Get your green service or business listed free on the Helderberg Basin Green Directory
The Helderberg Basin Green Directory
The Green Times is published by Elna Pollard http://www.thegreentimes.co.za/
Thermoshield Coatings is an energy saving roof coating http://www.thermoshield.co.za/
Water Rhapsody is a water savings company in Somerset West http://www.waterfriendly.co.za/
SolarTech is a supplier of solar heating systems in Somerset West: www.solargeysers-sa.co.za/
Solar Select in Somerset West solar and energy saving solutions see http://www.solarselect.co.za/
Green Building "Love and Mortar" Home Channel DSTV: http://www.loveandmortar.tv/index.html
Bottle Craft
The simple concept of creating artistic artifacts from discarded bottles results in a multitude of positive benefits to the community! Bottles no longer become a litter issue! The unemployed can generate income from collection and creation! Small Business and Welfare Organisations can utilise this profitable idea for entrepreneurial growth and significant fund raising!
Ten Things You Can Do for Greener Living
1. Don't Drink Bottled Water
Fill up your body, not the landfill. In South Africa, 85 000 tonnes of PET bottles are produced every year, while only around 7 000 tonnes are recycled. Drink straight tap water, or boil and filter it if you have any concerns. Don’t just worry about your body, worry about the planet it lives in too.
2. Buy Local Produce
Do this by buying locally produced food. Supermarket produce travels as far as 10 000km, so it’s less fresh and requires more fuel to transport. Visit your local Farmer’s Market, it’s a fun morning out!
3. Buy Fair-Trade coffee
Or any other java brewed from beans certified as grown on sustainable farms. These farms work to protect the world’s pharmacy, the Brazilian rainforest, for medicinal plants awaiting discovery.
4. Use a Map or GPS
Know where you’re going and you’ll save on fuel and frustration. While you’re at it, avoid right turns. Idling in traffic produces twenty times more pollution than if you hooked a few lefts.
5. Don't buy beverages in cans
It takes about twice as much energy to make an aluminium can as it does to produce a glass bottle of equal size. And no matter what kinds of cans they develop, bottled beer always tastes better.
6. Exercise in the morning
You’ll eliminate the extra shower after a midday or evening workout, saving water and time. Plus, air-pollution levels are lowest in the early morning, so you’ll fill your lungs with oxygen, not ozone.
7. Use a shampoo-conditioner combo
If 10 percent of us skipped the separate conditioner, the plastic saved would cover twenty-one football fields. The shorter shower also helps your skin retain more moisture.
8. Dispose of disposable razors
Ninety-nine cents buys you a scraped face and a hunk of metal and plastic that can’t be recycled and isn’t biodegradable. Better: Refillable razors. Best: Safety razors - you get a great shave and recyclable blades.
9. Be water-wise
Always check that you have turned taps off properly: a dripping tap loses about two drops a second, which over a hundred litres a week. Fit water-saving devices to toilet cisterns and water-saving taps. And if you have a dishwasher, use it sparingly: half-loaded machines use more than half the water of a full load.
10. Bike it
Fifty percent of the planets air pollution comes from cars. Most journeys are still less than 4km. There is no more important issue that we have to face together. It’s amazing that we have yet to understand the severity of the oil world and pollution situation. Give it up. Get a bike.
