When most people hear the words “green living” they think it means driving a hybrid car, installing solar panels on their roof, or building a backyard wind farm to power their home. While those are all noble efforts, they’re also pretty expensive. But living a green lifestyle doesn’t mean you have to drop tens of thousands of dollars. It’s more about making simple choices and subtle changes to your lifestyle that help reduce your impact on the environment.
Take your workplace for example. Whether you work in a cubicle, a garage, a restaurant, a dentist’s office, or wherever…I guarantee you can find ways to reduce waste and conserve energy. Let’s brainstorm a few ideas together shall we:
Starting a carpool with coworkers will keep a couple of cars off the road. You’ll be saving money on gas while reducing nasty emissions that clog up the atmosphere. Working from home a few days a week will have the same effect.
Use recycled or refillable ink cartridges in copy machines and printers.
Set up a recycling area and encourage employees to separate glass, plastics, and paper for recycling.
Send correspondence through email instead of a letter whenever possible.
Stop printing every email you get! Most of it just ends up in the trash anyway so print only what you need.
Don’t just toss out your used printer paper. Save it and use it for scrap and writing notes or shred it and use for packing material.
Switch to energy efficient light bulbs. They cost more upfront but last longer and use only a fraction of the energy that traditional bulbs use.
Encourage employees to shut down or use power-saving modes on their computers each night.
Most of us drink coffee at work and all those paper and styrofoam cups are clogging up our landfills. Ditch them for good and use a coffee mug instead.
If you’re an employer or office manager you can begin implementing these ideas right away. If not, you’ll have to go to your boss and make some suggestions. Emphasize the financial savings the company stands to gain and they’ll be more willing to hear you out.
These simple green living tips may not seem significant by themselves but if you add them all up they can have a huge impact on our environment as well as the company’s bottom line.
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Great info. Green living is practiced only in homes. But it should be promoted in workplaces to for a great impact to our environment. Wonderful information! Work is a very important place to make sure things are green.
Thanks for sharing the post..