Winter Prep: 5 Ways to Be Eco-Conscious

With winter on its way, there are a couple of easy things that each household can do to help create a healthier Earth while the seasons change. 

• Make sure your garbage stays inside the can until pickup time! Garbage cans that aren’t properly secured face being tossed and turned over leaving trash and waste to be washed down our sewer system and or other waterways. It also creates an easy opportunity for wildlife to dig for scraps that can be harmful to their health!   

• Before winter starts, replace or repair garbage cans with broken lids. This simple step prevent trash from entering the waterways, wildlife's unhealthy meals and any unintentional littering.

• Choose bags that are more eco-conscious than a traditional black bag. Selecting composting brown bags or asking a local coffee roaster if you can get some of their jute coffee bean bags is an easy step that ensures you won’t be tossing any plastic with your leaves. I just picked up some bags from BIVOUAC, a sustainable coffee shop in Evergreen!

• Another option is finding out if there are any local farms or gardeners who want your dry leaves. Facebook, or even a quick Google search, will lead you to these exchanges. 

• Cracked sprinkler pipes have the potential to become a huge water waster. If you’re in a freeze zone, make sure you are blowing out your sprinklers, and marking them for easy repair if they do break over the winter. 

• It is important to have your furnace tuned every winter to ensure it’s operating efficiently. When our furnaces are not serviced, we see more energy consumed to try and keep the system running.  Make sure that your thermostat is set to a more efficient temperature too. Here are some tips from ENERGY STAR to consider.                     

• Replacing incandescent bulbs with CFL bulbs reduces the wattage you use in your home saving money and energy.
• If you leave a room for more than 15 minutes- turn them off and remind those in your household to do the same!
• Create a habit of doing a walkthrough before your household leaves in the morning and on holiday vacations. The $1 a day you may save adds up and you could end up saving yourself money and saving the Earth too.