What Can You Do To Make Your Home Eco-Friendly?

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Living an eco-friendly life is all the rage nowadays, but there’s still so much more that we can do to help save the planet and reduce our waste output. It’s all well and good remembering to put out the recycling every week and making sure to finish off the leftovers even though you’re craving pizza much more, but this isn’t enough. 

If you want to create a more eco-friendly home for you and your family, then here is some advice on which areas to focus on. Some of them are things you might already do, so well done to you! Others, though, could be solutions you’ve not yet considered.

Whether you’re an experienced eco-friendly ally or someone trying to be more conscious about how they live, all the answers are right here. 

 

Start Getting Serious About Water
Water is life, and it’s predicted that by 2050 we will lose as much as 80% of the planet’s natural groundwater sources, which is why one of the first things you should do is start doing everything you can to stop wasting water. 

The quickest way to do this is by filling a basin with water when washing the dishes instead of letting the faucet run. Likewise, when cleaning your teeth, switch the tap off until you need to rinse your brush. You can also use a bucket to catch water in the shower while waiting for it to warm up. 

If possible, you can also invest in poly water tanks to catch rainwater and use it as an alternative to being part of the water grid. This will both help you save water and save you money, which you can put towards other lifestyle alterations in your quest for a more eco-friendly existence. 

 

Grow Your Own Food
Food waste is a massive problem, and it’s estimated that over 1.3 billion tonnes of food is thrown away every year, whether it is rotten or just not wanted. When purchasing food from the supermarket or eating out, this is something that happens. Food goes out of date, and you can’t finish your meal. But you can change these habits to treat the planet better. 

Learning to grow your own food in a greenhouse or your backyard if the weather allows it is another way you can live a more eco-friendly life. You will be able to cut back of wasted food and plastic packaging (although hopefully, that will become a thing of the past soon, anyway). 

Just like collecting water, your wallet will also feel full, which spells good news for your finances and the future. 

 

Renewable Energy
Investing in renewable energy is another fantastic way you can do your part to save the planet. Getting off the grid and using solar panels to provide power to your home will give you a reliable reserve of energy that you can use to power appliances, use your TV and keep the lights on. You can also ensure the power stretches further by using energy-efficient appliances and accessories to reduce using too much. 

Renewable energy is precisely what the name suggests. Instead of it being wasted and lost through emissions, it returns to the source so that other customers can use it again and again. They always say that sharing is caring, and when it comes to renewable energy sources, this will help benefit everybody. 

 

Track Your Energy Usage
If you’re unable to install solar panels or similarly eco-friendly energy sources, tracking your energy usage is a great alternative. You can do this by using smart meters or, if you’re not comfortable with these, you can look at how much energy you use by manually checking the meters every week or so, although this may not give you such exact results. 

By tracking your energy usage, you can identify the times where you use too much and make changes to your household lifestyle to reduce energy consumption and costs. If you find you leave your phone or laptop plugged in even when it’s fully charged, it’s time to change these habits. Likewise, you might leave the heating on all night, but this is often unnecessary. 

 

Reuse and Repurpose
Finding our clothes are filled with holes or torn is something we’ve all experienced, and the immediate response is to throw them out and head to the store to purchase a new pair of jeans or sweaters. However, because so many people do this, it creates an avalanche of old, entirely fixable clothes ending up in the landfill every year. 

If you want to be more eco-friendly, it’s worth stopping yourself before throwing your clothes out and considering what else you can do with them. If the tears are small, then repair them, if you can’t fix them, then consider whether you can repurpose them. 

The same goes for curtains, table cloths, throws, and sheets. Just because they are slightly damaged doesn’t mean you should discard then so readily, but instead, get creative. Transform them into jackets, dresses, ties, or of course, donate them to a local cause. 

 

Get Professional Advice
Because every home is different, you can’t be sure that every solution will work perfectly for your house. To get the best ideas of what you can do to make your home more eco-friendly is to work with sustainability consultants.

These consultants are experts in the sustainability field, and they have seen it all so they can take a look at your home and provide advice about which are the best avenues to explore. They can analyze your home and uncover any areas that could negatively affect the sustainability of your home.

You are not expected to know everything, so don’t be3 afraid to reach out for advice from those who have a more excellent knowledge of the industry. 

 

An Eco-Friendly Home
Shifting your habits from the old towards a new and eco-friendly may take some time, and you’re not expected to make a significant shift all at once. However, if you take small steps and focus on one area at a time, you’ll soon manage to live a more efficient and eco-friendly lifestyle that will quickly become natural, and the planet will thank you for it.