Cloth Diapers

Benefits
Environmental Benefit: ★★☆☆☆
Yes, it's true - the gal in the photo (one of ours) is not wearing a cloth diaper. This is one we debated about, and finally gave into disposables mainly for convenience sake. But lets look at the real environmental impact! Disposable diapers are mostly made up of plastic, pulp and paper which industries produce more hazardous waste products than the cotton industry (out of which most cloth diapers are made). Cotton farming requires vast amounts of energy and water however. Cotton is also a chemically wasteful crop to grow, taking up 10% of all agricultural chemicals and 25% of insecticides used on our land. Disposable diapers make up about 2% of the total landfill volume in the US and cloth diapers a much smaller fraction. However, cloth diapers take a significant amount of water (usually heated) to clean. If a diaper service is used, there is the energy involved in the pickup service to account for. If a tumble dryer is used, then that energy use is also significant. It isn't such a clear-cut decision, is it! A 2005 study by Britain's Environmental agency determined that the carbon impact of cloth vs. disposable was essentially a "wash" (about even). However, critics of the study noted that cloth diapers can actually have an environmental advantage if the latest efficient washers are used, with large loads and using lower (cool or warm) temperatures. Another advantage is given to cloth if line drying is used instead of tumble. And finally, if the diapers are later reused on another child (in the same family, or by some means passed to another family) then this gives them a further advantage. So yes - cloth CAN be a little more environmentally friendly than disposable if handled right, and it definitely creates less landfill waste.

Money Saved: ★★☆☆☆
The fancy cloth diapers they've got these days are relatively expensive! If you pay for a diaper service then the cost will be about equal to using disposable diapers. If you wash them yourself, you can save 20%-40% of the cost of buying disposables.

Lifestyle Benefit: ★☆☆☆☆
Cloth diapers generally soak through more often than disposables, and so need to be changed more often. It can't be denied that the convenience of being able to wrap that nasty little bundle up in waterproof plastic and toss it in the bin is awfully nice too!

What We're Doing
Part of the reason we didn't use disposables is I couldn't see myself swirling cloth diapers around in the toilet like my mom did for us! Since Shannon wanted my help changing them, we got disposables. Am I too unreasonable? I'm not sure my dad ever changed a diaper!

Tip
There are charities such as miraclediapers.org that will help you recycle cloth diapers! Or you can give them away on freecycle. Myself, I'd feel strange trying to sell them! Maybe give them away at a baby shower???? (umm . . . NOT!!!!!)

A Little Humor
Q. How many babysitters does it take to change a light bulb?
A. Are you joking? They can’t even change a dirty diaper!

Use a Fan in Summer

Benefits
Environmental Benefit: ★★★☆☆
The energy used by a fan to cool you is less than that used by a home A/C unit - so you're saving energy.

Money Saved: ★★★☆☆
As usual, when you save energy you are also saving money! Of course, this assumes that you turn your thermostat up to a higher setting since the fan is making you feel cooler.

Lifestyle Benefit: ★☆☆☆☆
I couldn't think of any benefits other than saving a little cash! Unless you like watching fans go round and round . . .

What We're Doing
As is typical in Southern home construction these days, we've got a ceiling fan in nearly every room. By using these in the summer, we have cooling breezes in our home that enable us to set the thermostat several degrees higher than would otherwise be comfortable. Note that indoor fans don't actually cool the air, they just make it feel cooler because moving air can carry heat away from your skin faster. So you should turn them off when not in a room (unless using them to bring warm air down in the winter)!

Another way that fans can be used to heat or cool is to transfer air from outside to inside when it is at a "better" temperature. We have a monitor that shows the outside temperature and humidity. In the summer, if it cools off enough in the evening (and isn't too humid), then we'll place a window box fan in a downstairs window and open several other windows across the house and upstairs. This rapidly cools the house and is much more efficient than air conditioning! Your home starts the next morning nice and cool, and the A/C may not have to kick in until after noon! I've frequently been disappointed to hear our neighbor's A/C running on a cool evening after a warm summer day. The walls of their house and attic are still hot, so the A/C needs to keep operating well into the night. A window fan could do the same job with 10% of the energy.

I do go around and close at least all the lower-story windows before going to bed - would love to leave them open but have to be security-minded! I have to check them all as I never know which ones Shannon may have opened! Other windows left partly open can be protected with window slide locks that keep them from opening further - a cheap little gadget available at most home stores.

A Little Humor
Q. Why did the blonde die in a helicopter crash?
A. She got cold and turned off the fan.

Grow Heirloom Plants

Benefits

Environmental Benefit: ★★★★☆

Heirloom plants are varieties that were grown many years ago but are not used in modern large-scale agriculture. They are open pollinated, unlike hybridized varieties. By growing them, you help increase the gene pool for future generations. Heirloom plants can self-propagate, unlike hybridized versions which depend on seed companies to produce them. It's a little scary to me that the most of the plants we depend on for food are unable to propagate without direct human intervention! It's also unpleasant to realize how few actual varieties of food are depended upon for feeding the world's masses. Helping to improve that situation by supporting heirloom plant preservation is the main environmental benefit.

Money Saved: ★★☆☆☆

Although the heirloom starter seeds may be more expensive to start with, you can harvest seeds from your produce and flowers and use them for next year's crop. This can greatly reduce the cost of keeping up your garden! With hybridized "non-heirloom" plant varieties, any seeds produced are generally sterile or unable to grow into the same plant.

Lifestyle Benefit: ★★☆☆☆

Although genetically modified foods may usually be completely safe for human consumption, with heirloom varieties you aren't having to take the chance they aren't. Also, by having the ability to produce your own usable seeds, you are independent of the seed companies. It's nice to be independent, isn't it? To be completely honest though, many of the heirloom vegetable garden varieties don't produce as much or as large of produce, or are more insect/disease prone. That's the incentive for buying the hybridized in the first place! But you may find that the heirlooms taste better . . .

What We're Doing

I'm afraid I'm no expert at gardening - Shannon does nearly all of it for our family. She has studied the different plants she grows, and knows how and when to collect their seeds. She packages them up in little paper envelopes which are carefully labelled. Then most of them are stored in a jar in our refrigerator until the next planting season (with a little rice to control humidity I think). Wouldn't it be great to be able to produce your own seeds?

A Little Humor

What did the blonde say when she opened the box of Cheerios? "Oh look, doughnut seeds!"

(Wish there was a politically correct way to refer to "dumbells" but can't think of one. I don't mean to rag on blondes!)

Go Unplugged!

Benefits
Environmental Benefit: ★★★☆☆
Most electrical devices these days are "on" even when they're "off"! They work like energy vampires, slowly sucking the electricity from your power lines even while you're sleeping. Put a figurative stake in their hearts by unplugging them when not in use and help save the planet. Vampire devices send an estimated 87 billion pounds of CO2 into the atmosphere each year.

Money Saved: ★★☆☆☆
This savings measure probably won't cut a big "bite" out of your electric bill, but every bit helps! Set-top cable boxes and digital video recorders are some of the biggest energy hogs. Unfortunately, there's not a lot you can do there since shows can't be saved if the boxes are unplugged - but if you don't need them then you can unplug them. Other devices can be dealt with more easily: computers, printers, TV, DVD, VCR, CD players, and microwave can be unplugged. When added up, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory says that standby power can amount to 10% of residential energy use. This extra energy, taken across all U.S. households, adds up to an estimated 65 billion kilowatt-hours of electricty each year, costing consumers more than $5.8 billion annually.

Lifestyle Benefit: ★★☆☆☆
Plugging your electronics into a power strip will protect them from power surges, even when turned on. The strip draws no power when it is turned off, and makes it easy to shut down multiple devices (computer, monitor, printer, DSL modems, etc.) with one switch. Another benefit of turning your computer off when not in use is that this helps protect it from viruses and hackers by making it less accessible to them. Yes, there is a small inconvenience of having to wait for your PC to boot up each time you turn it on. We generally switch it on as we're on the way to do something else for a minute or two, and come back when it's ready-to-go!

What We're Doing
Shannon unplugs our kitchen microwave when not using it, as we don't need it for a "clock" which is all it does when sitting there. All of our TV & audiovideo devices are plugged into a power strip which gets shut down when we're not watching. Similarly, all of our computer equipment is plugged into a power strip which is switched off when we're not on the computer. The printer switch is kept off unless we are printing something, which besides saving energy can make your ink cartridges last longer (since they don't go through as many "ink cleaning cycles" that occur when it's on).

A Little Humor

What Thomas Edison's mother might have said to her son:

"Of course I'm proud that you've invented the lightbulb! Now turn it off and go to bed."

Teach Nature Appreciation

Benefits

Environmental Benefit: ★★★★★

By sharing your appreciation and knowledge of nature and the world around us, you help to develop that same appreciation in others. This can multiply the effect of your own conservation efforts by encouraging them to also care for our environment.

Money Saved: ★☆☆☆☆

This one doesn't save you any money, except maybe in great Karma!

Lifestyle Benefit: ★★★☆☆

When you truly appreciate and enjoy caring for our earth, it is a joy to share that with others. This is the benefit.

What We're Doing

In the picture, you can see Shannon and our girls out on a little nature hike. The girls are holding identification guides for bugs, bird, and plants - as well as an animal track identification pamphlet. Having something to look for, and learning about the things you see, makes a nature walk so much more than just a little exercise! There is so much about our world to learn that you can never run out of interesting things to discover - and its more fun to do it with someone else along. Hey, another benefit might even be to impress your neighbors! My oldest daughter identified poison ivy growing by our neighbor's home, which they were very glad to be warned about (having 4 small children of their own)! For your own benefit, here's also an identification photo of that particular plant as it grows here in central Texas!

A Little Humor

What do you do when you see an endangered animal eating an endangered plant? -- George Carlin

"The college idealists who fill the ranks of the environmental movement seem willing to do absolutely anything to save the biosphere, except take science courses and learn something about it."
— P.J. O'Rourke

Line Dry your Clothes

Benefits

Environmental Benefit: ★★★★★

Clothes dryers use quite a bit of energy to operate! Drying your clothes on a line saves all of this energy - about 6% of typical residential energy use. By using hanging your clothes out to dry, you reduce your use of gas or electric resources. You may even be able to eliminate your need for a clothes dryer! A study by Cambridge University's Institute of Manufacturing found that 60% of the energy associated with a piece of clothing is spent in washing and drying it.

Money Saved: ★★★★☆

You'll be saving on your dryer energy budget, and during warm summer months you actually save twice as much! This is because by drying clothes outdoors your air conditioner doesn't have to remove all that extra heat from your house. And if you live in a dry climate, you can dry your clothes on inside racks by a fan and actually cool (by evaporative cooling) the house in the summer! Triple energy savings! The average money savings for a household that line dries is more than $100 a year. Also, your clothes will last longer. Where do you think lint comes from? If you do completely without a tumble dryer, think of the extra money you saved on the appliance! You'll spend a very small amount on line or racks for drying, and maybe clothes clips if the wind is blowing them off your line. By comparison, the average home dryer uses around $1500 of electricity that you could save during it's 18 years of life

Lifestyle Benefit: ★★★☆☆

Drying your clothes on a line takes a little more time and effort than in a dryer, but the money you save makes it worthwhile. And clothes that are dried outside smell fresher and feel soft. Whites are bleached by the sun, and sunlight also disinfects. Another lifestyle benefit: dryer fires account for about 15,600 structure fires, 15 deaths, and 400 injuries annually. In the winter, you can make your house more comfortable by rack drying your clothes to help raise the indoor humidity level when your furnace is making it too dry. And if you don't even own a tumble dryer, think of that extra space in your home you can use! And you won't lose as many buttons! Sheets can be especially nice when freshly off an outdoor line. If you have enough space on your lines, you can line dry quite a few more clothes at once than a dryer can handle - actually saving you time if you're doing lots of laundry!

What We're Doing

The photo shows a self-retracting clothesline that we use inside the house when it's too wet outside to dry clothes. We also have some collapsing wood racks that are easy to set up for indoor drying. Shannon sets them up under our ceiling fans for faster drying. When drying outside, we just use a line tied between posts. If you put up your own line outside, use a cotton line or one that is made for clothes drying rather than a synthetic line like nylon or polypropylene. Plastic (synthetic) rope materials will degrade and crumble if left out in the sun for long periods. We do still have a small electric clothes dryer, but it sees very infrequent use.

Tips

1. Turn clothes inside-out when drying outside on a sunny day, to reduce fading. Also hang the darker clothes toward the middle where they'll be more shaded. On summer days in particular, take the clothes in promptly when they're dry to prevent fading.

2. On cold days, hang clothes out early so they catch the midday warmth.

A Little Humor

Teacher: What is the axis of the earth?

Student: The axis of the earth is an imaginary line which passes from one pole to the other, and on which the earth revolves.

Teacher: Very good. Now, could you hang clothes on that line?

Student: Yes, Sir.

Teacher: Indeed, and what sort of clothes?

Student: Imaginary clothes, Sir.

Make a Solar Oven

Benefits
Environmental Benefit: ★★★★☆
By using solar energy to cook with, you reduce your use of gas or electric resources.

Money Saved: ★★★☆☆
Although your baking energy budget probably isn't huge, keep in mind that during warm summer months you actually save twice as much! This is because by baking outdoors your air conditioner doesn't have to remove all that extra heat from your house.

Lifestyle Benefit: ★★★☆☆
It is a little more work and hassle to bake this way. It takes a little longer, and you have to keep the oven pointed toward the sun which means making a couple of trips out to check on it. But the extra work is minimal, and there are a few advantages besides having a cooler house. Your kids will love bread baked in the solar oven, because it has a soft crust. For slow cooked items like a pot of beans, you can just leave it in there like you would a crock pot and not have to worry about burning or overcooking. So although you need to start cooking earlier (planning ahead), your cooking is more "hands-off" so doesn't really take more time. And by being independent of utilities, you can still cook when the power is out!

What We're Doing
In the picture, you can see the solar oven I made for Shannon. She actually got this started by building a small oven design she had found somewhere. That design involved using cardboard boxes, one inside the other to create an insulated space. Cardboard flaps that opened at the top had aluminum foil glued to them as reflectors, and a window on the front was covered with that clear plastic you use for turkey baking bags (so it could resist the heat). The contraption actually worked, but didn't get hot enough to be useful for baking most things.

I did some more research and came up with the improved contraption you see in the photo. I started by pounding a pipe into the ground and screwed it onto a lazy-Susan type cabinet base so that you can rotate the oven to face the sun. However, one of our trees conspired to grow more branches and leaves and started shading the spot I'd chosen during part of the day. So the design is now modified (not shown) to work at ground level. It is mounted on casters so we can just roll it out in the yard where we want it, and then roll it away when done. We keep a barbecue cover on it when not in use. It's made from 1-inch thick rigid fiberglass insulation that they use to make air conditioner plenums out of. The stuff is easy to cut with a utility knife, and has a reflective aluminum layer on one side. I put the non-aluminized sides together for each piece so that I end up with 2 inches of insulation and a reflective layer on both sides. That also prevents getting fiberglass fibers in your food! Use metal tape (also available at the a/c supply store) to tape up the pieces. The whole thing sits in a plywood and wood frame, and there is another wood frame on the front with a double-paned window in it to let the sun in. I just used silicon glue to attach two sheets of ordinary window glass. Be sure to leave a little space around the glass in the frame so it can expand when it heats up, or else it will end up cracked (voice of experience). Using two panes with about a quarter-inch space between them helps insulate and keep the heat in the oven. I hinged the frame so that it pulls open from the top with a piano hinge on the bottom - that way its own weight keeps it closed. Inside the oven, there's a black cookie sheet turned upside-down to absorb the heat. Also, when we cook with a pot in there we use a black enamel pot. You need dark material inside the oven to absorb the solar rays - otherwise the light will just bounce back out the oven without heating it. You also want to collect more sun than just the window can collect - and thus the four fold-out reflector panels you see here. Designs I saw on the web called for either using aluminum foil glued on rigid panels, or else mirrored tiles. The tiles sounded heavy to me, so I came up with the pictured approach that I think worked really well! Our home depot stores sell aluminum framing and corners that you use to make insect screens or solar screens for your home windows. You just cut them to shape, stick in the plastic corners to hold the frame together, and then lay your screen across them. A little roller tool helps you press a little round rubber "rope" into a groove in the frame which holds the screen in place. Instead of using screen, I used that "emergency blanket" material available at sporting goods stores that has a reflective side to keep you warm. It is made to reflect over 90% of the heat hitting it, and does a terrific job of reflecting heat into the oven! This oven will reach 325 degF in about 10 minutes on a sunny day. It works in the winter too, as long as it is sunny and not too cold out. It does take a little longer to cook than a regular oven because there isn't as much heat available - experience will teach you how long it requires. Shannon actually uses a cooking thermometer stuck into her food (usually breads) - and when it reaches the correct temperature it is done. Total cost to build was under $100 and we've been using it for about 6 or 7 years now - it's holding up well!

Tips
1. Don't use materials like plywood on the inside of the oven, as when they heat up they can release toxic gases.
2. You can make a good solar oven for less than half what buying one will cost you - and it will probably work better than the commercial model.
3. I'd avoid the "open air" reflector type designs, as they don't perform as well and really don't work at all in cool weather. An enclosed oven-type design is much more efficient and easy to use.


Links
Here are a few helpful links with solar oven design and cooking suggestions!

http://solarcooking.org/plans/Cookerbo.pdf (instructions for a fancy sun-tracking design)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_cooker (wikipedia article)
http://www.solarcooking.org/
http://cookwiththesun.com/

A Little Humor
Q. What is a solar cookers favorite day to cook?
A. Sun-day, of course!