New Year’s Eve, Conservation Style

Since 1907, folks have enjoyed watching the ball drop on New Year’s Eve in Times Square. This year, you can enjoy knowing that the Ball is illuminated with the latest technology and is energy efficient.

There are 32,256 LEDs that will brighten the sky of New York. The Ball used LEDs the past two years, but this year will be even more brillant, with three times the number of light-emitting diodes compared to last year.

The light show also will display 16 million colors and special effects, demonstrating the variety of applications that LEDs can be used for in the future. These LEDs will use an equivalent amount of energy as needed to power two conventional ovens.

No matter where you are in the world, you can enjoy the festivities of New Year’s Eve.

We wish you a wonderful 2010.

What Would You Like to See Next Year?

Wow, we sure have had a fantastic 2009 here at the blog! We’ve welcomed new visitors and taught old dogs new tricks when it comes to conservation. We had a successful and fun year, including…

• 2009 New Year’s Resolution theme
• Information on EE Tax Credits
• A video blog for EE Month
• Links to other blogs
• Reviews of neat books
• A Live Blog
• A Feature of Hot Lips Pizza

While it has been a wonderful 2009, we’re already gearing up for next year! We’ll be changing the frequency of our blog posts to once a week and when we hear something we urgently need to share, we’ll be sure to have a special post!

We also plan to have more fun and creative posts to help you save energy and money.

If you have anything you would like to see us blog about, feel free to add it in the comments section of this post.

See you in 2010!

Bob, Alison, and Tom

Have a Great Holiday Season

From everyone on the E-Conserve.blogspot.com team, we wanted to wish every one of you a fantastic holiday season.

No Bake Recipes for the Holiday’s

With many family’s gathering in kitchens to cook, why not take a break from cooking with some easy to prepare, no bake recipes?

I tend to spend very little time in the kitchen so when I have to, I prefer easy to make recipes. I have managed to collect a few from friends over the years and here are some of my favorites:

• No Bake Chocolate pie – The ingredients you need include: a pie crust, instant pudding, the milk to make pudding, and whipped cream topping. You pour the pudding in the pie crust and top it off with whipped cream and for added decorations, fruit is a good garnish on top.
• If you are cheesecake person, there are brands that sell no bake cheesecake where all you do is add milk and pour the cheesecake into a pie crust.
• As an appetizer, a 7-layer Mexican dip is always easy to just grab the jars of materials and compile into a dish. In my recipe, I substitute the sour cream for more guacamole. The scooping chips are an excellent choice to compliment it.
• I like citrus salads too, adding cranberries, oranges, apples and almonds to a salad is refreshing taste.

Insulation is Sexy, Even the President Says So

Earlier this week, President Obama was at a local Home Depot in the northern Virginia area giving a presentation on retro-fitting homes, green jobs, and how sexy insulation is!

I encourage you to take a look!

I’m Dreaming of a Green Christmas

This year, consider some of these green gift ideas:

• Remote controlled power strip
• LED porch light
• Help your friends go green while on their iPhone and consider some of these green apps
• Go green with an online magazine gift subscription or maybe even a gift card for kindle downloads.
• Eco-friendly office supplies like recycled copy paper, biodegradable break room products and reusable storage containers.
• Uncommongoods.com identifies which products are eco-friendly.
• Find energy leaks in your home with a thermal leak detector
• Or give the gift of energy with a Dominion gift certificate

What are you going to put in someone’s stocking?

How About a Plant?

In reading one of my favorite blogs, Greenversations, the EPA has a refreshing post regarding plants. They bring up the reminder that green foliage is a great way to help purify the air.

Just like Lina Younes of the EPA, I don’t have a green thumb, but there are plants that can survive either of our mere green thumb skills.

To see what some of these hearty plants are, check out her post Indoor Plants May Be Working Overtime, and grab yourself a plant to help purify the air.

New Year’s Resolution - RECAP

So did you keep up with your New Year’s Resolution you made for 2009?

What about the monthly tips we provided in the form of blog posts in the hopes of accomplishing being more energy efficient during 2009?

What resolution did you keep or like best from our list? Or did you make your own 2009 Resolution and stick to it for energy savings?

We'd love to hear from you!!

New Year’s Resolution Tip #12 of 12 – Outdoor Timers

Estimated Cost: $10

Ease of Install: Easy

Other Notes: Hopefully you took us up on the January 8th post to buy LED Lights after the holiday season to find great bargains, but if not, the LED lights have come down in price. Use our Holiday Lighting Energy Calculator to determine how much money you will save with LED light strands, over the traditional lights. To maximize energy efficiency, set your lights on a outdoor timer.