Guest Blogger: Simple Green Living Tips to Start at Home Today

Guest Blogger #508, Entry #1158, May 8, 2012

Many people have not been kind to Mother Nature and now she is fighting back. The temperatures are climbing, the glaciers are melting and the weather patterns are fluctuating. As the world’s population of 7 billion people generate tons of trash on a daily basis, space is running out in landfills to accommodate these. However, more and more individuals are now going green and are conscious of their activities’ impact to the environment.

What ways are you trying to conserve the Earth’s resources?

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Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Lately, numerous families have begun to adopt the reduce, reuse and recycle initiative. These three Rs are environment-friendly ways to lessen a person’s carbon footprint. It aims to reduce the trash generated, reuse still usable albeit old items and to recycle different kinds of materials so they can be made into other useful things. Recycling in particular, is extremely useful because it is also lessens the need to use natural resources for manufacturing purposes.

Repurpose and recycle to give new life to used items

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Recyclable Items

Recycling refers to the processing of waste materials into new products. It is beneficial to the environment because it reduces the need to use new natural resources, it lowers the use of energy, decreases the amount of air and water pollution and minimizes the amount of greenhouse gases generated.

Fortunately, there are a lot of recyclable materials out there. You can start this activity at home and you can ask every member of your family to join in. First you must establish a place in your house where to put the recyclable items like beside the trash can in your kitchen. You should also get a different container for each type so it will be easier to sort.

Aluminum

Aluminum is commonly found in soda and beer cans and aluminum foil. Aluminum is remelted and remade to be used again; it does not take a lot of electricity to recycle this material when compared to converting bauxite ore into aluminum. When less power is used, less carbon dioxide goes into the atmosphere.

Paper

Paper is one of the most common recyclable items. Paper is found virtually everywhere, in food packaging, newspapers, and junk mail. If you have sheets of used paper in your house, you can use the opposite side of the sheets; you can also pile up your old newspapers and bring them to the recycling plant which they will use to make new paper products.

Consider recycling and reusing paper in your home office

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Glass

Another recyclable material is glass. Just like aluminum, it does not take a lot of energy to recycle glass when compared to manufacturing it from raw materials. Just make sure that the glass you discard are clean and does not smell of food lest your recycling bins attract pests. If you do not want to discard your glass jars, you can use it for food storage.

Aside from doing Mother Nature some good, you can also get money for your recycled materials. Some recycling companies offer cash for your recycled items. Other people rely in their local government to have a recycling initiative by implementing a curbside recycling scheme.

Other Tips for Going Green

Aside from recycling in your home, you can also do other green practices. When you shop for groceries, make sure that the packaging can be recycled and buy products that are made from recycled materials. You can also turn your organic waste into compost so you can have natural fertilizer for your garden. Moreover, turn off and unplug all unused appliances to lessen your energy consumption.

This article was  written by Robert Kirk who works as an SEO Consultant for  Lothian Skip Hire who supply Skip hire to customers throughout the central Scotland.

For more green living ideas on Stagetecture, click here.