Ottawa IL Area Chamber of Commerce and Industry

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EASY ways to Go a little Greener!

Bike or walk to work. The only gas you’ll use with this option is oxygen.
Carpool. If you must use your car, share your ride.
Keep your car tuned. A well-tuned car uses approximately nine percent less gas than a poorly tuned car, and you ca lose about two percent n fuel economy for every pound of pressure your tire is under the recommended level.
Decrease your drag. If you aren’t using that overhead luggage rack take it off (do you really need to carry that much luggage in the first place?). Also, it may help to turn off the AC and open up your windows to conserve gas, but not when you’re cruising down the highway at 60 mph. Open windows at that speed increased drag and is less conservative than using the AC.
Learn about tax deductions for charitable goods. Charitable items now must be in “good used condition or better.”
Learn about recycling. There are hundreds of strategies about waste, disposal issues, and solutions for turning waste into resources. Just do a internet search...
Use filtered tap water in a reusable bottle. Plastic water bottles create small-scale environmental disasters. American demands for plastic water bottles requires the use of more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel approximately 100,000 US cars for a year.
Wash your clothes only when you have a full load. Two socks or a full load require the same amount of energy to wash.
Use cold water whenever possible. Home laundering accounts for up to 36 percent of total household hot water use. You can save 90 percent of the energy you use to wash clothes when you switch to a cold wash.
Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs). Wait until your current bulbs burn out before you make the switch so you don’t waste your money. CFLs will typically last for 5,000 hours compared to only just over 1,000 hours on average for the best conventional bulbs. You can save $30 or more in energy costs over each CFL bulb’s lifetime.
Recycle your batteries. The Battery House, at 365 24th St. in LaSalle, accepts all kinds of batteries, household, alkaline, hearing aid, camera, etc. for recycling.
Drop off your used inkjet cartridges, laser cartridges or old cell phones at any one of our Collection Point Partners!
- 1st Farm Credit Services
- Blackley Cleaners
- Bill Walsh-Saturn of Ottawa
- John L Cantlin & Associates
- Central School
- Centrue Bank
- Coldwell Banker Honig-Bell
- Conroy’s Amoco-North
- Conroy’s Amoco-South
- Feehan McClellan Insurance
- First Federal Saving Bank-Main
- First National Bank
- First State Bank
- Ottawa Area Chamber
- Handy foods West
- HR Imaging Partners
- Jefferson School
- Lincoln School
- Marquette High School
- City of Ottawa
- McKinley School
- Myers, Berry, O’Conor & Kuzma Ltd
- Old Second Bank Ottawa
- Ottawa Dental Lab
- Ottawa Township High School
- Ottawa Saving Bank
- Pilkington N.A.
- SABIC Innovative Plastics
- Save-A-Lot
- Shepherd Middle School
- The Times
- Tyson Fresh Meat, Inc.
- U.S. Silica Company
- Washington Square Realtors, Inc.
- WCMY
- YMCA of Ottawa

Want to learn more?
Try these websites!

www.cleanairgardening.com
Environmentally Friendly Lawn & Garden Supplies

www.treehugger.com
Green news, solutions, and product information

www.freecycle.org
A grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (& getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It's all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills.

www.freesharing.org
The sites featured on FreeSharing.org are all locally owned, grassroots groups, working to help their neighbors and the environment by keeping usable items out of the landfill by passing them along to people who can use them.

www.greenlivingtips.com
Earth friendly advice for a greener planet. Reducing costs, consumption & impact on the environment!

www.worldwath.org Worldwatch Institute delivers the insights and ideas that empower decision makers to create an environmentally sustainable society that meets human needs.

www.seventhgeneration.com
Many everyday products and coupons

www.obviously.com/recycle/
Provides a starting point for consumers in the USA and Canada searching the net for recycling information

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Scenic Photography by Skip Hupp, www.skiphupp.com