BioBag makes a range of bio-degradable, compostable plastic bags from corn. Bags that you can use for your kitchen waste, cleaning up after your pets or even storing your vegetables in the fridge since they breathe without leaking.

Supermarket Bags
If you own a store that uses plastic shopping bags, why not switch to BioBag shopping bags? You’ll be able to do something good for the environment, without needing to persuade your customers to change their habits! If you work for a store, try suggesting to your employer that they switch to these greener bags.

Composting System
In addition to making compostable bags, BioBags also has a solution to help make composting your organic kitchen waste a little easier, and odour free.

[Via The Daily Green]

So, you’ve heard the buzz about switching to CFL to reduce your energy consumption, and in doing so help the environment and save you some money on your electricity bill. You might even have seen some of the funny coiled bulbs in stores.

But how do you know which ones to get to replace your existing incandescent bulbs?

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Anybody who’s been following the US election news recently will have heard about McCain’s mocking of an answer Obama gave to a question in one of his campaign stops about saving fuel. Then he half-retracted it.

The truth of the discussion is that ensuring your tires (or tyres, for those English speakers outside the US) are correctly inflated does indeed help to maintain the efficiency. Having a handy little pressure gauge in your glove box and using it regularly will help keep your car running efficiently.

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Plenty Magazine answers the question about how to recycle plastic store gift cards once they’re used. Before answering that question though, let’s have a look at what the cards are made of.

A few companies are using cards made of a corn-based material called Mirel, from Metabolix. These cards are actually biodegradable, so when they’re all used up just throw them in your green composting bin! Major retailers using this include Target, REI, Borders and Wal*Mart. Hopefully others will join this list and use bio-degradable plastics (it would be nice to see banks doing the same with their cards too).

Unfortunately, most of the plastic cards out there are made of PVC (polyvinyl chloride) a toxic chemical that is not usually accepted in your recycling bin. They’re pretty small though, so throwing them in the garbage can’t cause much harm can it? Well, you’re right, individually each card is pretty small, but there’s a lot of them out there. Each year 75 million pounds of PVC finds its way into US landfills. That’s a lot of PVC, so read on after the jump to find out what you can do to avoid adding to that mountain of toxic waste.

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Here’s a handy green tip for the kitchen that everybody can do, and better still it saves money! Rather than buying plastic storage containers for keeping left overs, or partially used raw ingredients, keep plastic containers that food comes in, wash them out and reuse them. Everything from the little 6oz shredded cheese container shown in the photo to containers for yoghurt, fresh simmer sauces and other fresh goodies can be reused.

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It goes by a number of names, but essentially what we’re talking about here is power consumed by devices while they’re switched off. How can devices use power when they’re switched off? Well, most modern devices, especially those with remote controls, don’t really switch off - they just go to sleep or stop displaying anything. But they’re still on really - waiting for you to press that “power” button on the remote.

In some countries the outlets have individual switches, making it simple to really switch off equipment. For countries where this is not the case, think about using a simple power strip with a switch on it as a way to avoid having to keep unplugging things.

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A good lawn is green, but what about the lawn care products that you use to keep it looking great? Here’s a round up of a few products that can help to make your lawn care as green as your lawn.

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Here’s a really simple way you can make a difference: next time you go shopping, take reusable bags with you instead of using those free plastic bags that the supermarkets hand out (normally in pairs). If you forget the bags, you can still avoid the plastic in many places by asking for paper bags (just remember to reuse or recycle them - I use them for my kitchen food scraps and then throw the whole thing into the composting bin).

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Here’s a cool idea for those who use internet search regularly (and we all do, don’t we?). Switch to Ecocho. For every 1000 searches performed, these guys, based in Sydney, Australia, will plant two trees.

The search results are from Yahoo, so you know you’ll be getting high quality results still, but you’ll also be helping the environment. According to their site, they’ll be able to remove 1 ton of CO2 for every 1000 searches performed, and the whole thing is audited by KPMG.

That’s a really simple way that everybody can help make a difference. And all you need to do is change that little search box in the top right corner of your browser to use ecocho.com instead of your current search engine.

A simple change that everybody can make around their house is to change some of those old incandescent light bulbs into new, energy efficient ones. That not only helps the planet, but it will reduce the household electricity bill too. But how much difference does it make, and which option should I choose?

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