Residential Solutions

A typical toilet requires 3.5 - 5.5 gallons of water per flush. To cut down on water waste, put an inch or two of sand or pebbles inside each of two plastic bottles to weigh them down. Fill the bottles with water, screw the lids on, and put them in your toilet tank, safely away from the operating mechanisms. Using the Toilet Tummy displacement device can also help lower the amount of water you use for y our toilet. The Toilet Tummy saves 80 ounces of water with each flush!

Use natural rainwater for your yard and garden and significantly lower your water bills. Why let this water go to waste? Collect and reuse to save money and help the environment!

Automatic dishwashers and clothes washers should be fully loaded for optimum water conservation. Most makers of dishwashing soap recommend not pre-rinsing dishes, which means big water savings for you.

Turn off the tap while you brush your teeth and conserve up to five gallons of water per day -- which could add up to 1.5 billion gallons that could be saved across the country each day -- more than enough for all of New York City.

Some of the easiest ways to save energy are the most overlooked. Just by replacing incandescent lights with a compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL.) you can do your part in saving energy. CFL bulbs also last 10,000 hours as opposed to the relatively short life of an incandescent light bulb’s 1,000-hour life. Compact fluorescent light bulbs are a little more expensive than traditional light bulbs, but over time they pay for themselves and continue to save you money. With an incandescent light bulb, only about 10%–15% of the electricity that the bulb consumes results in light—the rest is turned into heat. Turning the lights off will keep a room cooler, an extra benefit in the summer. With a CFL, for most areas of the United States, a general rule-of-thumb for when to turn off a fluorescent light is if you leave a room for more than 15 minutes. The CFL is so energy efficient that if you are leaving the room for a short period of time, it is more cost effective to keep the light on than to turn it off. If every person in the US replaced 5 of their incandescent light bulbs with CFL bulbs, it would save the same amount of green house gases being emitted by 100 million cars!

Purchase energy efficient appliances such as a refrigerator, dishwasher, washer and dryer, and a hot water heater. An older refrigerator costs $50-150 a year to run where as an Energy Star refrigerator cost only $30-60 per year to run because refrigerator efficiency has improved so much in the past 30 years. Don’t forget that a computer, fax machine, TV, VCR, CD player, and a cable box consume energy because of their standby features. A lot of electronics will continue to use energy even when turned off if they are plugged in. Make sure to unplug chargers such as cell phone, IPod, GPS, and battery

This can be accomplished by using dimmers and other lighting controls, and educating family members to turn off unneeded lights.

Lowering wattage, which involves replacing bulbs or entire fixtures with alternatives that provide the same amount or greater amounts of light with but with reduced electricity usage. Today, this can be accomplished most easily by replacing inefficient incandescent bulbs with incandescent/halogen bulbs or compact fluorescent bulbs.

Many appliances use electricity even when they're turned off. It's called a phantom load, or vampire electricity, and as much as 75% of the electricity used by home electronics and small appliances is used while they're turned off! The simple solution is to unplug small appliances and electronics when you aren't using them or plug them into a power strip and turn that off. Energy Star estimates that consumers can save between $60-$100 a year by unplugging appliances!

Turn off all lights and appliances when not in use (fans, humidifiers, A/C). 

In homes across the U.S., the bathroom accounts for 74% of total water usage. Install the AQUS System to capture water from the bathroom sink, then filter and disinfect it to provide reused water for toilet flushing! Reduce metered water usage in a two-person household by 15–20 gals a day – or approx. 6,000 gallons a year!

When you start thinking about how water drips constantly for days, you will be surprised at how much is actually being wasted. A single faucet dripping 30 drops per minute wastes 3 gallons a day, which is the equivalent of about 27 baths a year. To see how much water is actually being wasted in your home, check out the United States Geological Survey’s (USGS) Drip Accumulator Calculator. http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/sc4.html

Check Department of Energy Wind Resource Maps at: http://www.windpoweringamerica.gov/wind_maps.asp

Tax credits are available for small wind generators at 30% of the cost, with no upper limit through 2016 for existing homes and new residential construction.

Check the back of the paint can for levels of volatile organic chemicals "VOCs". An ideal paint has fewer than 150 grams per liter. These are often labeled low-VOC or no-VOC.

For homes built before 1978, test painted surfaces for lead before sanding. If lead is found, contact a professional for remediation.

Common hardwood floors come from trees that take 50 years or more to reach maturity, where as bamboo replenishes every four to six years.

Cork contains a naturally occurring substance called suberin that repels insects, mites and mold. This makes cork floors a great product for people with allergies as it is hypoallergenic. The suberin in cork also makes it naturally fire resistant and also protects it from rotting when wet.

Many utility companies offer energy that is produced by renewable resources, which can be purchased as a percent of total energy used or in blocks of kilowatts. Buying green energy supports the development and use of renewable resources while helping reduce global warming!

About 47% of the average household's annual energy bills stem from heating and cooling. Every degree you raise your thermostat in the summer will reduce air conditioning bills by about 2%. Lowering the temperature by one degree in winter will save you 3% on heating bills. A programmable thermostat starts about $30 and produces an annual savings of about $100.

You can save 300 lbs of CO2 just by changing 3 frequently used incandescent bulbs with CFL’s. On average, CFL's use 60% less energy than a regular bulb and last five times longer!

Bring the beauty of pure, natural daylight into your entire home with day light harvesting systems.

Cook food as quickly as possible! Meaning, after you get your local ingredients, pick the recipe that takes 15 minutes instead of the recipe that takes 45. Less energy required and more time to do other things. A win for you and a win for the environment!

Don't even bother if you are broiling, roasting or baking a dish that will cook for an hour or more and when roasting meats or baking casseroles, turn off the oven 10-15 minutes before cooking time runs out and your food will continue to cook without using the extra electricity. By reducing the time your oven is on by one hour per year, you'll save an average of 2 kWh of energy!

Energy audits evaluate your home and look for ways to improve energy efficiency. You can hire a professional, or in some areas your gas or electric utility will do the audit for you. Inspectors often use thermography and other technologies to evaluate hidden leaks and insulation problems.

Frozen food uses 10x more energy to produce and has less nutrition than fresh food, since they are usually loaded with preservatives. Choose organic and always eat fresh fruits and veggies!

Chewing gum is the second largest littered item in the world and is not biodegradable and will stick to several surfaces for many years. Dispose of your gum in a responsible manner!

Trees are not only good for the environment but they can block winds, provide shade from the sun, and act as a sound barrier for your home!

There’s nothing like relaxing in a hammock with a good book, a cold drink and a warm breeze to kick-off summer.

Whether it’s Frisbee, badminton or a game of touch football, a little friendly competition is a great way to pass the afternoon.

Invite your friends and family over for an evening barbeque. Enjoy some quality time with people you love during the last few daylight hours.

The sun is one part of the triangle that enables plants to grow. Tend to your garden, or start one for fall produce.

Plug electronic equipment into power strips, and turn off power strips at the end of the day! You don't have to mess with tangled cords, and can be ready to go with the flip of a switch.

Print only the text you need and print double-sided! Many times, the back page of a sheet of paper remains blank. Sometimes, places that charge for printing will charge less for double-sided prints as well. Save paper and money!

Several big name office equipment companies offer recycling programs for products such as printers, scanners, fax machines, ink & toner cartridges, and even cell phones! Even large stores like Radio Shack, Target, and Walmart are starting to offer buy-backs on old electronics for store credit.

Place recycle collection containers in several areas making sure they are adjacent to trash cans. Many times, people will throw their waste in the nearest place that will accept it, and that usually happens to be a trash can. With recycling bins nearby, they are more likely to drop their cans and bottles in the recycling bins separate from the trash.

Purchase paper products with a certified recycled content, and high proportion of postconsumer content. Avoid chlorine-bleached paper wherever possible. Recycled paper tends to be cheaper and easier to make, plus you save some trees along the way!

Purchase rechargeable batteries and save money. You will get several uses out of the batteries without having to buy new ones. Recharging instead of replacing keeps the battery acid out of landfills too!

Share, repair, and reuse items whenever possible to reduce purchasing if economical. Consider the cost of shipping the products too. Farther products mean higher shipping and higher pollution for transport.

Look for options such as buses or trains instead of driving to and from the airport. These options are more efficient because they move more people per mile per gallon than just driving the family car!

If using a personal vehicle, make sure that the engine is tuned up, the amount and condition of oil is acceptable, and the tires are properly inflated. Simple preventative maintenance on a vehicle keeps it running more smoothly and efficiently!

Reduce the load on your air conditioner with window film applied to windows that receive direct sunlight! Designed to reduce up to 76% of solar heat and block up to 99% of the ultraviolet rays.

An easy way to save money around the house is to seal off drafts, which can reduce your energy bill 5-30%, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Check for window drafts by carefully holding an incense stick up to each frame and watch the smoke to see if there is a leak. (Be sure to remove all curtains first to avoid a fire). Then use caulking or weather-stripping to seal the cracks.

BYOB (Bring your own bag!) Re-usable grocery bags greatly reduce the amount of plastic bags going into landfills, and are easily available in most stores. Some stores in other countries charge for plastic bags now. Use them for all your shopping needs!

Billions of disposable cups are thrown out every year in the United States. Buy a reusable coffee mug and take it with you on your morning coffee break! Or buy a reusable water bottle for your water cooler talks!

Reduce the amount we consume, Reuse waste materials by finding a new constructive use for it, and then toss it in the blue bin to Recycle rather than throwing it in the trash!

Some people believe that bags made of trees (e.g. paper bags) are less harmful to the earth than bags made of chemicals (e.g. plastic bags). The fact is, making both types of bags creates a lot of pollution, and both paper and plastic bags use a lot of resources. The best solution is not to use any bags at all or to use a mesh bag that can be used over and over. If you must use a paper or plastic bag, don't throw it away! Try to re-use the bag as many times as you can.

You can get refurbs for a steal, often for less than 50% of the retail price! Before they're resold to the public, they go through an intense defect-testing process and the warranties usually remain intact, so you can save money and help reduce the amount of waste sent to landfills!

During the holiday season or birthdays, cut down on waste & save resources by wrapping gifts with recycled paper or creative alternatives like old posters and magazine/newspaper pages. If every US family wrapped just three presents in reused materials, it would save enough paper to cover 45,000 football fields!

More than 15 billion batteries are thrown away each year, which stacked end to end could stretch to and from the moon! And the number of batteries disposed continues to grow, as consumers are utilizing more electronic devices. Save money and resources by using rechargeable batteries, many of which can be reused up to 1,000 times!

Adding more gas after the nozzle has automatically shut off leaves no room for the gasoline to expand, immediately burning wasted fuel and contributing to the air pollution problem. Topping off your gas tank is bad for the environment and your wallet!

If you have a diesel car or truck, look for a fueling station that offers a biodiesel blend and drive greener! There are currently more than 1,000 such stations across the country and more popping up every day. Diesel engines are up to 40% more fuel-efficient than gasoline ones, and biodiesel emits 78% less CO2 than petroleum diesel, as well as less carbon monoxide.

A misaligned tire will use around two per cent more fuel and cause premature tire wear. The worn tires aren't easily disposed of either.

Cut down on pollution and energy by choosing ground transportation for your deliveries! Whenever possible, go with ground transportation instead of rush air delivery for your mailing needs. On average, ground shipping is more than six times more energy efficient than air. Plan ahead so overnight or next day air shipping doesn’t become a necessity. This will also help save on additional rush delivery costs and burn less fossil fuel per shipment!

Wherever you use water, there's a low-flow device to fit your hose nozzles, to showerheads, to faucet aerators. Low-flow nozzles save about 5 gallons a min for a standard garden hose, and a low-flow showerhead uses as little as 2.5 gallons of water or less each min and would save 25 gallons of water per 10-minute shower.

Say hello to water independence with the Ecoloblue Atmospheric Water Generator! Just plug it in and this revolutionary machine begins making fresh water...up to 7 gallons in 24 hrs! No water source required; it produces purified water through natural humidity in the air. Start saving money today!

Inserting a bucket to collect water while waiting for your
shower to warm up is perfect for watering plants or mopping
floors, after the shower is over of course!

Try turning down your water heater a few degrees
and still have plenty of hot water for everyone’s daily shower, dishes, and laundry! Lowering the temperature from
140 to 120 degrees could reduce your water heating
costs by 6-10%, and it’s better for our environment!

December and January are the most dangerous months for electrical fires.
- Routinely check your electrical appliances and wiring.
- Replace all worn, old or damaged appliance cords immediately.
-Use electrical extension cords wisely; never overload extension cords or wall sockets.
- Replace any electrical tool if it causes even small electrical shocks, overheats, shorts out, or gives off smoke or sparks.

The U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) cites christmas trees, holiday lights and lit candles as some of the top causes of holiday fires.
- Never overload extension cords or wall sockets. Avoid connecting an excessive amount of holiday lighting and decorations to a single circuit whenever possible.
- Inspect your old and new lights before putting them up. Throw the lights away if you find frayed wires, insulation gaps, broken or cracked sockets or excessive kinking.
- Install tamper-resistant receptacles to "child-proof" electrical outlets.

Find out what's new and different, and learn about our exceptional line of safe, reliable, quality products designed to meet these code changes.
- Need to know if a Tamper-Resistant Receptacle is required?
- What types of receptacles are required in accessory buildings?
The handbook can offer helpful tips, so you can specify products with confidence. Download the NEC Code Changes Handbook to learn more.