Earth Day(s)

Now that Earth Day has passed, it is time to put it in context. There are plenty of people who don’t care about the environment and ignore the whole thing but for the ones that make an attempt, do you treat it like: Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and your Anniversary? One and done.

There are people who will say ‘no I try all year long’ but as Yoda would say ‘don’t try, do’. 🙂

I’ve always been pretty anal about recycling glass, plastic, aluminum cans, paper, cardboard for the blue box program but that was about it. Before we moved in 2011, our previous city (Markham, Ontario) also had a green bin (organic material) program too (I wish London, Ontario would implement a green bin program.).

Researchers claim that 50% of the food in North America gets wasted, so I’ve always tried to keep food waste to a minimum. Anything in the fridge older than 4-5 days, gets fed to the dogs. Its good for the environment and saves me money on dog food, especially when there are many mouths. 🙂

Lots of dogs!!! Those mouths love leftover food!! That picture was taken in our old house, so the dogs are much older now. And yes, that is a TV remote in my left hand!! The dogs and I watch TV together.

Note: The reason my arm is in the air is because my wife walked into the room and said for me to move my arm as she wanted a picture of the dogs on me!!

Our old house had mainly incandescent light bulbs and some CFL (Compact Fluorescent Light) light bulbs aka the twisty ones. Probably a 80-20% split (20% being CFL). When we moved in 2011, our new/current house probably had 65-35% split between incandescent and CFL light bulbs (35% for CFL).

	Incandescent light bulb (worst)
	CFL (Compact Fluorescent Light) light bulb (better)
	LED (Light-Emitting Diode) light bulb (best)

About 6-7 weeks, after we moved to our current house, I accidentally left my truck unlocked and someone ransacked it overnight but they got nothing because I really don’t have anything of value in my truck. Around 6 weeks later, my wife accidentally left her minivan unlocked and it was ransacked. My daughters (10 & 12) had left their wallets in the minivan which had some cash and several gift cards which were stolen. My wife had several gift card that were stolen too. All total, probably about $400 in cash and gift cards were stolen. My wife was mad as hell. She called the London police (London, Ontario) to report it but they said they don’t look into those crimes. They said to fill out a web form on the London police web site, “if you want to”. (Talk about making the crime statistics look good!) Oh course, that made her even madder. She said to me: I want a security camera for the front of the house and I want the outside front lights on all night.

Tyler (son #2) and I setup a PC with a USB video camera to record the front of the house. That was easy because I have lots of hardware hanging around. Our house has 5 flood lights at front that are on a timer. It was originally set for dusk to midnight. I changed it to dusk to dawn. So, that made my wife happy (except for the burglary of her minivan).

After a few weeks, I started to think about five 100 watt outside flood lights running all night long. This was just before Christmas which means we have 9 hours of daylight and 15 hours of darkness. So all night is really a long time. I started to do searches on energy consumption of light bulbs and that is when I came across LED (Light-Emitting Diode) light bulbs. I was shocked that they used roughly one-tenth the electricity of an incandescent light bulbs but they were really expensive in 2011.

We happened to be at Micro Center in Madison Heights, MI (my favorite store) and they had a sale on LED flood lights. I really don’t remember the wattage but I think they were 5 watts and were equivalent to 40 watts of an incandescent light bulb. They were less than $10 each, so I bought 5 of them and installed them when I got home. Of course, they weren’t as bright as the original flood lights but they were reasonably bright and did the job. I went from using 5 * 100 watts for 15 hours to using 5 * 5 watts (for 15 hours), now that’s a hell of a savings plus I’m actually being environmentally friendly.

This incident, of course, got me thinking. What about all the other light bulbs inside our house? I’ve never ever counted the light bulbs in our house. Have you ever count the light bulbs in your house? It is a whole lot of light bulbs, way more than I thought it had. We have 5 kids who are home-schooled and I work at home. There are lots of light bulbs being used. The following Spring, I discovered that the Province of Ontario has a program called Save on Energy. They run the program in the Spring and Fall where you get a coupons ($1, $2, $3, etc.) to use to purchase energy efficient light bulbs (they must have the Energy Star blue label on the package).

Back then, LED light bulbs were expensive, so if I was going to spend money on new LED light bulbs then I didn’t want to be wasting my money. After a bunch of research, CREE LED light bulbs were some of the best on the market. I decided to replace the light bulbs in the kitchen and family room (most used rooms). 4 Pot lights (flood) in each room. At the local Home Depot, back then I think the CREE BR30 LED 65 watt light bulbs were $17.99 each (or maybe $18.99). The CREE BR30 LEDs only uses 9.5 watts each. Amazing! The Save on Energy program had a coupon for $5.00 off (you were only allowed to buy 5 bulbs per purchase). So, I purchased 4 CREE BR30 LEDs and then went back and purchased 4 more. With tax, that was over hundred dollars for 8 light bulbs. Wow. Expensive. (At least after 6 years, they are still lighting the kitchen and family room.).

So, over the years, each Spring and Fall, I have purchased more CREE BR30 LED light bulbs – so many flood lights in this house. I think it was last Spring (or maybe Fall 2016), Canadian Tire had a sale on the Noma 3 pack 60 watt of A19 (standard bulb) plus Save on Energy had a coupon, so the end price was ONLY 99 cents. 3 LED light bulbs for 99 cents, now that is a price everyone can afford!!! Each Noma A19 LED bulb only uses 10 watts. Of course, when I checked the store stock, most stores were sold out (you needed to do the purchase in person to use the coupon). I happened to find one store that coincidentally my wife was near. I called and asked her to go and buy 5 of the 3 packs and told her to take 2 kids with her and have them each buy 5 of the 3 packs. She said ‘What? You want 45 light bulbs?’. I said yes, we have a ton of light bulbs in this house and at $15 for 45 LED light bulbs, I definitely want those LEDs. So, they bought them, brought them home and I spent an hour running around the house changing every light bulb we have. I had 3 left over when I was done!!!

Of course, everyone asks “what did you do with your old light bulbs?”. I put them in several plastic storage containers and put the containers on top of the cupboards in the utility room. The old lights bulbs still work and if/when we move, I’m taking all of my LED light bulbs with me. In total, I bought 25 CREE BR30 LED bulbs for inside of the house (and another 5 for outside), so I have spent a lot of money on them (even with the coupons). Hence, they are coming with me.

Is my electricity bill lower, yes it is. Is my environmental footprint lower because of ALL of the LED light bulbs, yes it is. This is NOT one day a year ‘thing’ but something that is done 365 days a year.

So, to my fellow “First World” people:
(1) recycle your glass, plastic, aluminum cans, paper, cardboard, etc.,
(2) manage your food waste (get a dog or 2 if you need to) and
(3) reduce your energy consumption which is REALLY easy if you switch all of your light bulbs to LED light bulbs.

Don’t be a ‘one and done’ person. Do it all year long. And as Yoda said ‘don’t try, do’.

Regards,
Roger Lacroix
Capitalware Inc.