How to Celebrate an Earth Friendly Christmas

During the Christmas holidays, you can show extra care for the environment. Have your family celebrate an earth-friendly Christmas and soften the environmental impact of the season.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Decorate with an artificial Christmas tree. If you choose a fresh tree, purchase one that is potted down to its roots. You can celebrate with the tree indoors, and then revitalize the earth afterward by replanting the tree.

2. Buy less. The less packaged products you buy, the less excess waste you create. Buy one gift per person instead of multiples. Better yet, rather than buying people gifts, choose one organization you'd like to give a donation to in their name.

3. Purchase green gifts. There are great products available that are made from recycled materials. Supporting these products helps to reduce the waste stream and passes along earth-friendly karma to the gift recipient.

4. Shy away from power by purchasing gifts that do not require batteries. Estimates show 40% of all batteries are purchased during the holiday season. Discarded batteries are an environmental hazard.

5. Reduce holiday lights. Decorative lighting raises power bills and wastes electricity. Place fewer lights upon your house. Decorate your tree with shimmering, sparkling ornaments, rather than electric lights.

6. Connect with nature. Take the family on a holiday hike or decorate an outdoor tree with treats for the birds.

7. Wrap gifts with environmentally-friendly or recycled paper, newspaper or fabric. Choose pre-decorated boxes or other ways of presenting gifts.

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[FarmerSissy]

on 10/5/2007 Your list of eco-friendly Christmas ideas is a good one, except for “number one”. It is quite misleading that artificial Christmas Trees are better for the environment than purchasing a real cut tree. Most artificial tress contain PVC (polyvinyl chloride) and lead, used to stabilized most PVC products. Natural Christmas trees are grown on small farms, usually family owned, and take about 10 years to grow. Farmers replant multiple seedlings each time a tree is harvested. During growth, the trees stabilize soil, protect water supplies, provide refuge for wildlife, preserve scenic landscape from development, absorb carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases while giving off fresh oxygen. It is estimated that every acre of Christmas trees planted gives off enough oxygen to meet the needs of 18 people, and that in America enough Christmas trees are planted that 18 million people are sup