Eco-Friendly Products

The green movement keeps getting bigger.  Right when you think you've got things under control with your organic foods and reusable bags something else pops up:  Biodynamic Farming.

Dr. Rudolf Steiner is given credit for being the originator of biodynamic farming principles in the 1920s.  Biodynmaic farming is similar to organic farming in that it uses not harmful chemicals.  What differentiates the two is that biodynamic farmers view the whole farm as a living organism.

To better understand biodynamic farming, consider the natural order that our planet operates under.  Forests can regenerate themselves.  Animals and plants co-exist in a way where they benefit each other – animal waste and decomposing bodies serve as fertilizers to some plants that serve as sources of food for other animals, and so on.  Plants that are native to an area grow there, but not in other places, and adapt to the environment to increase their chances of survival.

Biodynamic farmers attempt to mimic this natural order.  Biodynamic farmers never take more out of a farm than they put in and attempt to maintain a natural level of balance within the farm.  This results in a carbon footprint that is almost non-existant.

The next time you're at the store, see if you can find some biodynamically farmed products, stuff them in your reusable grocery bag, and give them a try.

Our landfills are inefficient. The majority of our waste that gets sent to them, despite it's natural ability to biodegrade, is not biodegrading. There are a number of factors that contribute to this, but the bottom line is that these factors aren't going to change and our landfills are getting more and more full on a daily basis.

Landfills emit methane gas into the atmosphere, which can contribute to global warming. The only solution is to be more aware of what we send (or don't send) to landfills. The EPA estimates that nearly 25% of the waste we send to landfills can be composted at home, creating a great natural fertilizer that can be used to make plants healthier instead of helping to kill them by emitting methane in landfills.

Composting is one of the things that we can all do, such as recycling and using reusable shopping bags, to help improve the health of our planet. Used on a large scale, compost can help to yield more crops, restore contaminated soil, help reforestation, and decrease our need for chemical fertilizers – all steps in the right direction.

If you don't have a yard or don't do any indoor or outdoor gardening, your compost can still be used. Many local governments will collect it through their yard waste programs or you can advertise on local bulletin boards and find a local gardener or club that will happily accept it.

Collecting compost is simple. With the exception of meat, oils, and dairy products, most food scraps can be composted. Hair, clean paper, coffee grounds, wood chips, fireplace ashes, and pine needles are examples of the numerous other items that can also be tossed in your compost. Composting really is as simple as tossing all these materials in either an open outdoor bin or a covered indoor one. Turning the pile over every week will yeild a mature compost pile in a couple of months that can be identified by it's crumbly, dark, earth-smelling properties.

Once mature, it can be used as fertilizer without any modifications. A quick search online will give you plenty of sites with information about getting started on your own. It's simple – probably about as easy as recycling – and much easier than remembering your reusable bags for every shopping trip.

But the benefits are great – less landfill waste, less methane gas in our atmosphere, more natural fertilizer, and an overall healthier planet. The cost? Nothing really. You're going to throw those items away anyway – what's the difference in throwing them in a compost pile versus the garbage can?

A number of people mistakenly believe that making some "green" choices in their lives will involve a drastic change in their lifestyle. Fortunately, they are wrong. Going green simply involves making different choices. We all have a lot going on in our lives and can't afford to do things that take a lit of extra time and work. Going green doesn't have to. Here are a few quick and easy things you can do to start living a little greener without making big changes to your lifestyle.

First, start using reusable shopping bags in place of paper or plastic. Reusable bags are relatively inexpensive but are durable enough to last for years. As soon as you get in the habit of using reusable bags, you'll wonder what took you so long. Beyond their environmental benefits, most people simply find reusable bags much easier to use. They're bigger and easier to carry, resulting in fewer trips to the car to bring in groceries. Paper and plastic bags release toxins into the world throughout their lifetime and recycling them is often so expensive that it isn't done.

Second, buy some CFLs (compact florescent lights) to use when your current incandescent light bulbs burn out. Simply put, they save energy which results in less energy costs for you as well as reduced pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. And the best part is that it's just as easy to flip a light switch with a CFL in the socket as it is with an incandescent bulb.

Switching to CFLs can save energy and the environment

Finally, start buying locally grown organic foods. We all know what it feels like to run out of produce mid-week because it won't stay fresh long enough. Beyond the environmental benefits, one of the best things about locally grown produce is that it will stay fresh longer because it's spent less time traveling from the farm to your house.

So there you have it. Three easy things we can all do to have a positive environmental impact. None of these things involves any more time or effort than we're already using, they simply involve making different decisions. Choose a reusable grocery bag instead of a plastic one, a CFL instead of an incandescent bulb, and locally grown food instead. Next time you're in a position to make an eco-friendly choice, go for it with the understanding that it really isn't an inconvenience.