Putting My Trash Out There

Not only do we have a water bill for the first time ever in my life at the new place, we have to pay for trash pick up as well.  My thrifty solution: Don't do it!  Between composting and the free curbside recycling, we really shouldn't have too much trash.  Even though to pay by the bag is only $1.75 and I don't anticipate having more than a bag or two a month, I'd rather not pay it if I don't have to. 

The trash center in the kitchen, near the back door.  All trash is sorted here.

That's right: a family of 5 or 6 (depending on if my oldest son is here or at his dad's) produces less than a bag or two a month!  Even at our old place, where recycling wasn't available and I had to limit my composting due to concerns of being "discovered", I only had one trash can at the curb most weeks.  Here, I don't even have a regular covered trash can in the kitchen, where most refuse happens.  Instead, I have three small trash containers: one for recyclables, one for compost (so we don't have to run outside for every little thing), and one for actual trash.  There are many things that could either go in the recycling or composting bins, but, given the choice, and the mass quantity of compost I'm going to want for next year's garden, I'm opting for composting whenever possible.  Right now, the trash has been filling pretty quickly, but it is mostly packing tape, so I don't think that is indicative of too much.  The compost can fills up the quickest though. 

What goes in what, you might ask?  The short answer is that anything that once came from a living thing, other than meat (don't want to attract critters!), can be composted; a lot of plastic, metal, and glass can be recycled; and anything else is trash....which isn't much else!

Composting
veggie and fruit scraps
small quantities of dairy (including moldy cheese, melted ice cream, and more)
paper towel & paper napkins
paper plates
cardboard/boxboard, including toilet paper rolls, cereal boxes, and pizza boxes
pizza crusts, stales cereal, stale bread, etc
q-tips with paper sticks
used facial tissues (I actually prefer to flush these when I go potty though)
hair from hairbrushes
nail clippings
urine (okay, we haven't done this yet, but I'm thinking about leaving a bucket upstairs for the kids)
dryer lint
cotton clothing in beyond useable condition
pencil shavings
junk mail (minute plastic windows)
sticky notes
receipts
newspapers
latex balloons

Recycling (note: more can be recycled at certain places, but this is what we can recycle here)
glass (all colors)
tin/steel cans
household scrap metal
aluminum (cleaned of food)
plastic: #1, #2, #4, #5, #6, #7
bulky rigid plastic (look for HDPE symbol)
cartons, including milk cartons, juice cartons, juice boxes, etc

Trash
pretty much anything not listed above

How Much Do Your Showers Cost?

For the first time in my life, I'll be having a water bill at our new house.  Even though I've never had to pay for water before because it has always been included in my rent, I've tried to do the environmentally friendly thing and conserve by not running the dishwasher or washing machine until they are full, using low flow showerheads, not leaving the water running while brushing my teeth, stuff like that.

A low flow showerhead makes long showers cheaper

Except when it comes to my showers.  I like to take a long, hot shower every morning to turn my brain on, figure out the day, and meditate a bit.  Plus, my scalp gets itchy if I don't shampoo daily (sidenote: it's a bit better with the "all natural" shampoos that don't contain things like SLS, but it is still uncomfortable.  )

At the new house, my husband doesn't want me to take long showers, at least not until we figure out how much it would cost us on the bill to have my showers.  Thus began an epic quest to determine right from the first shower in that house, how much do long, hot showers cost?

For the purposes of my question, I'm considering the heat to warm the water a constant, since that's something we've been paying here and not something that would increase our bills at the new house versus the old house.  The only variables I'm looking at are water and the related cost of sewer.

From the rate sheet on the utility's website, it appears that there is a flat monthly fee, based on the type of meter and a rate per ccf, or hundred cubic feet of water used.  Since the flat rate isn't going to change whether I use one gallon of water for a quick wipe down, or take a full-length (read: until the hot water runs out) shower, I'm not going to consider that in the cost of a shower.  The cost per ccf per month appears to be $2.56, with an additional fee of approximately $0.44 for the chemicals they use to treat it, so a total cost of about $3 per ccf.

But wait!  That's just the water coming into the house!  They charge us coming and going!  On top of the water charges, there are a flat fee and per ccf charges for sewer use as well.  Again, since we flushed the toilet at the new house already, that's going to take care of the flat rate.  We used it, it is there.  The variable rate is 4.70 per ccf commodities charge plus a $0.59 per ccf inflow/infiltrations commodity charge.  So using one ccf a month, going down the drain, is $5.29, bringing my total costs per ccf month to $8.29.

I keep the water heater set to a really low temperature, to prevent scalding by the children (or me, during an airbrained moment) and to keep other utility costs down, so one of my showers (you can stop picturing me wet and naked any time now, thanks) usually consists of the hot water on full blast with little to no cold water in the mix and goes until the hot water starts to run out.  I know from survival stuff that the average hot water heater contains about 30 gallons, so that is approximately what I use for a shower.  Since I shower daily, that means I use roughly 915 gallons a month for showering, or 1.22 ccf (1 ccf = 748 gallons).   For all my showers for the month, it will cost a projected $10.11. 

The other way to look at it is one full-length shower costs about $0.33.  Considering how much I save the family on everything else under the sun, from food to clothes to things around the house, I don't think that's too much to pay for one little thing that is a small but important "luxury" in my life!

How much do your showers cost?

For this post, I had a lot of help from my expert on all things Lansing and crazy spreadsheet lady, my friend Melissa, from Cookies, Crayons, Classes, & Chaos.  (Seriously, she put yellow on a spreadsheet to do with sewers.  Who does that?  I guess I should just be grateful for her help...and that she didn't use brown.)

Time to Freeze My Buns?

So far this fall, despite a few frosty nights, I've had no desire to turn on the furnace (probably due in part to the fact that the furnace filters desperately need changing.  Eeeew!  Don't need that nasty old dust recirculating anywhere, especially since the furnace is practically right outside my bedroom door!).  But the call has gone out by The Crunchy Chicken, it's time to freeze yer buns off in 2011, and she's issued a challenge to go with it!  Apparently there are even prizes to go with it, but it seems to me like everyone participating wins, since you get a lower heating bill just for playing!

I'm going to cheat a little on the challenge and declare my temperatures to be the same as we usually set them in the winter: 65 during the day and 55 at night.  A lot of people seem to think that is crazy low already, so I'm officially going to leave it there. 

Even though I plan on leaving the thermostat the same place as last year, I do plan on better implementing strategies to keep the family warm, beyond putting on socks and a sweatshirt or breaking out extra blankets.

One advantage we definitely have at the Trailer Park Homestead for keeping the temps down in the winter is, like I said, the furnace is practically right outside my bedroom....and everyone wants to sleep in that bedroom.  This means that we don't have to worry so much about heating the far side of the house at night.  If the kids were to actually start sleeping where they are supposed to, we might have to turn the thermostat up a notch or two more, but, as it is, I encourage that less in the winter so they think they are getting away with something by sleeping in my room, and we're getting away with paying less on the heating bill.

Another thing I'll definitely be doing is strategically planning meals and baking around the weather.  If it is supposed to be overcast (more on why that is important a bit later) and cold, I'll be more inclined to stick something in the oven, or maybe fire up the canner to can some stock, or make  or something, which would also serve to heat up the house while getting something done.

One final unusual way I plan on keeping the house warmer without heat this winter is passive solar energy.  I don't even need any fancy equipment for this--just the storm window shut on the screen door!  On sunny afternoons, if I leave that front door that has a screen door open and the screen door shut, the light from the sun coming in generates enough heat that it raises the house's temperature as much as 10 degrees in an afternoon!  And that is even if it is in the 20s outside, so it doesn't have to be a warm day to do it!  I know this wouldn't work for everyone, but check out the windows on your house and see if you can do something similar, if they line up right that if you put up the blinds or curtains, it actually heats the house rather than loosing heat to a potential draft.

So those are my main ideas for keeping the house warm this winter without using much energy.  If you have others, especially ones useful for a single-wide trailer, I'd love to hear them.  This might be a bit of a game for us, participating in this "challenge", but my next door neighbors' furnace is broken and they don't think they'll be able to afford to replace it (yes, it is beyond repair, according to the guy they had come look at it already.  And, yes, we'll be being neighborly and inviting them to come over any time they need to keep warm, even if it means spending just about every night here), so any tips on keeping warm could literally be lifesaving for them.

Saving Electricity--beyond turning off lights

photo courtesy of Wikipedia

While I dream of one day living entirely off the grid in a lovely Earthship like shown above, with its solar panels and passive solar heat, right now I'm still here:

a not so lovely single-wide "manufactured home," built with little to no regard to energy efficiency.  It may or may not have "energy star" appliances, since they came with the rental and there is not a darn thing I can do about it if they are sucking in electricity like an anemic vampire would down a pint of blood.  Nor can I do anything about the flimsy windows or the central air conditioning unit (except not use it).  I can't plant trees around the house to shade it from the summer sun or block it from winter's winds.  I can't do anything about the roofing or insulation.  I have what I have until we move.  Period.

That doesn't mean that we are complete victims of the energy companies (gas and electric are provided by different companies).  There are several things we have done and keep doing that keep our bill significantly lower than what it could be.

• We don't fight nature so hard on the temperature.  Since we moved here in October 2010, we've had actual air temperatures ranging from about 0 degrees (F) to 100 degrees (F).  In the winter, we keep the (gas) heat at 65 during the day when we are up and around, dressed in seasonable winterish clothes and 55 at night when we are bundled up in warm, flannel or fleece pajamas, snuggled under warm quilts or comforters.  If no one is going to be home (rare, but it does happen), we usually turn it down to about 50, since we have no pets to keep warm.  In the summer, we have the thermostat set at 84 during the day, but we'll turn it down to 81 (sometimes my husband will turn it as low as 78 when he's trying to sleep during the day) if someone gets uncomfortable.  At night, except during the recent heatwave when the temperatures didn't dip low enough, I'll turn off the AC and open the windows, maybe plopping a fan in front of the window in our bedroom to draw in more of that cool(er) night air.  If we're not going to be home, we'll turn it off unless it is crazy hot outside (so stuff might start melting inside!), then we'll set it at 85 or so while we're going to be out.  I've seen a lot of people cite health reasons as to why they can't have temperatures as "extreme" as I set them, but my asthma flares up more if I go outside into the hot days if the place I'm coming from is more drastically different and my arthritis flares more in the winter if I face more extreme temperature differences going inside and out, so I really think a lot of that argument in many cases is a mindset thing.  People adapt, really.
• A programmable thermostat helps moderate the temperature.  As I mentioned, we keep it programmed at 84 in the summer and just turn it down if needed.  Sometimes, we don't even notice when it sneaks up another degree or two.  It also works well if we forget to adjust it before leaving, since it will adjust itself up at some point if we are gone long enough!  In the winter, it is nice to be able to get up and showered and everything with the heat blasting, without having to pad across the cold house to turn it up.
• Passive solar energy or lack thereof.  Huh?  Didn't I list that as a plus of Earthship living that we don't currently have?  Well, yeah, but every time you open the curtains in direct sunlight, you are using passive solar energy, whether you want to or not.  So in the summer, the curtains stay closed, at least on the side of the house the sun is on.  In the winter, I open up the front door and let sunlight stream in that storm door!  I've warmed the house by as much as 10 degrees by doing that, even when it is only in the 20s outside!
• If you can't stand the heat in the kitchen, don't!  If it is warm enough that the air conditioner needs to be on, the oven stays off.  I try to limit my baking to nights when it is cool enough to compensate for the heat of the oven or wait until a cold front moves in.  Meals can be prepared on a stovetop (or raw) just fine during those times.  Plenty of time for baking in the winter, when it benefits the bill to have the oven going!

Since, from stuff I've randomly seen, heating and cooling a home can comprise more than 50% of your energy usage, the savings from these adjustments are likely extremely significant.  There are more little things we do though:

• Turn the water heater down as low as it can go without being off.  I've seen some places suggest turning the water heater off entirely except for certain times of the day, but with our family, that just wouldn't work.  Between my shower in the morning, my husband's showers in the late afternoon before he goes to work, and the kids' baths or showers in the evening, not to mention my doing dishes at all sorts of random times and the occasional load of laundry that needs to be done with a hot wash, we need to have that sucker on all the time.  However, it is set slightly below "warm" (it doesn't have actual temperatures on it), which gives just enough hot water for running the dishwasher once or a nice, loooong (escape from the "mom, mom, moms" for a few minutes) shower, as long as I don't crank the hot water on all the way for the whole time.
• Don't run the dishwasher as much.  With 3-4 kids (sometimes more when neighborhood strays happen by), we end up with lots of dirty dishes and I do use the dishwasher, but I try not to abuse it.  I run a "normal wash" rather than a long one and leave the "warm to dry" (or whatever it is called) off.  The dang kids can use a towel to dry them off when they empty the dishwasher!
• Only do full loads.  That applies to dishwasher and washing machine and it is equally valid to both, as well as the dryer.  If I could, I wouldn't use the dryer at all during most of the year, but since clotheslines aren't allowed here, I suffer through it.
• Unplug things when not in use.  Duh.  There is a reason the news channels do stories on "energy vampires" every Halloween it seems!
• Turn off the television and read a book.  A real book, not some electronic book containing device that would require energy.  Well, keep your devices on long enough to read my blog, but after that, go ahead and turn them off.  Someday, maybe I'll get a book or two out there for you so you have that option for my goodies.  In the meantime, the library has a ton of books you can read for free (I know you'd want to buy any by me!). 
• Go to bed earlier so you don't have to use as many lights at night.  Okay, that one is a flat out lie.  I don't do that one.  I do try to get the kids to do it, but they won't go for it, kind of like that turning off the television thing.

Okay, I'm sure I'm missing some of the things I do because they are just so ingrained that I don't even think about them, but that's what I've got for now.  What are some of your favorite energy saving tips or advice?