Published on March 26th, 2012 | by The Green Divas
0Keep the Vampires Away and Reduce Your Home Energy Use
First of all, we had a special Green Diva in Training, 11-year-old, Zoe Marcus in the studio and she should give us all some hope that the next generation is ON IT when it comes to being aware of the environment and what we need to do to be more sustainable. Check out her Facebook page about Environmentalism in Morristown. Our Sleeping Naked is Green segment was a good reminder about simple ways to reduce our energy usage in the home. The feature interview was with Jessica Arinella of What You Can Do TV series. We talked about ocean conservancy and about water conservation and as always she had amazing statistics and some great ideas about what WE can do!
Why We Should Care?
We talked to the amazing Fran Drescher actress and activist and founder of Cancer Schmancer for this segment and asked her what she is most passionate about when it comes to sustainable and healthy living and why should we care . . . She really gets that many of the toxins in our every day environment are making us sick and we have to start to pay attention to the food we eat, how we grow it; our homes and how we clean them, etc. AND if you haven’t check out her hilarious new TV show, Happily Divorced, you are missing out! Listen to the Fran Drescher, Why We Should Care interview in this podcast of the Green Divas Radio Show.
We REALLY need your help! Please consider a $5 contribution and join us in being part of the solution! If most of our fans donate, we will hit our goal on time! Visit our Why Should We Care Campaign page and please donate (and get some awesome goodies when you do)!
The Sleeping Naked is Green
Turn off the lights before leaving the house!
The Environmental Impact
- According to The Environmental Defense Fund, 65% of pollution attributed to global warming (or climate change) comes from the generation of energy and its use.
- Coal is the most common fuel for generating electricity in the United States.
- In 2010, 45% of the Country’s nearly 4 trillion kilowatt hours of electricity used coal as its source of energy. [From EIA, the US Energy Information Administration]
- 5 – 20% of our home electric bill comes from “phantom†or vampire electrical use.
Good Ideas
- Turn off the lights when you don’t need them!
- Get energy-efficient appliances – when you buy new appliances, be sure to buy Energy Star appliances. And you might find some government incentives as well.
- Lighting – consider changing to LED, CFL or ESL bulbs, which are all more energy-efficient.
- Shed light on those vampires and expel them! Even if you switch off most electronics, many continue to draw an electrical current. Our friend, Ed Begley Jr., suggests that we put all the electronics that we usually off when we leave home, on energy-saving smart strips so you can just flip one switch to turn off several things.
- Try The Bye Bye Standby starter kit
- The Smart Strip
- Ed also reminds us NOT to put essential appliances or electronics like the refrigerator or the cable box on the strips that get turned off when you leave the house.
- Understand your energy use – The US Department of Energy offers this tool to calculate your household energy use. Get a home electric meter like to help monitor energy use:
Listen to the 5-minute segment on conserving energy at home.
Gettin Local with the Green Divas: Wherever You Are!
Listen to this week’s discussion in the 5-minute podcast about Transitioning to a Green Career.
You can listen to the entire show or download the podcast from here.
As always, please visit our website for LOTS of relevant links & resources from the show – Green Divas website.
The Green Divas Radio Show, podcasts, audio vignettes and blog posts feature fun and low-stress ways to live a deeper shade of green, while maintaining some comfort and style. Green Diva Meg, co-host Green Diva Lisa and Green Dude Paul offer tons of easily accessible information and resources to help make the journey to a more sustainable world easier and a little more fun and entertaining. The radio show broadcasts live every Saturday morning from WMTR 1250 AM in Northern, NJ/NY Metro area, streaming live on WMTRam.com, or catch up on the podcast.