The holidays are a time for twinkly lights, fancy packages and unfortunately, lots of waste. Go green this holiday season with these eight eco-friendly tips to help you reduce waste and save energy.

1. Gift An Experience: Consider gifting fun and memorable experiences rather than a tangible present that takes up space. Gift a concert ticket, a day at the spa or a night out at a favorite restaurant.
2. Get Crafty: Instead of buying new wrapping paper and accessories, repurpose what you already have. Get creative with gift-wrap by using scrap fabric, newspaper or even paper grocery bags.
3. Keep it Real: We know…it’s a pain to wash dishes when hosting a large gathering, but serving meals on real dish-ware instead of disposable will help reduce waste sent to landfills!
4. Don’t Peek: Resist the urge to open the oven door when cooking your holiday feast. Opening the door to check on food, rather than setting a timer, releases heat and requires the oven to use more electricity or gas to get back up to temperature.
5. Send Eco-Friendly Cards: Choose holiday cards made with post-consumer recycled paper or ditch the paper altogether by sending digital holiday e-cards.  
6. Switch to LED: LED Christmas lights use 80 percent less energy and last up to 10 times longer than regular incandescent bulbs.
7. Call off the Holiday Catalogues: Tis the season for junk mail! Cut down the trash, not the trees by calling the 1-800 number on catalogues and asking to be removed from their mailing list.
   
8. Don’t Trash The Tree: Keep your Christmas tree out of the landfill! The National Christmas Tree Association has info on recycling programs around the country.

At Renergy, we save energy and reduce waste by repurposing what’s already there into clean, green energy. Read more about what we do.