Clothing
Clothing
a Drying Rack or String
- Quick Fact: Drying your clothes on a rack or string saves our climate from about 602 lbs of CO2 emissions
- Quick Fact: Drying your clothes on a rack or string saves your wallet about $102
Tumble dryers are the most energy intensive household appliance, and their use not only effects your wallet but also our climate. The energy used to power your tumble dryer more than likely comes from a CO2 emitting source such as coal, oil, or natural gas. A simple solar dryer (a drying rack or string) costs $5.99 at Ace Hardware and emits not harmful greenhouse gases when used. Plus you don’t have to worry about your clothes shrinking about eight sizes too small!
is the Way
- Quick Fact: Wash your clothes in cold water to reduce up to 500 pounds of CO2 emissions per year.

Today’s modern laundry detergents are powerful enough to have your clothes spelling like a rose without the use of hot or even warm water. The energy used to heat the water in washing machines comes from CO2 intensive electricity instead of gas, so by heating the water in your washing machine both your wallet and our climate are affected. Washing machines don’t require as much energy as tumble dryers, however if you take into account the cumulative effect of a years washing with warm or hot water on CO2 emissions and then multiply that by the number of people in our country…well you probably get the point. Best to just use cold water.


