Growers and Grocers

Seeing how it’s February already, I’d better get cracking on the daily recommendations that author Jodi Helmer puts forth in The Green Year: 365 Small Things You Can Do to Make a Big Difference for easy green living. The key to the whole enterprise is small steps. A quick glance through the book, which showed up at my house about a month ago, confirmed that we were already on the right track.

Yes, we have heard this before — most famously, from the likes of Al Gore — but Helmer’s book puts into practice by making it task-oriented and seasonally smart. For example, on January 1, we all should have recycled our Christmas trees by grounding them into wood chips and turning them into fragrant mulch or checking out Earth 911 to see where you could have taken it to be recycled. Much of the winter advice revolves around keeping your systems warm, energy-efficient and/or well-insulated: install a programmable thermostat, change the filter on your furnace, and check the owner’s manual to determine how much warm-up time your car needs. Other tips are actions many of us already take or should be: turn off the computer every day, turn off the water when you brush your teeth, shave, or wash your face and you save a whopping ten gallons.

I jumped ahead to May to see what I should be doing to prepare the garden and for warm weather. On May 10, I should toss lemon peel into the garden to deter my many neighborhood cats from using my garden as a litter box. This one is a keeper, as we have many of them. On May 22, she advises to go out for an ice cream cone — not a cup –which uses less plastic. (Even better, I’d add, if you can WALK or ride your bike to an ice cream shop.) The average American consumes 5.5 gallons of ice cream a year, so imagine the reduction of plastic by switching to a cone. On May 23, she advises something I’d never heard before: fill up your gas tank at night because it reduces the amount of ozone-depleting fumes if you do it when the temperatures are cooler. Speaking of gasoline, I love her advice on taking the train when you travel, which is practical if you have more time and if your destination permits that.

Overall, most of the advice is solid and smart and full of common sense, but there are a few clunkers. For example, on August 4 she tells us to put a lid on the pot when you’re boiling water because less energy will escape and it will boil faster. I think my 9-year-old niece probably knows this. On September 18, Helmer says to opt for a fountain drink instead of a bottled water or soda, arguing that only 51 percent of aluminum cans and 7 percent of plastic bottles are recycled. But what about the paper cups you put that soda in? I usually just take the bottle home if there is nowhere to recycle it in my travels. The larger problem is that most places, including large facilities that hold concerts, sporting events, and the like, do not provision for the disposal of recycled bottles. This makes me crazy.

One nice thing about the book is that each piece of advice takes up no more than one page and gives you a check box that, in a satisfying fashion, enables you to cross the item off when the task is completed. She also provides you space to jot down an alternative way of being green if you think you’ve found another, or better, way to do it. For more information about the author and the book, visit Green Year.