The holiday season is approaching again. While we all love holidays, it is also a time with huge waste of energy and materials.

Between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, one million extra tons of garbage is generated each week in the U.S.

However, with a little green thinking and effort, we might be able to reduce that figure significantly.

1. Christmas tree

Plant a small potted tree and use it for Christmas each year.

Although artificial trees cost un-renewable energy to produce, if you can use it year after year, it shouldn’t be too bad.

If you must have a real cut tree, most cities have a program to recycle it into mulch and compost.

2. Lights

Switch to LED Christmas lights. They are 90% more efficient than traditional ones. They also last longer and emit little heat.

3. Gift wrap

Save wrap from previous years and reuse it.

Use newspaper, old calendars, posters, magzines, or catalogues as gift wrap (better yet, skip the wrapping).

Recycle any wrap that is no longer useful.

4. Other

Recycle greeting cards, gift tags, and especially cardboard or use them for crafts.  Avoid using disposable tableware. Save and reuse holiday decorations.

Hope we all have a greener holiday this year. For more green holiday ideas, click here.

Dell has announced plans to simplify and revolutionize its computer packaging and make it as their green steps. The company estimates that over the next four years, these new green packaging intiatives will save more than $8.1 million and about 20 million pounds of packaging material.

By 2012, Dell wants to:

• Reduce desktop and laptop packaging materials by approximately 10 percent worldwide.
• Increase sustainable content in cushioning and corrugate packaging by 40 percent.
• Ensure that 75 percent of packaging components are curbside recyclable.

Read more »

Green Small Business

Maybe you are wondering what reasons are 1000 Green Steps throwing at you now, but 1000 Green Steps will always have the list for you to read along and here they are:

1. Attract more customers

As you see each day people are growing more and more aware to our environment status. They keep on changing their life habit into green ones. So if you can show them what a ‘green’ you could be, you’ll attract even more people in.

2. Saving your unnecessary energy bills

Having too much money spent just to pay for electricity or water is such a waste to your income. Save your environment by first saving your own money!

3. Develop your brand

By going green you have the chance to help develop your business brand. This positive association will remind clients about your business when they think about environmental issues.

Happy Green Living!

Dell has expanded its U.S. Reconnect recycling partnership with Goodwill Industries to six additional states, including Arkansas, Iowa, Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon and Vermont and make it as green steps.

That means more than 1,000 Goodwill retail stores are now participating nationwide.

All you have to do is drop off any brand of used equipment at a participating Goodwill donation center in your area. Click here for locations.

These green steps are free. Plus, you’ll get a receipt for tax purposes.
“Today we’re making it even easier for environmentally-conscious customers to do the right thing,” says Mike Watson, senior manager of Dell Global Recycling Services. “Every technology provider has a responsibility to provide free, easy and responsible recycling to consumers worldwide. We hope 2009 is the year that brings the industry together around this shared principle.”

Compost is the result of decomposition of organic matters by micro-organisms. Well constructed compost is the best organic fertilizer and soil conditioner.

While compost is available commercially, it is quite easy to make it in your backyard.

To start, pick a spot close to the garden or kichen to build a frame or to put a compost bin.

For the micro-organisms to work, you have to provide them food.

Composable materials fall into two categories: soft “green” with Nitrogen (kichen wastes, grass clippings, manure, etc) and woody “brown” with Carbon (dry leaves, twigs, straw, hay, coffee ground, etc).

Now layer materials into the compost bin like a sandwich: one part of “brown”, three parts of “green” and a thin layer of soil which contains millions of micro-organisms. Water the pile and keep layering.

In a few days, the pile will begin to heat up when the bacteria start working. After 2-3 weeks, the pile will shrink.

To facilitate the process of composting, turn the pile from time to time to mix the content and provide air. Add water when it looks dry.

Your compost will be finished in a few months. By making your own compost, you reduce kitchen, garden, and yard wastes and save the energy used to transport and package commercial compost.

For an excellent video about composting, click here.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

To my surprise, last posting on 3 steps to turn your business green had gained many visitors’ attention. That encourages us to write more implemented 3R steps to be done. This time, 1000 Green Steps will show you just how easy to apply that exact same 3R at your very own home. Continue reading

Reduce

Reduce paper towels usage, and use cloth towels instead. To make things simpler, just avoid using anything disposable. That will just increases your unnecessary waste.

Try to buy everything you need ONLY IF it is packaged with eco-friendly packaging. Example: Choose card board-packaged eggs instead of Styrofoam-packaged eggs.

Reuse

Conduct a small (or big) garage sale for goods you don’t need anymore. This is 1000 Green Steps favorite step since it could make us money and being eco-friendly all at once.

Maybe you can choose old books from your shelf to be donated to your local library and see if they could use them.

If none of those works, I still have a back-up plan. In my upcoming post, I will show you how to make some Do-It-Yourself things you’ll like. Try to do that, and reuse your old stuff.

Recycle

Bundle up all non-organic stuff inside your house and give them to your local recycling center to get it recycled.

Buy goods from shops that allow you to return its bottles whenever you’re done with it. They are the producers, and believe us, they know how to recycle those packaging better than we all do.

Happy Green Living!

Bottled water industry has a huge impact on the environment.

It uses 1.5 million gallons of oil to just make the plastic bottles every year, not counting fuels used to transport them. The burning of oil emits pollutants into the environment and attributes to global warming.

Water at areas near bottling plants is over extracted, which affects nearby residents and farmers. Also it wastes 2 gallons of water to purify 1 gallon of bottled water.

Ninety percent of the plastic bottles are not recycled and end up in the landfill.

You will save both the environment and money if you drink tap water instead of bottled water. The U.S. EPA’s standards for tap water are actually more stringent then the U.S. FDA standards for bottled water.

If you are concerned or don’t like the taste of tap water, consider a filter pitcher or a faucet filter.

While traveling, fill a reusable bottle with tap water and refill it on the way.

Last week, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that its Plug-In to eCycling partners collected and recycled more than 66.5 million pounds of used electronics in 2008 as their green steps.

That’s nearly a 30 percent increase from 2007.

And it’s equivalent to preventing the release of greenhouse gases equal to the annual emissions from approximately 15,500 cars.

Read more »

Use Recycled Paper

You have no idea on how much that will help Mother Earth. This will even cost you lower than those plain papers. 1000 Green Steps already use it at home for years and 1000 Green Steps don’t regret it. Don’t forget to take note on BOTH sides of the paper, too.

Use Bike or Walk instead of Car

If you don’t live in a developing country, I’m sure your school has a comfortable pedestrian access. However if you don’t have, try to save up your fuel money by riding a bike. This will save up your money a lot and most importantly your environment.

Don’t use a Plastic Bag!

Who doesn’t know I’m not a Plastic Bag tote bag? Everyone has got to use it. Remind yourself, your family, or even your neighbor to use a tote bag instead of plastic bags which are mostly only going to be used once. You can get in style AND save your earth at the same time.

Very easy. 1000 Green Steps have been doing that for years until now, and now it’s your turn to influence the people around you to give some love for Mother Earth.

Happy Green Living!

Best Buy has announced that it will launch an electronics recycling program at all of its U.S. stores beginning on February 15 as their green steps program.

Consumers can bring up to two items per day, per household, to any Best Buy store.

Best Buy will accept most consumer electronics, including:

• televisions and monitors up to 32″

• computers CPUs and notebooks

• small electronics

• VCR and DVD players

• phones

• accessories, such as keyboards, mice, and remotes

You’ll be charged a $10 recycling fee per unit for items with screens, such as televisions, laptop computers, and monitors. But, then you’ll instantly receive a $10 Best Buy gift card in exchange for the recycling fee. (This fee does not apply for units recycled in California stores, and does not apply for any of Best Buy’s Exclusive-Branded products, such as Insignia, Dynex, and VPR Matrix.) Read more »