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Refresh, Recycle, Redefine Your Office
from
Carol Cannon, BBEC
Carol Cannon Group
This is an exciting year to celebrate Earth Day because many people have increased their interest in ‘greening’ their environments over the past twelve months. Many Sustainable Business Networks around the country offer members the opportunity to take a ‘Sustainability Pledge’ and report annually on their progress. This helps companies to make a positive impact on People, Planet and Profit. And while I have been committed to this effort for most of my life, I recently made a pledge with our local Sustainable Business Network, and I look forward to reporting back to you next year on the progress I achieved. Following are some highlights of what you can do as part of your own pledge for your company.
Energy Efficiency is something every business seems to be interested in. Start to become more efficient by reviewing your energy bills for the past 12 months. Begin to implement the ideas below, and then compare each month’s bill to the same month’s bill from last year. At the end of the year, total the bills from each year to gauge your savings.
- Are you using a programmable thermostat? Keep your thermostat a little lower in the winter months and a little higher in the summer months. This automatic setting can be a huge factor in lowering costs. Also turn it up/down at night (depending on the season) when no one is occupying the space.
- Turn off lights when not in use, and open the shades for natural sunlight. In low-use areas such as bathrooms, closets and conference rooms, consider installing motion-sensor lighting so electricity is used only as needed.
- Turn off and unplug office equipment that you do not use regularly. This will also help to reduce electromagnetic radiation, which can cause adverse health effects.
- Consider walking, carpooling, using public transportation or riding a bike to work.
Excess Solid Waste is a problem that we deal with in landfills. Following are ideas to help you increase responsible contributions.
- Recycle everything that you can. Call your community’s recycling department to receive recycling bins, or find the local drop-off center and commit to visiting it every month with whatever it will recycle for you.
- Reduce paper use in your office. Reuse anything printed on one side for printing your next draft. Even better, try to go paperless, thinking twice before printing anything—do you really need to have a hard copy?
- Use 100% recycled paper and print double-sided whenever you print.
- Switch to reusable cups in your office, or purchase cups that are made from recycled paper AND commit to recycling them when you are finished using them.
- Reuse shipping boxes.
Landscape/Maintenance can have a huge effect on the environment.
- Use native plants whenever possible.
- Use natural pest control vs. toxic, chemical laden pesticides.
- Avoid using gasoline-powered lawn-care equipment.
- Use rain collectors for watering purposes.
Eliminate Hazardous Waste in your environment, which is any product that is hazardous to human health or the environment.
- Use non-toxic products, including natural cleaning products, no-VOC paints, and natural building materials.
- Ask for MSDS (Manufacturer Safety Data Sheets) before purchasing any potentially hazardous product. Refuse to purchase items from companies that are ignoring this initiative.
- Visit the EPA site for a list of hazardous waste materials.
To help you get started with a pledge for your business, BALLE (Business Alliance for Local Living Economies) provides tools to locate a network in your area, or will help you start your own. Clean Air – Cool Planet also has a detailed list of items you can incorporate to make a change. Please join me in taking a pledge to eliminate anything that will affect people seven generations from now!
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