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Incandescents are also hard on the eyes

Well…. it shouldn’t take accidently smashing an incandescent light bulb in your eyes to make you wonder what we’re doing with this whole light bulb “situation”.  But that’s what happened.  I guess it’s not really a situation but that’s the best I could do.  So, I picked shards of glass from my eyes and hair went inside and asked my wife what we were doing with all these light bulbs in our house.  Turns out our plan isn’t that difficult.

• 1) Go to hardware store and buy Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs (CFL’s).
• 2) When old bulb burns out, replace with CFL’s
• 3) Hopefully you will do what I am trying to do and recycle old bulbs.

Cool stats about CFL’s

- CFL’s have a much longer lifecycle than the incandescent.

-  If every American home replaced just one light bulb with an ENERGY STAR qualified bulb, we would save enough energy to light more than 3 million homes for a year, more than $600 million in annual energy costs, and prevent greenhouse gases equivalent to the emissions of more than 800,000 cars.

- Save about $30 or more in electricity costs over each bulb’s lifetime.

- Produce about 75 percent less heat, so they’re safer to operate and can cut energy costs associated with home cooling.

This info was taken from http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=cfls.pr_cfls  so check it out.

Bad news is that incandescent bulbs end up in landfills.  What am I going to try and do to recycle them?  I can always use more salt and pepper shakers, little flower vases, maybe some artwork.  I’ll be posting the pics of my creations when the bulbs start burning.

If you were wondering, i flushed out my eyes and I’m fine.

- Jo e k

My House is an energy black hole

I guess that seems a little harsh considering this really is my wife and I’s first family home.  But after being here for a year we have both realized the house was built for comfort and attractiveness.  It’s a large single home with three bedrooms, 2.5 baths and an open concept kitchen family room.  The ceiling in these rooms varies from about 12 feet up to about 17 feet.  The living dining rooms have 9 foot ceilings as do the rest of the house except the master bedroom with peaks at 13-14 feet.

Now, why is any of this important?  It’s not like I’m selling the thing.  We love our home.  THIS HOME SUCKS UP ENERGY and is nowhere close to being green.  We are so on the grid that we should probably get more of it. WE NEED MORE GRIDS!

Ok, maybe not, but winter is coming and I need to take action. What am I going to do immediately (in the next 5 days) to lower the tax we are putting on the environment and my wife’s wallet?:

• 1) Program the thermostat properly and change it by at least a degree. Cool daytimes and nighttimes.
• 2) Improve the air tightness of the home. Re-caulk all the windows and put the plastic window wrap to reduce air flow. Make sure all outside doors fit tight and if not go to your local hardware store and get a repair kit.
• 3) Changing old light bulbs to Energy Star Compact Florescent Lamps (CFL’s)

I think this a good start to prepare the home for winter.  And some of these even allow you to get grants from the Canadian government.  Check out http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/energystar/english/consumers/products.cfm?PrintView=N&Text=N  to see what you can do to qualify.

 And I know there is more to do, and it’s exciting.  If feels good to know that we are making a small improvement to our world as well as our wallets.

Do you have any winter heat saving tips?  Drop us a line!!

- Jo e k

 

What did you do?…additup!

Be Greeny not Greedy

So, I’ve been curious about how and what I could invest in that would be considered “green” investing without compromising the ideals of investing: Making an adequate rate of return. After all we all have mouths to feed, some more than others. Also, based on what’s going on right now in the world, especially the financial health of people, gave me more incentive to start looking at where I see opportunities in the future based on current trends…one of the largest movements in the world is the move to become more “green”…I gotta stop using quotations when I refer to “green” (there I go again) - like I’m saying it’s not a real word…oh, it’s real! And it’s insane what kinds of investments are available today for the average person to take advantage of – THIS IS WHERE YOU GET GREENY…

So, the first step I took is finding out what being green (yippee!) means as it relates to investments? Well, I came up with the following criteria:

• Environmentally friendly – either by what or how they make their products
• Is the product renewable or sustainable
• Fair labour laws and equal rights

This lead me to the term Social Responsible Investing. Here is a good excerpt from Wiki to explain:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socially_responsible_investing

From my research I found that there are a plethora (ya, that’s right, I said it, plethora) of investments that are considered socially responsible and green – most cover all my mandates as well as having a pretty decent rate of return.

So, the moral of the story is that you should start getting Greeny with your money, not greedy. Do your research, ask your investment dude or dudette, and get a little more involved.

- Boompa

Shoprimising! Car shopping isn’t fun

Let me tell ya…recently buying a vehicle was not an easy relaxing endeavour. I had all these requirements to be safe, financially economical for me and my family, practical, and have some style while at the same time be as fuel efficient as possible.

I quickly realised that there is no such vehicle! Doesn’t exist, I don’t care what all those commercial’s say, they are lying…not to be a pessimist…screw it, I earned it! Anyways I ended up buying a Jeep Patriot, the gas mileage is excellent, price is fair, safe as you can get really, reliable, as for styling it doesn’t make me feel like puking.

If anyone is looking to use a site that will let you compare makes and models’ fuel efficiency (even used cars) go to: http://www.oee.nrcan.gc.ca/transportation/tools/fuel-consumption-guide/fuel-consumption-guide.cfm?attr=8 …it’s Canada’s fuel consumption guide, they even have a down-loadable pdf guide.

That being said, I am still a little sore from the experience…

Here is the Mastercard (TM) commercial I came up with after this experience:

One Car……….$18000

Taxes…….. $2340

Insurance…..$1000

Getting screwed three times in one day…PRICELESS!

Happy shopping and remember that as painful as it is to buy a car sometimes, there is something to be said about setting some standards to help you make the decision – I chose a vehicle that married economics, safety and fuel efficiency.

“Shoprimising”: its the new thing, and you heard it here first!

- Boompa