Going Green Tip of the Week - The Insomniac Edition

Unfortunately, I cannot sleep and it is 3:00 am.  It is no fun!  So, instead of tossing and turning, I decided to get up and do something productive (at least I hope it is productive) and here it is.....

Today's tip comes from The Green Book by Elizabeth Rogers and Thomas M. Kostigen.  Elizabeth and Thomas suggest that in the battle between "Matches and Lighters" that we select matches and try to use the kind that come in a cardboard book, not a box.  I had honestly never thought about this and that is why I picked as the "Tip of the Week."

Here are the details:

• You can probably guess why matches are better than lighters - the huge amount of waste created by those pesky little lighters.  In addition to the waste created,  the casings of the lighters, as well as the butane to fuel them all use one of our most precious commodities -  petroleum.
• Here is an interesting tidbit for you - According to Rogers and Kostigen 1.5 billion lighters end up in landfills or incinerators each year worldwide!
• Now, if you are anything like me you are wondering why cardboard books would be better than a box.  Initially, it seemed to me that the books would actually create more waste.  Well here is the deal.  Wood matches are made from, you guessed it, wood, which translates to cutting down trees.  On the other hand, cardboard matches are typically made from recycled paper.
• Here is another interesting tidbit - If all of the cigarettes smoked in the world, in a year were lit with cardboard matches we could save 5.5 million trees.  Wow!!!!

 If you are interested in The Green Book it was published by Three Rivers Press in 2007.  The ISBN is 978-0-307-38135-4 and it is full of all kinds of information about how to green all areas of your life.  It is also an exceptionally easy read, probably much easier than this post written at 3:00 am.