Source:  Treehugger 

The most important thing is to let your voice be heard. You can start a conversation within your community by giving your opinion in a popular piece of media. People will naturally show their opinions. Who knows, you might even create new talk around the water cooler that day!

Submitting your comments is now easier than ever - and paper-free. Once you have figured out which publication you would like to write to, search on their website for "letters to the editor" or the Opinion section.

They will most likely impose rules for your piece. The NY Times limits letters to 150 words that are in reference to an article written within the last week, and the letter must be sent only to the Times, and no other publication. Open letters are not permitted. They must also include your mailing address and phone number. Oh, and they might edit it as they choose. A lot of rules, yes, but a great forum nonetheless.

Save Our Environment Action Center agrees - they encourage people to write letters to the editor because politicians often monitor these letters as if they represent the voice of the people. They've even set up an interesting format: you pick your topic and zip code, and they will provide you a template from which you can write your letter. Check it out.

This Tip o' the Day was recommended to me by my rockin' peer here at Green Options, Megan Prusynski.

Editor's note: For more details on writing a good letter to the editor, check out this previous post, too… 

Even though newspapers are seeing a decline in revenue and may be cutting back on their print runs, newsprint is still alive and kicking. According to the Green Press Initiative Americans go through 9.2 million tons of newsprint per year. Of that amount only 32% is made from recycled material, which leaves 6 million tons of new trees needed for newspapers. Only 69% of newspapers actually get recycled.

Most large newspapers have online editions, but even if you're not in a major metropolitan area, check to see if your local paper has gone virtual. Or as Shea has suggested, you can build your own personal newspaper with RSS feeds from your favorite news sources. One advantage to this is news is updated throughout the day online, so you're always getting up to date information.

If you're printing out articles to read on the go make sure to use the 'print article' feature if available. It will format the article appropriately to get more text on one page. If you just want to save an article for later either book mark the permalink or copy and paste the text (including all pertinent publishing info) into a word document and save it to your computer that way. Plus there's always the online archives if you want to refer back to the article at a later date.

But if you still can't let go of your daily subscription (my mom certainly won't) be sure to recycle.

Amy says: I'll admit, I do enjoy getting my fingers dirty and flipping through the newsprint at my neighborhood cafe. However, instead of purchasing a new one, I'll first check to see if I can snag someone else's they've already finished.