I'm having a few friends over this weekend...and making SURE I keep the recycling bin out!  It's so easy to forget to recycle (especially after you've had a few adult beverages.)  Let's make sure we're all dilligent about recycling our cans and paper products over the holiday weekend.

Happy 4th, All!

Here’s another valuable Green Tip from Focus on Energy: Electronics like computers, DVD players, stereos and TVs draw power, even when turned off.  This is called “phantom load”.  Reduce your annual energy costs by plugging these electronics into a power strip and switching it off when items aren’t in use.  But that’s just the start.  There are so many ways to green the way you live and save energy and money.  For more Green Tips from Wisconsin’s energy efficiency and renewable energy resource, visit focusonenergy.com.

This past weekend I went camping with some friends and they were drinking beer and throwing the cans in the trash. I went through the garbage bag and started a “recycling” bag. In typical Wes fashion, I lectured them all about separating their recyclables from their trash. Then I proceeded to burn all the cardboard which I’m not sure if that is helping the environment. I will find that out though, but my heart was in the right place.  Tune in next week for the answer.

Hey gang,

I hope you're all having a great summer so far! You know, we talk a lot on this site about ways we can save and beautify our world...but maybe sometimes we get so caught up in that, we forget to get out and actually enjoy it!  We get so few months in Milwaukee that we can spend outside with being bundled up like a polar bear, we need to remember to get out any enjoy the world we are working to save...so make it a point to get outside each and every day and enjoy what we're working so hard to protect!

The following explains why ceiling fans can effectively compensate for a lack of AC, or if don't wanna use yours because you're trying to save $$/the world.

Use ceiling fans to increase comfort levels at higher thermostat settings. The standard human comfort range for light clothing in the summer is between 72 F and 78 F. To extend the comfort range to 82 F, you need a breeze of about 2.5 ft/sec or 1.7 mph. A sow-turning ceiling-mounted paddle fan can easily provide this air flow.

It would be unreasonable to think that I can't buy things or throw things away, but one thing that's helped me is buying in bulk.  I really helps with the amount of trash I have, plus it saves energy on the other end

Bulk products reduce the amount of waste going into landfills and take less energy and other resources to produce while offering shoppers lower prices.

Statistics show we generate about 80 million tons of waste from packaging and containers every year, which is almost a third of the country's municipal solid waste. And besides the waste products themselves, the manufacture of all those boxes, cans, cartons and labels that end up in landfills also wastes energy and resources. When you buy in bulk and reuse storage containers, it clearly contributes positively to our planet's health.