Celebrating Earth Day (Part 2 of 2)

In part 1, we took a look at some things your family can do to celebrate Earth Day on April 22nd. Now, let’s explore options that your small businesses can participate in for Earth Day. Just to re-cap the background information on Earth Day,

What is Earth Day?

The first Earth Day was started by Senator Gaylord Nelson and celebrated on April 22nd, 1970 in San Francisco CA. Establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) followed during that same year. The concept of Earth Day went international in 1990 and now celebrations are coordinated by the Earth Day Network in over 175 countries.

What is Special About this Year?

In recognition of the power of millions of individual actions, Earth Day 2011 will be organized around A Billion Acts of Green®: Personal, organizational and corporate pledges to live and act sustainably. The goal is to register one billion actions in advance of the Earth Summit in Rio in 2012. You can learn more about this initiative at http://www.earthday.org.

So How Can Your Business Make a Difference?

Earth Day is a day to reflect on our planet, our environment, our resources and what we can do to help keep them healthy for generations to come. There are so many simple things that every company can do to lessen their impact on the environment on Earth Day and throughout the year.

A few ideas are:

• Host an e-waste collection. Allow employees and members of the community to bring in old batteries, cell phones, televisions, computers, or other electronics. Work with local officials to ensure that everything collected is recycled or properly disposed of according to regulatory requirements.

• Embrace telecommuting and reduce travel. With today’s technology, many business activities can be conducted from any location. Email, conference calls, webinars, skype and other tools can be used to minimize trips, whether into the office, to a client site, or to a conference or seminar. If feasible, provide incentives to employees to use mass transit or carpool when travel is required.

• Check your recycling program. You may have a bin for bottles and cans in the break room and another one for paper by the copier, but are you recycling everything you can? Encourage your employees to go paperless where possible. Otherwise, use recycled paper and double sided printing to reduce waste. Eliminate the use of paper or Styrofoam cups and have everyone use a coffee mug instead.

• Encourage employees to volunteer. Go together as a group to clean up a park or roadway, or give employees a few paid hours off each year to volunteer for their favorite earth friendly activity or organization.

• Re-use packaging. Get multiple uses out of materials such as boxes and large envelopes. Use shredded paper from recycled documents or scrap for packaging materials.

• Evaluate energy usage. Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs, adjust thermostats – particularly during evenings and weekends, and have employees shut down computers at the end of the work day.

Your employees can probably come up with many more ways to celebrate Earth Day every day!


Air Matters LLC has performed mold testing services in the Raleigh NC area since 2002. The owner, Renee D. Ward, has over 25 years of safety and environmental experience and holds both her Bachelors and Masters degrees in engineering. Renee is also a member of the American Industrial Hygiene Association and the Indoor Air Quality Association. You may contact Air Matters at (919) 961-2221 or info@AirMattersMoldTesting.com.