Issues > July/August 2006 (#115) > Household Tips from The Green Guide to Keep Your Health and Your Savings Intact

Household Tips from The Green Guide to Keep Your Health and Your Savings Intact

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4. Petroleum-based plastics are all over kitchens, from vinyl floor tiles to storage containers and handy wraps. But phthalates used to soften plastics and vinyl enter the air and our food, affecting the hormones of developing children. Choose phthalate-free, recyclable containers and wraps such as Gladware containers, Tupperware's freezesmart line and Glad Cling Wrap. For phthalate-free kitchen floor tiling, iFloor's cork tiles and Forbo Marmoleum natural linoleum tiles are good choices. For more, see the "Flooring" and "Plastic Containers" Product Reports (www.thegreenguide.com/reports).

5. Make more home cooked meals using fresh ingredients, you'll be reducing your consumption of unnecessary quantities of sodium, sugars and processing aides. It's also a great way to reduce packaging waste, energy and money.

6. To cut down your energy bill, pick Energy Star certified appliances, such as Sun Frost's R-19 refrigerator which is 53 percent more energy efficient than conventional models and Asko's D3531XLFI dishwasher which is a whopping 159 percent more efficient than regular models. That takes a big chunk out of the greenhouse gases produced by power plants making the energy we use. For more energy-saving tips, see "Cutting Costs in a Fuel-Scarce World" from GG #110.

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