Electricity

• Turn off appliances and lights when you leave the room.

• Use the microwave to cook small meals. (It uses less power than an oven)

• Purchase appliances that use less electricity. (CFL lights etc)

• Have leaking air conditioning and refrigeration systems repaired.

• Cut back on air conditioning and heating use if you can.

• Switch off mains of appliances as they continue to consume energy even on standby.

Water

• Don't let the water run while shaving or brushing teeth.

• Take short showers instead of tub baths.

• Scrape, rather than rinse, dishes before loading into the dishwasher; wash only full loads.

• Wash only full loads of laundry or use the appropriate water level or load size selection on the washing machine.

• Buy high-efficient plumbing fixtures & appliances.

• Repair all leaks (a leaking toilet can waste 200 gallons a day).

• Water the lawn or garden during the coolest part of the day for maximum absorption (early morning is best).

• Sweep outside your house instead of using water to clean.

Others

• Close Empty Rooms: If there are rooms in your house that aren't being used, shutting the doors to those rooms results in an overall reduction in the amount of area that the heating and air-conditioning systems have to heat and cool. The less space you need to supply with conditioned air, the less often the heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems will need to operate.

• Draw at dusk...close your curtains. As the days get chillier, closing your curtains at dusk will stop heat escaping through windows.

• When preparing a meal try and reuse leftovers. Try to avoid wasting food.

• Use eco friendly writing instruments and paper:

  • Eco Friendly Pencils and Crayons - Pineapple flavoured recycled pencils. - These are a truly great find. They are scented pencils made from 100% recycled newspapers. They sharpen and write like regular pencils but smell better and they save trees.
     

  • Soybean Crayons - Environmentally friendly Prang soybean crayons
     

  • Green Notebooks and Paper - Nearly half the trees currently harvested are used to make paper!
     

  • Tree Free Notebooks - Made out of a sustainable substitute source for paper-making fiber. The growing demand for paper made with kenaf, a fibrous plant from the Mallow family that’s related to cotton and okra, has made it an increasingly viable alternative economically.
     

  • Elephant Poop Paper! - Yes this paper is made from elephant dung. In Sri Lanka, many elephants have been killed not for their meat, tusks, or hide but simply because they interfere with local agribusiness. A solution for villagers and elephants alike has been to find ways to utilize the elephant as a sustainable economic resource. Since elephants poop about 16 times a day, elephant dung is a resource with the potential to solve the farmer/pachyderm conflict.
    
     

• Use eco friendly backpacks::

  • Solar Powered Backpack - This stylish and smart backpack is the first in a line of backpacks with an integrated solar charging solution. Perfect for the student, mobile commuter, and outdoorsman, this backpack provides a quality pack with an integrated solar charging module for your high-tech toys. If your child has a cell phone or iPod then they might really like this backpack. 

  • EarthPak - The backpack made from recycled plastic soda bottles. They also have duffel bags, sports bags, computer bags, and fanny packs.

  • Hemp Sisters Backpack - Backpacks made from sustainable hemp and they are attractive too!

  • Basura Coin Purse -This is perfect for holding lunch money and they are made from recycled juice containers.

  • Basura Messenger Bag - For the eco-stylish this messenger bag made from juice containers is the perfect fit.
    
     

• Use eco friendly lunch boxes and water bottles::

  • The Laptop Lunchbox - This lunchbox is a favourite among many. It is an American style bento box that promotes waste free lunches. This lunchbox helps pack healthy and environmentally friendly meals.

  • Mr. Bento - Yes, another bento box…but this one is more appealing to older kids. It is a stylish stainless steel lined, thermos style lunchbox. There is one designed for boys and one for girls.

  • Klean Kanteen - These stainless steel water bottles do not leach chemicals into your water like plastic ones do and they are a much more sustainable option. They come in many different sizes and with different choices.

  • Sigg Reusable Water Bottles - These aluminum water bottles are attractive to younger kids.

  • Wrap-N-Mat - These reusable sandwich bags are perfect for wrapping your food so that you no longer need to use plastic bags. This cuts down on needless landfill waste.

• Turn off your lights. Lights are the biggest killer of energy in the corporate world. Massive buildings like the Empire State Building have millions of lights and they leave them all on, all night. What a waste.
   

•  When you go out of the office for lunch or to the toilet turn your lights off. This makes a huge difference. An average globe uses 60 watts in an hour. If you turn that light off for one hour a day you will save 22,000 watts of energy in a year. If 1000 people do it - we’re making a difference.
   

• Switch to compact fluorescent lamps. These bulbs are the spiral ones as opposed to the traditional round light bulb. Using one of these lasts as long as SIX traditional globes and saves up to 75% of the energy. They cost a bit more off the shelf but save heaps in long term costs.
   

• Change from Google to Blackle. Google has a white background. Most websites do. However, we spend a lot of time on Google. Most people have Google as their homepage. If Google made their homepage black instead of white it would save thousands of tonnes of greenhouse gases every year. Blackle is an alternative to Google. It is powered by Google so you get the same searches; it’s just black. Switch to this!
   

• Turn things off at the power point. At the end of the day we usually just turn things off at their console switch instead of reaching around and turning them off at the power point. Most people do not realize that a lot of power is wasted when you leave the power point on.
   

• Don’t throw out printer cartridges. The toner that you use in the printer shouldn’t get thrown out. Printer cartridges are designed to be refilled. Refilling them is cheaper than buying a new one. Every time a printer cartridge runs out they throw them in the box and then once a month get them refilled. This kind of system is going to save a firm a lot of money. Perhaps putting this idea to your boss could win you some brownie points!
   

• Catch the bus to work. There really is no advantage in driving to work unless you have to leave and come back during the day. The bus is cheaper and it is much better for the environment. Each car that you take off the road saves thousands of pounds of greenhouse gases ever year. By catching the bus you will be saving money and helping the Earth. It is a very humbling experience as you get to meet lots of people, see lots of things and get over the personal stigma of “only poor people catch the bus”. This is a mental trick we should all try to work with.
   

• Clean your Air Conditioner filter. Something you can do to save a lot of power is replace the filter (or clean it) to make sure that it is not struggling to operate and is running at peak efficiency.
   

• Turn your A/C down one degree. Every degree that you turn the air conditioner down saves a lot of energy. It really is amazing the amount of power you save if your a/c is set to 18 degrees instead of 16 degrees. In fact, if you set your a/c to three degrees higher you will save over 400 pounds of carbon dioxide per year. Remember, you don’t need to be frozen on hot days, you just need to make yourself comfortable.
   

• Make sure the work kitchen fridge is not leaking Fridges that leak air out the side because of poor seals waste a lot of energy. Be the one to glue it back on or if the job requires more attention submit an anonymous complaints saying that the fridge is a safety concern and needs to be fixed before the authorities are notified.
   

• Carry Your Lunch In A Lunchbox. Stop using paper or plastic bags that you wind up chucking at the end of your break and carry your sandwich in a lunchbox, instead.
   

• Don’t Print E-Mails. Only print out very important e-mails and save paper.
   

• Use Scrap Paper. Do you really need to write down a phone number on a brand new piece of 8″x12″? The envelope from today’s mail, the back of your Page-A-Day calendar or an old printed e-mail will work just fine.