I spoke about putting my LED lights on my tree. It's been brought to my attention that some people might not know why I chose them over conventional Christmas Lights. I will also talk about incandescent lights (conventional bulbs) vs CFL's (Compact Fluorescent Lights) vs LED (Light Emitting Diodes) a bit.
There are many reasons to choose LED lights over conventional Christmas lights. LED light are much cheaper to burn, they are not fragile and can withstand bumping and jarring, they do not get hot so less fire hazards and can withstand a lot of weather conditions like humidity and extreme cold specifically and they will last approximately 50,000 hours. That's an amazing 33 times longer than conventional Christmas lights!!! Their price has really come down this year so your initial investment is much lower now. Still take caution not to injure the wiring IE stapling it, closing it in a door for instance.
The energy that it takes to light an LED light is almost solely to make light not heat. An incredible amount of energy that an Incandescent light makes goes to heat instead of light. That's what makes it so inefficient and so hot when its on. Like we would all fill our houses with incandescent light bulbs to heat it. Kind of like an Easy Bake Oven. We have furnaces and heat pumps to heat our houses our light bulbs are just supposed to light our houses. I can't believe I ever tried to bake a cake with a light bulb.
Another point to make is that LED lights do not contain Mercury unlike their competition CFL's. They are supposed be making a new kind of CFL without Mercury but I haven't seen it yet just a lot of programs to collect burned out CFL's at places like Home Depot where they dispose of them properly. It also unnerves me that all CFL's are made in India and China what's up with that?
I am surprised that it's estimated that 90% of households still use incandescent light bulbs. Given the average house has about 30 light bulbs the average cost of running those incandescent bulbs is $330.00 per year versus $77 dollars a year for CFL's. That's a huge savings and in this economy the savings is what counts. I switched over to CFL's as my bulbs burned out so it wasn't so expensive. They were pretty expensive when I switched over almost $8 now they average $2 a piece. So if you consider that the average life span for a CFL is 8,000 hours, an incandescent bulb lasts about 1,500 hours and the LED's lifespan is 50,000 hours and if used in the whole house (30 bulbs) would cost about 33.00 a year to run you can imagine how much you would save. So even if you just switch over to LED Christmas lights you could save a bundle especially if you are a deck the halls with boughs of lit up holly kind of person.
I think too many people think being environmental is cost prohibitive and folks don't realize that being green can save you a lot of money.
So here's a jumping off point for you. You can just switch over to LED Christmas lights. Maybe just replace the light in a hard to reach or long burning location since CFL's last about 10 times longer than conventional bulbs. It's simple. You can do it yourself at your own pace in your own time or switch them all at once and assume the savings immediately. You can do this.
Check this website for a side by side comparison regarding light bulbs:http://www.designrecycleinc.com/led%20comp%20chart.html
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Friday, December 4, 2009
Our Christmas Tree Dilemma
I am profoundly humbled by even thinking that others would be interested or even inspired by what I have to say. Being environmental sparks every fire of my being. It shapes just about everything I do everyday. I don't even have to think about it anymore. How and when I go about my errands. Where I buy and what and who I buy from shapes just about everything I do. Hopefully I can help you with little steps and things to remember and to include in your everyday life. Soon you will do it without even thinking about it as well. Now this didn't happen overnight for me and I am far from perfect.
Like for instance I think I had a perfectly fine Christmas tree. Sure it's 21 years old and pretty sparse but it's sentimental. My dear husband who is Jewish bought it for me our first Christmas together. Let me remind you I say it's fine but my 17 year old refused to be part of the 2 hours it takes to put the menagerie together. My husband admitted that he doesn't look forward to building a tree every year either and would rather not do it. I didn't realize they were doing it for me. I really want everybody enjoying the process. This is my first holiday without my Father and I feel strongly about us all having a joyous and meaningful holiday season and I want us all to be engaged. So instead of digging my heals in this time and refusing to bend which I do frequently because I would rather repair things if possible. I tried to compromise.
So how did I handle this situation as environmental and responsible as I could?
We found a unlit tree at Home Depot for 100.00 so I can use my LED lights. I will donate my old tree to our local food bank/thrift store so it doesn't end up in the landfill.
The whole family put the tree up last night. It took about 30 minutes to get the lights on and put our beautiful new Peace sign on the top of the tree thanks to Dr. Kristin Mowry. We'll get the ornaments out over the weekend and put them on together. By the way Home Depot did have a pre-lit LED tree for $200.00. I like Home Depot for the most part. They are getting on the band wagon with conserving and recycling and selling environmentally friendly items. I looked in many places for a tree that met our needs. Now I assume this one will suit us for another 20 years maybe longer. Hopefully the LED lights will hold up that long.
We actually have a little project with our ornaments as well.
A friend of ours from our church has moved back here over the summer and her movers crushed all of her ornaments so members of our congregation are going through their ornaments and writing a story about one of their ornaments and we're going to present them to her next weekend. This is wonderful because all of her ornaments will have a history and we're all recycling and reusing.
I like the thought Reject, Refuse, Reduce, Reuse then Recycle instead of just the last 3 Reduce Reuse Recycle. We've got to take a stand against the extraneous packaging or the unrecyclable. We must Reject and Refuse first above all else. I didn't do a very good job of that years ago so now I am paying the price in clutter. I am trying to find other uses for things or give them away to charities or others who could use them so they don't end up in a landfill. Nothing makes me crazier than when my Husband says just throw it away. Insert scream here. If we all changed our thought process here and said throw it in the landfill maybe we would think before we buy or toss something. Our Landfills have up to 25 year liners that are to hold those leaching chemicals in for about that long. Well these liners are getting old and they are leaking. They are a pain to replace and extremely costly. Check out your local landfill and find out how old your liner is.
Do you realize that if you throw a banana peel in the landfill it cant decompose because it can't get air and light. It actually becomes toxic. We'll talk about composting in other blogs. For now just stop and think before you buy or before you send that item to the landfill. THERE IS NO AWAY. It is always here. So think twice before you add to our huge land fill problem. REMEMBER THERE IS NO AWAY.
Like for instance I think I had a perfectly fine Christmas tree. Sure it's 21 years old and pretty sparse but it's sentimental. My dear husband who is Jewish bought it for me our first Christmas together. Let me remind you I say it's fine but my 17 year old refused to be part of the 2 hours it takes to put the menagerie together. My husband admitted that he doesn't look forward to building a tree every year either and would rather not do it. I didn't realize they were doing it for me. I really want everybody enjoying the process. This is my first holiday without my Father and I feel strongly about us all having a joyous and meaningful holiday season and I want us all to be engaged. So instead of digging my heals in this time and refusing to bend which I do frequently because I would rather repair things if possible. I tried to compromise.
So how did I handle this situation as environmental and responsible as I could?
We found a unlit tree at Home Depot for 100.00 so I can use my LED lights. I will donate my old tree to our local food bank/thrift store so it doesn't end up in the landfill.
The whole family put the tree up last night. It took about 30 minutes to get the lights on and put our beautiful new Peace sign on the top of the tree thanks to Dr. Kristin Mowry. We'll get the ornaments out over the weekend and put them on together. By the way Home Depot did have a pre-lit LED tree for $200.00. I like Home Depot for the most part. They are getting on the band wagon with conserving and recycling and selling environmentally friendly items. I looked in many places for a tree that met our needs. Now I assume this one will suit us for another 20 years maybe longer. Hopefully the LED lights will hold up that long.
We actually have a little project with our ornaments as well.
A friend of ours from our church has moved back here over the summer and her movers crushed all of her ornaments so members of our congregation are going through their ornaments and writing a story about one of their ornaments and we're going to present them to her next weekend. This is wonderful because all of her ornaments will have a history and we're all recycling and reusing.
I like the thought Reject, Refuse, Reduce, Reuse then Recycle instead of just the last 3 Reduce Reuse Recycle. We've got to take a stand against the extraneous packaging or the unrecyclable. We must Reject and Refuse first above all else. I didn't do a very good job of that years ago so now I am paying the price in clutter. I am trying to find other uses for things or give them away to charities or others who could use them so they don't end up in a landfill. Nothing makes me crazier than when my Husband says just throw it away. Insert scream here. If we all changed our thought process here and said throw it in the landfill maybe we would think before we buy or toss something. Our Landfills have up to 25 year liners that are to hold those leaching chemicals in for about that long. Well these liners are getting old and they are leaking. They are a pain to replace and extremely costly. Check out your local landfill and find out how old your liner is.
Do you realize that if you throw a banana peel in the landfill it cant decompose because it can't get air and light. It actually becomes toxic. We'll talk about composting in other blogs. For now just stop and think before you buy or before you send that item to the landfill. THERE IS NO AWAY. It is always here. So think twice before you add to our huge land fill problem. REMEMBER THERE IS NO AWAY.
Welcome!
Hello Everyone,
This is Dr. Mowry blogging first... I am leaving this first post because I created this blog for Diane. She is a fantastic person with a big heart and a lot of knowledge. I think you will find this blog to be one of the best out there and I hope you will enjoy it as much as I will.
Do good, eat well, and go green,
Dr. M
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