How eco-friendly are you?

Sian-of-the-dead wrote:

We also don't have a dryer - we air dry everything. .

I couldn't do without my dryer :? And I do have a dishwasher though we usually use it when we have guests and the washing up is massive!

Sian... a friend makes the orange spray... I'll ask her.

I conserve energy by flopping on the couch and getting everyone else to bring me food and tea.

many of these ideas are simply recession busters :oops: I do several of these things but only for financial necessity. I'm sorry but I really don't care about the environment any more... I don't have time to even think about a lot of this stuff.

_Crazy_Mary_ wrote:

I consolidate my trips to town. I'm 10 miles from any store so I try to schedule my shopping trips or errands around when I go to work.
I wash my clothes on cold and dry them on the clothes line.
I wash all my dishes in one of my two dishwashers - it uses less water than hand-washing.
My water heater is tankless, on demand.
My windows are all new, dual-pane to help conserve energy.
I have an organic chicken egg farm and I put all my eggs in used egg cartons and when I deliver them to the organic restaurant next to my work I take them on a day when I'm working, on my way to my shift.
I leave most of the lights off and I use those curly-cue lights.
I do all of this to save money, not for the environment...

theres another way???? cause in my house this is the only way clothes ever get washed and dried.

Super Vedder wrote:

I fart into a specially designed and attached to my body vacuumed jar so as to not let the gases into the ozone

beat that...........

1 out of 10 for originality. We all do that in this house.

redmosquito10 wrote:

my eco-friendliness takes a bit of a different form. I'm currently a senior in college, in an environmentally-focused major. Right now, I'm working on a couple projects to help the environment. The first is a stream restoration project. The stream is failing to meet EPA standards and erosion is also starting to threaten a few houses' foundations. Throughout the course of a few months I'll come up with computer models of flow in the stream, and based on that, make a recommendation to the city, probably to increase the undeveloped area around the stream, and design a restoration that increases bank stability and improves the water quality

The second project focuses on designing and installing a series of rain gardens, and then after collecting data on them, coming up with a computer model that cities can use to determine where they should put rain gardens in their city to minimize the amount of stormwater runoff they get.

other than that, i try to do all the basics mentioned here already, although being a poor college student most of the organic or locally grown food is a bit outof my price range

That is super cool! I wish they had programs like that when I went to college

I do pretty much what everyone's mentioned so far: I'm a recycling fanatic, energy star high efficiency appliances, shutting electronics off, buying recycled, eco-friendly products and now recently trying to encompass more local products and produce. I'm also trying to find ways to repurpose a lot of building materials, odds-n-ends and furniture.

With a kid and Chicago winters, I'm not giving up my car, but I definitely want to get a hybrid or fuel efficient car when I get my new one next year. Keeping your tires at their proper level and getting frequent oil changes also makes your car more fuel efficient which is better for the environment and your wallet too.

My biggest impact besides my psychotic recycling is what I'm doing in my garden. I've planted a lot of native grasses and plants in my garden to help with weeds, but mostly to attract local birds, butterflies and pollinating bees. I've established two butterfly and humming bird gardens and I'm installing 4 large capacity rain barrels in the spring. I'm also dedicating the rear section of my backyard to composting and fertilization that will supplement the vegetable garden. I've got a butterfly house and a bat house on its way and we have crysalis on order for spring

My goal is to certify my yards as a wildlife habitat. Which is a bizarre concept in itself. I have to *make* my outdoors a safe place for wildlife. Irony sucks sometimes.

Actually now that I think about it, my biggest impact is raising my daughter to think eco-friendly, consider human's impact on the environment, to be charitable and an activist/advocate for what she believes in. It just comes naturally for her now.