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1. Get an idea (light bulb!) but make it fluorescent. If you do only one thing, do this: replace three normal incandescent light bulbs in your house with long-life fluorescent light bulbs (CFL’s.) Take a look HERE for a good comparison (though the prices for the compact fluorescent bulbs has gone down significantly.) This site also offers advice on colors, wattage and other options to consider. Replace the bulbs that often stay on for hours at a time, for instance living room lights (they are usually on from sundown until you go to bed) or a ‘night light’ or even. If you use automatically timed lights when you go out of town to deter would-be burglars, change those bulbs before you go. Fluorescent bulbs last longer when they stay on longer.

Even governments and big businesses are starting to realize what an amazing impact such a little action like changing a light bulb can have. Australia will be phasing out regular light bulbs completely (yep, that includes manufacturing) by 2009. They have calculated that this change alone will mean home energy bills will be cut by 66.9% yearly. WOW! That is not a small thing.

While in general I do not like WalMart (I despise the fact they have put so many ‘little guys’ out of business et al reasons ) today, right now, I love WalMart. I want to marry them. Why the change of heart, you may ask? HERE'S WHY. They have finally turned the lights on in their brains and in their stores … and apparently, those lights are now in an eco-friendly, long-life form. The heart and soul of the story is that they are dedicated to selling at least one long-life bulb to each of there 100 million customers this year. They have even negotiated a lower price for the bulbs with their supplier, GE. Wow.

Apparently Home Depot sells compact fluorescent bulbs at even lower prices than WalMart and at Ikea, bulbs can be returned for recycling at a drop off point once they have burned out. Look HERE _switching_to.php for the best ways to use a compact fluorescent light bulb to its most optimum performance.

2. Before you buy an appliance, look for the Energy Star seal of approval or check HERE, at the website. Energy Star is the program created by the EPA to evaluate the energy performance of appliances and electronics equipment as well as to provide ideas on how to save energy and, as a happy result, money!

3. If your desktop computer has a power management option… USE IT! Note that contrary to common wisdom, turning your computer off and on does not shorten its lifespan AND that when your computer is in screen saver mode, you are not saving either your motherboard OR any electricity. Sleep, hibernate, bag some zzz’s … these are the modes that save energy consumption (well, except for the last one.) Again, go to the Power Star website for more information on how to utilize your computer’s power options more efficiently and, at the same time, save between 60-80 % of the power your computer uses every day.

4. Don’t stand by … walk the extra few steps and turn it off at the source. If you wake up in the middle of the night and move through your home, does it resemble a low-key Starship Enterprise, with every corner and countertop filled with LED standby lights in various tutti-frutti hues? If so, here’s one for you. The American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) estimates that the average American household uses 440 kilowatt hours of electricity per year through standby modes on various appliances and electronic devices. That may not seem like so much, until you realize that on a national level, that means America is using 44 billion kilowatt hours per year … and THAT is the equivalent of five, count ‘em FIVE, nuclear power plants. Still think your little night time light show has no impact?

All you need to do is to unplug appliances when they are not in use, or if you use a power strip, turn the power on the strip off. If you are one of those folks that have on/off switches directly on your power outlet, turn off the outlet completely when it is not in use. If some things can’t have power completely off, again, check the Power Star website for models that use very low energy in stand-by mode. At the VERY least, when you are done watching television, stand up, and turn off your television with its power button. Don’t just stand by … take a stand…SO easy.

5. Just because you throw something in your garbage bin, doesn’t mean you’re not littering … kind of ... I’m talking here about the endless stream of broken ‘toys’ we are creating with no lovely ‘land of broken toys’ in sight. Coffee makers, blenders, irons for both, hair and clothes, hair dryers, clothes dryers, extra pliers, perhaps Mike Myers… OOPS… where did I go? Ah yes, I was about to get to computers, printers and even little cell phones that are about to stack up to proverbial heaven and back again. We are all clever consumers these days. Before we buy, we Google (another one of those mysterious verbs I am getting to know and at least not to abhor completely). So now, go a teeny, tiny next step … before you toss out an appliance or, more importantly a computer or cell phone (these are HUGE toxic pollutants and America, because we don’t know what to do with these out-dated machines because we didn’t ever have a plan and we are so resistant to forcing manufacturers to take recycling responsibility as they are now doing in Europe and Japan, WE ship our useless things to the developing world, ie Pakistan, China and India, to rot in their dumps, toxifying their land… eeek. Waaaay too much out-of-site-out-of-mind going on for my taste) research the safest way to dispose of it.

This is a website with recycling information (for example, where to do it at a location near YOU) for old appliances and beverage containers. You can also donate old computers that are still in usable condition (as long as they aren’t too slow) to charities or even contact the manufacturer for suggestions about what to do with your machine (This is a website that can help you find the environmental department of most manufacturers.

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