There are many ways that you can lead a more sustainable and eco friendly life. I am sure that you have been told a million times that you should turn off the lights when you leave the room, shut off the faucet when you brush your teeth, and recycle. These are all of the things that appeared on commercials when we were young and they are the ones that were drilled into our heads in school. All of these things are small things that can make a huge difference over a large amount of time but for those who want to go a little farther, there are several things that you can change.
1. Take shorter showers, less often. This idea follows the same train of thought as turning off the water when brushing your teeth but on a bigger level. In an average shower head, 2.5 gallons of water is used for every minute. I know many people who regularly take 20 minute showers. They do this nearly every day without fail and this means that they use as much as 50 gallons of water per day on just showering. By decreasing the amount of time and how often you shower, you can decrease the amount of water that you use drastically. This causes much less unnecessary water waste. This can also help reduce your water bill and save more money.
Image of shower from Wix.
2. Change your laundry practices. Laundry machines use a lot of energy to run. One person can significantly change the amount of energy that they use doing laundry by changing the temperature of the water they use to wash their clothes and by air drying them. An average washing machine uses anywhere from 400 to 1300 watts per use. Much of that energy is used in order to heat the water that you are using to wash your clothes. By changing the settings on your washing machine, you can reduce this amount of energy. Air drying clothes causes an even more significant change in the amount of energy that you are using regularly. A dryer uses anywhere from 2,000 to 6,000 watts per use. By removing this, you can cut down on energy usage and expenses dramatically. The amount of energy that you use matters because by reducing the amount of energy you use, you reduce the amount of fossil fuels that are burned. This is the energy that most people use and the more people that reduce this use can help with the ever present threat of climate change. By doing these two things, it also allows you to keep your clothes in better shape for longer which cuts down on the amount of textile waste that is created and reduces the amount of fast fashion clothes that are bought. This can also save a lot of money on the energy bills of a household.
These few practices may not seem like much but they can create worlds’ worth of differences in the way that they save energy, water, and time. It can save thousands upon thousands maybe even millions of watts of energy in a lifetime. It can save thousands of gallons of water too. This benefits more than just the world and the environment, it also benefits the individual who institutes them by saving them money.