Keep Our Environment Clean

Keep Our Environment Clean

The convenience of modern life can make it easy to forget how big an impact our lifestyle has on the environment: we can all hop in a car, buy a soda, or do a load of laundry without having to think about where those products come from or where our waste is headed. But the hidden cost of that convenience is often paid out in the form of damaging environmental pollution. For example, that trip in your car releases greenhouse gas emissions while that plastic soda bottle may end up bobbing in the ocean for decades. Even the water you send down the drain can be dangerous when it deposits chemical cleaners and organic waste in rivers and lakes. That’s why Greenhome asks you to live green by reducing pollution.

Did you know?

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  35% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions were the result of electricity production; 28% come from transportation.
  
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  The World Health Organization estimates that air pollution contributes to over 2 million premature deaths every year.
  
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  41% of the pesticides applied in the U.S. are used on corn.
  
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  Sulfur dioxide from coal mines can travel over 1000 miles in the atmosphere.
  
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  2/3 of U.S. estuaries and bays have been severely damaged by nitrogen and phosphorus from agriculture runoff and wastewater.
  
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  The 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill killed over 100,000 seabirds.
  
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  A 2008 investigation by the AP found low levels of prescription medications in the drinking water supplied to 41 million Americans.
  
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  The pesticide DDT – which has been banned in the U.S. since 1972 – is still used in some areas of the world to control mosquito populations.
  
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  The Centers for Disease Control found BPA – a toxic chemical used to manufacture plastics – in the urine of 93% of people tested.
  
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  Seven species have been declared extinct since 2000 – the Vietnamese rhinoceros, the Christmas Island pipistrelle, the Chinese paddlefish, the Yangtze River dolphin, the Vine Raiatea tree snail, the Pyrenean ibex, and the Po’l-uli (a bird previously found in Hawaii).
  

5 Easy Ways to Cut Pollution