This article may apply to some furniture products but mainly applies to roofing and exterior siding materials.

As a recent victim of a severe storm packing baseball and softball size hail we had significant damage which included a  roof, gutters, skylights, pool safety cover, and combing the condenser coils where hail had impacted.

 As a former home builder and owner of a construction company I look for several things when hiring a roofing contractor.  My main criteria required; the company was local so that if I had a problem someone local could service it, good references which should speak for itself and someone I felt was honest to deal with.

All the roofing contractors I spoke with would not give me a fixed quote, all said they would do the job for whatever the insurance company would pay.  This certainly was not the way I was used to contracting a job, however all we singing the same tune so I checked references and made a selection.

At the same time I made initial contact with the person who would be handling my claim and told them that I would expect to be kept in the loop with all correspondence and conversations.

When you contract to allow the contractor to do the job for the amount of insurance payment, most of these contractors look for ways to escalate the claim which puts more money in their pockets, it may be revenue neutral to you now, but when it is all done, we will have to pay higher premiums.

So to the subject at hand sub roofing material.  As I spoke with each contractor I told them all exactly what I wanted.  I wanted an upscale shingle and I wanted “radiant” plywood.  The old roof was cedar shakes which is about the best venting roof covering you can get.  In all climates you need a well ventilated attic space to allow the insulation to work properly.  Since I was going from shakes to asphalt shingles I needed some assurance my attic would not bake in the summer and contain moisture in the winter.  Radiant plywood fit the bill by lowering the attic temperature nearly 30 degrees.

The first problem I had with this contractor materialized when the product for my roof was delivered.  No radiant plywood, in fact no plywood at all, OSB was substituted.  OSB stands for oriented strand board which is wood from small trees which are quickly replaced bound together with glue in layers oriented in different directions.  Sounds like something an energy freak like me would like huh?  My memory from my days of building houses was that OSB warped easily if it got wet and that was not something I wanted on my roof.  So I told them to remove the OSB from my driveway and bring me radiant plywood which they agreed to.

The day they are beginning the tear-off of the roof still no sub roofing.  Finally it showed up, it was radiant OSB, again not what we agreed to, so I stopped the job.  Instantly the head field guy showed up to convince me radiant OSB was what I should have.  By the way the local company I contracted with to do the job, sub contracted it out to a Texas firm (I’m not close to Texas).

1000’s of roofs are being replaced in our area from the large storm that came through which had supplies in large demand.  With my contacts I got on the phone and computer and attempted to find the sub roofing I wanted.  It wasn;t available anywhere so I looked into the OSB radiant panels.  My main concern from days gone by was that if the edges of the OSB got wet they would swell and you could see the edges of all the panels show up through the asphalt shingles.

The manufacturers had evidently heard this from other builders and was treating either the edge of the panels or the entire panel with a waterproofing product to prevent swelling.  So I conceded they could use the OSB radiant panels however I made sure that these panels were covered on the ground and on the roof.  I’ve seen sheets of OSB sitting in driveways for weeks now as thunder storms come rumbling through and I’m concerned for them.

OSB is used in some furniture as backing material and sub-structure because of it’s strength and low cost and because it is not normally exposed to moisture.

To finish my roofing story, the roof went up quickly, broken skylights took four attempts before they could get that done correctly.   The contractor has tried to back-load the cost to the insurance company which I have prevented by having good communications with my insurance company.

A good roofing company may be an oxymoron, there are some and following a storm like we had, those companies are booked well into the fall.  It probably would have been advisable to wait until the fall.

Reuse has created new companies on the Internet to deal with demand for products of the past.  Likely the the greatest demand has come from textiles and wallpaper from prior decades.

It seems that everything old is new again is particularly true with colors and patterns.  When we fled the 60’s and 70’s bright colors and patterns for jewel tones and then earth tones, a lot of fabric, paint, and plastic remained in storage.  So far the plastic furniture hasn’t made a rebirth, but the colors and patterns have become the accents of today’s designer pallet.

You need only watch a few HGTV shows to find a designer using fabrics from the 60’s or earlier to make accent pillows, recover a seat cushion or bedspreads and duvets.  Many of the old pattern wall paper has also made it to mainstream design as an accent wall or an entire room.  Some patterns have found their home as a stencil patterns.

While it may be obvious to you that reuse of these products is a good thing, most will not think of the enormous amount of energy consumed in the manufacture of these products.

Fabric for example first has the raw cotton or other material washed (often with heated water).  The product is drawn, dyed, woven, and sometimes printed, cut and prepared for shipping.  And while there has been some energy consumed in the manufacture the next step consumes more than the manufacture…….shipping.

Where products come from over seas as many products do these days,  energy consumed with ocean transport is somewhat minor compared to the truck and train transportation once it arrives in the US.   Today’s transport and distribution network is nearly 75% more efficient than in the past.  However, if you have a vintage product in you hand, it has already completed its trip to you and the energy has been expended compared to having a product shipped.

As more Internet sales occur distribution programming becomes more and more efficient, although it will never be as efficient as reusing or re-purposing a product or material already in your possession.

We asked several people who had recently had furniture worked on, who they used and how pleased they were with the service.  From this list of people and information regarding local upholstery services we compiled a list of companies that we might used and narrowed that list down to three that we would ultimately get quotes from.

We tried to tell the same information to each company we received quotes from.  We would provide the fabric to be used which was not going to be a stripe which makes the installation a little more tedious.  Any need for piping they would construct from the fabric provided.  They would construct the seat and provide cushion material.  Any point of attachment that they needed for the application of the fabric that needed repair to use, they would repair.  Schedule was not a problem, we had plenty of time.  And aside from a request for price and delivery time we asked for the amount of material they would want us to buy.

The quotes had a large spread to their cost.  The high quote was $850 and the low quote was $350.  This was an easy decision to make.  We spent the time up front looking into the companies and only took quote from a company we would let do the work, so we selected the lowest bidder.

They indicated in their written quote that we would need 5 yards of fabric and since they were very busy they didn’t want our piece for another month.  This gave us a liberal amount of time to look for fabric.  We wanted a fabric that was true to the time the piece was originally made.  We looked at old photos of the love seat and did some research for the period which gave us a good idea of the types of fabric and patterns that would be appropriate for the period.  Ultimately we found a tone on tone, botanical pattern. 

For those of you who work with fabric all the time, you will think this is funny.  When the upholsterer told me to get 5 yards, I assumed they meant 5 square yards.  So I took the width of the fabric and figured the length I would need to make 5 square yards.  And then the engineer in me looked at the overall dimensions of the love seat a thought I would make the installation easy and add a little.  I took the bolt of fabric to the counter and told them I wanted  13.5 feet of fabric.  They looked at me like I was crazy and asked again the amount of fabric I wanted.  I now know when the upholsterer told me to get 5 yards of fabric they wanted 5 yards of whatever fabric I purchased.  I was very fortunate the store clerk added enough fabric at the beginning of her measure and at the end that I barely had 5 yards, but I did have 5 yards to work with.

We delivered the fabric and love-seat frame to the upholsterer and began our wait which was estimated to be around a month.  Three weeks past and they called to tell us it was ready.  You can see for yourself how it turned out.

We are extremely pleased with the final results.  The love seat looks good everywhere we placed it.

As my wife explained to our grand-daughter how she would lay sideways on this love-seat and read in her room and some day she wanted our grand-daughter to have it, I could see how this was becoming a heirloom that would pass down memories for years to come.

When technology changes as fast as it does today, it’s just as likely you will replace an electronic device because it is obsolete rather than not functioning.

I’m talking about; TV’s, computers, printers, modems, routers, gaming devices, hard drives, cell phones, telephones, remotes, batteries, cameras, etc..  All these devices now have materials worth salvaging.   The copper alone in the printed circuit boards can support recycling today and there are many other materials that can be economical to recover and re-use.

 Recently I had a HP printer that had some problems with the case closing which prevented printing.  After using duct tape for a while to hold it closed which kind of worked, I decided to buy a new wireless printer.  I was lusting over a new printer for too long before buying a new Epson Artisan 835 which I have to tell you is fantastic.

I had the old HP printer and my thought was to take the printer cartridges out and trash the rest.  I knew the printer refillers would want them but the rest of the printer had little value.  I noticed when I was looking at printer while at Besy Buy that they had recycling bins, strategically placed near the front door, for cell phones and batteries.

And while I was shopping I noticed HP had a printer which advertised that it was made with 60% recycled parts.  The more I thought about it the more I thought before I throw the printer away I’ll call around and see if anyone wants my printer.

I called Office Depot, Office Max, Staples and Best Buy.  All of them were interested in my printer cartridges but only Best Buy wanted the entire printer.  I loaded my printer into the car and went to Best Buy.  When I arrived the gentleman at the door asked if I was recycling the printer, I told him I was so he placed a sticker on the printer that said “recycling” and ask that I give it to the customer service desk.

With four people in front of me and me holding the printer I so became disenchanted with this procedure.  I decided to leave the printer next to the customer service desk, shop a little and come back when they were less busy.  I did just that and when I returned the line was down and the printer had been picked up and moved into the back.  I asked if there was any paperwork that was necessary and was told there wasn’t.

It is obvious the electronics that are in the biggest demand for recycling are batteries and cellphones.   These recycling bins are seen in most major chain department stores.   Many of the component materials are easily separated and reused.

However, I do feel there are some precautions that should be taken when recycling electronics.  Many of these devices contain personal information that you would not want shared.   Computers obviously have hard drives with information which should me removed and destroyed.  Likewise any remote hard drive, memory stick, flash drive, RAM, etc. should be removed and destroyed.

Cell phones have a small chip called a SIM card that not only contains your phone number but also a history of your calls, your contact list, photos you have taken, music and so on.  I would remove the SIM card and destroy it before recycling a cell phone.

In a similar fashion home phones store similar information about contacts, call records, ect..  I think it goes without saying that you should remove any memory cards from a camera you are recycling to remove and photos you have left on the memory.  Even erasing the memory card does not totally remove images.

Gaming devices today are getting smarter and smarter.  Not only do they hold your game preferences they have contact information, Internet logs, Netflix account numbers and so on.  Here again remove memory and destroy it.

 It may sound like I’m not in favor of recycling electronic devices, which isn’t true.  I am saying be careful to remove any electronic memory for your own security.  We do not want all the devices mentioned in this article in our landfills.  Recycling Electronic devices makes real sense for both the donor and the recyclers so don’t be afraid be careful.

Beyond the normal thought of recycle and reuse should be refurbished and recertified.   So much energy is employed in the manufacture and distribution of products which is rarely considered when a product is purchased.   Much energy can be saved by purchasing a product already manufactured, omitting the need to manufacture more.

I frequently use sites like www.ecost.com , www.overstock.com , www.refurbdepot.com to see what is available when I’m looking for a product.  My experience is that manufacturers with recognizable names, that I see advertising on TV, thouroughly inspect products returned to them for quality control.  Repairs are made and the entire use of the product is tested for operation.  Typically if products have been returned for other reasons, those problems are also repaired at the same time.  So in most cases products that are offered as refurbished have been tested much more thouroughly than products rolling off an assembly line.  

And the best news is that you can save a lot of money buying a like-new product with as good or better chance of operating satisfactorily over the life of the product.

Electronics are one of the best places to look at recertified products.  I practice what I preach.  I have a Denon amplifier, Panasonic Blu-Ray player, and Dyson vacuum.  The amp and the vacuum were purchased for about 50% of their cost a most stores and the Blu-Ray player was 75% of the cost of advertised specials I’ve seen for the exact same product.

Knock on wood, we’ve had no problem with any of these products.  However if you have a concern, warranty extensions are available from companies specializing in refurbished products.  Typically to add a years warranty will cost 10% of the discounted purchase price.

 The best tool in your arsenal to conserve energy and cost is your computer and the internet.  Shop around, compare without impulse buying, without consuming gasoline, employing the internet to research and the result might be a great quality product for a lot less than you thought.

Most people think living truly green is an expensive proposition.  Quite the contrary, simple steps will conserve more energy than the person who goes out and purchases some energy gizmo and thinks they are living truly green.  The following are a few steps that can be easily done, saving energy and consequently the enviroment.

Plan your trips!  Unles you currently live many miles from a city and know that planning your trips is imperative, then you are wasting both time and energy by not planning your trips.  The person who lives in the country knows that it is a long way into town, one that they won’t be making every day.  So to save gas and the time it takes to drive that long distance into town they plan.  They schedule when they are going, where they are going (likely in some logical sequence), and they make a list to make sure they get everything so they don’t have to make another trip.

The closer you live to grocery stores, department and specialty stores the more likely you are to make numerous trips.  It seems like common sense that if it’s not too far you could make more trips and not use as much gas/energy as the person who lives in the country.  Many studies say not so.  In fact you are more lkely to use the same or more.  Of course this is easy to deal with by setting a day each week for grocery shopping, developing a menu with a list of items required to prepare the menu and replenish household consumables.  Similarily set a day for shopping for those other items.  Make a list and establish a logical route.  Aside from saving far more gas then you can imagine and saving several hours of time throughout a week you will find another non-energy bonus, you will save money.  When you make several trips to the store you rarely know how much money you are spending and you likely don’t go through your coupons when you are only going after a couple items.  Knowing what you are spending and using coupons is a powerful tool to save your dollars.

Next on your list of living green is to take those canvas bags with you whenever you shop which I might add is much easier to remember when you are making a planned trip.  Plastic bags in our landfills represent huge volumes of waste that don’t deteriorate for decades.  Numerous studies have estimated volumes and the life of a plastic bag in a landfill, all of which have different values quoted,  most intelligent people don’t dispute they are a bad thing.  I leave my canvas bags in the car and try to remember to take them into anywhere that I am shopping.  I occasionally forget and will be standing in line when I remember, that’s when I stop and go get the bags or ask someone to get them for me.  The enviromental savings are obvious and here again incorporating the canvas bags as part of your planned trip further solidifies this living green excersize.

Next is setting thermostat settings at reasonable levels.  Reasonable levels vary in different parts of the country for obvious and some not so obvious reasons.  Obviously when you live near a large body of water, water temperature helps regulate temperature and contributes mositure/humidity to the air.  And more obscurely if you live in  areas of constant extremes like Florida or Alaska you’ll find ductwork that delivers air to the house is designed to deal with just those types of extremes and not like a house that has to deal with all four seasons. 

A good example contrast our house in the midwest which is subjected to four seasons of weather.  The ductwork needs to be placed to prove some air high for cooling needs and some air low for heating requirements.  Our midwest home is passive solar and is well built, but in the heat of the summer the thermostat needs to be set on 72 or 73 degrees to be comfortable.  Our Florida home has all the duckwork positioned high in the house to provide cooling (cooling air falls and warm air rises).  76 is very comfortable setting there because the cool air is falling on you.

I hesitate to give you a fixed setting for your house rather use this simple guide.  Don’t turn the thermostat down in the summer and then spend the evening covered with a throw.  Don’t set the thermostat down low and sleep under a sheet, a blanket and a comforter through the night.  In the winter the opposite applies.  Don’t set the thermostat up high during the day and be throwing off blankets through the night because you are too hot.  A good cheap programmable thermostat will cost you $40.  Your return for this investment will be measured in days not months.  Heating and air conditioning was invented to provide you comfort so find the temperature that feels comfortable at different times of the day for both heating and cooling and make your bed to match the season for where you live.

Just these few steps can save you a lot of money and substantially reduce your impact on the enviroment not to mention, make you more efficient with your time and more comfortable in your own home.

Simple concepts, huge benefit!

At recycledfurniture.com decluttering creates an opportunity to sell furniture and buy furniture.  And that’s good for the enviroment and good for you.

 We recently bought a winter home in Florida and everything we bought in Florida was for that specific house.  When we were done we found we had everything we needed and not a lot more to clutter up our lives.  At our other home we have accumulated stuff over more than 25 years in this home and 15 years worth of stuff from older homes.

The more we looked at our clutter the more we became determined to change our enviroment which meant getting rid of a lot of stuff.  If I hadn’t needed something I was saving for twenty years, I likely wasn’t ever going to need that piece of stuff for another twenty.  And even if I needed that exact piece of stuff the very next year I decided I’d rather have the space and buy the purged stuff when I needed it in the quantities I needed and discard the rest in favor of decluttering.

So my rule was simple, if I hadn’t touched or needed the thing I was holding in the last year, it was either discarded or sold.

In the garage my life became very simple.  I knew what I had and where everything was, with the results being clear isles at the side of the cars,  room to store the new giant trash cans required by the city and boxes of great garage sale items other guys would need to clutter up their garage.

The basement was very similar in results lots of great garage sale items and getting rid of some old lawn furniture and ping pong table gave us tons of room we didn’t have.  We even took a shelf we didn’t need in the garage any longer and put it in the basement to help organize our stored items.

But the biggest change that I see every day was in our office.  Old office furniture stemming back from the days of huge computer monitors and desktop computers served to store a lot of unecessary stuff.  These days we have two laptops, a need for file storage and a wanting for more room.

We sold the old computer desk and hutch, the office desk, bookshelves and printer stand.  Once all the clutter was gone we were amazed how big the space was.  And even more amazing was how many of our children noticed one of the walls in the office had tongue and groove oak paneling.  It has been that way for all twenty plus years we have been here.  The clutter was the first thing that caught you eye. 

Now we have two regular desk, a printer stand/file storage and a bookshelve that is both attractive and functional.  And the space still looks large.  Here again I thought I had an idea what was in the office furniture….. I didn’t.  I do now, and I know where everything is. 

I am very careful what I keep these days, I like being decluttered.  The net results was that the sale of furniture and garage sale items yeilded a net gain after purchasing the new furniture.  The new furniture was new to us, looked brand new, but we bought furniture that was previously own and gently used.

A win-win life altering event.

One of the easiest projects you can do is to recover your diningroom chairs.  I’ve done this project several times over the years and it is amazingly simple.  Of course you have to start with a chair that has a fabric, vinyl or leather seat to begin with.  Tools you will need are; screw drivers, pliers, and maybe a hot glue gun.

If you turn the chair upside down and look at the corners of the seat from beneath likely you will see the screws holding the seat to the frame.  Remove these screws and the seat should come off easily.   As you look at the bottom of the seat you are probably thinking this doesn’t look too professional how they attached the covering to my chair seat.  At least that’s what I’ve thought when I looked at the roughly cut fabric and the staples holding on the fabric.

 Usually I leave the existing fabric in place and cover the old with new.  However if you have had some damage to the covering or the cushioning below that would show through the new covering then remove those pieces. 

If you needed to remove the foam cushion it is easy to find a replacement at stores like “Michaels” or “Hobby Lobby”.  Replace with a cushion that has similar density and cut to the same dimension as the one removed.  Shopping at some of the larger fabric stores you will find fabric suitable for you chairs and it doesn’t take a lot of fabric to do this project.  Use the existing covering to help esimate how much material you will need.

OK we are ready to start.  Place the fabric face down on your working surface.  If you are replacing the cushion place it in the middle of the fabric and place the seat face down in the middle of the cushion.  If you didn’t replace the cushion just place the seat face down in the middle of the fabric.

Begin in the middle of one side and pull the fabric to the back of the seat with a little tension and staple the fabric in place on the back of the seat.  Now go to the opposite side and pull the fabric to the back and pull the fabric tight enough so it has some tension on the front of the chair but not too much.  Don’t wrinkle the existing fabric.  I’m probably making this sound harder than it is. 

After putting a couple staples in both sides repeat the process top and bottom and continue working from the middle of all side towards the corners.  When you get to within say 3 inches of the corners try folding the corners just like you do when you are wrapping a present and establish how you will finish your corner. 

Once you have stapled the fabric to the seat flip it over and have a look.  Chances are it looks great but if you have some changes you need to make remove the staples in that area and try again.  If you have a lot of excess fabric trim the excess with scissors or an exacto knife.

 When you are happy with the results merely reattach the seat to the chair frame with the screws you removed. 

I’m always shocked how easy it was and what a dramatic difference if makes.

If you want you chair to look a little more finished or up scale, the same fabric stores you found the fabric in will have piping trim which can be either stapled or hot glued to the seat before reattaching the seat to the chair.

This easy project saves both energy and natural resources in the manufacture of a new chair as well as reduces waste to our landfills.

I saw an article on the news ther other day, alarming all consumers to beware of compact fluorescent lamps or CFL’s since they have mercury inside them.  I couldn’t believe what a dis-service this station was doing to their listeners by promoting such fodder.

 So let’s set the facts straight.  Is there mercury in these CFL’s, yes there is.  It’s one of the components that helps provide the efficiency improvements over incandescent lamps.  How much mercury is there in a CFL?  An average of 4 milligrams is present in each CLF which is roughly the amount it would take to cover the tip of a ball point pen.

 Old thermometers contained nearly 500 milligrams of mercury.  Therefore the amount of mercury in an old thermometer would provide the mercury needed for approximately 125 CFL’s.

Don’t get me wrong, exposure to any mercury is not good and careful handling is recommended.  But here’s the kicker.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates the US is responsible for releasing nearly 104 metric tons of mercury annually through the emissions of our fossil fuel (coal) power plants.  The math is straight forward.  A 13 watt CFL produces the same amount of light as a 60 watt incandescent bulb and both are used for 8000 hours consuming a total of 104 kWh for the CFL and 480 kWh for the incandescent.

The average mercury emissions for producing electricity in a fossil fuel plant is 0.012 mg/kWh.  There the mercury used in producing electricity for the CFL is 1.2mg and the mercury used to produce electricity for the incandescent lamp is 5.8mg if mercury or 4.6mg of mercury more than that used for the CFL.

 To be perfectly fair when CFL’s are landfilled the measured mercury from one CFL is 0.4mg and the mercury of the power plant goes directly to the atmosphere.  So adding the 0.4 to the 1.2mg of mercury totals 1.6mg of mercury contributed to the atmosphere over the life of the bulb versus 5.8mg for the incandescent bulb.  A savings of 4.2mg for the CFL.

 So on a slow news-day you have to be careful what doom and gloom is being presented and which half truth you are being told.

You should be careful with CLF’s and recycle them.  Just as you should with your batteries and those 4 foot fluorescent bulbs in your garage shop.  But there is more news, many manufactures have worked to lower the mercury in their CFL’s and in this last year the mercury has come down from 4mg to 1.4 to 2.5mg per light bulb.

Re-run the math, it is even more imperative that we switch to CFL’s not only to save energy but also to reduce mercury emissions to our atmosphere.

What exactly is renewable energy?  There is a lot of talk about it lately, but in order to make informed choices, people need to understand what renewable energy is and how it works.  Basically, this process draws power from sources that can easily be renewed over time.  Some examples of these renewable resources are the sun (solar power), wind, rain, and tides.  Renewable energy is preferable to other sources of energy, like oil, because its sources cannot run out.  With the current high price of oil and its dangerous effects on our atmosphere, there has been a growing interest in utilizing sources of renewable energy.

Wind power has been used since ancient times, and is probably a source of renewable energy with which you are familiar.  Many farms use windmills to power water pumps and irrigate their land.  Although windmills have increased in popularity, there are a few setbacks to this method of renewable energy.  For one thing, windmills take up a large amount of space and some people consider them unsightly.  Another issue with windmills is the fact that commercial wind farms can only be effective in high areas that receive a constant, steady wind.  One very positive aspect of wind power is that it does not produce gases that are harmful to the environment.

Solar power is power from the sun can that be captured through panels and converted into electricity.  Some homes now have special panels on top of their roofs so there aren’t big pieces of solar power apparatus littering their yards.

Water power is a very diverse form of renewable energy.  There are many ways that energy can be harnessed from water, involving the power of dams, waves, and even tides.  Other types of water power, such as damless hydro-electric power, are being explored and developed.

Biofuel is another type of renewable energy that relies on plant products to create fuel.  Many individuals have been able to convert their diesel engines to run on fuel that has come from plants.

Understanding renewable energy is a positive start to creating a cleaner, greener world, but how can the average person get involved with renewable energy?  Homeowners who are willing to make an initial financial investment can employ the use of solar panels for electricity, and a solar water heater.  Another of the easiest ways to support renewable energy is to make sure the electricity in your house comes from renewable sources.  Most electric companies have “green” plans.  They may cost a little extra, but this is an easy way to support the growth of renewable energy.

If you don’t own a house or pay for your own electricity, you can still inform others about “green” electric plans and encourage them to participate.  Many colleges have begun to use clean energy for dormitories, and college students may want to confirm that this is the case at their school.  Simply spreading the word can be a great way to support the use of renewable energy!