July 30, 2010 @ 12:14 PM 3 Comments

Filed under: Awareness, Ecofriendly, Websites

If you think recycling is too hard or takes too much time, even after reading my previous post. Than this is something for you!

This morning I found out about Blackle.com a search engine powered by Google custom search, thanks to a tweet from Sophia Bush. Basically it’s Google, only in black! And that’s where the energy saving lays. A monitor requires more energy to display a white (or light) screen than it does displaying a black (or dark) screen.

So if you use Blackle every single time you search for something on the web, you save energy one search at a time!!!! So, change your homepages / search engines to Blackle.com and start saving energy .

And with the knowledge of black saving energy in mind, Silent-Butterfly.com will go from green to black over the weekend!

July 25, 2010 @ 7:51 PM 2 Comments

Filed under: Ecofriendly, Recycling

In this day and age everybody is in a rush. For most there is hardly any time to think about recycling their trash, let alone actually do it. But to be honest, recycling doesn’t have to be difficult or time consuming.  What it really is all about, is getting into the habit of doing it, so once you set it all up it’s as simple as picking the right bin.

I think it’s a very personal thing to set up a recycling bin system as not everyone has the same space in their home or feels like using the same techniques. But I’m going to share my separating and recycling ways with you in this blog, maybe it can give you some ideas on how you can set up something like that in your home.

I have a big basket that I use for my paper waste. All paper waste goes in there, empty boxes, milk cartons and just paper I need to throw away. My local council picks up the paper waste every other week, so to make sure the empty cartons don’t start to smell, I rinse them before I put them in the basket.

For my plastic waste I use a big plastic bag that I bring to my local plastic collection box once a week, or more often if needed.

Glass can be recycled too and I usually just leave that in my storage room and bring that to the glass deposit box once a week or less often, I don’t seem to have a lot of glass waste. I also rinse it before I put it away, that way you bring relatively clean glass to the box and it reduces odours when you leave it for a while.

For my green waste I have a little container on my kitchen counter that I clean at least once a day. All my green waste goes in there and once I want to empty the container I dump it in the green waste section of my wheely bin. The reason why I don’t directly throw it in there, is because I have to walk a few stairs to get to the green waste bin, so instead I use the small container and clean it once (or more) a day.

And last but not least, the “normal” bin. It’s just a normal sized kitchen trash can with a trash bag in it (currently it’s made of recycled plastic, but I found out today there is one store in town that sells biodegradable trash bags). All my ‘rest’ waste goes in there. Which honestly isn’t much as I separate most of it. Which by itself is a great thing for people who have to pay for the weight of the trash the council picks up for them.

It’s all pretty close together so all I have to do is pick the right bin, I only have to walk in one direction and just dispose of it. It can’t be easier. I noticed that there are special outdoor systems you can place on your balcony / patio / deck or even inside. They are inexpensive and it looks a lot cleaner and neater. The only downside is that the store is a bit away from my house, so I have to wait until I need more decoration material etc for my new kitchen so I don’t have to make more than one trip to the store. Which of course saves me gas and cuts down on pollution by only going once. So for now I just use the containers and bins.

That’s not all I recycle though. I also recycle water. Yes, you read that right; water. I have a condensation tumble dryer and the water container states I can use the water from it to water my plants, fill up (car) batteries or use it to iron my clothes with. It clearly states I CAN NOT drink it so don’t try that! If you have a tumble dryer, check your manual or water container, you might be able to re-use that water too!

At first I didn’t know how I was going to get the water into my watering can since the hole is somewhat covered by the handle, but from a water bottle I was going to dispose off (in the plastic bin of course!) I made a makeshift funnel to get the water in. So now I can use my waste water from my clean and dry laundry to water my plants and iron my clothes or to rinse the paper / glass waste. There’s a photo below of my make shift funnel. It’s ugly but effective and that’s what counts .

July 20, 2010 @ 12:36 PM Comment?

Filed under: Awareness, Ecofriendly, Environmental Awareness

One of the things I do to minimize my ecological footprint, besides recycling and separating my trash, is buying organic food. The first time I heard about organic food I figured it was going to be way more expensive than “ordinary” food and because of that not something I could afford.

I did a  little research in different (grocery) stores and supermarkets though and I let go of that idea pretty quickly. Buying organic products doesn’t have to be much more expensive! In fact, I found that some organic products are actually cheaper than regular products from A-name brands.

In The Netherlands there is a special quality mark to indicate a product is organic and around the globe there are many more that indicate the same thing.  You can’t just call a product organic just because you feel like it or because the cows it came from lived outside for a while. There are special rules and regulations in place. These rules are enforced (in The Netherlands anyway) by an inspection organisation named Skal. They go to companies to check if they keep to the rules, take products from there as well as soil samples etc. to be checked in a laboratory to see if there aren’t any chemical or synthetic pesticides or artificial fertilisers used.

So as you can understand it’s not that easy to create an organic product, there are so many things a farmer, baker and butcher have to think about and do before they can label their food organic. Even the way it is stored and shipped has to be taken into consideration. You aren’t allowed to bake bread from non-organic flower and call it organic, or make steaks from a cow that has seen some outside air and call it organic, even the food for the cow has to be organic!

Therefore it surprised me it’s just a little more expensive in general to buy organic, and by that I mean a difference of about 20 cents on products. I really prefer organic food, I think it tastes better, you can keep it fresh longer and it’s so much more environmental friendly that it’s worth the money for me to spend on it.
However with that said, I can imagine that some people might not be able to afford it; those struggling to make it to the end of the month financially will think that 20 cents on a product is a lot. And granted, some products are more expensive, sometimes even too expensive for me to buy (a piece of chicken breast for €9 for example).

The only sad thing is that I can’t seem to find a lot of organic vegetables, I went to different greengrocers and they all looked at me as if I were a little crazy asking for organic food. I found some fruit and vegetables in a supermarket that were organic but only in small amounts ( apples, broccoli and pineapple) so I’m still shopping around for that .

Not all things come in organic form, but the things I use most do such as milk, yoghurt, meat, (some) vegetables & fruit, rice etc. So shop around in your area and look for organic food, it doesn’t have to cost much more to make a difference in your ecological footprint!