Green Living | Green living tips and advice

The Expert answers:

1. All my vegetables are organic from local farms shops.
2. I only ever buy free range eggs.
3. I’m a vegetarian so I don’t eat any meat.
4. Honestly, I’m not sure. Thanks for the idea though, I’ll check that out but I only really use shampoo, toothpaste, that sort of thing.
5. I always buy recycled toilet paper and kitchen roll and look out for eco friendly producys wherever I can.
I also recyle pretty much everything.
Thanks for the question, it’s nice to know others are thinging about the environment too.

The Expert answers:

Check out Green Holiday Solution! They carry eco-friendly products for just the holidays, and they have a nice Christmas selection.

Check it out:

http://www.greenholidaysolutions.com/category/32366525761/1/Christmas.htm

The Expert answers:

Unfortunately, greenwashing does exist. BUT there are countless products out there that are truly eco-friendly. The key is simply knowing what to look for when evaluating a product’s green-worthiness. The Green Checklist at AltFuels Now is a great resource where you can find a break down of what makes a product green, and what doesn’t, including:

Appliances
Food
Beauty Products
Cleaning Products
Clothes
Baby Products
Pet Products
Home construction products

Link to these articles via the link provided below.

The Expert answers:

Yes and no, sorry.

Why the answer is, by definition, no.

Fair-trade is in reference to the wages and working conditions that the laborers undergo while creating the product. There’s nothing in fair trade, however, that says people can’t be fairly paid to do a job that creates lots of pollution and is harmful to the environment.

Why the answer is actually yes.

Fair-trade is part of a broader more liberal social movement that is more about small business, sustainability, and other hippie-type stuff. It is much more likely for fair trade organization and fair trade workers to support environmental sustainability. Many fair trade organizations will explicitly address this by incorporating environmental standards when certifying companies for fair trade status.

The Expert answers:

Fair trade usually refers to food, so I’ll talk about it that way here. Fair trade food means that the farmers who grew the food were payed fair amounts of money, and that th company selling doesn’t get as much money. A lot o fair trade products are Natural/organic, mostly because the people selling it care more about healthy food and good working conditions then other companys, witch tend to care more about profits.

The Expert answers:

If you had an idea then you’d be rich.

The Expert answers:

If you want to convey the idea of eco-friendliness, you almost don’t have any choice but to use the word “Green.”

I suggest you name the store “Green Paws” and use a graphic of green paw prints running behind the name, which should be in dark brown or deep blue.

It’s a play off the idea of a green thumb- it subtly suggests that animals want to be environmentally sound because they’re animals.

It may not be as flashy as Eco Chic Pet Boutique, but it is more brandable, advertisable, memorable, and will lend itself to signage better (short is better because it allows you to use larger words within the legally allowable sign size for your area).

The downside is that acquiring the domain name might not be as easy. Someone has registered the idea with GoDaddy and may be open to an offer- perhaps some common stock would suffice if you’re planning to incorporate. The good news is that it isn’t actually in use already.

I’m answering the question as if you wanted to compete with Petco and Petsmart though, which would be a bit ambitious since both can leverage the eco-friendly idea more effectively at this point if they so choose.

If you’re thinking, at most, about a very small chain of small-store-front specialty stores in places like San Francisco, Boulder CO, and Seattle, then a longer name perfectly fine. I really like Eco Chic Pet Boutique. It’s really clever and conveys a very precise message.

The Expert answers:

Why leave nuclear material laying around the ground where it occurs naturally? If this were PCB’s you would be all for cleaning up the waste and disposing it at a safe dump site.

The same happens with nuclear power.

Nuclear power is used, shipped across the country, and disposed of in safe sites everyday. You just aren’t aware this is going on.

Nuclear power is safe, clean, reliable, and available without producing any green house gases. We would be fools to not use nuclear.

Nuclear power is nothing more than heating water with a hot rock. Why are liberals so scared of new and modern technology?

The Expert answers:

Recycle bins in the cafateria.

The Expert answers:

1

Thaís צ♥¦×

The Expert answers:

My dtr. Started using Shaklee Laundry a couple of years ago as her babies were having a redness and itching reaction using other soaps. She tried OTCounter and this one worked the best.Very economical too.

The Expert answers:

The last time I saw anyone tangle with a mangle was my gran in her backyard just outside the coal hole over 40 years ago…. You’ve invented an antique. Clever you.

The Expert answers:

I would try craigslist.com

to see if anybody in your state/city has one for sale at a decent price.

I always find stuff on craigs list.

Its amazing

The Expert answers:

I do prefer liquid detergent as well….if you’re concerned about being eco-friendly, you could make your own detergent.

I found this recipe (though I’ve never used it or know anyone who has, it does sound like it is pretty straight-forward and it does sound like it would work….given you can find the materials!)

http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/laundrysoap.htm

The Expert answers:

Type paper making in your search engine.

The Expert answers:

The answers of 1-2-3-4-5 is (no)

6-(color or shine)

The Expert answers:

Neck Yes No No No
Price and color I like to look good when I work out

The Expert answers:

Did you try mojo surf shop off howard street

The Expert answers:

A hippie and a hipster are two entirely different things.

Hippies do not dress like hipsters. Hipsters are generally arseholes who shop at thrift stores, do everything “ironically”, and like to pretend they discovered certain bands and things before everyone else. Hippies are what you described in your original question except they tend to dress in flowy clothing.

The Expert answers:

I ran out of detergent once and just put the machine on with none. Clothes came out fine and clean. Hung the washing out in the sunshine to dry and they smelled lovely.

The Expert answers:

For the pet stains, you could try a dilution of tea tree oil and water – let sit on stain for a while and then soak up liquid with a rag. I would test this on a hidden patch of carpet first though.

For the glass shower doors and surround, use rubbing alcohol to get all the residual bought cleaning product off the surface and then you can just use white vinegar (not diluted) in a spray bottle. This of course works for mirrors and chorme fixtures. If there is hard water build up on the glass doors, let it sit for a while – although it may not get all that residue off right away. I also have a squeegy that I use to squeegy off the water from the tub surround – it reduces the chance that you’ll get mineral build up on the surround (that stuff that looks like water drops dried up, but you can’t seem to get rid of it easily).

For my stainless steel sink and such, I just use a baking soda paste that i make as the scrubber (it seems to work like ajax or comet) and then rinse. You tend to get a filmy residue afterward rinsing with water so i just take a dry flannel cloth and wipe it up (a piece of old pjs that I ripped up works wonders! – or I get them from the second hand store for CHEAP and rip them up if I am running low on cloths). Also, you can use 1/2 a lemon dipped in borax as a more abrasive cleaner but I never have a lemon around so I haven’t used it often (I find the soda works well to get grime off stuff anyway). Now that I think of it – try that for your tub surround too! It’ll scrub off scuzy stuff!!! If you want to polish the stainless steel after you’ve cleaned it, you can use mineral oil too.

Borax in water is a great way to get grease out and off of stuff.

I know you didn’t ask but I see that you have a septic field/tank so I thought you might be interested to know about laundry softner that you can use in your washing cycle rather than using those sheets… And this literally costs you about 3 cents per load
In a large container mix
2 c white vinegar
2 c baking soda
4 c water!
Shake everytime before using (the soda settles).
Get yourself a downey ball from the store, fill it with the regular amount of homemade softner. It’ll release in the rinse cycle! I use it and it works wonders!

I am not sure about safe septic cleaners for toilets. I would assume that using borax in water would suffice. Apparently 1/2 cup borax in 1 gallon of water meets the most sanitary requirements. I think it is considered the enviro-bleach!!

Hope that helps!!!

The Expert answers:

Eco-friendly produce doesn’t leach nasty chemicals into the environment and the more people who buy these products, the more likely mainstream companies will start to supply such products. Ever since I gave up cleaning the loo with bleach based products and started using unbleached loo paper, a green tree frog has started visiting our sewerage pipes. Some nights I can hear a big gurgle when I turn the light on, as it makes a quick getaway.
I switched to eco friendly products a couple of months ago, and that includes ALL my cosmetics too. I did it because it’s unatural to put nasty chemicals into or onto our bodies.
Recycling is important because it means we are reusing our planets resources instead of constantly depleting them.

The Expert answers:

1. Female
2. 58
3. No. I neither give or receive cards.
4. Yes. But they are usually too expensive.
5. No. I don’t buy cards or gift wrap.
6. Red.
7. I don’t have a favorite christmas color because I have no reason to celebrate any of the holidays.
8. None of them. I don’t celebrate any of the holidays.
9.See # 8.
10. See # 9.
You’re welcome.

The Expert answers:

1 ) Male

2) 20-29

3) Yes

4)Nope

5) Yes

6) Blue

7) Red

8) Other

9)Raindeer

10 ) Imm Fam

The Expert answers:

Yea

The Expert answers:

Penny’s Green Clean

The Expert answers:

Use cloth diapers. Disposable diapers are one of the most damaging products to the eco system used these days.

The Expert answers:

Dont know hairstyles, but if you need products for hairstyles then go to LUSH.
Its an eco – friendly soap shop, and has all sorts of stuff like shampoos, hair gels, even face masks and of course soap.
Everything is really good, you can cut your own size blocks, it even does henna for hair dye instead of chemical based dyes + solid shampoo bars.
Just a recommendation, it’s what I use.

The Expert answers:

Definately aussie
just look for the purple bottle
it’s the only kind i use

The Expert answers:

Saw this real sweet organic one at http://guffly.com. Check it out

The Expert answers:

More than you’ll ever dream of.

The Expert answers:

It has more to do with how it was grown/raised and processed than the actual material. If you have natural grazing animals that don’t take a lot of resources, aren’t pumped full of antibiotics and the skins aren’t tanned with toxic chemicals (which most are, that’s why the process has been shipped overseas) you would have less impact than convention cloths. Cotton is a highly sprayed crop and the dyes used on it are often extreamly toxic.

I have found trying to buy eco responsible clothes is a challenge. There are many low pesticide, natural products being used, modal (wood fibre), bamboo, organic cottons but many are shipped half way around the world and are produced in less than ideal social conditions. I usually weight the ecological impacts more than the social and transportation. My hope is that with enough interest in low impact clothes the proctice will increase and there will be better social and local choices. I don’t have much leather in my life, it is too expensive to find the stuff that wasn’t produced with toxins. I do like many animal products, silk,cashmere, angora and wool, and try to find items that were not factory farmed, they tend to be expensive, but if you take proper care of them, they will last a lifetime.

I avoid petroleum based synthetics. I try to reduce my over all consumption of oil, I avoid plastics as much as possible. I also avoid hybrids, that would be something like a poly/cotton blend. When you put a synthetic and natural product together you destine it to the landfill. A 100% polyester shirt can be recycled. A 100% cotton shirt can be recycled or biodegrade, a hybrid can’t do either.

The Expert answers:

Http://www.babycentre.co.uk/baby/buyingforbaby/knowhow/ecofriendly/
http://www.ecobaby.com/
http://www.ecomall.com/biz/baby.htm

The Expert answers:

I do the same things, reducing toxins and other chemicals in my cleaning supplies, and recycling.

A couple other areas to reduce your impact on the earth. Reduce food miles, buy fresh organic and local. Eat what is in season. Look at where the food you buy comes from, some so called farmers markets import food from South America, so ask if it isn’t labeled. Reduce toxins from your beauty products, buy organic and natural products there is a whole list of chemicals to avoid. Reduce packaging, look into the bulk bins at your local market and get reusable produce bags as well as shopping bags. Conserve energy and water, time your shower and cut it by a few minutes, adjust your thermostat by a few degrees, unplug chargers when not in use.

My favorite book on the subject is “The Green Book” you can check it out online at www.readthegreenbook.com I also really like “Easy Green Living” by Renee Loux. I got my produce bags from ecobags.com, but they would be easy to make.

The Expert answers:

1. Do you feel a need for more internationally inspired clothing( ex. Indian, hawaiian, european, australian,african, brazilian)? No
2. Would you buy 15 dollar eco friendly jewelry if it meant you would be saving the enviroment as well as looking great? Yes
3. Would you pay more for jewelry and clothing if you knew you were helping save the planet by purchasing it? No
4. Are you looking for unique/hot jewelry/clothes? Yes I like unique items no one else would have
5. Do you like knowing that the jewelry your wearing is one of a kind and/or limited addition? Yes
6. What your favorite thing to have in the jewelry you wear? To be long and big and look boho vintage

The Expert answers:

You should save up for something like a front loading washer and/or dryer. As the front loaders pays for itself in-terms of the water usage, they don’t really use up that much energy and they generally clean clothes better.

Cleaning clothes in hotter water doesn’t speed up the cycle, it actually slows the process due to the water heating.

Some of the front loading washers even have a steaming function, that steam cleans your clothes for that quick fresh-up and on the go. Check with your local appliance retailer for selection.

The Expert answers:

I prefer the smell of Gain but right NOW am using Tide with Bleach alternative 🙂 Smells and cleans great, and I am using SNUGGLE Fresh release fabric softener in the blue bottle… Smell greeeeat! ((sniffs shirt)) Ahhhhh! 🙂 LOL

The Expert answers:

You could get her jewellery or bracelets ? You can actually get bracelets which can look quite hippie along with those flower head bands Some bracelets you can find actually have things written on them to support eco friendliness etc. Search around.

You might find something she’ll like on these websites 🙂

http://www.hippieshop.com/cgi-bin/gold/category/12000B

http://peacebracelets.co.uk/

The Expert answers:

I got 2 cotton ginny

The Expert answers:

Ethnique sounds good 🙂

The Expert answers:

Core
Greenscape
Earthscape
Geoscape? (lol i’m stuck on scapes)

The Expert answers:

One of the keys to green living is supporting the local economy while doing what you can to protect the environment. That said if you buy a painting that is made using milk paint or non toxic oils such as linseed but on a canvas made in the UK it is a safe bet that you doing more for the environment than if its shipped around the world. As far as what releases more pollutants the one shipped around the world does… When you consider the emissions from the shipping vehicles, the emissions from the manufacture of the vehicles, the emissions from the production of the fuels ores and energy needed to create the products,shipping vehicles and place that the art work was created…

General rule of thumb… Buy all natural/organic, if you can’t buy all natural buy local made, if you can’t buy local consider if you can do without.

The Expert answers:

For the greatest Eco-friendliness, you want to select products that require the least energy and raw material to produce, systems that require the least energy to use and products and materials that preserve the air and water quality of the space.

Re-purposed materials are prime candidates for eco-building materials. For insulation, options include recycled cotton such as Ultra-touch http://www.ecohaus.com/C-121/ultra+touch. It is basically shredded blue jeans. Another option that is gaining in popularity is straw bale house construction. Straw bales are set onto wall foundations and are framed. Then the bales are covered with stucco or cement. The result is a structure made of renewable materials that has very good insulating properties. Here’s an informational site about straw-bale construction: http://www.strawbale.com/

For framing and walling, alternatives such as Wheatsheet is an eco-friendly alternative to virgin wood products. Wheatsheet is made of recycled wheat chaff instead of tree wood. It also does not off-gas (produce fumes) like some glued and treated wood construction materials, helping maintain clean indoor air.
Http://www.ecoproducts.com/top/price%20sheets/wheatsheet.pdf

For decking, recycled composite products such as ChoiceDek are eco-friendly because they use recycled plastics and wood fiber instead of virgin tree wood and they last longer than most wood products. Http://www.choicedek.com/

For floor-covering, hard surface floors are usually preferred to carpet because they are easier to clean and do not trap allergens and contaminants. Bamboo flooring is an eco-friendly option because bamboo is a fast-growing and renewable wood source. Other options are cork flooring, recycled rubber flooring, natural linoleum and recycled glass tile. If you do decide on carpeting, use carpet made of recycled PET (pop bottles) or wool–they are renewable products and do not off-gas as much as new, conventional carpeting.

There are several alternative adhesives, paints and finishes, including solvent-free Titebond adhesives, Timbertek wood finishes, Osmo Color wood sealer.

Most of this information came from Eco-products. I have a binder of theirs. Although most of the material on their website is about plates and cups, you might be able to find construction-alternatives in their site or register in the “training” section. Www.ecoproducts.com.

Also, try to make use of passive solar energy in your design. It is the simplest and least-resource intensive method of building. Strategies include using south-facing windows to heat rooms using the sun, brick or cement walls on the south side to absorb heat during the day and radiate it at night (called a Trombe wall) and properly-placed windows and skylights to provide natural lighting to every room of the house. Planting deciduous (leafy) trees around the house provides shade in the summer to keep the house cool but allows sunshine through in the winter when the leaves fall to help warm the house. The National Renewable Energy Lab has many strategies and suggestions for green building. Their visitors center employs many eco-friendly strategies: http://www.nrel.gov/visitors_center/eed_model.html

There is so much more to green building but hopefully that’s a helpful introduction. Have fun with the project!

The Expert answers:

Hi There,

Organic and Eco friendly products don’t always cost more, understanding what lies behind the terms ‘Organic’ and ‘Eco friendly’ is often the key issue and being prepared to become a greener shopper by degrees.

First principals to follow are not about the labelling at all,

1. Avoid over packaged goods and buy loose goods wherever possible, this way you cut down the carbon emissions and waste related to the goods you’ve purchased and made them more eco-friendly.
2. Try to buy goods grown or manufactured as locally as possible. For example buying organic asparagus from Peru will probably devalue the “organic” status of the product simply due to the air miles and pollution involved in getting it onto your plate if you live Manchester. Many local authorities support local farmers markets etc so you can get good produce locally, plus look to see where your food and other goods come from.
3. Join Freecycle, look in the charity shops and news papers for second hand goods, you are saving them from landfill at little or no cost to you and great gain to the environment.
4. Join an allotment association and grow your own, that way you can guarantee that at least a portion of what you eat is organic, plus you can use the allotment to help you compost your kitchen waste and grow some wildflowers to help support your local nature.

These principals are called the “New or Green three R’s” and are basically about thinking about reducing waste, and increasing recycling and re-use from the point we go out to shop.

Next regarding whether costs will go down, the answer is yes. We as consumers have the power to say no to environmental damage and to lobby our shops and governments to do better. If the market demand for green goods increases then people will need to produce these at competitive prices if we reject non green goods then the producers will either have to change their practices or go out of business.

Already many “Fair Trade”, “FSC Certified Wooden” items environmentally friendly cleaning products and products made from recycled materials cost only as much as or sometimes less than their less green equivalents. Its definetly worth getting to understand the many different eco labels and doing some price comparison.

At 40 years old I’ve had time to see this welcome change begin to happen and the likes of you and me and everyone else out there actively encouraging it may mean the world we live on has a future.

Happy Eco Shopping,
Ruth ;0)

The Expert answers:

Since you seem new to it, here are a few links. One is a book to read up on the subject and get more in depth ideas ….
The other is a website for purchasing Green items.

http://www.greenpeople.org/

The Expert answers:

This is already being done. There’s plenty of reserch goin on wind turbines, various ways of using solar, tide and wave power. Plus biodiesel, cars that run on ethanol (grain-based alcohol, really), hydrogen, hybrid and 100% electric cars.

Some of it is already rolled out. Hybrid cars are on the streets even in US, UK has biodiesel in gas stations, Brazil – ethanol cars. Wind turbines have been around a decade at least.

These things are still 30-50% more expensive than fossil fuels, that’s why rollouts are mostly subsidized by governments.

But do not worry, once oil price goes up another $30/barrel, all those alternative energy sources will go mainstream.

The Expert answers:

1- I would say something like the “Sustainable volume” or “Sustainable amount” or “Sustainable Limit”
2- ?
3- Could be both, In the UK a rare habitat may be protected as a “Site of Special Scientific Interest” and there are other EU protection designations. But, scientific evidence of the value of the habitat needs to be presented to grant these statuses, so “Both” could be an answer
4- ?
5- The ozone layer keeps out UltraViolet radiation that causes sunburn, skin cancer and can be harmful to plant life as well as animal life.
6- Well, salicylic acid was originally found in Willow bark. Penicillin is produced by certain molds. The answer could be ‘chemicals’ or ‘molecules’ – not a very well written question.
7- Biofuels
8- I think the setter is wanting ‘Electrical’ as this is what wind and hydro power actuually produce, but again, not a well set question. Indirectly wind and hydro rely on Solar energy, but then again, indirectly biofuels rely on solar energy too.

Get a better science teacher!

The Expert answers:

Money is simply a medium of exchange. It’s nothing more than a type of language for communicating value. You could say it’s “out of thin air” but only to the extent that words are; it’s true only in a particularly stupid sort of way.

What causes money to operate in this certain way is the existence of a market of private properties. Private property creates value by limiting who can control it, producing an opening for a desire of control in other people while a market is a series of rules which produce the types of values that a culture or government intends to produce. Money can be seen as a peculiar rule in this sense; it regulates interactions but only by insisting that they be mediated while not saying by what they should be mediated. In other words, I don’t just give you my turkeys for your chickens but I give you pieces of paper or coins or checks or credit cards for your turkeys which you give back to me for my chickens. Money is so powerful in this sense that even if I went back to just giving you turkeys, the turkeys would become the medium of exchange and in a very real way, “Money”.

This preface is just to point out what it is you’re proposing we get rid of. While there are other ways of regulating markets and organizing societies, it is the underlying logic of the society which causes the problems you’re attempting to address, not some symptom like money itself.

The Expert answers:

.
1) I don’t get the choices for the first question: (27 meters) / (9 seconds) = 3 m/s

2) answer A.

Could the use of renewable resources as a primary energy source happen in your lifetime?

Doubtful. Were still using late 1800’s technology (that is petroleum) to power 99.999% of cars, with essentially the same internal combustion engine. If big business is making big profits then there is almost no way to change the status quo. Theoretically, if the efficiency to generate electricity from some renewable energy sources increases (as expected) then renewable energy can make a significant impact.
.

The Expert answers:

I think a breakthrough in either battery energy density, or battery recharging rates would make the biggest environmental difference in the short term. It’s these two things which make fully electric vehicles undesirable to consumers, which is the only reason they aren’t abundant. So, chemical engineering is a good choice.

Going into politics could also have important short-term effects.

If you want to plan for the long-term, bio-engineering and aerospace are where it’s at. Humanity will eventually control its own evolution, and become a space-faring civilization.