Go Green!

Five Things Triangle Families Can Do Right Now

All of a sudden, popular culture is more environmentally aware. Credit Al Gore's The Inconvenient Truth, the staggering price of gas, and years of hard work by far-sighted environmentalists for the many of us that are now paying attention to the state of our environment. Here are five things Triangle families can do right now to care for our planet.

Recycle

If you aren't already, make recycling a family value. Recycling while your kids are young means that you'll instill it as a value and you'll make it an easy habit for them to continue as adults. Contact your local recycling center to learn which objects your community will accept for recycling.

Change Your Light Bulbs

If every American replaced just one incandescent bulb with the new compact florescent variety, according to the EPA's ENERGY STAR program, we'd save enough energy to light 3 million homes for a year. A Compact Florescent Bulb (CFL) that earns the ENERGY STAR rating uses 75% less energy and produces 75% less heat than a traditional bulb. A CFL do contain a small amount of mercury (approximately 1% of the amount contained in a mercury thermometer) so it's important to dispose of it properly. Visit www.earth911.org to find a recycling facility by zip code. If the facility is not in your backyard, don't worry. You won't have to make the trip often. CFLs can last 8-12 times longer than incandescent bulbs, so it might be years before you need to change them.

Check Your Appliances

Using appliances that have earned the government's ENERGY STAR rating can decrease your energy costs by $80 per year and by using less energy you'll help to protect our environment resources. According to ENERGY STAR, if 10% of homes used ENERGY STAR qualified appliances, the effect would be like planting 1.7 million new acres of trees.

Use Cloth Diapers

Without a doubt, both cloth and disposable diapers have a negative impact on the environment. The question is, which is worse? There's still plenty of lively debate on the topic, so here are some of the primary arguments to for you to consider. The pro-cloth camp argues that disposable diapers make up a huge part of the garbage dumped into our nation's landfills. Estimating six changes per day and three years of diapering, each baby will produce more than 6000 waste diapers in his lifetime. They go on to argue that manufacturing disposable diapers uses wood pulp from more than one billion trees each year. That wood is then bleached with chlorine gas, producing toxic chemicals known as organochlorines that make their way into wastewater. The pro-disposable camp looks primarily at the washing of cloth diapers to assess their eco-impact. One load of wash consumes approximately ten gallons of water, and for the two-and-a half years a child is in diapers the impact is approximately 20,000 gallons using a top-loader or 10,000 gallons using a front-loading machine. Because diapers must to be washed in hot water, this means additional energy consumption. Although this is rarely the case anymore, some diaper services use detergents containing phosphates that are harmful to the environment.

Our own editor, Corey Williams, has weighed much of the information and research. Her assessment is that cloth is the most environmentally friendly choice. For a thorough assessment of both arguments visit www.punkinbutt.com.

Use Rechargeable Batteries

So many of today's toys require batteries. Save money and the environment by using rechargeable batteries for your kid's toys. Not only does recharging help reduce waste, it prevents toxic chemicals from entering the environment.