It’s the year 2020 and being ecofriendly is cool. There’s no doubt about that. Everyone is looking for ways that they can live a greener life and, like most things, going green starts at home.
From installing velux skylights to creating your very own compost heap—there are a number of ways you can make your home more ecofriendly. Are you ready to hop aboard the green train? Then keep reading.
1. Swap Out Your Old Bulbs with LEDs
If you knew how much energy your light bulbs really use and how much of an impact they have on the environment, we guarantee you’d start living in the dark. LED bulbs use approximately 75% less energy than traditional halogen and incandescent bulbs.
In addition to this, LEDs last 5 to 10 times longer than these bulbs, meaning your lightbulb replacement chores won’t contribute to the landfill issues that the world is experiencing.
The budget-conscious will appreciate this next point. For every 10 halogen bulbs that are replaced with LEDs, the average Australian household can expect to save $650 on their electricity bill for as many years.
Can you believe that an act as small as changing your lightbulbs can have such a huge impact on your environmental footprint?
2. Create Your Own Compost Heap
Did you know that food scraps and waste from gardens accounts for over 28% of refuse? So instead of chucking your scraps and leftovers into the bin, & contributing to a much larger problem, consider putting them to good use by creating your own compost heap.
Creating a compost heap is a quick and easy project that has far-reaching environmental benefits. Here’s a simple overview of creating your very own compost heap:
- Grab a bin with a lid. Stainless steel and plastic bins are the best options as they tend to absorb smells better than bins made from other materials.
- Place biodegradable bags inside the bin. Using plastic bags from your grocer may be tempting, but it hurts your overall ecofriendly endeavour.
- Start composting! Be sure to add both brown and green materials to your bin to ensure your compost is as healthy as can be. Brown materials are dry materials such as twigs, branches, dead leaves and old newspapers. Green materials are moist materials such as vegetable waste, coffee grounds (and even filters!), fruit scraps and grass clippings.
- Use your compost to enrich your garden! If you don’t have a garden, chat to your local municipality about drop-off sites or collection services.
3. Switch to Natural Cleaning Products
Unfortunately, common household cleaning products are typical full of chemicals that cause environment damage. As if what’s in them isn’t bad enough on its own, what they’re packaged in is equally harmful. The packaging of many household cleaning products is non-biodegradable and unrecyclable.
So why not skip using harmful chemicals to achieve a sparkling toilet and opt instead to use natural cleaning products?
You can buy organic cleaning products, but you can just as easily make your own natural cleaners using common household ingredients including the following:
- Baking soda
- Lemon juice
- White vinegar
- Borax
- Salt
4. Install Skylights
Many people choose to install velux skylights because of the aesthetic appeal and abundance of natural light that come hand in hand with them. And that’s all true.
But they are also phenomenal tools for increasing your home’s ecofriendly status.
Skylights are the energy-warrior’s trump card. They reduce the reliance on artificial lighting and act as a passive heating system, lowering your electricity & heating bills, while flooding your home with natural light. On top of all this, they act as a filtration system to protect you from the harmful effects of UV rays.
Who knew that an architecturally attractive home addition also has such impressive carbon footprint reduction properties?
5. Go Solar
When you’re ready to commit to making a long-term investment into the greenness of your home, solar panels are a must. We use the word investment because that’s exactly what a solar panel is.
The cost to install solar panels can be pretty hefty, but the returns on solar panel investments are high:
- Reduced carbon emissions
- Increased insulation
- Reduced water consumption
- Increased house value
- Reduced need for peak load stations
- Increased energy security
- Reduced line loss
- Increased job creation
Final Thoughts
As you can see from the ideas we shared with you in today’s article, going green is not that difficult. In fact, it’s pretty darn easy for the most part.
You can start small with green acts like creating your own compost heap and purchasing natural cleaning products & slowly work your way up to bigger changes such as installing velux skylights & solar panels.
It’s not about how big you start or how quickly you turn your home into an ecofriendly hub. It’s just about starting. Thanks to Belle Skylights for consulting!
