A Green Irene Garden

Planting a Garden

Mary, Mary might have been quite contrary, but she knew before the Obamas did that a garden provides many benefits. Growing and cultivating your own garden grants you the ability to grow your own food while teaching you the invaluable lesson of how nature works right in your own backyard. Kids and adults alike love to observe the fruits and vegetables of their labors. Whether your garden is a fully-stocked organic vegetable patch or simply a few peppers and tomatoes in containers, gardening educates children about where their food comes from–that is, not from the store. I had the pleasure of planting a garden with my children this past weekend.  My son, who usually is loathe to lift a hand if something smells of work, declared that it was the most enjoyable activity he did all weekend, and has even volunteered to care for it from now on.

No Little Red Hens Here!

Before you plant, talk with your family about the produce that you might want to grow and eat.  How about a pizza garden, featuring tomatoes, basil, oregano, and onions? Or perhaps a Mexican fiesta patch of green tomatoes, cilantro, and jalapenos? Your kids would love a “Ratatouille” garden of tomatoes, squash, eggplant, zucchini, and rosemary. Involve your kids in planning, planting, tending and cooking, and you will be able to experience a complete journey from garden to plate. A side benefit for parents include lower grocery bills, as well as the chance that your child actually will be willing to eat (or at least try) a few vegetables.

Gardening Tips

– Water early in the morning or in the late evening to maximize water absorption.

- Consider a rain barrel.

- Keep it organic and weed by hand.

- Sprinkle coffee ground on your garden to enrich the soil

- Determine if you really need to water your lawn with Green Irene’s Soil Moisture Probe, shown at left, or Rain Gauge, shown at the right.

These items are available through ShopGreenIrene.

Don’t have enough room for a bed? Try a few pots. Other options for obtaining fresh produce and seeds include shopping your local farmers’ market, joining a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture), or spending a few weekend mornings at a “you-pick” farm that lets you pick food yourself-who can resist delicious local berries? Another idea is to take advantage of community gardens offered by some local YMCAs and parks & recreation departments.

The benefits of growing your own food are bountiful, from saving money to the assurance that your food is safe to eat. Summer is the perfect time to start a garden, so start planting today!

Ellen Hall

Lebanon, OH Green Irene

ellen.cincydayton@greenirene.com

513-932-7304

http://www.greenirene.com/CincyDaytonEllen

What Happens to Water Going Down the Drain

Commentary: Green Irene‘s Water Conservation Kit can help you reduce water use immediately and save money at the same time. The Kit includes a calculator that will tell you exactly how much you will save from installing low-flow showerheads, aerators, and taking other water conservation techniques. In addition, you can get a Green Home Makeover to learn about additional steps that will get you on the path of going green. Act right away! Find your Local Eco-Consultant and Go GREEN today!

Last week, peer-to-peer network CurrentTV invited us to participate in their Earth Week special, where they asked their readers to pose their most burning eco-questions to a handful of savvy bloggers. We’ve been thinking a lot about the state of the world’s water lately, so this question stood out to us:

It’s always considered a major no-no to waste water. But how is water used in a household wasted? Isn’t it all just processed and reused?

I understand that there is energy spent in processing and there are possible chemical issues in the cleaning process but I’m really just interested in the whole concept of “wasting water”.

What percentage of water that goes down the drain is actually lost forever?

– Jakebot

Great question, Jake. We want to answer this question for you in two parts: simple and not so simple. First, the simple answer to your question is zero. Zero percent of water that goes down the drain is actually lost forever because, according to the law of conservation of mass, matter cannot be created or destroyed.

But what you want to know, then, is, ‘why is wasting water is such a big no-no?’ The answer to that is cost and location. In the United States, most people get their water from wells or from municipal systems. Once they’ve used it, most people send their “waste” water down the drain to either the wastewater treatment plant or to a septic system. It is costly — in terms of both money and energy — to transport water from its source to our houses, and to treat it once it leaves our houses.

Location is a big deal when it comes to water. If you live in Seattle, like we do, it’s plentiful enough that we don’t need to worry too much about wasting it because there is always enough for all of us to use as we please. But in most places, water still goes through a natural cycle — either evaporating or soaking into the ground — before being taken back into the municipal system. So in cities that suffer from drought, there is not enough water in the public system for everyone to use all they want, all the time, and it becomes even more apparent why sourcing water from a reservoir many miles from your home, and flushing it to a location just as far away, is a massive dedication of resources for a system that could be handled more locally.

The costs of operating these systems are growing every year. As Carol Steinfeld, author and founder of Ecovita told us (we asked for her input to help answer your question), “we have more people on the planet, each using more and more water, than ever before in human history.” So, to provide the basic human right of clean water for all, it becomes imperative that we get more efficient at using our water. When you think about it that way, it seems very wasteful to use clean drinking water to wash our cars water plants, or spray the sidewalks — when water re-used once, twice or even three times from relatively clean places like the shower, the sink or the washing machine, would work just as well without requiring nearly as much energy.

Making our water systems more efficient means we need to implement some of our more innovative solutions to reusing and treating our water at the source, such as the super-treatment facilities in San Diego, home rainbarrels, or even Steinfeld’s waterless toilets. If we can get better at cutting the external cost of providing clean water — treatment and transport — then we can build a system where water isn’t waste, but a resource.

Excerpted from Worldchanging.

Saving Energy and Water Made Easy

Blue is the next green! You’ve probably heard it before and may be wondering what it means. With an increasing human population, global warming, and increasing demands per person, water shortages are gradually becoming more extreme as our water resources dwindle. Less than 1% of the world’s total water supply is available for human consumption, but most of it is polluted, unusable, or dedicated to such heavy users as agriculture and industry.

Here in Maryland, we LOVE the Chesapeake Bay. It provides us with tremendous natural beauty, abundant opportunity for recreation, and of course delicious regional food (crabcakes anyone?). But our beloved bay is threatened on many fronts, one of which is contamination from overloaded sewage treatment plants and outdated septic systems. The more water we waste, the more chemicals and nutrients flow into the bay, and the more local tax dollars need to be spent trying to repair the damage.

With this and the prospect of dwindling water supplies in mind, it is becoming ever more important to conserve water. As your local Green Irene Eco-Consultant, I can help you determine how you can conserve water in your home. Using the Green Irene Water Conservation Kit, you can save thousands of gallons of water per year in your home, which also helps reduce your energy bill in addition to reducing your footprint. The Kit includes a 1.5 gallon per minute (gpm) kitchen sink aerator, a 0.5 gpm bathroom sink aerator, a toilet fill cycle diverter, and other items that will help you save water and money.

For example, if you heat water with electricity purchased from our local utility, your electricity rate is approximately $0.12/kwh (and likely to increase!). If your water rate per thousand gallons is $7.68 ($2.32 incoming plus $4.08 outgoing plus 20% environmental protection charges), and you purchase and install the $133 bath kit, your family can save nearly $6,000 over the lifetime of the kit, which is about 7 years. Your investment would pay for itself in less than 2 months, and if electric or water rates increase, your savings would be quickly amplified. The Green Irene Water Conservation Kit will help you reduce your water use at home by using less without sacrificing lifestyle.

I can help you to determine your water consumption and find out how much you can save. Just ask me — your local Green Irene! I would be more than happy to help you make blue the next green!

Contact Terri Rafiq, Independent Authorized Green Irene Eco-Consultant

http://www.GreenIrene.com/1028; 443-454-0732; terri.annapolis@greenirene.com