Green Options

One of the big reasons that Christmas lights suck is because they are so fragile. They break if the wind blows, they break if you drop them, they break if you smash them against the neighbor’s house (who’s Christmas display really blows), and sometimes they don’t work when you pull them out of the attic.

You know those gnarly Christmas lights you have stashed away in the basement, closet or attic? Well, here’s 3 reasons to leave them there this year and replace them with LED string lighting:

1. LED Christmas lights are 80-99% more efficient than standard incandescent lights.

2. LED holiday lights are safer than incandescent lights. They operate at 1 degree above ambient room temperature and draw so little energy that risk of circuit overload.

Green Options writer Maria Surma Manka suggested this simple tip she heard on NPR: change the margins of the documents you print, and save lots of paper. Smaller margins means more text per page with less wasted white space. The idea is simple: by switching the margins from the default 1" or 1.25" to .75" or less, we would us 4.75% less paper. This may not seem much for

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The great outdoors and environmental sustainability have long gone hand in hand, and many outdoors-gear companies have been leaders in sustainable business practices. Patagonia, Keen, and Teko have been pioneers in producing gear that uses lower-impact materials (like organics) or recycled materials (like PET bottles). Now, outfitter super cooperative REI is getting into the act, incorporating more sustainable materials into their line of clothing.

"Our eco-sensitive offerings are the

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This November 7-9, Chicago will host the largest GreenBuild Expo in history. Put on by the USGBC (United States Green Building Council), this year over 18,000 attendees will gather to learn about the trends in green construction and get inspired about future projects. In a city aiming to be the greenest, this is a monumental event. On top of it all, GreenBuild will be held in one of

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Editor’s note: Please join us in welcoming Jason Phillip to the Green Options writing team! A freelance writer and editor based in Chicago, Jason will be focusing on the "green scene" in the Windy City for us. Mayor Richard Daly has committed to making Chicago the greenest city in the country, so we’re looking forward to Jason’s reports on these efforts.

My idea of sustainable fashion has always been making sure the clothing

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When Amy wrote about green magazines, she mentioned GOOD as being one of her favorites. I, too, a self-described magazine junkie, am a big fan of GOOD since it’s inception last year. With all the depressing news out there on any given day, GOOD always reaffirms my faith in humanity. Its focus is, like its name implies, good stuff: those things that are

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Although the progress in lighting technology has move slowly, there is a new and better option for holiday and Christmas string lighting: LED string lighting. LED string lighting is still relatively new to most consumers as it has only been widely available for a few years. LED string lighting is available in a wide variety of shapes, colors, sizes and qualities. This year if you decide to make the switch to LED Christmas or holiday string lights here are [...]

For all you suburban dwellers, alternative energy is finally finding its place in or on your home! Most commonly when we think of wind power, we think of industrial wind farms in the country. Well, wind power is again retreating in size, making it available for the most modest home.

Mariah Power of Reno, Nevada has developed a new efficient and attractive wind harvesting station called the Windspire that has a quite attractive profile

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Electronic waste is a big environmental issue, and we’ve covered numerous ways that both electronics companies and consumers can reduce the amount of e-waste headed for landfills. While most recent efforts focus on reuse and/or recycling (which are both important), Israeli site FixYa harnesses "crowd power" (ie, social media) to help people fix their electronics rather than disposing of them. The main motivation behind FixYa was the increasing lack

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Designer Scott Amron has created a catalogue of conceptual products designed to persuade people to use less energy, or at least think about how many things are plugged into sockets in their homes. The experiment is called "Die Electric," named after the insulating properties of a dielectric material. A dielectric is a substance that is highly resistant to the flow of an electric current. The experiment is about

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