A Better Way to Live Life

Living life to its fullest is the greatest thing people can do. Like living every day like it is the last or going out and doing the best to help protect the environment. Helping to protect the environment is a great feeling. Knowing that the work that is being done will help out future generations is such a great feeling. There are many ways to help out the environment. Some of the big ones are recycling, changing the household products and how they are used, and getting out and help take care of the community.

Recycling is a great way to get out there and help the environment. Some items that can be recycled are toner cartridges, aluminum cans, newspapers, plastic soda bottles, milk jugs, steel containers, organic materials and glass. Stopping junk mail cuts down on the amount of paper needing to be recycled. If people saved all the unwanted junk mail for one year, they would have enough paper for one and a half trees! Rechargeable batteries are the way to go. Batteries have become a major reason for contamination in landfills. The materials in batteries either break apart and go into the soil, or the materials are released into the air.

Buying a cloth bag to use when grocery shopping, or if it is a small purchase, just not getting a bag, helps cut down on the millions of plastic bags thrown in to the trash to break down and release harmful materials in the soil. The ink on the plastic bags is very harmful to the environment if left to decompose in the ground. Use cloth diapers instead of wasting hundreds of dollars on diapers from the stores. Diapers alone can take up to five hundred years to decompose. The diapers that decompose can seep into our groundwater. When using cloth diapers though, diaper covers are needed so the moisture can be held in. Recycle printer cartridges. Americans throw out enough cartridges to stretch from Los Angeles to New York City and back again. To recycle these, just find a local business that will take them or contact the manufacturers and ask where they can be recycled. Besides recycling, buy items that are recycled. Reuse whatever is possible to reuse. Make recycling easy by putting bins to throw recyclables in wherever those products are used. Keep used paper in a stack and use the back side for scrap work. Reduce, reuse, and recycle!

More ways to help the environment is to change the household products and how they are used. Change the kitchen habits. Use reusable containers to wrap up left over food. Use rags to wipe up spills instead of paper towels. Check the water heater. It uses about twenty percent of the energy in the house. To save energy and money, turn the temperature to 130 degrees. Refrigerators use up about seven percent of the nation’s electricity. To have a refrigerator run more efficiently, have the condenser coils cleaned annually; and by raising the temperature up ten degrees, it saves twenty-five percent of the energy used. Installing toilet dams can save up to one gallon per flush. To save with showers, replace the shower head with an aerated or nonaerated shower head to cut the water output by fifty percent. Fluorescent light bulbs are more efficient than incandescent light bulbs. They last longer and use less energy. They also stop 1,000 ponds of carbon dioxide from going into the atmosphere. Unfortunately, they cost more, but they last longer.

Watch the paint that is being used. Latex is better than oil-based paint. Oil-based paint is more toxic and produces more nasty pollutants. Dispose of paint as a hazardous material or with latex paint, it can be set outside to evaporate for one year. Then it can be disposed of with the regular trash. Clean paint brushes in the sink because if they are cleaned outside, they can contaminate the ground water. Excess paint can also be donated to local schools or someone who needs it instead of being thrown away.
Now that recycling and helping inside the home is covered, there is one last thing: the outside world and everything in it. Maybe that is a bit big for a little goal and getting started, so just the community is a great start. Like going and cleaning up a local beach, park, or somewhere where there is a lot of trash. A beach is a great place because oceans supply the earth with most of the oxygen and moisture that is needed. Keeping the beaches clean helps keep the oceans clean, which help the environment stay clean.
Everyone loves balloons, especially little kids. Balloons though, are not that good for the environment. Balloons are the cause of deaths for countless numbers of sea turtles and whales. Balloons that are released and end up deflating land in the oceans and the sea turtles and whales end up eating them which causes them to starve, or they suffocate on them. Metallic balloons can also cause power outages when caught in power lines, and that is not good.

So there are many ways to get out there and contribute to helping get the environment back on the right track. Starting big is not always the way to go, so start within the home. Get kids, relatives, and neighbors in on it. They will then get their own kids, relatives, and neighbors in on it. It will spread, and those who truly care will be able to make a change. It will be small changes at first, but eventually, those small changes will turn into huge changes that will help out future generations to come. Helping the community, helping within the home, and recycling are the best ways to help. Remember, reduce, reuse, and recycle.