9 Christmas Gifts You Can Give to Your Mother ... Earth

By Tara Lohan, AlterNet. Posted December 17, 2008.

• Of 30 commonly used lawn pesticides, 17 are detected in groundwater, 23 have the ability to leach into drinking water sources, 24 are toxic to fish and other aquatic organisms vital to our ecosystem, 11 are toxic to bees and 16 are toxic to birds. (National Coalition for Pesticide-Free Lawns)
• Homeowners use up to 10 times more chemical pesticides per acre on their lawns than farmers use on crops. (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
• North Americans now devote 40,000 square miles to lawns, more than we use for wheat, corn or even tobacco. (The Lawn: North America's Magnificent Obsession by Robert Fulford)
• Americans spend $750 million a year on grass seed alone and more than $25 billion on do-it-yourself lawn and garden care. (From the exhibit at CCA, "The American Lawn: Surface of Everyday Life")

You can find great resources and photos about edible estates on their Web site.

7. Join Forces with Community Members

If you don't have a lawn or yard of your own, fear not -- there are 10,000 community gardens in the United States that you can join. And if you can't find one in your area, then consider teaming up with your neighbors to start your own.  It has great "environmental, economic and social impacts on a neighborhood," as Urban Community Gardens points out.

Not only are people in communities getting together to grow food, but there are also tool-sharing networks cropping up, as well, that help people share the cost of owning tools that can be used for gardening or home improvements. Need help getting those new solar panels up? Consider asking your neighbors and working to form a tool collective.

8. Re-energize Your Home

The most popular residential renewable energy option right now is solar, although you can find other renewable energy options, here. More than 10,000 homes in the United States are completely powered by solar, and 200,000 use some type of photovoltaic solar technology.

One of the best places to use solar energy in the home is for heating water. Solar Development points out:

• The United States spends more than $13 billion a year on energy for home water heating. That is the equivalent of 11.4 barrels of oil per household, more than the amount of oil burned by a medium-sized automobile driven 12,000 miles.
• Of all of the major types of water-heating systems, solar energy systems offer the biggest potential savings to homeowners -- with owners saving 85 percent on their utility bills over the costs of electric water heating.

Realistically, not everyone can afford to buy solar systems for their homes, although the long-term savings usually outweigh the up-front costs. And of course, many people are renters and can't put capital investments into the place where they live. So how else can we save energy, and as a result, also money and water?

Here's a few ideas from Flex Your Power:

• Enable "power management" on all computers and make sure to turn them off at night. A laptop computer uses up to 90 percent less energy than bigger desktop models.
• When possible, wash clothes in cold water. About 90 percent of the energy use in a clothes washer goes to water heating.
• Turn your water heater down to 120 degrees or the "Normal" setting when home, and to the lowest setting when away. Water heating accounts for about 13 percent of home energy costs.
• Test for air leaks by holding a lit incense stick next to windows, doors, electrical boxes, plumbing fixtures, electrical outlets, ceiling fixtures, attic hatches and other locations where there is a possible air path to the outside. If the smoke stream travels horizontally, you have located an air leak that may need caulking, sealing or weather stripping.
• Add weather stripping around windows and doors to reduce drafts.
• Unplug electronics, battery chargers and other equipment when not in use. Taken together, these small items can use as much power as your refrigerator.

There are also a bunch of great resources to do a home energy audit. And if you're curious whether your home is powered by coal that comes from the destructive practice of mountaintop removal mining, then you can check this easy link at I Love Mountains to find out. 

See more stories tagged with: environment, energy, water, global warming, climate change, consumption

Tara Lohan is a managing editor at AlterNet.

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