Greening Up Your Graduation



Dreamstime Stock Photos / Graduation Robe © Uciekinier  ID: 5257063

Congratulations graduates! Graduation is here and so are the graduation celebrations. There are many things you, your family and friends can do to green up your festivities!

 

Whether you are graduating from high school or college, jobs are probably one of the things you’re thinking about. Did you know that your bottle really means jobs? Recently, the Carolina Plastics Recycling Council created the Your Bottle Means Jobs campaign which was launched in the Carolinas. The goal is to capture more of the 3 billion plastic bottles thrown in the trash each year. By recycling only two more bottles a week you’ll help create jobs, grow the economy, support local businesses, reduce energy and other natural resources, and save valuable landfill space right here in your own backyard.

Chances are you might be wearing some of the fruits of your recycling efforts to your graduation. North Carolina based company Unifi Incorporated, creator of REPREVE ® recycled fiber, in partnership with Oak HallCap & Gown have created green graduation gowns. Each Oak Hall GreenWeaver® and NuHorizon® gown is made from about 27 post-consumer plastic bottles. As of today, over 87.7 million plastic bottles were recycled and made into new, recyclable graduation gowns. Now that’s getting off to a green start for your next journey!

Don’t stop there! Greening up your graduation festivities starts with the invitations and announcements. Consider emailing...not only will it save you on postage, it will save money from ordering the paper invitations as well. Do you still want to go the paper route? That’s ok! Be sure to ask everyone to recycle the announcements and invitations when they no longer need them.

Dreamstime Stock Photos | Wild Flowers Including Daisies And Corn Flowers

ID: 82988084 | © creativecommonsstockphotos

Decorating can be beautiful and environmentally friendly. Instead of buying new decorations, ask family or friends if they have any you could reuse. If they don’t, try incorporating nature into your decorations with greenery, flowers, shells or other natural materials.

Dreamstime Stock Photos Free Picture | Fruit Market

ID: 4369081 | © Michael Zysman 

A little preparation can go a long way! When you are planning the meal, first get a list together. Then try incorporating local foods into the menu. Local farmer’s markets are a great source of local food. Once the meal is over, don’t throw away those leftovers, reinvent them into other meals or compost them.

Dreamstime Stock Photos | Festive Table Setting

ID: 84940824 | © creativecommonsstockphotos 

Take steps to reduce the waste from your celebration. At your party, consider reusable dining ware and cloth napkins and table cloths. Can’t get away from using disposable items? Use one-time use items made from biodegradable or compostable materials where possible. Recycle all other materials such as plastic, aluminum, paper, and if possible try to avoid using Styrofoam.

Whew! Now that the festivities are over it’s time to clean it all up. Clean post-graduation messes with environmentally friendly cleaning products. Carefully pack away any decorations and excess supplies that may be used again.

 

As always, Reduce-Reuse-Recycle as much as possible. Now got get ‘em graduates: the world is your [recyclable] oyster! 

Dreamstime Stock Photos | Graduates Throwing Graduation Caps

ID: 84994878 | © creativecommonsstockphotos 

 

My Trip to Australia, Part 4: Energy Conservation

Kristen Aubut

During our three-week trip to Australia, I observed that energy conservation seemed to be a top priority for most Australians. Clothes lines could be spotted behind almost every house, whether in the country or in the city. During our stay, we hung our laundry on the huge clothes line in the back, as you can see in the pictures below. Air drying prevents fossil fuels from being burned to make electricity, it prevents all that heat from being produced by the clothes dryer, it slows the wear and tear of clothes and it gives you a reason to go outside and enjoy the fresh air!

My husband’s grandmother gets annoyed when the bower birds steal the blue clothes pins right off her line and drop them in the woods behind her house. When she goes out walking, she collects the pins and brings them back to the line. She is not sure why they only go after the blue ones.


























































Every electrical outlet I came across, whether in the old farmhouse, in the new construction home of my husband’s aunt, or the hotel in Sydney, was fashioned with power switches. If the outlet is not being used, you flip the switch to off to save energy.


















With the global population increasing at such a fast rate, we all need to be wiser with our energy consumption. Unplugging appliances that are not in use and using clothes lines more and electric dryers less are good ways to conserve energy.

Follow these NC Project Green tips to save money and natural resources at work

Simple Ways to Save Money and Natural Resources at Work

With the current budget reductions, state and local government agencies are looking for cost savings. Here are some ways to save money and reduce the consumption of energy and natural resources:

• Replace older inefficient exit signs with LED exit signs. LED exit signs typically cost between $20 and $40 to purchase and install, but can save up to $37 a year in energy costs and $26 a year in labor costs; payback for the initial investment usually occurs in the first or second year of installation. Once the initial investment is recovered, the energy savings may grow to $500 over the life of each LED exit sign. In a building with 10 exit signs, that’s an estimated energy cost avoidance of about $5,000.

• Travel less to meetings. Use conference calls or webinars. By meeting on a conference call instead of driving to a meeting 100 miles away, you could save $50 (at 25 cents per mile) in fuel costs and three hours of travel time equating into $75 (at $25 per hour) in staff productivity costs. This results in a cost avoidance of approximately $125.

• Slow down. Aggressive driving (such as speeding and abrupt starts and stops) wastes gas and is dangerous. Getting 30 mpg instead of 25 mpg saves an average of $445 per year in fuel costs.

• Don’t idle. Idling one car can waste $60 - $750 (depending on fuel prices, idling habits and vehicle type) per year in fuel. Generally, it is more efficient to turn off most warmed-up vehicles than to idle for more than 30 seconds.

• Save paper. At the state contract cost, each ream of recycled content copy paper costs about $3. If your office saves three reams every week, that produces a yearly savings of $470. Here are simple ways to reduce paper usage: Set the printer to print and copy on both sides of the page (duplex). This could reduce paper costs by close to half. Print memos, drafts and informal hard copies of documents on clean paper that has already been used on one side. Go electronic instead of printing. Use email, phone and overhead projectors and convert paper forms into an electronic format.
  

• Turn off computers, monitors, printers and other office equipment on weekends and holidays. If 40 people in an office turn off their computers and monitors over the weekend for a year, it will save about $2,300 in energy costs.

Use this formula to estimate energy use and cost:

• (Wattage × Hours Used Per Day × Days Per Year) ÷ 1000 = Annual Kilowatt-hour (kwh) Consumption

• Kilowatt-hour (kwh) consumption × Electric rate = Energy Cost

*Average electric rate in NC is $.0860/kwh

North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources
Division of Environmental Assistance and Outreach
1639 Mail Service Center | Raleigh, NC 27699-1639 | (877) 623-6748
June 2011

Source: NC Project Green
http://ncprojectgreen.com/Documents/SimpleWaystoSave.pdf