Green Your Day

About a decade too late, Israeli’s are finally starting to understand the importance of recycling. This is most obviously seen by the recycling bins that have been popping up in the streets of Tel-Aviv (where I live.)

Unfortunately, most of these bins seem to be filled with mostly water bottles, so I wanted to point out a few other things that (believe it or not) ARE made of plastic and SHOULD be recycled as well:

• plastic cups AND straws (usually sold at coffee shops: ice coffee, milk shakes, fruit shakes, juices, etc…)

• plastic boxes, forks, knives, spoons (especially from take-out and food ordered in at the office or at home)

• plastic lids (usually found on top of paper coffee cups)

• plastic beauty products (shampoo, conditioner, liquid soap, hair products, body lotions, nail polish remover, deodorant, etc…)

• plastic cleaning products (laundry detergent, almost ALL cleaning materials, liquids and sprays)

• plastic food packaging (almost ALL cheeses, yogurts, ketchup, mayo, puddings, syrups, etc…)

• plastic trays INSIDE food packaging (for example, the plastic trays inside cookie boxes or frozen foods, etc…)

Of course, there are many more places we can find plastic right under our noses. If you can think of any, please comment and add them below. Oh, and recycle, recycle. recycle! Thanks!

For the first time in history, Tel-Aviv will be representing Israel in the global Earth Hour 2008 and turning off the lights for one hour of energy-free bliss.

Unfortunately, as we have yet to hear about separation of church and state, let alone separation of church and globe, due to the Jewish Sabbath, Tel Aviv will kicking off the project one day earlier than the rest of the world: tomorrow, Thursday March 27, between 8pm to 9pm.

(Note to self: focus on the positive side…)

So yes, Israel is taking action, action long overdue, but action nonetheless.

Bottom line is, I dont care who you are, where you will be, what important things you’ll need to be doing.. tomorrow night please, please, please do us all a favor and:

TURN OFF THE GODDAMN LIGHTS!!!!

Thank you.

Electrical appliances and chargers (including cancer cell phone chargers) left plugged in drain electricity like there’s no tomorrow - even when they’re not in use! Yes, even appliances that are switched off can draw power from the grid (it’s called phantom load).

For example, a TV set that’s switched on for 3 hours a day (the average time Europeans spend watching TV) and in standby mode during the remaining 21 hours uses about 40% of its energy in standby mode. Forty (freikin) percent of all electricity is used to power home appliances while they’re turned off!

Yeah, but what could I possibly do about it?

1. Switch your TV and other appliances off completely - don’t use standby modes!
2. Unplug, unplug, unplug: Just as you know to turn off the oven when you’re done using it, condition yourself to unplug entirely an electrical appliance when you’re done using it. It’s really that easy - even a child could do it (though I wouldn’t necessarily recommend that a child do it…)

Sidenote:

I just did a quick scan around my house to see what appliances were currently not in use and unplugged them. I counted 14 energy wasting appliances (not including those that are currently in use. )

Did You Know?

If everyone in the U.S. recycled their Sunday newspaper it would save roughly 500,000 trees every week!

SOURCE

Ordering in food to your home or your office can be fun every once in a while (I’m rather addicted to it myself…) But ever notice all the “stuff” that comes along with your meal? A typical order of one simple meal can usually include most (or all) of the following:

A plastic fork, a plastic knife, a plastic spoon, 1 or 2 paper napkins, a small paper packet of salt, a small paper packet of pepper, a toothpick, freshener wipes in their little paper cover and the little plastic bag that holds all these unnecessary items together! Oh, and not to mention a plastic cup and/or straw for your drink!

What the means is that one simple meal (that you didn’t even make yourself!) can result in a bag full of waste that goes straight to the garbage! Un-freikin-believable!

“Yeah, but what could I possibly do about it?”

Believe it or not, all it takes is one simple sentence upon ordering: “And I won’t be needing the utensils and stuff, thank you.”

Use your own utensils, use your own salt and pepper, use your own cups and as for the “freshening wipes”… oh, for green’s sake, just wash your hands!