Conservation Tips

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Green Cup Tips

Seven Top Tips
Electricity | Water | Paper | Recycling and Reusing
Cooking, eating and gardening | Shopping | More Tips

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Green Cup is all about developing habits that improve our impact on the environment and reduce our consumption of resources for everyone's benefit. Conserving energy and resources doesn't have to be difficult; the idea is to make changes that become a natural part of daily living. Here's a list of tips to help us achieve this goal. Choose the ones that make sense for you now, and you'll make a great difference!

Disagree with a tip? Email us about it! Part of the purpose of these tips is to generate discussion about what steps really help the environment.

The Top Seven Savers: Simple, But Often Simply Overlooked [top]

• Turn off the lights when you leave a room- the bathroom, a suite, the laundry room... anywhere. Even if you're just passing by. Also think about whether or not you even need to turn on a light where you are, since sometimes there's enough light from a window or nearby lighting.
• Unplug appliances and cell phone chargers.
• Turn off your power bar at night or when you're not around.
• Turn off your computer and printer when you don't need them.
• Make sure the faucet or shower is completely off before you leave the bathroom.
• Use the sleep mode on your computer instead of a screen saver.
• Read first-hand sources on environmental news and issues, read multiple sources, and discuss with others. This way, information and tips will circulate and awareness can spread.

Electricity [top]

Turn off the lights when leaving a room. Think about whether or not you even need to turn on a light while you're there, since sometimes there's enough light from a window or nearby lighting.

It can be easy to forget to turn off a light; if you think it'll help, post reminders.

Unplug appliances and cell phone chargers. Many appliances continue to draw energy even when they're off or not in use.

Another option is to get a power bar and plug your appliances into the bar. When you're not using them, you can just turn off the bar and save energy.

Turn off your power bar at night or when you're not using the equipment plugged into it.

Use the sleep mode on your computer, not a screen saver.

Print using draft quality except when it's absolutely necessary to use normal or higher quality.

With some printers, draft quality is even good for final copies.

Rather than turning on all the lights in your room, try turning on only a few in the areas you need most.

Consider three-way lamps; they make it easier to keep lighting levels low when brighter light is not necessary.

Use some compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs). They use only a fourth of the energy to provide the same level of light and last about four to ten times longer. Halogen lamps, on the other hand, generate excessive heat and can create fire hazards.

Look for the energy star label when purchasing lighting products and other appliances.

Water [top]

Don't dispose of things in the toilet when they can go in the trash.

Take shorter or cooler showers. Consider turning off the water when you don't need it for rinsing.

Don't run partial loads of laundry. Wait until you have a full load, or combine your laundry with a friend's.

A low-flow shower head can use 2 gal/min less than a conventional shower head.

Turn off the water except when you really need it. Don't let it run while you get out soap or put toothpaste on your brush. Easy to forget, but it can save a lot of water.

The amount of water saved by not running the water while brushing your teeth is 5 gallons, the amount an average person in Kenya lives on for a whole day.

Water generally flows out of a faucet at about 5-15 gal/min. Adding an aerator to a faucet can reduce the flow to 3 gal/min!

Turn off the water except when you really need it. Don't let it run while you get out soap or put toothpaste on your brush. Easy to forget, but it can save a lot of water.

For more tips on conserving water, see the cooking, eating, and gardening tips.

Paper [top]

Print on both sides of the paper.

If you have paper that is printed on one side, use the other side for scratch paper.

Start a scratch paper bin in your dorm to make use of used paper.

Reuse sticky notes. How often do you use up an entire sticky note for one reminder?

Tons of money, energy and resources are poured into producing and distributing junk mail. Contact senders and remove yourself from mailing lists and listserves that don't interest you.

Partially used notebooks? See if someone else in the dorm or in class can use them.

Recycling and Reusing [top]

For tips on conserving paper, see the paper tips.

Learn the guidelines for sorting your trash and recycling.

If you're not sure whether an item can be recycled and you don't have the time or opportunity to check, don't recycle it. Non-recyclable items disrupt the recycling process.

If you have a car, recycle your car battery. Call the Department of Public Works to find out the details for your area.

Recycle plastic rings from cans, or at least cut them up before throwing them away.

Use rewritable CDs or flash drives to transfer and save files.

Cooking, eating and gardening [top]

Watch the placement of your fridge; don't put it near a heat source or a south-facing window.

Wash dishes in a basin instead of with running water.

A dishwasher run on a full load uses less water than washing by hand.

Let hot food cool before putting it in the fridge, and let cold food warm up before microwaving or heating them.

Heat only the water you need.

A study found that if everyone in England boiled only what water they needed, the energy saved in a single day could power the country's street lamps throughout the following night!

Don't defrost with a microwave or oven.

Bring a plate, cup and silverware to events like picnics or barbeques where disposable eatingware is often used.

Carry a cup or bottle with you. Stainless steel containers are great, and long-lasting plastic bottles can be worthwhile if you normally would use a lot of recyclable bottles or disposable cups. (Better to recycle a recyclable bottle than throw it away, but the fewer bottles you use, the less energy is required for recycling.)

At meals, put on your plate only what you know you will eat and go back for more later if you want.

When cooking something on the stove, turn off the heat a few minutes early- this way you use the residual heat to finish cooking the food. If you're not sure how much this extra heat will finish cooking the food, try it first on something you're heating up but is already cooked, like canned chili.

Limit the takeout you eat, reducing the amount of disposable cartons, silverware and packaging you consume.

If you have a plant or garden, water it at night since plants lose less water then.

Watch which fish you eat and avoid overfished species like swordfish.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the average swordfish caught was 350 lb. At the end of the century, the average weight was only 90 lb.

The Shedd Aquarium has a great printable card of fish/seafood to eat and to avoid. To check it out, click here. For more information on the issues surrounding fishing practices, here's one reference: http://www.sheddaquarium.org/right_bite_issues.html

If eating free-range eggs and chicken is important to you: American labeling is not yet standardized, so "free-range" may only require that hens have access to the outside; it doesn't specify how much area per hen of living space. Look for "traditional" or "total freedom" free-range.

Shopping [top]

Turn down the plastic/paper bag when you can put your purchase in your backpack/purse or when you can carry it as is.

Use a reusable cloth shopping bag. Some are thin but strong and can fit comfortably in your backpack, your purse, or even your pocket.

Plastic is not biodegradable, so make plastic products last.

Buy products with as little packaging as possible. Besides, packaging often costs extra.

Buy or make biodegradable cleaning products.

When possible, consider avoiding polyester, nylon, and fake fur, which are non-biodegradable, are made from non-renewable petroleum products, and are water- and energy-intensive to make.

More Tips [top]