Top 10 Ways to Use Less Water Every Day
Saving energy and saving water are two of the most important and financially sensible ways to go green, and you don’t have to sacrifice as much of your comfort as much as you’d think. Just by changing a few bad habits, you can commit to saving water in the bathroom, kitchen, outdoors and even while you’re out in public, at work or on vacation. Here are top 10 ways to use less water every day.
- Start noticing how much water you use. You may not realize how much water you’re using – or wasting – until you make a point to notice how many times you flush the toilet, how long your showers take, and how many times you fill up your water filter. Once you start tracking your water usage, you’ll find that it’s easier to cut back little by little.
- Don’t rinse dishes before putting them in the dishwasher. Most modern dishwashers can handle a few crumbs, so once you dump out (or compost) the scraps, go ahead and load up the dishwasher.
- Take faster showers. Start washing your hair once every other day, and turn off the shower radio to speed up your shower time. If you just can’t bare to step out of the steamy shower any faster, lower the water temperature until you’re ready to hop out.
- Don’t dump dirty water out. Use leftover water from guests’ glasses to fill up your pets’ water bowls or water your plants.
- Evaluate your pipes and faucets. Check for leaky pipes and faucets that are left dripping water.
- Flush the toilet less. If it’s just you at home, flush every other time (unless you’ve got to go number two!) Throw tissues and waste in the trash, not down the toilet.
- Start composting. Kitchen garbage disposals depend on large amounts of water to work properly. Throw your waste in the garbage or a compost pile to reduce water waste.
- Turn the water off when you wash your hair, brush your teeth or wash dishes. Letting the water run when you’re not directly using it is the fastest way to waste it.
- Only wash clothes when you have a full load. Wait to run the washing machine until you have enough clothes to fill it up.
- Use mulch. Put mulch around your plants to help them absorb water, letting them benefit from fewer waterings.
This post was contributed by Emily Thomas, who writes about the online colleges. She welcomes your feedback at Emily.Thomas31 (at) yahoo.com
Was There Ever Any Good Stuff in Snapple?
Snapple has always proclaimed to have “The Best Stuff on Earth” in all of their drinks. Just recently, they have a new campaign called “Better Stuff” in which Snapple believes they have found better stuff than the already best stuff that they use in their products. Let’s take a look at one of their commercials:
Wow, I always knew Snapple had great ingredients, but I didn’t think they could ever find better stuff.
I find this entire campaign ridiculous. They make it known through all their commercials that all the ingredients they use in their products could never be improved yet somehow they found a way to improve them. This just makes me think, what exactly were in their drinks that they were able to find “Better Stuff”.
So let’s answer the question I proposed in the title of this post, Was There Ever Any Good Stuff in Snapple?
I found a graphic that shows exactly what they used to include in something as simple as their Ice Tea:
Photo By: GraphJam
That’s pretty interesting that the most important ingredient is in such small quantity and so much filler. Who knows what they “Natural Flavors” they include and that’s an awful lot of high fructose corn syrup. Most of their other products are much worse containing just as high levels of high fructose corn syrup, but also artificial sweeteners, colors and caffeine. If you notice that most of their products that have a fruit in their name are not followed by juice, but rather the word “drink”. This means that instead of trying to use the “Best Stuff” they choose to fill their products with sugars and artificial flavorings to make it taste nothing like what the juice counterpart would.
So now that they have chosen to use “Better Stuff”, what exactly have they changed. As described in the video above, they now are using real sugar, natural green and black teas and more fruit in their drinks. It’s about time that Snapple decided to finally start using real ingredients in their products instead of the crap they were trying to sell before. Even now, many of their drinks contain lots of sugar and little fruits.
This campaign really makes me laugh since they are trying to make it seem like they were never selling crap to us at a high price. That’s great that they decide to improve their products, but don’t make the outrageous claim that your products are the “Best Stuff on Earth” in the first place, when they are anything but that. I have tried Snapple a few times in the past and I regret ever drinking them. This goes to show that it’s essential that you read labels and do the proper research before buying any food product so we don’t waste money on products making such absurd and false claims.
EcoSmart Natural Pesticide Contest Part 2 Winner!!!
The winner of the EcoSMART Natural Organic Pesticide and Insecticide Contest is Patricia. Patricia will receive a bundle EcoSMART products of her choosing. Even if you didn’t win, make sure to check out all of the great EcoSMART products. To find out more information, see Discover EcoSMART for more information.
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The Whole Foods Outrage
Many shoppers of Whole Foods Market stores are outraged with the comments that CEO John Mackey made about Health Care Reform last week in the Wall Street Journal. Mackey said that he supports the idea of Health Care reform, but does not support the plan our government is proposing. His belief is that every person does not have an “intrinsic right to health care”. Whether you agree with his statements or not, his comments just do not make sense from a business perspective.
Usually high profile people, especially from the entertainment, sports industries, make small comments about political topics, but leave it that. When you are a CEO and write a huge opinion piece about such a heated topic in a large newspaper, you are just asking to lose business. To top it off, why make such statements about health care when Whole Foods has such a huge liberal customer base?
Whole Foods in fact may lose some business since many people have taken to the streets (well actually quite the opposite) to boycott Whole Foods. The boycott has spread quickly, so much so that 12,000+ people have joined the Boycott Whole Foods facebook page to show their anger at the comments made. People have also flooded Whole Food’s forums to show their displeasure in the piece written. In terms of how much if any business Whole Foods may lose due to this is yet to be seen, but it will be interesting to see their quarterly numbers at the end of this fiscal year.
Regardless of how you feel about Whole Foods, it’s worth checking out your local farmer’s markets and CSA’s to get a lower price on all your dairy meats or produce that are direct from the source. I use local natural food stores to get items that I can’t find at my local farmer’s markets or during non-growing seasons. I do respect the values of company in terms of their efforts to be a green company and promoting organically grown products, but they do tend to have slightly high prices.
I want to get your thoughts on this whole situation. How do you feel about Mackey’s statements and will you stop shopping at Whole foods because of them?
Natural Heartburn Relief
If you are like the millions of other Americas, you probably have suffered from heartburn at one point of time or another. Millions of people suffer from heartburn every day with over 100 million people suffer at least once a month. With worldwide sales at around $10 billion, the pharmaceutical industry is making a killing off of consumers. Many of these products contain ingredients that are unnecessary can even be harmful. Here are some natural ways you can relieve heartburn.
Antacids
The root cause of heartburn is when our stomachs become too acidic, especially due to foods that contain high levels of acid. One great natural way to fight the symptoms of heartburn without having to break the bank is sodium bicarbonate or baking soda.
Sodium Bicarbonate
A great homemade antacid is to mix a solution of water with 1 spoonful of baking soda. Baking soda not only works great for cooking and household cleaning and affordable, but is also an extremely effective antacid. The logic behind how baking soda works to stop heartburn makes complete sense. You are consuming a strong base that neutralizes the strong acidic stomach fluids when coming in contact. The effect works just as many products on the market, lasting for up to 60 minutes. Just be careful if you have high blood pressure problems since taking baking soda can raise your blood pressure.
Why all the ingredients?
Just as with most of the products that are sold for us or our pets, there are tons of ingredients that add nothing to the food but make it more appealing to look at. Given that baking soda works so well by itself, why do we need to have so much crap in antacids. Here is an example of a popular antacid that uses calcium carbonate that works similarly to baking soda:
And why is it necessary to have four different food colorings and artificial sweeteners just to calm down our stomachs? The answer to that question is simple, we don’t. Companies would like us to continue believing that we need their products to solve a problem in our lives. I would stick with using simple baking soda. There is no need to spend tons of money on products that add nothing.
Diet
Using an antacid like baking soda is not the only way to treat your heartburn. Changing your diet to remove alot of the foods that are causing the problem is an easy way to prevent heartburn from arising in the first place. This means eating less acidic foods to reduce the amount of acid that enters our bodies. The biggest problem with this is that so many foods we eat have high acidity levels, especially high foods high in fat and sugar. Eating a diet comprised more of fruits and vegetables especially when they are raw can reduce the risk of heartburn, while making your healthier.
It’s no surprise that instances of heartburn are so high. Taking baking soda or other antacids can help relieve your heartburn temporarily, but the only way to really eliminate it is to improve our diets. By combining all the above methods, you should be on your way to a heartburn free and healthier lifestyle.
EPEAT Green Certification Expands Globally
In an effort o meet the high demand for green electronic certification worldwide, EPEAT has expanded it’s certification to include products from 40 different countries. EPEAT is a certification that allows manufacturers, purchasers and consumers to examine how environmentally friendly an electronic product is. This expansion allows major countries throughout the world to determine with EPEAT certified products are available to them. Jeff Omelchuck, the executive director of EPEAT had this to say about the expansion of their certification:
We’re responding to a rapidly expanding demand in interest, but it also allows more specificity for manufacturers to see what is out there and available.
What is EPEAT?
EPEAT is a system that allows manufacturers to given their products a certification around a set of 8 environment performance categories and a total of 23 required criteria and a total 51 criteria. It headed by a 12 person unpaid board from backgrounds including environmental advocates, electronic recyclers, government policy professionals and manufacturers. All staff are contracted from the Green Electronics Council.
Each of the EPEAT criteria relate to how environmentally friendly a product may be. They range from the materials used to make the product, to how recyclable it is and even as far as the packaging of the product. At minimum, a product must meet the 23 required criteria to be certified. The more of the 28 optional criteria that are met, the higher the rating. EPEAT issues three levels of rating categories that products can fall into:
- Gold: Meeting all 23 required criteria and a minimum of 75% of the optional criteria.
- Silver: Meeting all 23 required and a minimum of 50% of the optional criteria.
- Bronze: Meeting the required criteria, but below 50% of the optional criteria.
Check out EPEAT’s website to get a full list of all categories and required and optional criteria that go into this certification.
In order to receive this certification, all manufacturers must sign an agreement ensuring their accuracy in all declarations. So what happens if the manufacturer doesn’t quite the truth? Well not only would they look bad, but they will be removed from the registry if the error is not corrected.
The fact that EPEAT is so comprehensive, it’s a win-win for both manufacturers and consumers. Manufacturers can change their business practices and have a positive impact on the environment. It’s tough to tell whether an electronic product is environmentally friendly, even with extensive research. This certification allows consumers to be much more informed about how environmentally friendly the electronics we buy are.
With this new expansion, all standards mentioned above will remain the same. This new change moves EPEAT towards being the global standard for assessing electronics for environmentally friendliness. Be sure to check out their website for further details and a comprehensive list of all products and manufacturers covered under the certification.
The Big Palm Oil Debate
Palm oil is such a widely used product that has been causing drastic deforestation to major rainforests of southeastern Asia. Palm forest are being erected in place of tropic rain forests that house precious ecosystems. The only problem, it’s used in so many household products and even to create biofuel. Let’s look at both sides of this huge debate as well as some solutions that could help prevent further damage.
History
Let’s look at a brief history into the palm oil industry and how it has rapidly become the one of the most widely used vegetable oils. Palm oil has been used for years, most in Africa as a cheap oil. It caught on in Britain and was used in a variety of non-food products because of it’s inexpensive and cheap nature. Palm oil was introduced to Malaysia, a British colony at the time, as a method to eliminate the country’s problems with poverty. Since then, it spread to Indonesia. Both countries have become the word’s largest exporters of palm oil producing 80% of the worldwide palm oil. It has become both countries major source of economic growth and stability.
What’s it used for?
I have never directly used palm oil nor have many people out there, but it’s in so many of the products we buy that makes it so heavily demanded. Palm oil is in food products as well as non-food bases uses including cosmetic, personal care products and even used to make biofuels. So many major companies use palm oil and I bet if you were to look on the label of one of these products you would find it in there.
Biodiesel is rapidly growing worldwide and one of the major sources used to make it is palm oil. This mainly stems from the fact that it is cheap to produce. Biodiesel is a great fuel source and can help with reducing greenhouse gases as long as it’s source is not a substance like palm oil.
Environmental Concerns
As I mentioned above, the major objection to the use of palm oil is the environmental impacts it’s production is having.
Greenhouse Gases
Proponents of palm oil suggest that the planting of palm trees actually capture at least as much carbon dioxide as existing already standing rainforest do. They also claim the fact that it is being used to make biodiesel makes it reduce greenhouse gases even more. The problem with this is that those same rainforests needed to be cut down using mechanical equipment and replaced with palm trees. On top of that,areas of the tropical forests called peatland have pockets of carbon dioxide that were released upon the forests being cut down. It is estimated that 4% of the worldwide greenhouse gas emissions are caused by these rainforests being cleared. That’s a staggering number considering they are only two small nations in our big world. The continual destruction of the southeastern Asian rainforests in no way is offset by erecting palm trees and making biodiesel from palm oil.
Habitat Destruction
In these precious rainforests that are being cut down so quickly by palm tree plantations there are many species of endangered animals including the Sumatran tiger and orangutan. With valuable wood in these rainforests as well as a booming palm oil industry, there seems to be no concern for these animals that are watching their habitats be destroyed. These animals are also being killed because they attempt to protect their homes from being cut.
Roundtable of Sustainable Palm Oil
The Roundtable of Sustainable Palm Oil or RSPO sounds like an organization trying to make palm oil sustainable produced. Their website describes their organization to:
Promote the growth and use of sustainable oil palm products through credible global standards and engagement of stakeholders.
The organization has moved slow since its creation in 2004 and only achieved to get 4% of the worldwide production of palm oil deemed sustainable. The problem with that is that the same countries that are allowing rain-forests to be cut down are doing the certifications. On top of that, the same organizations that are major contributors on the board of RSPO also are the heavily dependent on the industry. These companies allow these countries to continually cut down trees. Some of the major companies involved include:
- Unilever – Makers of Flora butter, Lipton tea, Knorr, Dove and many other major brands.
- Cargill - Makers of Crisco and many foodservice products.
- Nestle – Major chocolate maker.
- ADM – Produces ingredients for products worldwide.
It’s no surprise that these companies along with many more major companies are so heavily involved in the palm oil industry since it’s in so many of their products. Greenpeace investigated this issue in their Cooking the Climate report to show just how these companies are only contributing to the problem.
Fixing the Problem
The rapidly growing worldwide demand of vegetable oils worldwide does not have to be at the expense of tropical rain forests. There are ways that we take the dark cloud hanging over the palm oil industry and make it more sustainable. One way is to stop the deforestation that is currently taking place. This means that further peatlands in these countries needs to stop to avoid the significant amounts of greenhouse gases that are emitted and destruction of precious habitats. There are also ways that the peatlands can be rehabilitated that can offset further carbon emissions.
Some ways that we can fix the problem is to put more pressure on companies like the ones listed above and demand they stop supporting the deforestation taking place. We can get through to some of these companies by buying less and reducing their profits. By continuing to buy from these companies we are only encouraging these companies to continue down the road they are taking and the ultimate demise of precious tropical forests in South Asia.
