Your dishwasher is spic and span, and it’s starting to make your cluttered refrigerator look a little bit…well…gross. Don’t despair! We’ve got you covered with some Earth-friendly fridge-cleaning tips. Not only does cleaning out the fridge keep things sanitary, you can do your part to make it more energy efficient!

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Australian researchers have figured out a cool new way to tackle the threat of global warming, by setting up a network of ‘talking’ fridges.

But wait, the idea isn’t as crazy as it might sound. The fridges feature cutting-edge technology enabling them to communicate with each other via a network to share and store energy from renewable energy sources such as solar panels or wind turbines.

According to inventor, Sam West, “The fridges are designed to talk to each other, negotiating when it’s a good time to consume electricity and when it’s better not to.”

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Live in the UK? You may be the lucky recipient of a free “intelligent” refrigerator. 3,000 fridges that adapt power usage based on the demands of the electrical grid will be given away by the government next year. According to a report from the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change, the dynamic demand fridges could potentially save 2 million tons of carbon each year and £222m.

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Ice cream lovers of the United States, rejoice. Greenpeace and Ben & Jerry’s have teamed up to bring the first climate-safe ice cream freezer to the USA. The Greenfreeze refrigerator eliminates the use of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), an extremely potent greenhouse gas that has 1,400 times the global warming impact of CO2.

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Via:  The Guardian

The idea was great, it operated without electricity, using ammonia, butane and water.  The principle being that water boils at a much lower temperature at high altitudes where air pressure is lower than it does when you’re at sea level, where air pressure is higher.

Malcom McCulloch, an electrical engineer at Oxford University in the U.K., is leading a team in a three year project to produce appliances that can be used in places without electricity.  Or, for that matter, places with electricity, why not?.  That’s when McCulloch latched on to Einstein’s fridge idea.

Einstein’s concept, shown in the image above, works thusly.  At one side is the evaporator, a flask that contains butane. “If you introduce a new vapor above the butane, the liquid boiling temperature decreases and, as it boils off, it takes energy from the surroundings to do so,’ says McCulloch. ‘That’s what makes it cold.”

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So how old is your refrigerator?

More than five years? If your fridge is similar to most, it uses about 40% more electricity than the ENERGY STAR certified units being sold today. And given the fact that your fridge is one of a typical home's biggest energy gobblers, that adds up to a pretty good chunk of change each year.

Replacing your current refrigerator with a modern unit could save you upwards of $70 and reduce your home's annual carbon dioxide footprint by a thousand pounds a year. Given that the life cycle of a fridge is ten years or more, it makes sense to replace aging units whenever possible. But that's not always financially feasible.

If you're not ready to upgrade, there are some things you can do to improve the efficiency of your current model:

• Check your door seals. Put a piece of paper in the fridge door and see how easy it is to remove. If it slips right out, you know cold air is doing the same thing. A little silicone spray may renew the rubber sufficiently to improve things. Otherwise, check on the availability of replacement seals.
• Clean the coils on the back of your refrigerator once or twice a year. Dust build-up insulates the coils, making heat transfer less efficient. Vacuum whenever you notice a dust buildup. Be sure to unplug first.
• Relocate your refrigerator if it's in direct sunlight, beneath a heating duct, or next to your range or oven. The warmer your fridge's environment, the harder it must work to keep its contents cool.
• Be sure there's a few inches of clear space between the condenser coils and the wall. There should be similar space on the sides. Give the warm air coming off the coils somewhere to go.
• Set your thermostats to realistic levels. ENERGY STAR recommends 35 to 38 degrees Fahrenheit for the fridge, and 0 degrees for the freezer. It's worth checking these temperatures with a household thermometer.
• Keep the freezer defrosted. A quarter inch of frost is too much.
• A full freezer is a good thing for your refrigerator's efficiency. That's not the case in the cold section, however. Avoid overcrowding, and leave room for air circulation.
• Cover liquids stored in the fridge. Uncovered foods release moisture, making your fridge's compressor work harder.
• Quick in; quick out. The less you keep the refrigerator and freezer doors open, the less energy you'll use. Organize your fridge so things are easy to find. Label frozen goods for quick identification.
• You can improve an older refrigerator's efficiency by up to 10% by attaching one-inch foam sheeting to the sides. Too ugly? Do the side facing the wall and save 5%. Don't cover coils or electrical lines, and leave room against the wall for air circulation.

Cool off your fridge — and cool off your energy bills!

Copyright © 2007 Lighter Footstep Media

Always plugged in, it's one of those appliances that you can never shut off. That makes it even more important an item to make sure it is pulling as little electricity as possible.

In order to see if you are letting money flow right out the door of that refrigerator, you'll need to stick some money in that door. Close the fridge on a dollar bill. If the bill is held tight by the door, your seal is intact. If you can easily pull the money out, you need a tighter seal.

According to Money, fixing this can save you $15 a year. We say, the 15 bucks is great, but even better is not to throw all of that precious energy out the door.

Rebecca says: Do the test with a $100 bill and you'll feel like you're saving even more money. And yes, I did the test. And yes, our fridge passed with flying colors!

Money Magazine: Global Warming: What's in It for You