Easy Tips for Green Living
Did you know that the air inside of most American homes is more polluted than the outside air? Scary, but true. When we clean our homes, we are replacing the dust and dirt we wipe up with hazardous chemicals that coat everything in the home. Think about it – if you have to open the windows and wear protective gloves to clean your bathroom, do you really want those chemicals in your house in the first place? Start your go green mission by examining the cleaning products you use most. These probably include an all purpose cleaner, chlorine bleach, laundry detergent and dish soap. By replacing these products with eco friendly ones, you will remove most of the harmful chemicals from your home. Look for products by companies like Method, Seventh Generation, and Ecover. Seventh Generation makes wonderful smelling laundry soap and a very effective all purpose cleaner. Ecover makes some of the highest rated dishwashing products, including powder for automatic dishwashers and dish soap. Method has a wonderful wood cleaner called Wood for Good that comes in versions for cleaning the floor and furniture. Also, replace your chlorine bleach with Oxo Brite, a multi purpose cleaner that can be used for laundry and scrubbing bathrooms.
Another relatively easy thing you can do is replace all of your light bulbs with compact fluorescent ones. Not only will you be saving energy and contributing less pollution, you will see a significant savings on your electric bill. The bonus: these light bulbs last almost forever, so once they are in, you and the planet will reap the rewards for years.
Plastic bottles and shopping bags are a huge problem and are filling up our landfills. You can make a big difference by replacing your plastic water bottles with a reusable stainless steel one. You’ll be helping the environment and protecting yourself from the chemicals that can leak into your water from the plastic bottles. Klean Kanteen makes a great stainless steel water bottle that you can take everywhere. Purchasing reusable shopping bags is a simple way you can become more eco friendly. Simply keep them in your trunk so you will have them handy each time you go shopping. You will help to keep plastic bags out of landfills and reduce the pollution from manufacturing them.
