Elisabeth Leamy spoke to Ted Trabue, Managing Director of the DCSEU, for her weekly column in the Washington Post about living green but comfortable.
It’s not easy being green. Kermit the Frog said it — even sang it — but it might as well have been the motto of the first wave of eco-conscious consumers. Scratchy sheets, anemic showers and weird-looking lightbulbs were the norm as people tried to do their part. To add insult to injury, these clunky green products used to cost more green cash.
No longer! When consumers started demanding environmentally friendly products, manufacturers started delivering better, cheaper ones. Today, it’s entirely possible to be eco-conscious without giving up comfort or breaking the bank.
The key is to consider how you can positively affect the environment, in addition to how you negatively impact it. “Every person has a carbon footprint. As hard as we try to reduce it, we cannot exist without one,” said Leigh Stringer, author of “The Green Workplace” and “The Healthy Workplace.” Stringer has been collaborating with the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, which is trying to change the conversation from reducing our footprint to increasing our “handprint” — our positive influence on the environment.