Essential Skill #19: Advertise Your Trash

"Every retail item you purchase has already cost energy -- and produced CO2 -- to grow, mine, manufacture, alter, or build, and then transport," writes author David de Rothschild in The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook.

"This energy is unrecoverable -- i.e., wasted totally -- unless the stuff is reused as is (for maximum return on energy investment), reused as something else (called 'new life reuse'), or recycled (for a lower return)."

Recycle your stuff with essential skill #19:

Advertise your trash.

Though you could go the old-fashioned route and advertise in the paper, why not go with the paper-less (and mostly free) advertising options online. From furniture to clothes to those oddball items that don't seem to fit into any category at all, chances are, someone in cyberspace wants what you don't.

De Rothschild suggests the following online advertising venues:

• Ebay.com
• Craigslist.org
• FreeCycle.org
• ClothingSwap.org
• SwapStyle.com

Of course, while you're there turning your trash into someone else's treasure, dig around for some gold of your own. As de Rothschild notes, "You may never need to waste a day at the mall again."

For other recycling options, check out this link to NewDream.org.

Essential Skill #18: Say No to Styrofoam

“We are almost as addicted to Styrofoam as we are to oil,” writes author David de Rothschild in The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook. “The U.S. makes some three million tons of it each year, the majority of which goes into the landfill.”

Styrofoam is made out of fossil fuels, and takes thousands of years to decompose. It’s used in everything from disposable cups and plates to packaging materials to insulation.

Thus, Essential Skill #18: Say No to Styrofoam.

Though de Rothschild suggests making your own packing peanuts out of real popcorn, a more practical solution is the packing peanuts made of corn starch. They look and feel similar to Styrofoam, but immerse them in water, and they dissolve.

“25 billion Styrofoam cups are thrown away by Americans each year,” adds de Rothschild. So if you must use a disposable cup, always choose paper over Styrofoam.

Another one of de Rothschild’s suggestions is choosing products with as limited packaging as possible. “Unpack your product right there in the store,” he says, “and hand all that pesky packaging to the manager. This sends a message to retailers to downsize their waste.”

Fortunately, there is an infrastructure in place for you to recycle any Styrofoam you may already have. Check to see if there’s a program in your area at EpsPackaging.org/info.

Essential Skill #17: Talk to Your Kids

If the subject of global warming seems overwhelming to you sometimes, imagine what it's like for children. It's nearly impossible to go a single day without hearing about it on television or in conversation. Sometimes it's new evidence of the dire impact of global warming. Other times it's arguments for why global warming is a hoax.

In The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook, author David de Rothschild says there's just one way to avoid confusion and fear. It's Essential Skill #17:

Talk to your kids.

Instead of letting the media educate your kids on global warming, take the lead and educate them yourself -- just the basics though, with as limited information as they need (based on their age) to understand what's going on, but always with the bigger picture in mind.

Specifically, De Rothschild suggests that you:

• Filter the information that comes into the home
• Put the news in context (i.e., the earth isn't going to burn up tomorrow)
• Encourage children to verbalize their fears
• Be moderate, not obsessive
• Be positive
• Find ways children can help
• Get active (i.e., encourage activities that let kids be kids, without worry or fear)

You can also direct children to environmental websites just for them where they can learn more and take action to help. One of our favorites is the webiste for our Live Earth Leader of the Week, Roots & Shoots, a program of the Jane Goodall Institute. You can also browse through this comprehensive list of environmental websites for youth.

Essential Skill #16: Pick Your Power

Your utility company may offer "green power," including more than 600 companies in the U.S., as well as many in Canada, Australia and Europe. If yours is one of them, there's just two things you have to do to get it: 1) ask for it, and 2) pay a little extra. It's Essential Skill #16 in The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook:

Pick your power.

Before you call your utility company to ask about alternative energies, familiarize yourself with the technologies that may be available:

• Solar energy, or "photovoltaic" energy, uses solar panels to convert sunlight into electricity
• Solar thermal energy uses mirrors to turn the heat of the sun into electricity
• Wind energy uses wind mills to convert wind power into electricity (we could power the whole planet with just 20% of available wind power)
• Geothermal energy sends water underground to heat it from the earth's internal temperature, and back up to the surface to convert it into electricity
• Hydroelectric energy uses water to spin turbines that create electricity
• Biomass energy converts the gas from waste and landfills to into electricity
• Coal with sequestration captures carbon dioxide and stores it undeground
• Natural gas powers generators thate create electricity (though a fossil fuel, natural gas produces half the carbon emissions of a coal-fired power plant)

"Your PlayStation doesn't care whether it's juiced by Wyoming coal or a solar panel on the outskirts of Vegas," writes author David de Rothschild. "But you are a beautiful, discerning, and independent-minded energy consumer, and you deserve to connect with a power partner that brings out the best in you."

For more information, check out EnergyGuide.com.