I want to save the planet. Where should I go green first?
One question I hear often is: Where should I go green first? It is an excellent question for a couple of reasons:
- Obviously you have to start somewhere and…
- It is impossible to do everything.
There are so many green choices that you can make. Are you going to eat organic? Wear organic? Sit on an organic couch? Drive a hybrid? Skip the car and ride a bike?
Where do you begin???
If you are trying to go green in order to “save the planet” then I suggest that you start with recycling. Recycling isn’t a very big commitment. Most communities should have a recycling program in place. Plus you don’t have to change any of your buying habits in order to recycle.
The only effort on your part would be setting up your home so it is recycling ready. That means that you’ll need to be sure you are part of your communities recyling plan and have their bins to collect the items to be recycled. You’ll also need a list of what things are recycled in your community. If your community doesn’t provide recycling, then you’ll have to locate your closest recycling drop-off location.
If you are already recycling, then I would suggest that you start reducing your amount of trash. Is this something that you could use again before you throw it away? Could you buy a big tub of yogurt instead of the individual size cups? Could you donate that item or give it to a friend instead of throwing it out? Think twice before heading for the trash can.
Next week I’ll share my suggestions for where you should go green first if you are trying to avoid toxins.
Do you agree that recycling is the perfect first baby step? If not, what would you suggest?
This post is being linked to Healthy 2day Wednesday on Day2Day Joys.
I would agree that recycling is an easy way to feel like you’re making a difference. Someone once told me that even with recyling, start with the easy stuff and then start expanding. So once you’ve mastered recycling the basics like cereal boxes add paper towel rolls and toilet paper rolls. Then add the plastic bag in the cereal box. Then before you know it you’re also recycling the plastic film on your sour cream!
The one recycling item I struggle with is batteries. Any idea where to off load used batteries??
Jennifer, I love that idea of being able to recycle every little thing, but doesn’t that depend greatly on your local recycling center? My own recycling program only accepts plastics #1 & #2. I often have to throw out yogurt containers and other things that seem like they should be no brainers to recycle. Any tips on how to get around that???
My local recycling center DOES take batteries. I’m not sure what I would do with them if they didn’t! Do places like Staples or Office Max do battery recycling? It might be worth looking into.
My curbside recycling has it’s limits but the recycling center in the city where we shop accepts more–like plastice bags. So I use the large plastice bags that toilet paper and paper towels come in to store all that sort of plastic stuff that my curbside won’t take. So I put cereal bags, baggies, grocery bags (that are ripped) and other plastic products are wrapped in in my big bag and drop it off when we go shopping. Often a recycling center will accept more than curbside. So a great first step is to embark on curbside and once you master that add items the recycling center takes to your recycling.
I should definitely look into what is accepted at neighboring recycling centers! Thanks for the tip, Jennifer.
Recycling is super easy and can definitely help save raw materials, production energy, and therefore help your local economy. So, sure, good first step. A quick internet search can probably get you a local e-waste site (recycling center), and some batteries like Li-ion can even earn you a quick buck since their metals are reused and are in high demand.
That being said, “Reduce” and “Reuse” come first in the line-up. Start taking a look at what you need vs. what you consume and you will find what needs to go. Bottled water is a low-hanging fruit because it can easily be replaced by tap, which is practically free and usually healthier.
BUT, a HOME is probably the largest earth-killing ticket for most Americans. Hire an energy audit – they are sometimes partially subsidized by local utilities – and take *every recommendation. Financially you are looking at far better returns than putting that money into any stock or CD, because a penny saved is indeed a penny earned.
Great points, Kurt. I especially agree with you about bottled water. I also agree that reduce & reuse should be at the front of our thought process when we are thinking about waste, but… I don’t think reduce and reuse should be the number one baby step. The point of taking green baby steps is to encourage people who honestly aren’t very green at all to at least take a small step in the right direction. Recycling is a good first step since you don’t have to change anything about your spending/buying habits. Once that is conquered then people should totally go crazy with reduce and reuse!
I agree–recycling is so easy because it’s right there for you. Even if you don’t have curbside pickup, there are usually plenty of places to drop off your recycling. In our town, you don’t even have to separate it. It just all goes in the same bin! That saves us a lot of time!
By the way, I’ve been loving reading your blog. I awarded you the Versatile Blogger Award at http://www.Tmuffin.com. Come over and check it out when you get a chance!
Gaby, thank you so much for the award! That is very sweet of you and I really appreciate it.
Have hopped over to see you from Tmuffin.com Versatile Blogger Award. I’m a huge fan of recycling and the 3 Rs and agree that in most areas with kerbside collections, recycling is a great place to begin your green journey. Also making just one green cleaning product is a nice way to ease your way into the green journey – such as a bicarb scrub or vinegar rinse. Lovely blog and thanks for sharing your ideas 🙂
Mrs. Green, thanks for stopping by! I agree with you about adding natural cleaners to the list of good first baby steps, but you’ll have to wait to hear more about that next week when I share my suggestions for where to go green first when you are trying to avoid toxins. 😉
Hi Rebekah – just discovered your blog, very nice 🙂
I think recycling has to be near the top of the list, as it starts to make us reconsider our relationship with ‘stuff’ and waste.
Kurt’s point about bottled water, being a low hanging fruit is right – it has a much larger environmental footprint than its perfectly adequate alternative tap-water, and is actually far far cheaper. There are other ‘low-hanging fruit’ – giving environmental benefit with relatively little effort, and that save money rather than cost money – draft proofing, low-energy light bulbs, turning things off, growing some vegetables to eat, not using plastic bags, walking more and driving less etc.
I think the next step should be buying less ‘stuff’ – and perhaps reusing, buying second hand, mending and making -do, swapping with friends and neighbours etc.
The nice thing is almost everything we do to reduce our environmental footprint as individuals actually saves us money – we just need to change the way we think 🙂
-STEVE-
http://www.nextstarfish.com
Thank you for your thought filled comment, Steve! I agree with everything you said (especially the part about my blog being “very nice.” haha! kidding!!). There really are so many small things we can do to help the environment. They don’t all have to be this big, scary, EXPENSIVE change. Simple changes can make a huge difference if everyone does their part. Thank you for stopping by!
I need to recycle MORE! Thanks for linking up last week at Healthy 2day Wednesdays! I added this post to my top three this week! Yay! Glad you linked up again!
Rachel, thank you for featuring my post this week! I’m honored to be chosen.