Earth Day was last week, and since then I’ve been thinking of all the things I can do or have already done to make my business more environmentally-friendly (and by extension, my home, since my office is part of that).

  1. I’ve switched to a carbon-neutral host for all of my websites, and will be recommending it to any future web clients. Not just because they’re an eco-friendly company, but because they have an amazing deal on hosting, have easy to use control panels, and are reliable.

  2. I use online fax (MyFax) and file sending services (YouSendIt) instead of wasting paper, disks, envelopes/tape, and transportation costs on communicating and sending files with my clients.

  3. I recycle the used ink cartridges from my printer. I use an HP printer, and the ink cartridges come with postage-paid little envelopes to send in used cartridges for recycling – very handy.

  4. I’m slowly switching over all of the light-bulbs in my house to CFL’s. My office and living room are already completely switched to these more energy efficient bulbs. The local HEB grocery here actually did a really cool thing and gave each customer one free CFL bulb on Earth Day. **update: ALL of the bulbs in my house are now CFL’s.

  5. Working from home most days means I don’t use my car all that often, which means I’m not using up fossil fuels or polluting the air as much as I would commuting to a normal job – another point for freelancing!

  6. All of the Pepsi cans that I go through get recycled. This is actually pretty major. I don’t drink coffee, so Pepsi is my caffeine source of choice. The cans pile up.

  7. The shower head in my bathroom is a low-flow model for water usage efficiency.

  8. My dishwasher is also set to the Energy Saver setting, instead of indulging in things like Heated Drying.

  9. I generally work with just the screen door open or maybe the ceiling fans going, instead of turning on my A/C. This gets harder to do as Austin reaches the upper 90’s and 100’s, but I keep it up for as long as comfortably possible.

  10. I’m OCD about turning lights off when I’m not using them, and unplugging things like phone and laptop chargers when I’m not using them.

  11. I’ve switched to paperless statements and bill notices for all of my various bank and business services accounts. This means they just email me my statement or the bill, and don’t waste paper and all that sending it through snail mail.

How about you? What are you doing to make your home or business (or home business) green?