Eco-Confessions

Used books

Last weekend, I needed to buy a book about baking whole wheat breads. Since I knew I wanted to keep it, I skipped the Library (usually my first stop) and went straight online to look for it. When I found it, I was also presented with the opportunity to purchase used copies from several retailers. What a deal - I could buy my book "pre-read" but in very good condition, save money along the way and keep that book from ending up in Recycling or, worse yet, the landfill.

Next time you need to buy a book, look for a used copy; many times, they are in great shape and will work just as well as a new book!

 

 

Mosquito solutions

This summer hadn't been too bad in terms of mosquitoes around our house, but in the past couple of weeks, their population seems to have exploded! I can't even walk to the mailbox without getting bitten at least twice. On top of that, I seem to have some sort of reaction to the local breed - I get nickel-sized welts that will hurt like heck for a couple of hours, then disappear, only to reappear two days later in the middle of the night and have me in a scratching fit first class.

I try to avoid being outside after dark (that's when it's really bad), but I also have things to accomplish outside, and I flat out refuse to give those pesky bugs the satisfaction of beating me into retreat. So, unless it's really hot, I will wear sweats and a long-sleeved shirt - that way, I can apply the bug spray mostly on my clothes. I have noticed that my skin seems to get "warm" if I apply spray directly to it, so I try to avoid contact as much as possible. Don't get me wrong, I HATE having to apply bug spray, but, unfortunately, anything containing a generous amount of DEET seems to be the only remedy that actually works when it comes to our Minnesota mosquitoes. At least I haven't found anything less toxic that works as reliable - if you have any recommendations, I'd love to hear them. We will be going hiking at the North Shore in a few weeks, and if there's anything I can use instead of toxic chemicals, I'd be open to try it. Has anybody tried these new "personal shield" thingies that you clip onto your belt? How about ultrasonic devices? Any non-DEET-based sprays or lotions out there that work?

 

 

Doing laundry the "green" way

Tomorrow is Saturday, which is Laundry Day at the Jennebach home. Since I'm the stay-at-home dad, I get to do a bunch of chores, laundry being just one of them. When we bought appliances for our house three years ago, we decided to get a front-loader washer and dryer. We've been very happy with our purchase - it has great capacity, gets clothes clean and seems to be running very efficiently, as far as I can tell.

There are a few things to keep in mind when doing laundry, be it in a front-loader or "regular" washer - these tips can help you save water, energy and detergent, which will translate to money in your pocket:

• Find the right temperature: most clothes don't need to be washed in hot or even warm water, and none of them need to be rinsed in warm water at all. The warmer your water, the more it will cost per load. In our house, we pretty much wash towels and anything seriously soiled in hot/cold. Everything else gets washed in cold/cold.
• Which brings us to the second point - detergent. Make sure to use the right detergent, and the right amount. Using more detergent will not make your clothes cleaner, but will be money wasted.
• Next, load the machine to capacity, but not beyond. A full load utilizes the washer best - overloading it could damage it.

When it comes to drying, there are a few easy things you can do to save time, energy and money:

• Shake out each item before tossing it in the dryer (I'm skipping the clothesline because it's most likely impractical for 90% of us Minnesotans, but if you use one, good for you!). It will get some wrinkles out and "air" the piece at the same time, so the dryer will be able to keep it fluffy and dry it faster.
• Take your laundry out of the dryer immediately after it's finished drying. It will fold easier and have fewer wrinkles.
• Run your dryer loads as close together as possible. That way, the dryer stays warm from load to load and saves energy to "re-heat".

Do you have any favorite tricks you use when doing laundry? Any preferred detergent? Let me know - I'm always up for suggestions...

Adding insulation to your home's attic

Last fall I decided to add some blown-in fiberglass insulation to our attic. When the house was built, the builder put in the minimum required by code, but I wanted to have a little extra, for those chilly Minnesota winters. A local home improvement store had a great Sale on loose insulation, and I would be able to take a tax credit for 30% of the cost, so I decided to do it myself instead of hiring the job out to a Pro.

I purchased 20 bags of insulation, which included a free blower rental for 8 hours. That sounded like plenty of time for me to get everything done, even with the 40 minutes it takes me each way to pick up and return the blower. I had "hired" a friend to run the blower outside the house while I was up in the attic, maneuvering the hose around. A set of walkie-talkies comes in handy for this kind of project, in case you need to tell the person loading the blower to shut off the machine. So, she'd break up the bales, feed them into the machine and make sure it didn't clog, while I "made it snow" in our attic. Protective clothing and goggles/facemasks are also an absolute must, by the way.

After about 5 hours, all of the material was blown in, and I had added at least 6 inches to our attic insulation. The whole project was very affordable, not too complicated and definitely a great investment.

Right now is the time when a lot of insulation products are on Sale - I encourage you to take a peek up into your attic. Make sure you have enough insulation, that there aren't any spots where it has settled or gotten wet. And the tax break still applies to a lot of products - check with your store for eligibility. Finally, pick a cool day for the project and start as early as possible; it gets plenty warm under the roof in a hurry.

More information about Home Energy Audits

Apparently, RPU will start to offer Home Energy Audits for your home very soon, along with workshops about saving energy and making your home more energy-efficient. Find more information on RPU's website.

If you are a customer of Xcel Energy (such as myself), you can find info here.

Energy Audit results

So, last spring I finally got a chance to schedule an Energy Audit. I had always wanted to do it, but somehow kept forgetting about it. When the inspector came out, he set up the blower door and got to work. The house has air blown out the front door, to create a slightly negative pressure inside the building. Then, with the help of an infrared camera, the inspector is able to see where exactly colder air is being sucked in from the outside.

Overall, we did pretty well. There were some spots that will require an application of caulk before it gets cold outside (such as around our recessed light fixtures, and where the walls meet the ceiling). But, for the most part, he said that our walls were a lot tighter than he had seen in other log homes.

One thing he mentioned was our missing storm door at the front entrance. So, this past weekend I put in a nice, full-glass storm door to match our existing front door. A storm door will add greatly to the insulation value of your existing front door, and in most cases is also part of the Energy Tax Credit (depending on what front door you have), so you might be able to claim 30% of the cost on your next tax return. It took me about 4 hours to install, but I think I could do it faster now.

Take a look at your home - with fall and winter fast approaching, it might be a good idea to seal those cracks, fix or replace old windows, add some extra insulation in the attic (I'll tell you more about that next time) or add a storm door. You will spend less money on heating this winter, even with the smallest of improvement you make.

Save a tree - go paperless

Don't we all get waaay to much mail that we don't really want or need? Here's an easy way to cut back on some of it: wherever possible, sign up for "e-delivery" or "paperless billing" for businesses you deal with. Get an e-mail when your credit card statement is avilable online. Get your 401(k) statements via e-mail. Even get a note that your garbage bill is due. Most companies offer some form of paperless billing - all you have to do is sign up for it. And, if you're comfortable with it, you can even set up automated payments (look for an added fee for that service, though. Some companies charge for that "convenience".).

Free Recycling

I don't know how many people know this, but the City of Rochester does actually not REQUIRE you to have Recycling or even garbage pickup. A few years ago, whe we still lived in the city, I decided to haul our own. Here's how I did it:

The first step is to recycle, recycle and recycle some more. The more you receycle, the less trash you have. You'll see in a moment why that's important. I had a bunch of stackable bins in the garage; one for glass, one for plastic, one for paper, one for cans and one for cardboard. And a small, 30 gallon trash bin, lined with a plastic bag. When that trash bin was full, I'd drive the trash and recyclables out to the Olmsted County Recycling Center, where they take all of your recycling for FREE. I'd just dump the recycling into the appropriate bins and then pay for the trash. Now, there's a $5.00 minimum fee, which usually covered a bag of trash or two (depending on who would drop it off - it seems my wife always had to pay less:). So, for 5 bucks about once every three weeks, I was able to dispose of all of our trash and Recycling. Not a bad deal.

If you don't want to take sometimes smelly trash across town, you could consider dropping your Recycling pickup only and start taking your own recyclables out to the site. Especially if you drive past it regularly, you could even take individual bins, such as glass or cans, when they're full. Again, dropping off your Recycling is FREE...!

Calling all pumpking growers

My mission this year was to grow some pie pumpkins from seeds that my wife's parents used to grow pumpkins at their old house. The resulting pumpkins had been, for years, used to make the most delicious pumpkin pie from scratch. I had plenty of seeds and planted a bunch of them in nice mounds of dirt. I covered the mounds with chicken wire, to discourage critters from looking for the seeds. Everything started out well; the seeds sprouted and started to grow. But then I had problems with powdery mildew and the plants started to loose leaves at an alarming rate. I guess we had a very wet early summer - that could have been a main cause. By now, most of the plants have recovered, and it looks like we might have at least two pumpkins (don't know if that will be enough for a pie, though). I'm planning to do things slightly different next year.

How about you gardeners out there - how has this season's weather impacted your efforts? Any special treatments you had to apply? Any advice for my pumpkin-growing?

Open your windows!

After the hot and humid misery that we call "August" so far, it has been incredibly nice the past couple of days. The cooling part of our Geothermal system is surely enjoying the break when I can open the windows in the morning and the temperature outside is actually LOWER than inside the house!