Can You Afford to Go Green?
As soon as you start thinking about how to live more lightly on the earth, your eyes start opening to the myriad ways you can do that. You can eat only organic food. You can bike to work instead of driving. You can insist on high-efficiency appliances. You can line dry your clothes.
Some of these lifestyle shifts will save you money. Others are expensive. Often, I hear cost used as a reason not to “go green”. In fact, environmentally damaging products and lifestyle choices are only affordable because we’re not paying the full cost of them. While you enjoy your cheap plastic toys, people in the developing world are paying the price in terms of pollution, exploitative labor, and natural resource consumption.
Most of us want to do right by the environment. We’d love to have pesticide-free homes and diets. We want our spending to support small farms, local businesses, and fair wages for workers in the developing world. That doesn’t mean we necessarily have the available cash to do what our values dictate.
A lot of green lifestyle changes also have a time cost, associated with them. A few weeks ago, I wrote about how easy it is to slip into Time Debt by thoughtlessly taking on new commitments. Biking to work sounds great, but if it adds an hour to your commute time each day, you’re losing an hour at work or at home.
With every green step you take, you need to consider whether or not you can truly afford it.
Here are some inexpensive steps you can take that will “green up” your bank account and the planet:
- Stop buying Stuff. You all knew I was going to say that, right? When you buy consumer goods, you create demand for resources to make, transport and sell those goods. That can be good for the economy, but it’s bad for the planet — and your wallet. When you do need to buy something, always investigate your options for getting it used rather than new. Used goods are cheaper and greener.
- Cut back on utilities. You can save about $150 a year worth of electricity by line drying your clothes instead of drying them in a machine. Another $150 can be trimmed just by washing them on cold cycles instead of hot. Using high-efficiency light bulbs, insulating your home, and using recycled rainwater to quench your garden are all small changes that can save you big money. They also leave a smaller ecological footprint.
- Park your car. Biking to work might not be practical every day, but maybe you can do it one day a week. Try expanding your radius for walking and biking, and explore public transit options in your area. My family of four drives less than 500 miles a month these days; much less than that in the warmer months. How low can you go? Make it a game. The prize: more money in your pocket, and fewer emissions into the atmosphere.
Once you’ve explored your free or cheap options, you may want to take a close look at some of those spendier choices. Should you be buying organic strawberries? What about “green” disposable diapers? How do you know what the best use of your limited resources is?
Making a decision about a green lifestyle change or product is like making a decision about any other expense. You just need to add the impact on the planet into your set of priorities.
It helps to do your homework. I can’t afford to buy only organic foods, so I use this handy table to help me understand which foods absorb the highest amount of pesticides. I prioritize getting organic apples and strawberries because they’re high on the list, and worry less about sweet potatoes, since they’re very low.
It’s also useful to consider how the added cost of an eco-friendly item will affect your ability to do other things you value. For example, I cloth-diapered both my children. We used second-hand diapers and washed them in a high-efficiency washer. If you’re going to use diapers at all, this is about as low-impact as you can get.
When my daughter’s daycare refused to use the cloth diapers, I assumed I’d put her in the “eco-friendly” disposables you can buy at Whole Foods. Those diapers, made in part from recycled paper, can cost as much as ten times what a box of generic disposables costs at Costco. I bought the generics, and used part of my savings to pay for a membership in the Union of Concerned Scientists.
Ultimately, being an earth-conscious shopper is a bit like being a frugal shopper. It’s important, but it isn’t the whole answer. The simplest, best thing we can do as consumers is to just consume less. That’s good for our bank accounts, our environment, and our bodies.
When we do consume, we’d do well to weigh the environmental impact of our purchases and look for used or eco-friendly options. We also need to hold corporations and governments accountable for large-scale change.
Don’t buy into the idea that every purchase you make needs to be local, organic, hand-made, or recycled. What matters most is that we bring our lives into balance, value the simplicity of buying less, and work for change on a global scale — as well as in our own backyards.
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There are 70 comments to "Can You Afford to Go Green?".
The easiest way of cutting your energy consumption is to install programmable thermostats in all your rooms. Then set up the programming depending on your life style and needs. I am currently paying an avg 125$/mo in electricity for a 2000 sqf house in Quebec.
For organic veggies and fruits, look into an organic buying club or a farm share. My local club has prices on seasonal vegs and fruits that are half what you’d pay in the grocery store.
Some times green choices include start up costs that save in the long run. We re-did our yard to a more sustainable footprint, less grass, different grass, more native and tropical plants (we are in Fla.) which cost us some money up front but has reduced our costs over the long run and reduced impact on environment. Same could be said for energy efficient windows and appliances.
To park the car, select a home in a walkable neighborhood, try this tool http://www.walkscore.com/ before you buy or rent. We score an 83 on the walk score and its true, we can walk to our local dining and entertainment destinations, we can walk to the beach, we can walk to city hall, and the library, etc.
I am glad finally someone brought up the fact that going green has it’s cost. And for many folks costs is a real issue. The same applies to things like food for example, eating healthy can cost more. A 99 cents Wendys burger may be cheap but unhealthy!
You missed the biggest part of the whole movement, advertisement. Companies know “green” sells, even if it isn’t really any better for the environment, and in some case worse. As one article put is, “green consumerism is an oxymoronic phrase.” Anything we consume takes away from natural resources. We shouldn’t be trying to consume more green, instead we should simply consume less stuff.
The green phase craze reminds me of the Snackwell food craze of the mid 90’s. “Wow these are fat free. That means I can eat two boxes and never gain a pound.” Somehow everybody forgot to check for calories and sugar.
Totally agree with Chett!
Buying “green” is a marketing scheme all by itself. Do you need to buy a “green” shopping bag at the grocery? Chances are you already have a canvas bag at home. Do you need to buy a new fuel-efficient car when you have one now that works fine?
Prepackaged foods is the biggest real green decision most of us will make. All that extra packaging and plastic for individual servings. Instead make food at home from scratch and use reusable tupperware when you need food for on the go.
I personally think that in terms of produce and being green that it is more important the food be local rather than strictly organic. We are a member of a local CSA, and we visited the farm last fall. They try their hardest to be organic, but it is not always economically possible. But I still feel like this is the best choice. I would rather eat non-organic tomatoes in season from an hour away than pay for organic tomatoes from South America. This just doesn’t seem green at all when you consider the fossil fuels that it takes to bring them to my local grocery store.
I agree with Chett that “green” has become diluted by advertising and consumerism. For instance, HGTV really bothers me on this issue. They often feature families that rip out perfectly good kitchens in order to make them “green” with bamboo and recycled glass countertops. How is this good for the environment if you already have a perfectly good kitchen? I could understand if the kitchen needed to be replaced anyway and you decided to use green materials. But replacing something that is perfectly good is NOT green. The only way I think this would be acceptable is if you donated all the materials or appliances you replaced to someone else.
I raise chickens (meat & eggs) and recently switched to organic feed (3x’s the price). It has a huge impact on my profit if I don’t raise prices.
Another impact we have as consumers is in how we build our homes in the US. The positive effects you can have just by cutting down the size of your planned new home down and reusing materials is potentially very large. I knew an architech that spent a ton of time designing a ‘green’ house that would be highly insulated (it got very cold) and placed the house to take advantage of passive solar. The client decided to put a window on a north wall of the house. All of the architect efforts were negated with this one window!
@ Molly: I totally agree! We can buy all the green products we want, but the big cars and big houses (complete with swimming pools and big lawns) suggest that our society doesn’t really care about the environment. If we were serious about being green, we’d use a lot less!
In my area, it seems like all they’re building is luxury homes and condos. There’s very little to offer for someone looking for affordable housing. I guess expensive homes are okay for people who have the money, but I wish people would realize we’re all paying for them.
Going green can be many things from buying used, to buying less. Getting rid of something you already have to replace with a “green item” is not green. Use the original until it no longer works. Play board games in the evenings, take a walk as a family. Grow your own tomato’s.
I grew up on “green vegetables” chemicals cost money leaves and grass cutting were natural and free. Buy used books and then donate to the library so they can be reused.
I wrote about Earth Day today as well and would like to share my story and thoughts about what it means to Be Green! Enjoy!!!!
Today is Earth Day.
Around the globe people are banding together to help improve the health of our planet. My contribution this year was to clean the river that runs through our campus. Halfway through what I expected to be about a two hour job, we ran into a bit of a problem: a tractor tire almost as tall as me, buried in the middle of the river. It was filled with sediment that smelled like death (no exaggeration).
We pulled it out of the river and laid it on the ground, contemplating our next move. Should we roll it all the way across campus to our collection area or should we try to find another option to get it there? While we were discussing our alternatives, a student offered to meet us with his pickup truck so we could load it into the back and drop it off right where we needed it. Problem solved…or was it?
Another student thought it would be environmental heresy to use a fossil fuel burning machine to help us in our quest to save the planet. I, on the other hand, didn’t want to be the person rolling an old tractor tire across the campus as it leaked muddy, smelly water the entire way. Sarcasm got the best of me and my response of “Ironic, isn’t it?” brought on a barrage of environmental propaganda I wasn’t expecting. I decided to keep my mouth shut and let her rant about her commitment to the Earth and the environment.
At that point I could have launched into a monologue about how big of an environmental hypocrite I am. Actually, it would have been quite entertaining for myself but maybe offensive to this particular person. I drive my car daily but I compost my kitchen waste. I own a 52″ television but my apartment is 100% CFL. I am the Vice President of the Environmental Club on campus but I spend a lot of time flying around the world. I am a meticulous recycler but I take long showers. I will drive half an hour one direction to buy organic food. We purchase dish detergent that is phosphorus free and I am growing my own vegetables but I eat meat regularly. I buy credits from my electric provider to offset my energy consumption and hang my clothes to dry…
I am thankful that there are people who care about the consequences of their actions and I am thankful there are people in this world who don’t feel a need to consume and be wasteful. I, too, care about the environment but I am also thankful for the luxuries of technology.
This interaction made me wonder what it means to Be Green. Do people with a superiority complex turn people off to the Green Movement? Am I being Green enough? Are my efforts to be environmentally friendly void and invalid because I am also making other choices that are not the best option when we consider their effects on the Polar Bears? Should I do more? Should I have pushed that stupid tire all the way across campus instead of picking it up with a truck?
Being Green doesn’t require you to be a tree hugging hippy. For those people who are so devoted to the cause of saving the planet, I applaud you. I find your ambition to be a noble one but please don’t stand on a soapbox and ridicule people who aren’t doing everything you think they should do. Your only success with this approach will be in alienating people from the movement. Encourage people for what they do right, teach them when they are making poor choices but do not judge. I believe most people have a fundamental desire to make the right choices. Sometimes those choices are not so simple.
Do you choose paper or plastic at the grocery store? I always thought paper was the best choice. It’s biodegradable, paper is the most recycled material and trees are a renewable resource. Then I read an article stating the opposite of what I thought was the right choice. In fact, paper is not the best choice due to the energy required in the manufacturing process compared to that of plastic bags.
Making the right choice isn’t always easy and your attempts at doing the right thing might actually not be the best choice. Being Green is about doing what you can in the areas of your life where it makes sense. Give some, take some. Do what works for you and do your part. Being Green doesn’t require you to give up your car and you don’t need to hug a tree or put flowers in your hair. There is no need to grow out your armpit hair and sing folk music to a poorly tuned acoustic guitar. (Yes, I know I am stereotyping. It is all in good fun.)
It is the small choices that we make on a daily basis that make the most difference. Recycle, install CFLs, carpool, turn off lights when you aren’t using them…the options are endless. Mix and match to your heart’s desire!
Happy Earth Day!
***Disclaimer: My area of study is in Environmental Science and I intend to continue my Postgraduate work in Natural Resource Science & Management.
Worth thinking about is investing in the “Green Movement”. Possible to do good and do well at the same time. You can diversify by buying ETFs. TAN is the exchange traded fund for mainly solar companies, FAN is for wind power. There are many others – just google green etfs.
I wouldn’t invest more than 20% of total assets and no more tha 5% in a single ETF.
A couple of good paperbooks: “Green Investing” Ulrich and “The Clean Tech Revolution” Pernick and Wilder.
Keep in mind that this is a very volatile part of the market.
I started getting all my groceries from my local farmers’ market (I’m lucky; I have two in walking distance) after I read Michael Pollan’s “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” (and other books by him, Joel Salatin, Barbara Kingsolver, Nina Planck, etc). I actually find that I spend less on groceries now – I eat much less because these real foods fill me up faster and satisfy my hunger longer. Also, I’m not spending $3.49 on a 13 oz bag of Baked Lays (my biggest weakness) or other junk foods. I didn’t use to take my nutrition/cost ratio into account, but I think I was actually paying quite a lot for very little nutrition. Food for thought.
Anyway, I like this post – it’s a nice little introduction on the “doability” of going green. There are pros and cons to everything, e.g., biking an hour to work takes time, but maybe it saves you a gym membership. The grass-fed beef is more expensive, but has also been proven to be more nutritious than the grain-fed beef. There’s so much to think about; thanks for opening a dialogue!
And I agree with the poster (#10) above – I recycle, compost, use a rain barrel, and have solar panels on my house, but I also take long showers, and drive an additional 160 miles per week to see my horse. No one’s perfect but it’s good to do what you can.
Everyone may have already seen this, but it brought up some similar points:
How to Be a Savvy Cheapskate – Yahoo! Finance
(http://finance.yahoo.com/news/How-to-Be-a-Savvy-usnews-3454225752.html?x=0)
“For most Americans, the greenest thing you can do is consume less, which probably means spending less…. Take green cleaning products. They tend to be more expensive than the toxic products. But you can clean almost everything with baking soda and vinegar, which are safer for the environment than green products and cost less than any other cleaning products, green or toxic.”
Sometimes, though, the market push for this stuff has positive results. For example “Target Opens Recycling Centers in All 1,740 Stores.”
Do you think they’re doing that for fun? No, it’s a way to get people to go there and think well of them. And anything that gets people to be more conscious about recycling I am all for.
We all have to spend some money, but the money we spend can push companies like Wal-Mart (sustainability, anyone?) and even McDonald’s to change what they buy and how they buy it.
Thank-you for this article Sierra. You make some important points about the choice – or should I say choices – to go green.
A couple thoughts to add to the pile:
1. You can cancel catalogs and junk mail by going to catalogchoice.org. Just by reducing the amount of paper that flows through the system, you’ve helped.
2. You can count some of your green activities (like walking or riding a bike to work) as your exercise for the day – so gaining back some of the time commitment.
3. love the walkscore.com that Sam #2 shared) Choosing to live in a walkable area – and then choosing to walk – is not just green but also a great way to connect to your neighborhood
4. Going green isn’t one choice – it’s many choices, made continuously over time and balanced against our other values. We may not always make the most green choices, as steven #10 points out, but so long as we keep trying in manageable ways, we’re doing good.
Hey, Mich @BTI… is that home of yours in Quebec heated mainly by electricity? I know that’s often the case where you live.
Any supplementary heat sources?
Re: Going Green Affordably posting
Let me crow a little… we’ve cut roughly 50% off the electrical use at our home in the last 5 years, by modifying our behaviour and replacing old appliances inherited from previous owners, over time. Thank god the 30 yr old fridge “died” within a month of moving in! It was taking alot of armtwisting to convince DH. LOL
And absolutely….agree with consuming less, and creating more.
I agree that majority of people want to do right when it comes to protecting our environment, after all, we all breathe the same air. But the cost of going green is a valid excuse for delaying the pursuit if not at all. The media is partly to blame for helping in upping the premium on going green. It’s a double edged sword in a way. It’s nice that they were the vehicle for awareness but on the other hand, they made it the “IN” thing so people will try to make a profit out of it, hence the cost issue.
As for my household, we do try to go green in areas we can afford. I buy used stuff. It’s cheaper and as the author said, greener. We’ve opted for paperless billing when it’s offered.
We’ve replaced most lighting with CFLs where it’s practical but more importantly, I’ve become the “switch police” of the house. We don’t leave anything on if we’re not using it. Small steps count.
I would say that buying less stuff and cooking at home have had the biggest impact on our carbon footprint. I only have to put out garbage and recycling twice a month because of how little goes in the bins these days.
When we stopped eating out, I fully expected that the garbage and recycling would shoot up. It’s amazing that the opposite has happened. Oh, and we use less gas by not doing extra driving going to restaurants and I usually shop twice a month. A grocery budget has eliminated all those one-off trips to the store for cilantro or broth.
I’m all for doing green things that SAVE money first, then deciding after that which things are worth spending some extra money.
Line drying, growing food on my porch, and walking or biking places are all things that I can easily do in the city that save me money. There are other things I do that cost money (buying food at the farmer’s market, say), so I think it evens out.
Great post and comments…lots of ideas. One that is often overlooked is cleaning with vinegar and baking soda. This is as green as it gets, and it doesn’t cost a ton like other green cleaning products.
Huh, did you know the 3R’s used to be the 4R’s? “Refuse, reduce, re-use, recycle”
Another good Earth Day article here:
http://www.thenextfamily.com/2010/04/it-aint-easy-being-green/
For the posters commenting on green credentials being used to sell yet more products that we probably don’t need, it’s a well-documented phenomenon and even has its own name ‘Greenwashing’.
Many of the world’s most influential companies are guilty of this sort of spin and there are even blogs dedicated to the topic.
The easiest way of going green for most Americans (I’m a Brit, we have our own failings!) would be to cut down their water use. I read a recent newspaper article and the average person in the US uses up to 10 times as much water as people in similarly developed countries! This fact really shocked me.
Good point about the catalogs, Ami. I just went to http://www.catalogchoice.org and unsubscribed from all of the ones I could remember (Lands’ End, Campmor, Performance Bike, VS). I don’t even know how we got these as we don’t catalog shop.
I also sent an email to Time Out Chicago as they are the worst, sending us TWO magazines per week that we never asked for and never read.
I agree on both sides. The greenwashing (aka companies cashing in on going green) is a problem.
However to simply say “it’s too expensive to go green!” is nothing but a lazy cop-out.
You can eat healthier for cheaper. People are just lazy and choose the .33 box of macaroni and .99 soda because of laziness.
The way I see it, there’s only two options:
1) Your decision is helping to save the planet from becoming an uninhabitable place. In this case, can you afford *not* to do it?
2) You decision makes no real difference, in which case, why bother?
People have made environmentalism all about feel-good self-congratulation, and almost nobody is actually checking to see tha the world’s a better place because of their decisions, which was ostensibly the whole point in the first place.
You can grow strawberries in a hanging planter on your porch. They won’t be as big or appealing as the ones you buy in the store (organic or otherwise) but they WILL taste a thousand times better.
My husband and I aren’t that “green” but simply frugality leads to “greener” ways of life.
We own a Prius for it’s storage space. We were in the market for a small SUV until we saw that the Prius had the room we needed and was cheaper than the Hyundai Santa Fe we were interested in.
We also use as little electricity and water as possible since I’m cheap. Oh, and I save our aluminum cans to trade for money every 6 months since we don’t have recycling in our area.
Lots of things you do can save money and be “green” at the same time. I concentrate on the frugal part so being “green” doesn’t seem like a chore.
We’ve done a lot in the past few years to go green. I buy most of our groceries at a store where most of its products are local, hormone free and antibiotic free. We’ve cut back our energy usage and recycled more. We eat less processed and packaged foods.
These changes have helped our wallets and the environment.
Trini has a point. Many marketing campaigns involve free giveaways like cheap toys, items we use once or twice and throw away and samples that come in wasteful packaging. (And enough of the eco-bags! How many of them do we really need?)
It’s frustrating being an individual trying to help the environment when much of the waste comes from systems that are beyond our control.
Not in any way to be offensive, but for me “Going Green” is one big turn off.
When I think of “Going Green”, it’s some nebulous group wanting me to think the way they think, and not to think for myself. They are the all-knowing and I’m merely the sheep following along.
It’s namby pamby, followed up by the pseudo science of global warming.
Follow in line with us, you’re part of the group, keep your mouth shut, and keep sucking on the tit of ever growing mama government.
Basically, when I see the word “Green” nowadays, I want to puke.
A lot of “environmentally friendly” detergents are about the same price (or less, because they’re no-name) as “normal” ones, but they are also specifically designed for low temperature washes (less energy use = money saving). Win-win!
Anyone who follows the advice on this and other personal finance blogs should certainly be able to afford “going green”. Ever since getting out of debt in Oct. of 2007, I have had no trouble paying for more sustainable choices like energy efficient appliance replacements, switching to locally grown, grass-fed foods, etc. I buy very little food at the grocery store now, and I find my overall food bill has decreased slightly.
It’s the folks who are addicted to the consumer lifestyle who claim it’s too expensive to “go green” because they can’t comprehend that the greenest action they could take would be to stay home instead of cruising the mall for more junk.
Judging from my Inbox this week, corporate America would have me celebrate Earth Day by shopping. My favorite was a “deal” for $4.99 shipping on a folding bamboo garden bench, no doubt made half-way around the world. Green? No. Greenwashing? Yes.
Great article!
Not buying stuff (and not going places) is the absolutely most frugal and greenest thing we can do.
Also, thinking in frugal (instead of cheap) terms is key – we are putting in the money now to make our house more energy efficient. The new furnace we got in 2005 (replacing one that was 60 years old) cut our heating bill by $200/mo in the winter. It is halfway paid for just in those savings already. Instead of always thinking of the up-front cost, we need to be thinking of lifelong costs.
(p.s. my old car is pretty damn energy efficient when I leave it parked 6 out of 7 days and ride my bike. Plus it’s cheaper to run that way)
Sierra,
Nice post! I find that the “green” choice is often the easiest choice. This is because it’s often about what I DON’T do. I don’t take vacations where I have to fly, I don’t buy brand new stuff, I don’t buy premade packaged meals, I don’t spend much, so I don’t have to commute much.
People can get caught up on what they have to “DO,” when often the thing to do is “DON’T.”
Sustainably and lazily yours,
Katy Wolk-Stanley
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”
I recently realized something about myself – I’m absolutely unwilling to compromise my lifestyle for the sake of the environment.
I used to think I was relatively “green”: I barely drive, I have a small apartment and don’t spend much on heating/electricity, I don’t buy Stuff (especially of the electronic gadgetry variety), and I shop almost exclusively at Whole Foods (purely out of convenience – they are everywhere around here; actually I don’t know if this one makes any difference at all).
But that’s just my natural tendency, I don’t make any of those choices based on “greenness”. On the other hand, I like traveling; in a given year, I will make at least 1-2 trans-Atlantic (round-trip) flights, and 2-4 trans-continental, more some years, which I’m sure dwarfs any driving or shopping habits, impact-wise.
Yet I just can’t see myself deciding not to take every opportunity to go somewhere because of environmental considerations.
Not sure what my point is… guess I just need to be less smug.
I must admit that I am not green at all. We don’t even recycle in my house. We do have energy and water saving appliances though.
@Deborah M
Yes Deb, my house is heated only by electricity, no other heat sources. It was built in 2003 so the insulation here is another variable that helps.
I agree with Dmitri. Do what you can at home and travel if you want to travel. Would it be the best thing for everyone to stay home and give up travel? I would go insane.
“You can grow strawberries in a hanging planter on your porch. They won’t be as big or appealing as the ones you buy in the store (organic or otherwise) but they WILL taste a thousand times better.”
You could grow the same cultivars that you buy at the store if that’s what you want. In strawberries (as in most things) there are tradeoffs.
A chart like the one found at the UMN Extension website can help you choose the type you want to grow: http://www.extension.umn.edu/distribution/horticulture/dg5625.html
Store berries are usually very hardy and have very good texture. These attributes help them to still look good when they reach your store, but may involve compromise in the flavor category.
Giving up meat at least one day a week is a way to help the environment and potentially save money on your food budget as well. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization has estimated that meat production accounts for nearly a fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions.
Also, the decision that has the biggest impact on your carbon footprint by far is how many kids you have. And having fewer kids is certainly something that everyone can afford!
I wrote and posted a similar blog on my site today. Fundamentally, I think “going green” where one can is a socially responsible thing to do and represents good stewardship over what we have. You can choose to make it more expensive or you can choose to have awareness.
Great article Sierra! It’s complex to choose when faced with these trade-offs.
Sometimes the time investment to go green or save money is deceptive. Biking to work is a great example. It takes longer, yes, but you are accomplishing more than one thing– not only are you getting to work, but you also are getting exercise. So that one hour investment is serving double duty to spend time on two things that you might instead have done separately. With bussing to work, as another example, again your trip takes longer, but you can use the time for something else– read a fun book or get some writing done, instead of finding additional time for those activities out of your day.
Because of the possibility of multi-purposing like this, the time cost of doing something more slowly is therefore not always as high as it seems at first glance.
Great thread. Like others, I tend to do the lazy or cheap thing because I’m lazy and cheap. Not because I’m green.
I particularly dislike the organic food movement. Uncertified organic or IPM (integrated pest management) from someone who could be my neighbor over certified organic flown from Peru any day. Esp. when it’s in season!
@Julie (#39): It’s true that animals grown at CAFOs contribute in a bad way to the greenhouse gases. However, raising animals on pasture helps trap carbon (good for the environment). See today’s post at http://www.sustainableeats.com/. So you don’t necessarily have to give up meat – just give up CAFO meat!
I was thrilled to find out we are going to have a famers market throughout the summer in my area. Thank you for the other suggestions on how to be green.
I think “reduce, reuse, recycle” remains a great way to think about it. And it’s in the right order: reducing helps more than reusing, reusing helps more than recycling. It’s better to drink from glasses made of glass and reuse them than to use paper or plastic cups and recycle them.
I’m sure everyone can see that. But what people sometimes can see is the amount of things that can be reused that way. Handkerchiefs or cloth napkins. Glass/metal straws. Cloth diapers or cloth/silicone feminine products.
Reusing is better for the environment, and it’s cheaper as long as it’s things you’ll use enough to cover the initial purchase. But if you won’t use them enough, often you don’t need to get them to begin with.
Also, I have noticed people too often think they have to go the whole way, all or nothing. I use handkerchiefs at home, but when I go out it’s often more practical to use paper tissues, and possibly more hygienic depending on how long I’d end up carrying the handkerchiefs. When I have a big cold or allergies, even at home, I use both because I just need more.
I have cloth bags for shopping and a bottle for drinking water.
Mostly, it’s about making conscious choices and buying less stuff. Then, when you do buy, asking if you can reuse: either buy something you’ll use more, or buy something second-hand… Or both! Straight razors, for instance, are still available and some people really like shaving with them. Some other even use the cut-throat type.
And when you do get rid of things, think about re-using (by selling them or giving them to someone else) or recycling.
The choice you make will depend on your lifestyle. It shouldn’t feel like a huge sacrifice. Actually, it should make you /happier/.
It just takes some thinking. There are many, many things that we use nowadays in a disposable variety without even realising reusable versions still exist and might work better for us.
@Avistew: It’s easy to forget the costs of reusing, though. Diapers is the perfect example: washing cloth diapers is about as tough on the environment as manufacturing disposables (I think the jury’s still out of which one’s worse).
There many things which are economically cheap, but have a disproportionately high environmental cost: transportation and washing are probably the big two.
Great points!
We have always been frugal, so that has made us green in many ways. We’ve been traveling the world as a family non-stop since 2006 & live large on just 23 dollars a day per person.
We rarely take a flight yet have been to 4 continents & 32 countries & even though we have used every mode of transportation from cargo ships to camels, mostly we see the world by walking, biking & using mass transit.
Despite popular belief, travel, especially slow travel, can be extremely green and extremely frugal even in some of the most “expensive” places on the planet.
Now that I’m used to always hanging my clothes out to dry ( as most do in Europe, even in cold rainy climates) I’m amazed that so few do in California with over 300 days of sun a year. It’s actually quite pleasurable & the clothes smell divine.
We are thrilled to have less “stuff” & even though we never had that much, now we can live with soooo little & find it so freeing. We can go for months with just a small day pack/ carry on each. The more we get into simplicity & minimalism the more we like it, basing our life on the richness of experience & time instead of things.
Green, frugal & getting rich slowly can easily be very compatible things!
Here what I do to stay green.
Always cook before its get dark outside so I can cook in sunlight so don’t have to turn my kitchen light on.
Never use my dishwasher.
Never use my dryer until its emergency.
My kids cloths are always had washed and hand wash always give long life to cloth then machine wash.
My light bill never more than $60.00 per month because we use high-efficiency light bulbs in every room.
We never use air-condition because we always have open windows and if too hot then we spend lot of time in basement which is always cool.
We do not use paper towels.
We always use plastic grocery bags as garbage bags for kitchens and bathrooms.
We grow lot of organic vegetables in summer and save in freezer which last for many months.
I’ll get right on that biking 12 miles each way down the interstate in my business suit. Most cities in our country simply don’t encourage mass transit or are too sprawling to make walking and biking an option. The nearest bus stop to my home is 5 miles away. I guess if I loved the environment more than anything else, I’d give up my 1900 square foot home and move downtown into a 1200 square foot overpriced condo (and possibly pay more) so I could walk to work. Just not very practical.
I just made the second payment on the solar array going up on the roof of our house. However, it wasn’t so much a “green” decision as an economic one. These solar panels will provide most, if not all, of my power needs for the time that I live in this house. My upfront cost of $20,000 that I pay now will be returned within 5-6 years and after that, I’m paying no power bill. In fact, since I live in sunny AZ, my power comany will be paying ME at the end of the year for what I will put back into the grid.
Is this good for the environment, too? Oh yeah, I guess it is. But I’m not completely mercenary. Having grown up in the Washington State public school system I can’t help but have the belief that “my very existence on this planet is utterly destroying it” ingrained in me, so I recycle like mad because of the pangs of guilt I receive when I throw stuff away. I have a garden. I ride my bike when at all possible even though bike lanes here are a joke.
Some of the biggest things that affect one’s “footprint” is transportation (fuel) and heating/cooling costs for house. We purposely picked a place to live where both my husband and I could bike or walk to work if needed (we don’t do it every day) so we can be a 1 car family and maybe spend $80 a month on gas. Regarding heating/cooling, it is worth it to spend some money on insulation, and have a smaller size home sq foot-wise. This makes the biggest difference, and why ironically most city dwellers have smaller footprints than suburban dwellers. But- the way most cities and towns are designed (or NOT designed) the majority of housing is spread out, and there is poor public transportion. Given the choice of a larger, newer house for less money than a smaller older house close to the center, I can see why not everyone does this. That’s why we can personally do what we want to improve the situation, but there needs to be better planning to make the most impact (compare European versus American cities).
Want to make a green impact? Vote!
Public policy changes and laws are the things that will ultimately make a difference. You flushing the toilet a few less times won’t.
Here’s how I “go green”:
– I don’t buy or eat processed food. I also don’t drink soda so no aluminum cans to try to recycle!
– I don’t eat meat more than a couple times a week.
– I only have 2 kids instead of more.
– I work full time so I don’t have to heat my house, use the bathroom, or turn on the lights during the day.
– I live and work in a small town so I don’t drive much even though I do drive to work.
When I read this article and the comments that follow I can’t help but thinking that it must be tiresome to live up to all the rules and expectations of green fundamentalism. I suppose humans have an installed need to believe in something and that must make it worth it.
Excellent post Sierra! I must admit I found some of the responses absolutley hilarious. Does anyone really decide to have fewer children solely becasue it’s good for the environment? Come on – these are complex decisions based on a miriad of factors, economics, personal preference, and yes, sociatal impact should have some say. But it is true that green living has become so fashionable that people will think up all sorts of reasons to put themselves in the ‘good’ camp. The bottom line is that it’s all about making concious decisions. Mindless, rampant consumerism isn’t good for anyone (expect maybe Sam Walton’s children). But neither is getting on your high horse and pointing out how much better you are than your neighbors because you didn’t have children. I guess if humans became extinct that might be a good thing for ‘mother earth’ – but isn’t the point of keeping the earth green so that it remains habitable for us?
@49 GolfingGirl
The point is, don’t do the things that are super hard or expensive, and focus on what’s easy to do.
I used to bike 12 miles each way to/from work on the interstate, but I’m into biking. I wouldn’t expect others to do it. But what’s the point of a snarky, bitter post about how it’s too hard to be environmentally friendly? What was your point?
If it does take you round trip an hour to ride your bike to work, why would that be a bad thing?
You have to exercise anyway, so that saves you an hour in the gym. And money on multiple levels.
Regarding line drying, you can still do this if you live somewhere without a garden (e.g. a flat). I haven’t used a tumble dryer in years; instead, I have something that looks like this:
http://www.shop-com.co.uk/cc.class/cc?main=p&act=211491882&ccsyn=261
That takes about two loads of washing, and I can fold down some of the segments if I want to dry something like trousers, i.e. have them hanging from the top rail, past where the middle rail would be. When I’m not using it, it just folds up flat, so it’s not in the way. I can’t remember how much mine cost, but it wasn’t much, and I’ve had it for 13 years (surviving 3 moves).
I fold T-shirts in half and hang them over the rails to dry. For work shirts, I put them on hangers and then hook them over my shower rail. That also has the fringe benefit that I don’t have to iron them afterwards. (I don’t even own an iron!)
Uh, maybe some think this is gross but we don’t flush every time we pee. We drink a lot of coffee in the morning, live in Seattle where water isn’t cheap, and saved $60 on our last water bill by simply only flushing when really necessary. Lots of water saved as well as money. No judging others who flush every time but just a thought to those who are open to the idea.
FYI–The bit about having fewer children was actually a joke….. 🙂 I agree that sometimes people sound a bit sanctimonious over their “green” choices, which are usually just what they choose to do anyway green or not.
My resposne would be “How Can You Not?”
Start off with green steps that will SAVE you money, then use this savings to afford the green steps that cost a little.
Sierra,
TERRIFIC POST!
My favorite part: “…environmentally damaging products and lifestyle choices are only affordable because we’re not paying the full cost of them. While you enjoy your cheap plastic toys, people in the developing world are paying the price in terms of pollution, exploitative labor, and natural resource consumption.”
Thank you.
I think a point that has not been discussed enough is that in *most* cases, the green choice is also the frugal choice. People tend to focus too much on the few counterexamples. For instance, they think of “green” clothing as pricey organic cotton, bamboo, Tencel, and so on. But secondhand clothes are even greener, because they use *no* new materials and reduce waste at the same time, and they’re also a lot cheaper than equivalent items purchased new. Similarly, buying organic produce may cost more, but planting a garden, if you have room, will save you money on food and give you fresh, local, organic produce at the same time. (Yes, there is a time investment, but it doesn’t have to be a huge one, especially with container gardening.) Line-drying clothes, biking to work, switching to CFLs, using your local library–all of these are good for the planet *and* your wallet. (True, as Sierra Black points out, you have to consider the cost in time as well as money, but in many cases the time cost is quite low compared with the financial payoff.) I’d like to see a greater awareness of “ecofrugality”–the concept of “waste not, want not”–as a single ideal, not two separate and conflicting ones.
Being environmentally friendly is not just a bandwagon you can hop on and spend money. What people don’t realize is that the frugal choice, the practical choice, the choice that avoids waste, is also the green choice. Environmental degradation is the natural outcome of wasteful, extravagant lifestyles. Therefore, if you avoid waste and extravagance, you are “green” whether you like it or not.
I look at green strategies in categories.
1. the changes that cost me little or nothing in time or money. Switching to reusable bags at the grocery andother stores is one of these. It doesn’t really cost me more money as I already had cloth bags around the house and it doesn’t cost me more time. I just have to change my habits. No brainer on these things.
2. Changes that cost money. Yeah, it costs more to buy free range chickens or no hormone beef but I can balance that extra cost by simply eating less meat. Sometimes it does cost too much more and I have to balance what I can and can’t afford.
3. Changes that cost time. Hanging my clothes on the line, riding my bicycle to work… Again, I have to balance what time I can afford and if it gives me pleasure otherwise. Maybe I really enjoy that bike ride. That’s worht something.
Nice post. Thanks.
Why is having kids not green? That sounds horrible.
Why would having kids be green? Having more kids is going to use more resources than having less kids. I am a firm believer that we need to start instituting a population control program soon .
Wow, great post and comments. I have a few thoughts…
– 4 R’s: Refuse, reduce, re-use, recycle – love it! Should always be done and in that order.
– to Crosby: “It’s namby pamby, followed up by the pseudo science of global warming.” Pseudo science? Are you living on another planet?
– Giving up meat is something more of us need to do. Methane produced in raising cattle is 13 times more damaging to the environment than CO2. It’s also responsible for a lot of the cancers in America. Don’t eat red meat more than twice a week and try to eat more fish. Your colon and your planet will thank you.
Going green is more than a movement. It is quickly replacing religion in America. It’s hard to believe in a church that lets priests harm our children. It’s easy to believe in doing something with scientific evidence that supports its “goodness.” Green living is becoming something more of us can believe in.
The synergy of going green and saving money is a sometimes on, sometimes off thing. But in the end, even if you spend a little more to practice green living, you end up with fewer health problems and save money that way.
By the way, there’s another synergy here: mindfulness. When we pay attention to our choices and really think about our actions before we buy, we are doing more for our souls too! It also helps combat greenwashing. You can’t just buy things because of a green label. You have to think about the claims and look them up.
Has anyone seen the Good Guide? It’s an iPhone app that lets you look up the “goodness” of a product environmentally and socially. See something touted as “green?” Look it up in the good guide first. If enough people make purchase decisions based on its affect to society and the environment, manufacturers will naturally make more environmentally and socially responsible products.
It doesn’t work if you are going green but nobody else is going green. Here, you can’t ride your bike to work unless you want to be killed or sweaty and smelly like a pig at your desk.
If you have ever visited a third-world immigrants here in the States, going green is not a big deal at all. They eat out much less, conserve water, conserve everything. So if you want to go green, the only way is to have your brain washed by living in a third-world country and recalibrate your mind about how to live. Otherwise, it’s like a weight-loss program: you go fasting for a while, then you go back to eat like a pig and the cycle repeats.
I think a better question is, “can we afford NOT to go green?” So doing things in a green way may take a little or a lot of initial investment. However can we afford to not reduce our dependency on oil and other fossil fuels. Can we afford to not reduce our emissions.
So many things we can do as individuals are fairly easy. It a more plant based diet. Go vegetarian one or two days a week. Or go vegetarian all the time this can really make a huge difference. Air dry your clothes on a clothes drying rack or a laundry line. This will save 6-10% of the domestic energy use in the USA. Not to mention saving you money and your clothes will last longer as well.