The First Step Toward Off Grid Living

As energy costs continue to grow more expensive, off grid living becomes appealing to more and more people. It is now entirely possible to disconnect from the power grid and make all of your own energy. If you size the system appropriately, you can use solar panels or wind turbines to produce all of your own power. You can take at least your first step towards off grid living by producing some of your own power.

Let’s start by talking about solar power. Solar panels are a great option for supplying power to many homes and can work in all parts of the world, even in remote areas or places with a harsh environment. Some hardware and plenty of sun are the only requirements. For the do-it-yourselfer, the best guide to building a diy solar panel is GreenDIYEnergy. Solar power systems can be big or small and can even be portable to take in your RV. Solar panels are tough, require very little maintenance and can last up to 20 years if properly cared for.

Some number of solar panels wired together are primary part of any solar power system. Solar panels in the northern hemisphere should be facing directly south for the highest power output. With older solar panels, it was more important that they point directly at the sun and many solar power systems used motors to rotate the panels so they always pointed directly at the sun, however with more modern panels this is less important.With more modern solar panels, it is less important that they point directly at the sun, but older solar power systems often had motors to rotate the panels as the sun moved across the sky. With modern solar panels, as long as they are pointed due south and at the proper vertical angle, stationary panels will work almost as well as ones driven by motors. Another great resource for how to build a solar panel is Build your own Solar Panel.

Direct Current (DC) electricity is produced by solar cells and can be used to charge batteries to power any DC appliance. Electricity can be provided at night or when the sun isn’t shining by charging batteries during the day.

In order to provide power to standard AC appliances, you will need to use a power inverter. A power inverter can be used to do the DC to AC conversion on power coming from either the solar panels or from batteries.

Wind turbines can be mounted on a tower, a pole or sometimes even the roof of your house. They are very efficient and fairly small. If you want to generate power at night as well as during the day, wind turbines can do this which is an advantage over solar panels. As long as the wind is blowing, a wind turbine can produce electricity. For a great guide to building your own wind turbine, visit Earth4Energy Review

It is possible to combine both solar panels and a wind generator in one system. This can give the best of both worlds and the same batteries and power inverter can be used with both. If it is overcast and windy the wind turbine can generate power and if is it a sunny, calm day the solar panels will provide power.

For people wanting to live the off grid lifestyle, either of these systems can provide enough power. They will let you take your first step towards completely pulling the plug.

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7 Ways To Save The Planet

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

1. Reducing

We  need to find ways that aim at reducing our wasteful habits and by reusing items we use everyday rather than throwing them away, for the times ahead are troubling for our economy and have a huge impact on the environment in which we live on our planet. Greenhouse gases are being released into the atmosphere that are destroying our planet and heating it up.. Here are a few green solutions:

2. Reuse

Before you throw them away try to find uses for your items that may be misplaced. Plastic utensils that you may not use in the kitchen anymore that are not broken and safe to use may be just what your kids are looking for to put in their play kitchen or to use with their play-dough set.

 

3. Recycling

Try to recycle your oldtennis shoes. Large companies like Nike can recycle your old sneakers to use in various programs that use them to pave new playgrounds for children, making it a safe play area for your children. A quick search online will point you in the direction of ways to participate.

4. Composting

Composting bins are a great investment – Why throw out your vegetable scraps when you can make your own inexpensive, safe fertilizer? Homemade fertilizer will make your gardens grow abundantly, and your home grown fruit and vegetables will be much tastier and healthy as they have been fertilized with a natural substance, and are chemical free.

5. Old Clothing

A wonderful thing to do is to join in with your family and friends for a clothing exchange, or go on an excursion to your local goodwill store. By shopping at “thrift” stores you will be helping their organization and you never know what great buys you will find stashed. There seems to be no shortage of clothing items, in fact it would be a lifetime enough!  In addition, you could use old clothes that are unable to be donated as rags around the house for cleaning jobs, or donate them to an animal shelter, where the clothing will be used for a bed.

6. Trading Old Goods

There are a number of programs that are online now for the sole use of trading old and unwanted household items, sometimes these can be a real score if you know where to look. Look for ways to trade unwanted items. Post an ad in a trade classification paper or website, and trade your unwanted items that you may not want or need anymore with an item that you do require and save money at the same time.

 

7. Shopping Bags

Think about using reusable shopping bags with you when you go shopping, or even when you go shopping for clothes or household items. This will be a great way to conserve our resources and to save the planet. Plastic and paper bags are very environmentally unfriendly, and they contribute to the unnecessary filling of our shrinking landfills and can take a sometimes hundreds of years to breakdown. Although paper bags are mostly recycled themselves, a better solution would be to not have to use them at all.

If you find yourself still using these kinds of bags, make sure that you do your part and recycle BOTH you plastic and paper, as they are accepted in most recycling programs nowadays.

Save The Earth Today For The Future Tomorrow!

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Why There Are Few PlacesTo Buy Biodiesel

While researching biodiesel there are limited places to actually purchase the product. In most instances the product is pushed to be self made for self use. There are resources in which an individual interested in the product can find out where to buy biodiesel.

Change is not easy for anyone, some changes are unnecessary and are not needed. Changing is human nature but the probability of negative change to positive change is completely reversed. The only way to get the positive changes we need as a population is to bring the positive aspects into the light of the skeptical public eye.

There are number of supplies needed to produce home made biodiesel, and once the technique is shown to farmers and trucking companies the doubts of operational benefits will diminish greatly. Most companies and farmers cannot find the time to analyze the potential of the benefits on the economy, the human race, and the businesses which decide in favor of the use of biodiesel.

The government loves to hand benefits out to those undeserving souls which have chosen a free ride on tax payers money thus far. When the transition of the use of political distribution finances funnels into positive outcomes, the world can be saved.

There are some inexpensive home made ways to create the processors and procedures needed to produce biodiesel. The batches made can be extremely large, and can be sold very cheap to any individual that uses diesel fuel. The fumes from biodiesel are harmless to the air, therefore lessening the amount of carbon produced by current diesel fuel use. This product will greatly reduce the distinct carbon print already existing in the environment.

The political spin on the production of Diesel’s is extreme and needs to be eliminated. Some political oriented individuals do not push the issue of production of biodiesel because some of the elements involved can be manipulated into a power narcotic. This should not be a resistance, those narcotic manufactures can choose to eliminate the population, however, there should be a balance of chances for the insurance of the survival minded people as well.

Upon comprehension of the directions held within the original recipe, and following this procedure to the exact detail, the batches of biodiesel are completely unlimited, as long as proper storage temperatures are maintained. Temperatures are a huge factor in the successful production, use and purchasing. So, to sum it all up, where to buy biodiesel depends on who is making it and what the weather is like in a specific regions.

Get free and useful resources about biodiesel fuels including where to Buy Biodiesel Fuel when you visit: http://www.energysolutionshub.com

Technorati Tags: Alternative Energy, Biodiesel fuel, energy, energy source, environmental, Renewable Energy, where to buy biodiesel

Green Power Close to Home

When we hear about how thinking globally and acting locally, power is often not at the forefront of our minds. But perhaps it should be. The environmental impact of transporting electricity is easily as taxing on the world climate as transporting hard consumer goods can be. Transporting power creates a direct waste of that power, creating a larger carbon footprint.

One argument that immediately springs to mind is that all power is produced locally. Californians aren’t getting their power from New York. However, this is largely out of necessity. Making power a local endeavor can be taken much further.

For a moment, consider the factors at play in producing power. First, one has to consider the source of the power (i.e. coal, solar, wind, etc.), then where it’s made (in a plant, in your backyard, etc.), then how far it has to travel (NY to CA or from the source to your breaker box). Something we often don’t realize is that electricity degrades as it travels. While our technologies for creating power have advanced rapidly, our technologies for transporting and storing power have not. Some new developments, such as hydrogen fuel cells, have promise, but the kinks are not all worked out yet.

It seems clear, then, that truly green power is created close to where it is used. This prevents the degradation of the signal that occurs in power lines, in transformers, etc. However, that is not the only benefit. Producing local power takes advantage of whatever natural form of energy is avaialable- be that solar, wind or hydro.

As it becomes easier and easier to build solar cells and wind turbines (not to mention micro-hydro systems) at home, it is worth considering ones environmental impact. The benefits are numerous- it save the environment, saves your power bills, and could even make you money (think tax breaks or even selling power back to the power company). Numerous resources are available to the home builder of green power, allowing it to be used in many different environments (rural, urban, suburban). Between the guides available today, the necessity of saving the climate, the potential financial savings, and the long-term satisfaction of building green power, building your own home power system is more attractive than ever.

Damon Westchester is the editor of www.build-green-power.com.

Technorati Tags: Environmentalism, green power, Local Power, Solar Power, wind power

How to save energy and save money

In this bad economic times, a lot of people are still in searchh of saving money. One of the often overlooked ways is to conserve energy.Not only will this save you some money, but it also will help in saving the environment.In this article we will examine a way for you to save a lot in energy costs.

The best way that you can save on your energy bills is to have a solar energy system for your house.It isn’t as difficult as it may seem to be.All that it will take is for you to go and have solar panels installed onto your house.When people take a closer look at this they start to see that it will be quite a bit of a cost to use solar panels.  So they go looking for cheap solar panels.

Now they might be able to find some but if they really want to save they should look into building a solar energy system themselves.  There are plenty of manuals that can teach them how to do a diy solar panels.In general all of them are written so well that you will be able to easily follow along step by step.If you are able to do it this way you are going to be saving thousands of dollars for yourself.  So even if you didn’t want to do it yourself, you could hire someone to do it.And it doesn’t cost the same as an electrician or a solar contractor would charge.

It doesn’t matter if you have someone install it yourself or if you learn how to build a solar panel.  As long as you change your energy into a solar energy system you will save money.

But you will not only be able to save some money yourself you are also helping out with the environment.  Using solar energy eliminates the need for more toxic type of energy.Your use of energy will be much cleaner and more natural.  Who knows you might be able to set a good example and more people will follow your footsteps.

Technorati Tags: cheap solar panels, diy solar panels, Renewable Energy, Solar Energy, solar panels

How Your Food Is Killing Mother Earth

Yogis Go Green With Wai Lana Yoga

Going vegetarian for the planet
Sometimes it helps to look at statistics.

We’d like to share some statistics regarding how a vegetarian dietaffects  the environment.  So that you can easily see the benefits that the diet can have for you and the world.

How going vegetarian will help you and the world

-    Raising animals as livestock is the perfect way of destroying natural resources.

-Studies have shown that only 20% of the corn that is made in the United States is eaten by humans, with the other eighty percent is eaten by animals. Consequently, a full 50% of the water in the United States is used to raise livestock.

-A single acre of land can produce twenty thousand potatoes. Raising cattle on one acre of land, on the other hand, would result in only one hundred and sixty five pounds of meat. In short the amount of land that it would take to feed one person exclusively meat would be equivalent to the amount of land it would take to feed twenty vegetarians.

It is easy to see how raising animals for meat is extremely wasteful. If mankindwere to adopt a more plant-based diet, many problems with world hunger would be solved. Scientific studies have shown that if Americans were to decrease their meat consumption by merely ten percent, sixty million people could be fed by the resulting grain. With a child in the world dying of starvation every two seconds, it would be a sacrifice of love for even just for some people to switch to a more vegetable based diet.

Preventing Erosion

-    Another thing to consider when considering the implications of raising livestock for their meat is the soil depletion that it can cause. Historically, many nations have fallen due to a depletion of their topsoil, and studies have shown that the United States has already lost approximately seventy five percent of its original topsoil. Every year, four million acres of crop land in the United States is lost due to soil erosion. Consequently, many forests are cleared in order to make room for more crop land, resulting in an acre of trees disappearing in the United States every eight seconds. By switching to a vegetarian diet, an individual conserves roughly one acre of forest per year. For more information, go to Wai Lana Yoga.

Global warming and livestock
-    Global warming is becoming more and more of a concern in our world today. Raising livestock is one of the most significant causes of global warming. The carbon dioxide produced by livestock raised for meat contributes to approximately eighteen percent of the global warming effect. Automobiles, by contrast, only account for fifteen percent of humanity’s carbon dioxide output.  We should support the going-green movement, which in turn, also helps reduce the effects of pollution and global warming, Wai Lana is one of the supporters of this cause.

Changing your diet can change the planet
The effects of your diet on the world are far-reaching. If you don’t know where to start, you can look for vegetarian recipes and articles on Wai Lana. Not only is being a vegetarian a great move to make for your own health but it is also a significant measure to take when it comes to saving the environment.  These are facts that each one of us should definitely consider.

Technorati Tags: environment, Global Warming, Going healthy, keeping the environment well, staying healthy, the environment and vegetarianism, vegetarian, vegetarianism, Wai lana, wai lana yoga

Sustaining Nature Through Ecotourism

Usually the time we get as leisure is spent on recreation. It has an important function in our lives. Amidst the stress and strain of modern life, recouping and energizing the body and mind is vital. There are many ways that this can be done. Some of them are bungee jumping, skiing, hang gliding, snowboarding, rock climbing, sky diving, backpacking, canyoning, motor sport, adventure tourism and ecotourism. Ecotourism is where one visits the natural habitats to enjoy nature. However, there are two kinds of ecotourism in vogue. The first is what has come to be called responsible ecotourism. This is when the visitor is sensitive and respectful to nature and feels socially responsible to protect it. The focus here is on learning from nature and reflecting on the adverse human impact on nature. Central to it is the profound appreciation of nature. The second category is where nature becomes incidental to profits. Primarily a commercial enterprise, nature becomes a commodity for business. Tragic enough, this type of ecotourism continues to dominate.

Neither ecology nor local cultures are the concern for the indiscriminate ecotourism that is practiced. Ecotourism is just a marketing tool. These rich natural habitats are the location for resorts, hotels and lodges with all its luxuries and wasteful lifestyle. These ecologically sensitive areas are neither the focus of conservation nor respect. The ecology deteriorates and the forests degrade when such infrastructure is established in the name of ecotourism. The more is the waste that is generated when more are the facilities. More visitors mean more pollution and generation of garbage. The tourists who frequent such facilities are also not aware or concerned about the impact their visit have on ecology with their lifestyle in such facilities.

Responsible ecotourism on the other hand is in stark contrast to this destructive ecotourism. Typically the visitors come unobtrusively in small groups. They invariably carry their survival needs in their backpacks. These include flashlight, first aid kit, personal care products, utensils and map amongst others. Sleeping bag and the camping tent are the most important for their minimal comforts. There are many camping tent manufacturers such as Black Diamond, Sierra, Kelty, Eureka and MSR who manufacture tents. Camping tents are designed for different seasons and capacity. The features that come along with it can be previewed from each of the reviews of these tents for instance searching the Internet for MSR Hubba Hubba reviews.

As camping has very little impacts on ecology, it is generally considered responsible tourism. It pays attention to recycling and energy efficiency. There is much attention paid to their visit benefiting local communities.

Technorati Tags: camp, camping, Conservation, ecology, ecosystem, family, nature, outdoors, outings, recreation, summer outings, tent, tents

Understanding How Hybrid Cars Work

More Americans are weighing whether to sell our outdated gas consuming clunkers and instead buying a more cutting edge type of car that can cut fuel consumption by half. These high tech vehicles are most commonly referred to as hybrids. Even better is that these hybrid cars release less greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere than conventional cars. So, with more of us turning to hybrids, the better off we all will be.

Now that you know about hybrid cars you might also be interested to learn how they work. Here’s an overview of the hybrid cars. We will not be looking at Hybrid car history in this article.

Overall, hybrids run on both gas and electric power sources to work. First of all, it’s important to know that the electric part of the engine is only working while the car is idling and the gasoline engine is automatically shut off. This means the hybrid car actually becomes an electric car while sitting still in gridlock traffic, for example. This actually explains why hybrids are so quiet at intersections. This is one of the main reasons why it can effectively conserve fuel consumption. Once a driver presses down on the gas pedal, the internal combustion engine will automatically start up again. There are also hybrid cars that give you the option to ask it to run purely on electric mode. This can be an incredibly useful thing if you are only using the car for local travels. This could make it so you don’t even have to put fuel into your car for longer than you ever imagined possible.

However, in this type of hybrid car, you’ll need to gas up the vehicle before taking a trip longer than 50 miles. It could be said your gas tank as a back up power source for a run down battery. That’s all there is– a battery to hold backup energy, a generator, a combustion engine, a fuel tank,and a motor that runs on electricity. Now you know why it is called a ‘Hybrid’.

Now that you know how hybrid cars work, you now see how beneficial it can be if you are driving one. Having a hybrid in your driveway will not only save you considerable amounts of money on fuel, but you will also be doing your part to help preserve and protect the environment.

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Advantages Of Being A Hybrid Car Owner

The impact that fuel has on our economy and the planet is now very obvious and so too is the likely positive impact hybrids cars can have on these vital issues. Using a amalgamation of an electric motor and gasoline engine, hybrid automobiles emit less fumes pollute a smaller amount and and need significantly less gasoline to run. In fact, hybrids stand to outnumber conventional cars in due time, and,they’re far more practical for everyday use than solely electric-powered cars.

By using a combination of two power sources, gasoline and electric, a hybrid vehicle can reach higher speeds with less effort, just like any other convertional cars, it also requires less energy in stop and go traffic scenarios. The hybrid fuel cell vehicle was invented due to the demand for more efficient and less pollution emitting cars that will run lesser fuel. It’s also worth noting that it’s not necessary to charge the hybrid vehicle through an electrical outlet. Hybrids are able to charge themselves through clever engineering and science.

Hybrid cars offer an array of benefits not currently offered by combustion engine cars. Here are just a few:

Advantages Of Owning Hybrid Cars

1. Less Potential For Pollution

As more people drive hybrids, we are also in less need for foreign oil, as does our emitting of earth-heating greenhouse gasses.

2. Less Time At The Pump

Almost all of today’s hybrids can achieve up to three times the gas mileage of the old combustion car guzzlers.

3. Tax Breaks For Hybrid Owners

Hybrid car buyers have been offered a number of tax incentives, so if you buy a hybrid car your tax refunds can be withheld from your taxes and will provide you with additional savings.

4. Hybrids Don’t Depreciate As Quickly

Hybrid vehicles by nature car can retain a higher resale value. If you ever want to trade or sell a previously owned hybrid car, you be confident that they’ll receive a fair price for their car.

5. Better Performance

Hybrid engines require considerably less energy to perform.

Hybrid cars are indeed a choice for many drivers who wants to save. While it is a more pricey, you save a lot more on your gas top-up. I believe that by the next decade, it will be much more reasonably priced.

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