, you won’t be making it so more gold has to be mined from the ground, leading to more toxic runoff for a simple little earring.

Eco-Electronics

jareds — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 01:26:18 +0000

In the world of eco-friendly electronics, there are a few heavy hitters that really stand out against the crowd. Obviously, you can’t gauge how ecofriendly a place is simply by how large or how small they are– it’s the actions that really mean something. With this in mind, I have compiled a list of the most eco-friendly electronics that you can find for under $200 in the hopes that it will inspire you to choose something a little more green for your electronics addiction. This equipment isn’t just made to quality specs, but it is all made by companies that have shown an actual interest in environmentally friendly issues.

CASIO Solar Running Watches

The CASIO brand was the original “solar” watch brand and they have been pioneering this technology to this day. They continue this love for solar watch technology with this awesome new runners watch that has an integrated battery and a small solar panel. The solar panel gathers enough energy from the sun so that you never have to change the battery, even if you live somewhere that offers a minimum of sunlight on an average basis. Technology like this is very important when you consider just how many batteries end up in landfills every year from consumer electronics.

Genius DX-ECO Wireless Mouse

Wireless mouses are great and I’m using one right now as I type this. However, they do run through batteries way faster than you may expect them to. This can be a huge problem for a number of different reasons and it really makes the DX-ECO wireless mouse a great choice. This mouse recharges quickly and completely eliminates the need for extra batteries.

Bamboo Toys for All

jareds — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 01:15:33 +0000

So there has been a lot of talk here about bamboo and how plain awesome it is. I don’t think that I’m the only one that believes that, and I know that there have been quite a few new products coming out lately that are made entirely out of bamboo. Some of the products that I’ve been neglecting that are made out of bamboo here are toys. There are a lot of great toys being brought to market every year that are of growing complexity and totally made out of bamboo. If you want to get an interesting bamboo toy for a special kid in your life, these are a couple of great options.

The HaPe International E-Racer Le Mans

This is a great little toy for any kid. It is designed to look like the same type of race cars that are used at the Le Mans, and it’s made entirely out of bamboo. One of the big problems with kids and small toys like this is that they often put them in their mouths. This can be a really big problem if you don’t know what the paints and materials are made out of with the toy. With this awesome little car, you know that you’re getting something that’s great for young kids and won’t make you worry about the kinds of toxins that could be in the paint or materials.

HaPe Bamboo Collection Rapido Game

This is a fun little scramble game a la Hungry Hungry Hippos. The object of the game is to collect as many of the different colored balls as you can before your opponent. It’s a great game to help kids with their reflexes, their fine motor skills, and their ability to negotiate and solve disputes. After all, when you have a couple little kids play a game where they have to scramble to get the most of something, you can be absolutely sure that there will be an argument or two over “who got what” on the horizon.