From Guest Blogger Jon Wikstrom: Five Eco-Friendly Technologies You Need in Your Life

People around the world are becoming more conscious of our effect on the environment than ever before. Technology has changed the world in many ways and has made a lot of things easier for us. It was only natural that sooner or later some technology would develop enough to aid us in saving the environment.

There are a lot of simple applications and technologies that can help us become more eco-friendly simply by reducing your material and energy consumption. If you have decided to adopt a greener lifestyle this year, here’s a few ways that can help you do just that.

1. Going Paperless

The internet has almost completely transformed our workspaces. A lot of companies in the country have been adopting paperless office policies to save on costs of paper and the harm it does to the environment. Online applications such as Dropbox and Google Drive, not to mention a host of cloud-based storage and productivity applications, have made all this possible.

You can also adopt the same policy at home – you’ll be happy with the clutter you can cut out from your home while saving the ecosystem. Here are a few tips you can use in your own life:

• Consider purchasing an e-reader and downloading books instead of buying the paper version.
• Use small handheld scanners to scan important documents and save them on the internet to access in an organized way whenever you need them.
• Tell all of your banks, credit cards and utility companies that you want to go paperless and they’ll send you all statements and bills in e-mail form.
• Write to-do lists on the notes app on your phone.
• Subscribe to the online versions of newspapers and magazines.
• Use sites like DMA Choice to opt out of receiving junk mail.
• Recycle all paper products that you get rid of.

2. Green Dry Cleaning

Dry cleaning has always used a number of chemicals which are known carcinogens and harmful to the environment. The traditional method of dry cleaning has always been dangerous for our ecosystem, but it’s just been one of those things that’s been accepted. Over the past few years, however, a new method of dry cleaning has been developed which promises to change this.

The modern, more eco-friendly method for dry cleaning involves the use of recycled carbon dioxide. CO₂ is a naturally occurring element and is highly effective at cleaning garments with the same amount of precision and thoroughness as traditional dry cleaning.

To further lessen the burden on the environment, the CO₂ gas used in this sort of dry cleaning is directly sourced from industrial waste, which would otherwise have been released directly into the environment, so it’s a 2-pronged benefit to Mother Nature. Look for eco-friendly dry cleaners that use CO₂ cleaning machines – if you live in a city, you almost certainly have one near you.

3. LED Bulbs

Incandescent bulbs were almost everywhere just a few years ago. But if you notice, they have been slowly and steadily disappearing from our streets and homes. This is because of the development of alternatives to the bulb, which are designed to be more environmentally friendly.

For a while compact fluorescent lights were being used to replace traditional light bulbs, but Light Emitting Diodes or LEDs have been getting more popular over the past few years. LED lights are similar to the ones you find in your TV screen. They tend to cost more upfront but are many times more energy efficient than other sorts of bulbs. They also tend to last many times longer than the others, meaning you’ll have to replace them a lot less frequently, so fewer will find their way to landfills. Save the environment while cutting down on your energy bills by replacing your bulbs with LED ones instead.

4. Smart Homes

Computer technology has developed so rapidly that the smartphone in your hand is capable of more than some of the computers used in NASA’s space missions in the 60’s. They have gotten a lot smaller and more powerful over the years and this has allowed us to use the technology to convert our homes into smart homes. Nearly every object in your home can now be turned into a mini computer with the sole purpose of tracking consumption and reducing usage. Smart thermostats and fire alarms have been finding their way into local electrical stores and a lot of architects are building fully integrated smart homes from the ground-up.

Nest is one company that is changing the way people heat and cool their homes. The smart thermostat learns your habits and adjusts itself to reduce your energy use and your bill. So, even if building a new green home is not on your agenda any time soon, you can adopt some tech based home appliances which can help you consume less and save the environment.

5. Eco-Friendly Wall Chargers

Wall chargers are designed in a way that they continue to draw energy from the wall socket even when they are not being used to charge anything. Take a second to think about all of the electronics you have plugged in all the time and consider that they are all using energy 24/7. This blatant waste of electricity is an unfortunate side effect of bad design.

A few designers have been working on a more eco-friendly wall charger to help change this. Osungo’s Mushroom GreenZero is one such wall charger which automatically switches itself off when not being used. Considering the number of devices the average household has, this innovative product could go a long way to dramatically decreasing our energy usage.

This list of eco-friendly technology is, in no way, complete, especially considering the fact that new developments are being made every single day. In fact, it’s fair to say that in a decade we may be living very differently than we are today.

As the realities of climate change and unrenewable resources becomes more and more clear, we will continue to change the way we live in order to lessen our impact on the environment.

About the Author: Jon Wikstrom is the founder of Cool Clean Technologies, an eco-friendly company that designs custom systems that use dry CO₂ cleaning technology in industries like manufacturing, aerospace and medical equipment. He frequently appears as a guest blogger on a variety of environmental and technology sites and enjoys sharing his passion for green tech whenever he can. Click here for more.