NBC Universal’s new “Green is Universal” campaign kicked off yesterday (Nov. 4th) with a week of green-themed programming aimed at entertaining, informing and empowering Americans to lead greener lives. While I completely endorse their use of programming, I wonder exactly how much is corporate responsibility and how much is a marketing ploy to be seen as “environmentally aware”.
Regardless, it’s about time we as a nation step forward and do whatever we can to preserve our resources and make people aware of the options available to reduce our ecological “footprint.”
About a year ago my wife and I moved into a new home – we made it a point to replace all of the lights in our house with Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs). A rather expensive ordeal by comparison, but we spaced out the purchases over a couple of months.
We started with our most heavily used lights, the kitchen, living room and kids’ bedroom lights. Those were relatively easy choices to make. It got a bit harder once we moved into the bathrooms and dining area.
My wife likes a bright light to put on her “face,” which is understandable, but CFLs are not an accurate lighting source for applying makeup. I’d hate for her to walk out of the restroom thinking she looked fabulous – only to find out her eyeliner looks like black crayon in natural light! For shame.
The dining area was also a toss up as we like the ability to dim the lights, and CFLs won’t let you do that very well (unless one of you know something I don’t). So that’s for future upgrading as well.
Other than that, we’re about 85% transitioned to CFLs. Not bad. Also, our electricity bill went down about $20-30 a month.
We’re trying to do the same thing at Citizen Desk. During the day we’ve turned off most of the lights (fluorescent anyway, but… ), this makes for a nice working environment as we have so much natural light coming in our windows. There are four strategically placed hanging lamps that provide direct desk light if need be, also with CFLs. Finally, there’s a UV protected screen that we can pull down to block out the late afternoon sun and keep the office cooler (less reliance on the A/C).
Outside of that – we’re recycling every chance we get. I wish there were some more options, like green energy (wind or solar power), or even a sustainable housing community, but all in time.
What’s most important is that we all do our part, right? What are you guys doing to preserve our resources?
