Earth Day is coming up and is a perfect time to reflect on how we can improve our lives and the world around us. Going green has financial, physical and societal impacts that can change our lives for the better. There’s a general stigma attached to going green–it’s inconvenient, it’s time-consuming, it’s pointless to even try. While you may feel like your green efforts might just be a drop in the bucket, think of it this way: going green can actually save you hundreds of quid a year and buying green products are, more often than not, healthier for you. In the long run, the discipline of living a green life has many benefits for you as an individual as much as it does for everyone else.

In 2010, throw away all those invalid excuses and try doing something for yourselves and others and who knows, it might just the change you’ve been looking for this year. Here’s 10 easy green tips that can save you money:

1. Turn off your lights & Energy Efficient Light Bulbs

It sounds simple but notice how much you leave lights on. Do you tend to leave a room and forget to turn off the lights? If you have lights that can be dimmed, do you tend to use that option? Or do you turn the lights on all the way, all the time? Do you have a night light? Turning off or turning down lights can save you a bundle on your monthly energy bill. Another thing that can help you save money is replacing old bulbs with new, inexpensive energy saving light bulbs. Beginning January 1, 2010, you can only replace light bulbs with energy saving bulbs in the EU. That’s good news since they’re easy to find and they last 15 times longer than a typical bulb! It is estimated that you can save around £14 a year, per bulb if you change to energy efficient bulbs. A typical household has about 10 light bulbs–that’s about £140 a year!

2. Turn off the water.

Like turning off your lights, turning off your water is another tip that we’ve heard time and time again, but often fail to heed. Think about all the times you use water. Are there any ways to minimise your consumption? When you brush your teeth, do you leave the water running the entire time? Or do you turn the water off while brushing? How long are your showers? Do you turn off the water while soaping up? Do you have any leaks in the house? A leaky sink can mean an abnormally large water bill at the end of the month.

Again, like energy efficient lighting solutions, there are water-saving appliances and fixtures that can drastically save you money. Check your shower head, toilet and taps–are they water-saving? If you’re planning on purchasing any fixtures or appliances that use water, choose water saving shower heads, taps and toilets. You’ll watch your water bill drop significantly if you use products such as these. Investing in saving water is synonymous with investing in your own finances.

3. UNPLUG chargers & electronics.

It’s not just enough to turn electronics off. Electronics and chargers left plugged into a socket still consume energy, albeit at a lower rate. Unplugging them completely from the wall ensures that they are not sucking energy, and money, out of your home. If your laptop or computer turned off, unplug it! If your mobile phone changer is not charging your phone, but is still plugged into the wall, unplug it! Remember–anything plugged into a socket consumes energy, regardless of whether or not that electronic or appliance is turned off. So do the earth and your wallet a favour and UNPLUG IT!

4. Simplify your life: Clean Your Home & Slow Consumption

At the heart of going green is the concept of simplifying your life and getting back to basics. And in a complex world filled with stress and a never-ending list of errands to do, getting back to basics might just be what we all need. Take an inventory of everything you have–clean out your closet, organise your home and your life. Instead of throwing away things you don’t use anymore, including clothes, furniture, appliances, electronics and everything else, try donating them instead.

When cleaning your home, make sure you use eco-friendly cleaners. Eco-friendly cleaners tend to be non-toxic which means you won’t have to worry about them making you sick and neither does the environment. Also take into account everything you buy in a week and in a month. Are you wasting money on things that you really don’t need? If you’re buying products, the companies that produce them use resources. So before making any purchase, think hard about whether or not your hard earned money could be spent elsewhere on something much more fulfilling.

5. Recycle

There’s really not too much to say on the topic of recycling. It’s something that we can all do and it isn’t hard to do. Recycling can also earn you some cash if you are able to save up a load of glass bottles or tins to donate. When you buy notebooks, stationary or any kind of paper product, try to buy recycled paper products. Support products and companies that support a sustainable approach to the environment.

6. Carpool, Turn off the AC, Pump Your Tires, Clean Out Your Car & Don’t Idle your Car.

With petrol prices soaring, this tip might just save you the biggest wad of cash. Carpool or take public transit to work if at all possible. The money you save on costly petrol will be enormous. If there’s absolutely no way to carpool or take public transportation to your workplace and you have to drive, taking care of your car will help you save money on petrol. Make sure your tires are pumped to the proper pressure–improperly inflated tires forces your car to work harder to get it to go your desired speed. More work means more gas. Clean out your car–any added weight also means that you car has to work harder to get moving–so that bowling ball you’ve been storing in the boot of your car? Leave it at home.

And finally, don’t let your car idle any more. You don’t need to “warm up the car” any more either. The concept of warming up your car is only relevant only for cars older than 10 years old. Cars made in this decade have been manufactured so that you don’t have to idle your car before driving it. The only suggested way to “warm up” your car is to drive it slow for the first five minutes. Driving slow will allow the engine to heat up gradually, and perhaps most importantly, it’ll allow the car’s breaks to warm up as well. Idling in your garage or parking lot is bad for the environment and your wallet–instead, go ahead and drive your car but make sure not to drive it too aggressively in the first few minutes. Driving it aggressively or accelerating rapidly right at the get go will result in unnecessary wear and tear on your vehicle.

7. Turn the heat down and wash cold

Turning down the heat and throwing on a sweater or a blanket when at home is also a sure-fire way to save some money. Make sure you plug up any drafts you may have in your house–make sure there aren’t any cracks in the doors or windows that might let the cold in. If you’re planning on fitting your house with new windows, make sure you get energy efficient windows that keep your house sealed up and warm. If there’s a space between the door and the floor that’s allowing cold air to seep in, roll up a towel and stuff it underneath the door–that’ll prevent cold air from penetrating the warmth of your home a bit. Better yet, get an energy efficient heater. Energy efficient heaters can save you a load of money in the winter time.

Most people wash with warm or hot water, thinking that it will result in cleaner clothes but that’s not the case. 90% of the energy produced by a washing machine is to warm the water. That means that you could cut your energy cost by 90% if you choose to wash with cold water. Warm or hot water is only necessary when trying to kill dust mites on linens or clean heavily soiled clothes. If you’re washing linens or heavily soiled clothes, go ahead and use warm water but remember to use cold water in the rinse.

8. Eat healthier & stop wasting food

This is probably the single most healthiest tip on this list. If you want to look and feel better this year, it’s not a surprise that you should eat better. Eating healthier can also be healthy for the environment. Organic foods are grown without any pesticides, growth hormones or chemicals which means it’s healthy for you and the environment. Cutting out the fast food means you’ll be eating healthier and you’ll be giving your money to farmers and companies who produce their goods in a sustainable and healthy way. Buy foods that are against animal cruelty.

Fast food chains that mass produce livestock for slaughter tend to have horrendous standards in terms of raising and slaughtering the animals–so choosing to not eat these unhealthy foods would help you look and feel great, not to mention helping those poor animals. So eat foods that are organic and blatantly against animal cruelty, like dolphin-safe tuna and cruelty free meats. Take time out and educate yourself about the meat that you are purchasing–where it came from and what their standards are. Buying from local farms usually helps.

9. Buy eco-friendly products

You can practically buy eco-friendly anything. As I said, you can buy eco-friendly light bulbs, appliances, taps, toilets, cleaners and food, but you can also purchase even purchase eco-friendly clothes. Eco-friendly clothes are usually made with organic cotton and usually have fair-trade standards attached (which means that it was not produced in sweat shops or under horrendous labour conditions). Did you know you can by energy efficient tellies? You can. Practically every single electronic has energy efficient products that can save you time and money.

Think about every single thing you purchase in a day. Your choices really affect the state of the economy–what should be produced and what shouldn’t. It’s about time all of us take responsibility for our choices and purchases and try to make the best decisions we can. Check out these website for more information about stores and companies that do not do animal testing or are involved in animal cruelty and support them:

http://search.caringconsumer.com

http://www.uncaged.co.uk/crueltyfree.htm

10. Go Paperless

Now this tip is extremely easy and will be sure to save you time. Nowadays, you can pay your all bills online with a click of a button. Banks and credit card companies now offer a paperless option–they’ll stop sending you your bank and billing statements through the mail and email them to you instead. Doing this can save you a ton of time and can prevent a lot of waste.

When you think about it, you have the ability to change a lot in your life and the lives around us. Every action, every decision affects someone or something somewhere. So this Earth Day, take responsibility and make a commitment to being the change you want to see, help yourself and help others with these 10 easy tips.

Did you know?

Going green will save you money. You can save an estimated £100 a year for 20 years in heating costs if you change a single window to an energy efficient window.

-Miljean

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