by Trevor Sanders, intern for American Sustainability
Thank you for finding your way to American-Sustainability! It is one of our main goals to educate organizations and individuals on ways to operate in a more sustainable way. Reaching as many people as possible is something that we are hoping to accomplish, so we wanted to gather information that can be easily taught to friends and family who may not know how simple and easy changes can be made towards a more sustainable lifestyle. These changes can benefit the environment, our pockets (in some situations), and provide some possible stress relieving activities.
Let’s briefly go over what sustainable living means for the people we will be reaching out to, and how changes can be made individually and within a household.
Living sustainably means taking actions toward reducing negative impacts that we are having on our environment. The goal of a world living sustainably, while still accomplishing goals and dreams that individuals have, will help our planet continue to be a safe and welcoming place for generations to come.
There have been many changes in our climate over the past few decades and humans have had positive and negative impacts on these changes. By doing our best to come together and intentionally behave in ways that are not destroying our environment, we can decrease the number of negative impacts that we are having on our climate.
Going over the basics with sustainability newcomers will help them understand the importance of the possible changes that can be made.
There are many things that can be done within a household that can benefit our environment. Some of these actions will not even require much effort from you or your family!
Next, we will take a look at some of these effortless changes that can be made within the home to be more sustainable.
Recycle, Recycle, Recycle! – There are hundreds of thousands of pounds of plastic, and other recyclable goods, that end up in landfills due to people throwing items away instead of taking the extra step of recycling. In some neighborhoods, there are recycling bins that are provided and the city comes and picks them up. If this is not the case in your neighborhood, a weekly, or biweekly, trip to the recycling center in your town can be made into a family event! There are many craft projects that can be done with children involving plastic goods. Some ideas for these projects are listed here: Incredible Art, Plastic Bottle Penguins, and other Animals!
Taking these projects to the recycling center with the kids after they are done with them can be a fun learning experience of how important it is to recycle!
Be aware of energy output – Most of the people who have found American Sustainability will find most of the information in this post as information that is already understood. This does not mean that all of our friends and family are aware of the good that can be done. Turning of lights, devices, overhead fans, and anything else you can think of, while they are not in use will not only have a positive impact on the environment but also your pocket! By only having things plugged in and turned on while they are being used will help lower electric bills and you will help decrease greenhouse gasses that power plants are releasing into the environment.
Cutting down on waste – Some of our learned habits are incredibly wasteful. There are opportunities present where we can teach our friends, families, and loved ones how to make decisions that are less wasteful, and in return, less harmful to our environment. An example of wastefulness is the amount of paper towels that my household goes through. If we are not careful, we can easily go through 4 or 5 rolls a week. Instead of following those old behaviors, we have done our best to always have a reusable towel ready to go in the kitchen! This comes in handy when cleaning dishes, cleaning up spills, and drying dishes after they come out of the dishwasher. We have also been using reusable napkins with our meals. This has been an easy way for our family to cut down on waste that is not 100% necessary. Other ways to cut down on waste include, but are not limited to, donating clothing instead of throwing stuff away that no longer fits or interests you, reusing plastic containers from the grocery store for storage, bringing reusable bags with you when you go shopping, and making sure to save leftover food from meals to eat the next day, or make compost, instead of throwing extra food away.
There are many other beneficial and simple actions that can be taken in order to live more sustainably within a household, but these are ones that take minimum effort and are a great start to becoming a responsible steward of the planet. It is our responsibility as people who are looking to live more sustainably to spread this information to people around us. If information is not shared, nothing is learned! We hope that these simple and easy suggestions will make it easy to inform people around you of ways to become more sustainable.
