Today is the 40th annual Earth Day. Tweets are a’ flying and statuses are proclaiming, “Happy Earth Day”. But where did all of this start anyway? The EPA explains that, “In Spring 1970, Senator Gaylord Nelson created Earth Day as a way to ‘force this issue onto the national agenda.’ 20 million Americans demonstrated in different U.S. cities, and it worked!” In December 1970, Congress authorized the creation of a new federal agency to tackle environmental issues, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Unfortunately, 40 years later, our planet is still in need of our help … check out just a few of the facts below
Check out some of the Earth Day facts we found from our friends over at Planets Pals!
- The garbage in a landfill stays for about 30 years.
- Each person throws away approximately four pounds of garbage every day.
- One bus carries as many people as 40 cars!
- Each gallon of fuel releases 20 pounds of carbon dioxide into the air.
- Approximately 5 million tons of oil produced in the world each ear ends up in the ocean.
- The energy we save when we recycle one glass bottle is enough to light a traditional light bulb for four hours
- For every 2000 pounds of paper (1 ton) recycled, we save 7,000 gallons of water free from chemicals.
- Recycled paper requires 64% less energy than making paper from virgin wood pulp, and can save many trees
- Every ton of paper that is recycled saves 17 trees
- The amount of wood and paper we throw away is enough to heat 50 million homes for 20 years
- Earth is 2/3 water. but all the fresh water streams only represent one hundredth of one percent.
- 14 billion pounds of trash is dumped into the ocean every year
- 5 billion aluminum cans are used each year
- It takes 90% less energy to recycle aluminum cans than to make new ones
- Each year billions of used batteries are thrown away in the United States. This constitutes 88% of the mercury and 54% of the cadmium deposited into our landfills
- Approximately only 10 percent of every landfill can be cleaned up.
- One gallon of motor oil can contaminate up to 2 million gallons of water. Dispose of properly!
So, what can you do? The Earth Day Network Suggests the Following:
Project Switch: Change your light bulbs!
There are now highly efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) that last for years, use a third of the energy of regular bulbs and actually produce more light. Look for the government’s ENERGY STAR label, which means the bulb has been tested for quality and efficiency.
Drive your car differently – or drive a different car altogether!
The sad truth is that a gas guzzler emits as much CO2 as some homes! That’s the bad news. The good news is that anything you can do to improve the fuel efficiency of your car will have an impact. On average, a passenger car emits 11,400 pounds of CO2 each year while a home emits 9,000 pounds of CO2 per person each year in the United States.
Buying a fuel-efficient car (like a Vista MINI!) is wonderful. In fact, replacing your gas-guzzling car with a fuel-efficient one is by far the best thing you can do, out of all your choices. But not all of us can do that – at least, not right now. So, in the interim, there are things you can do with the car you drive now to conserve energy and be more fuel-efficient.
Get your car tuned up. Just a simple tune-up often improves fuel efficiency. Studies have shown that a poorly tuned engine can increase fuel consumption by as much as 10-20 percent.
Your house – not too hot, not too cold!
The bad news is that about 42 percent of your household energy costs go toward just two things – heating and cooling. The good news is that means you have a lot of room to make a difference and even small changes can make dramatic improvements in household fuel efficiency.
Clean vents, close unused vents, and change filters in the vents. Again, just these simple things will save you up to 5 percent in costs.
Buy a programmable thermostat, which can regulate different temperatures at different times of the day. And if you have one, use it! These thermostats reduce energy use by 5-30 percent and save you $100-$150 in energy costs each year.
Add two degrees to the AC thermostat in summer, and two degrees in winter. If everyone did this, the cumulative impact is significant.
Tame the refrigerator monster!
Did you know that your friendly refrigerator has a voracious energy appetite? It is the biggest consumer of electricity among household appliances and responsible for 10-15 percent of the electricity you use each year.
Turn on your “energy saver” switch near the thermostat.
Clean the condenser coil. This one, very simple thing can improve the efficiency of your refrigerator reducing your annual energy costs by $20.
Twist the knobs on your other household appliances!
Either turn the hot water heater down to 120 degrees, or turn on the “energy conservation” setting. Some manufacturers set water heater thermostats at 140 degrees when most households only require them at 120 or 115 degrees. For each 10 degrees reduction in water temperature, you can save 3-5 percent in energy costs.
Buy insulation at a local store and insulate your hot water heater and pipes.
Install a timer on your water heater to turn off at night and on just before you wake up in the morning.
Wait until you have a full load to run the dishwasher.
Wash clothes in warm water, not hot. Ninety percent of the energy used in operating a washing machine goes toward heating the water that washes and rinses the clothes. The clothes will be just as clean, and you’ll cut energy use.
Green plants with less water, more trees to provide shade.
While it is true that planting more trees will help in the short term because they essentially soak up carbon, they also release carbon dioxide when they die. So it just postpones the problem. But there are other reasons to plant trees – as wind breaks to save energy, and as shade to lower cooling costs. And even the short-term help while we get our act together is a good thing.
As for plants, do everything you can in your yard and garden to create ways in which plants use less water. Choose hardier plants, plant things in groups that need more water and put in mulch to help keep moisture in. When you mow your grass, make sure you do it smartly – with sharp blades, and only when the grass needs cutting. Finally, make sure you water your lawn sparingly. All of these will conserve energy.
Buy Green Energy, and invest in green energy stocks.
Imagine if we ran out of fossil fuels tomorrow, what would we do? Well, we’d get our electricity from renewable energy, such as solar panels, geothermal and wind power sources. Many utilities now give consumers the option to buy “green power.” Ask for it!
Learn the truth about nuclear power and natural gas as viable “green” options. They aren’t. Radioactive waste will be a problem for tens of thousands of years into the future. Even though natural gas emits half as much CO2 as coal, it is still responsible for 20 percent of CO2 emissions in the United States while only providing us with around 23 percent of the energy consumed. Natural gas can help us make a transition, but it isn’t the solution.
Go organic.
Even with our vast reservoir of scientific knowledge about farming, most American farmers still spray a billion pounds of pesticides to protect crops each year.
Now here’s the kicker: when chemical pesticides are used to kill pests, they can also kill microorganisms that keep carbon contained in the soil. When the microorganisms are gone, the carbon is released into the atmosphere as CO2. And when those organisms are gone, the soil is no longer naturally fertile and chemical fertilizers become a necessity, not a luxury.
But besides going organic – thereby saving the carbon release from soil – there are other simple things you can do with food that will also make a difference:
Eat locally grown food. If the food doesn’t have to travel far, there’s less CO2 from the trucks that ship it.
Eat fruits and vegetables in season. Again, that saves the enormous transportation costs.
Plant your own vegetable garden. It’s not as hard as you might think.
Buy recycled.
This may sound simple, but it takes less energy to manufacture a recycled product than a brand new one. So if you and every other consumer buy recycled products, you’ll help create a market, and conserve energy along the way.
Recycled products can often be considerably cheaper than non-recycled products. Most recycled paper products are of comparable quality and cost competitive with virgin paper products.
Be a minimalist.
We know it’s difficult, but in today’s consumer economy, an easy way to conserve energy is to simply use – and buy — less. Every time you buy something, energy has gone into getting that product to you. So the less you buy, the more you save energy-wise. It’s a simple equation.
This last item on our Top Ten list may, in fact, be the single biggest way to make a dent in the global warming problem. Again, we know it sounds obvious, but buying less things – some of which you just don’t need – changes the energy equation across the board, on every single consumer product. If everyone used less, the impact would be large indeed.
So how about some specific things? Here are a few:
Buy in bulk. In short, bulk items use less packaging, which translates into less energy.
Buy one of something, not 21 of something. You don’t need 21 pairs of shoes, if one pair works just as well.
Go through your closet. Donate or recycle what you really don’t need, then make a pledge not to replace everything you just got rid of.
Buy quality products that will last longer. Over time, you’ll obviously buy fewer products that way.
