Collectively, small lifestyle changes can make a huge impact on the environment–and your life. Looking for happiness and health? What’s good for the environment is also, it turns out, great for you. Here’s a collection of tips from the No Impact community.
People always think that “going green” means making sacrifices, so here’s one that’s all good. Try sleeping for an extra hour or two each night. I read once that before the electric lightbulb, people slept an average of 9 hours a night. NINE HOURS!!! Most people I know struggle to get seven. Believe me, you’ll LOVE how you feel once you let yourself enjoy getting a few extra hours of sleep.
So forget what you’ve been told about being lazy, sleeping more is good for you and good for the environment. So try turning in a few hours early, that’s a few extra hours each day when you can turn down the furnace, turn off the lights, TV, computer etc, and enjoy feeling more rested and happy! See, going green is easy!
This post was submitted by Rebecca.
I realize the word “Hippie” has gotten a bad rap here, but I must tell you that my waterbad has become an incredible energy-saving device.
Basically the water in the bed works as a large thermal mass which helps to cool the bed in summmer and keep it warm in the winter. Here’s the trick: NO WATERBED HEATER.
In the summer I keep about a 2 inch pad on the mattress so I don’t get too cold but I NEVER have to cool the house at night.
In the wintertime I up the padding to about 6-8 inches. I use old blankets and quilts from the thrift store (wool army surplus blankets work great – and it doesn’t matter how stained or ugly they are because they go under the bottom sheet). It’s wonderfully warm and allows me to turn the furnace WAY down at night. If your bed is near a south facing window you could cover it with a dark color and it will absorb sunlight during the day to heat the room.
This post was submitted by Rebecca.
What I do with my band, Capone BungtBangt, is to built musical instruments using wasted things. We play a kind of reggaefunkadelic misic. The sound is professional and totally competitive with the commercial musical instruments but the great difference is that what sounds is selfmade by wasted things!
The group was born ten years ago with the idea of leaving behind the standard ways of playing music, while at the same time heightening global humanitarian and ecological awareness.
The music of Capone BungtBangt is created with trash and recycled materials that begin a new life as musical instruments. Virtually every kind of object can be, and is, transformed into real instruments: A piece of wood with 4 sewing elastics mounted on it becomes a double bass. A kitchen broom strung with an elastic band becomes an electric guitar. A polystyrene ice cream box with 5 rubber bands turns into a harp. Plastic garbage cans, metal construction containers, and scrap and sheet metal replace a “real” drum set.
We hope our music will help the new people generetions to see how many things can be done in no impact direction and how is fun to live in that way!
Thank you for the attention and I’m always happy to meet people like you!
Capone
This post was submitted by Capone.
Equation for Life:
Start 3 people: 2 adults, 1 child. Add dog & parakeets for color.
Add 1 small, fuel-efficient car (35 mpg, though sometimes when going up mountain you feel like you should get out and walk to spare the engine-gerbils. Tell self again- 35 mpg!!)
Add 1 job: 50 mile round trip commute each day- work from home 1 day per week. (see also above, 35 mpg car) Avoid rush hour to avoid idling.
Add an already-built townhouse with Southern Exposure that shares utilities. Subscribe to power company’s “green energy” program to use 50% wind energy. Add upgraded attic insulation, a few gallons of low-VOC paint and live with the old purple carpet until can afford recycled-material new carpets. Do NOT add A/C- enjoy basement during summers.
Add 1 elementary school just under 1 mile away- bike to & from unless bitterly cold (be warned: 8 year olds define “bitterly” somewhat differently). Add warm coat and umbrella. Teach to ride bicycle one-handed. Deny all claims that this is child abuse.
Mandate that most clothes be purchased secondhand- anything worn by an 8 year old is going to be destroyed immediately anyway. Add rule that “actually new” clothes must be of organic materials whenever possible.
Add food bought in minimally-packaged bulk amounts. Do this rarely to save gas. Take own bags. Don’t buy single-serve anything.
Add organic products. Subtract tested-on-animal products, products imported from the other side of the planet for no reason, products you saw on TV, and anything you could get secondhand.
Add the twirly lightbulbs that take a minute to get bright and stick way out of the fixtures downstairs but which haven’t had to be replaced in 3 years & counting.
Add an “it’s not THAT dirty!” laundry policy, add condensed ecofriendly detergent, combined with a new energy-star gas dryer and the cheap ancient washer that came with the house: permanently set to Cold Water Wash. Subtract bleach- despite what the commercials say, nobody’s judging you on your whites!
Add entirely inherited furniture to save money- spend to replace a couple of the criminally inefficient appliances like the fridge. Maintain that empty rooms are Zen-like. Add furniture as garage sales and freecycle allow.
Add rolls of recycled unbleached toilet paper and “This is NOT a paper towel!” organic-cotton kitchen towels. Add ecofriendly cleaning products.
Add Family Rule that all holiday gifts given to adults must be Fair-Trade, Organic, Sustainable, Ecofriendly, or all of the above. Learn that people are delighted to get a pound of fair-trade shade-grown coffee and fair-trade chocolate bars wrapped in a reusable shopping bag with a pretty design. Consider Adopt-A-Water Buffalo or similar from Heifer or WWF. People don’t need more STUFF!
Add common sense: an 8 year old would not be consistently delighted with with such a gift, so add Captain Underpants books or Pokemon manga from Paperbackswap.
Subtract disposable anything. Recycle/compost/donate/freecycle what you dispose of.
Speaking of which- realize in 1st week of 1st grade that school lunch is served on styrofoam trays which are immediately thrown away- subtract school lunch. Add reusable lunchbag & sandwich boxes. Add fifty cent mismatched spoons at Goodwill, to prevent loss of own precious inherited silverware.
Subtract the American conviction that you must have a new electronic device every 6 weeks to be a success.
Subtract the need to HAVE. Substitute the need to BE.
This post was submitted by Mia Wederski.
1. 18 years of living aboard sailboat on a floating mooring in the middle of San Diego Harbor (ie) not hooked up to electricity or water; no refrigeration except ice chest, no hot running water.
2. Operate electrical items by solar to battery, wind generation to battery.
3. Shopping done on a fresh item basis with almost all foods/meals made from scratch and made in proper portions so no waste if no ice.
4. Shop using own carrier bags.
5. Don’t replace it if it isn’t broken. By the same token, constant review of systems keeps everything in good working order so things don’t break. Use it or lose it.
6. When we are travelling abroad we use the two person kayak as much as possible for shore transportation instead of the outboard motorized dinghy.
7. We SMILE at everyone we see and WAVE until they wave back to PASS IT ALONG!!
Cheers!
This post was submitted by caryn and gary.