Easy Ways to Go Green

From September 30 to October 8 I wrote a series of steps I’ve already taken to go green.

Here, in summary, are some of the easiest ways you can tweak your lifestyle to go green. The links in the titles are links to the specific blog posts covering these topics, which you can click on to read in more detail.

1.     Don’t drive: bike, or ride transit.

If you have access to biking or transit, you have privilege. Don’t be that person who still insists on smogging up the highways and driving yourself crazy over parking and gas. If you have no transit or can’t bike due to safety concerns, I recommend a $150 electric scooter. You can use it on the sidewalk. If there’s no sidewalk, try to rearrange your commute so that you drive as little as possible; or, carpool.

2.     Cut out beef.

It can be difficult for people to go full vegetarian; just stop eating beef. Beef is the worst for the environment; cattle require an excessive amount of grazing grounds and lots of pastureland to grow their feed. As I write this the Amazon rainforest is being depleted to make room for enormous herds of cattle. You can have your turkey or your chicken, please no beef. Red meats have been shown to be carcinogenic anyway.

See this post more.

3.     Reduce*, reuse*, and recycle.

This seems to me like basic information but I put it on here in case.

4.     Compost.

The importance of composting is totally understated. If it’s too intimidating to start your own home compost pile or you don’t have space for it, I suggest buying a private composting service or, if you’re a lucky bastard, put out your compost in municipal compost. (Not composting when municipal compost is available is similar in ethical taste to refusing to recycle. It just makes no sense.) I have a private composting service, which split between roommates is only $3-5 a person, but in this blog I’ll explore other composting techniques.

5.     Use a thermos.

The simplest solution to the paper-cup coffee situation.

6.     Ditch single-use plastic.

Again, this seems relatively obvious, but I have been guilty of buying solo cups or even using plastic forks and paper plates out of convenience. And, try not to order iced drinks directly in those plastic to-go cups; a thermos will keep the drink properly iced – see step above.

*Reduce and reuse are more important than recycle, as discussed in the section “Zero Waste” here.

Please note that this blog discusses lifestyle changes from the point of view of Americans, who are some of the most wasteful people on the planet. So, while these tweaks may seem obvious to people from other countries, or even to people on the elite liberal coastal cities of America, they may not be as obvious to those who are not heavily invested in the movement or do not have a certain amount of privilege.

Throughout this blog, I’ll expand upon and explain my reasoning behind each of these techniques. But this should be enough to get you started.

If you have comments, leave them below! And if you like my content, implement these steps, subscribe, and share. The environmental movement needs your participation and involvement.