How To Have A Green Christmas While Protecting The Earth

The holidays are a great time of year. They are a time to celebrate, care, and give back. However, they also bring about a burden on the environment: tons of extra garbage, millions of chopped-down trees, megawatts of flashing lights, and all the discarded batteries that will be used for toys then thrown away. According to the EPA, about 40% of all battery sales occur during the holiday season. Discarded batteries are an environmental hazard.

 With a little creative thinking, we can all do our part to reduce the environmental impact of the holiday season. Here are some ideas to help celebrate an eco-friendly Christmas while caring for our planet. 

 Buy Less

 Not all gifts need to be store bought. You can give sustainable gifts that dont take from our planet. I like giving services instead of giving goods. Gifts of service require little if any use of natural resources. The gift of your time, energy, and expertise is just as valuable as anything that comes in a box. Cooking a friend dinner, offering babysitting services, dog walking services, or teaching a skill.  You can also donate as a gift. Check out the organization charity: water which allows you to give the gift of clean drinking water to 1 person in the developing world as a donated Christmas gift.

Buy Smart Think Green 

Look for locally made gifts - many gifts in today's marketplace come from halfway around the world, and the impact of transportation contributes significantly to greenhouse emissions and global warming. Local craft fairs and artisan shops are a good source for gifts that come without the added costs of transportation.

Choose gifts made from recycled sources - many individuals and small businesses have developed great products using recycled materials. Supporting these businesses helps reduce the waste stream while promoting the concept of making best use of available materials. 

Reduce Lighting

Reduce the size of indoor and outdoor lighting displays -  Electricity  drains our natural resources. When you cut down on electricity, not only will you be saving on your electric bill, you will be helping to save our planet as well.  

Use LED lights for house and Christmas tree lighting - LED (Light Emitting Diode) holiday lights use up to 95% less energy than larger, traditional holiday bulbs and last up to 100,000 hours when used indoors

Turn lights off at bedtime - Leaving lights on is a waste of energy 

Choose A Live Tree

 Today nearly all of the trees sold at seasonal Christmas-tree lots are grown on tree farms. So forests aren't hurt by choosing a cut tree. And while plastic ( artificial ) trees seem like they would be more environmentally friendly since they are re-usable year after year, real trees are a more sustainable choice.  Plastic trees are made of petroleum products (PVC), and use up resources in both the manufacture and shipping. When artificial trees are discarded they are sent to landfills, where their plastic content makes them last forever!

Re-Cycle Holiday Gift Wrap and Other Ideas Eco- Friendly Ideas for Gift Wrapping 

In the US, the annual trash from gift wrap and shopping bags totals over 4 million tons. If we all did our part and wrapped just three gifts in reused paper or fabric gift bags, it would save enough paper to cover 45,000 hockey rinks.

Use environmentally friendly wrapping paper made using fibers such as hemp. Look for paper using recycled content. 
Avoid buying glossy foil or metallic wrapping paper - this kind of material is difficult to recycle.
Reuse gift wrap where possible - large wrapped presents usually have large enough uncreased sections to be reused for wrapping small gifts.
Reuse grocery bags such as Trader Joes or WholeFoods for gift paper and tie with green or red corded rope.