We've been accustomed to the changes and innovations that technology offer us yearly. Such a fast-phased industry that upgrades and phased out several units and machines for a very short time. Advantages come along with the competition between manufacturers, and that's good for the consumers. Let's cite the smartphone industry as an example, in this category there are a lot of big names that manufacture high-end phones from which we splurge ourselves spending our hard-earned money purchasing the latest mobile phone in the market.

Now with the competition, there goes the added features, exclusive services, unique functionality, as well as price drops and bargains which we love the most. Talking about bargains, Apple has been working on creating an even more affordable version of iPhone for those millions of users who dreamt of having such an exquisite device but incapable of purchasing one as of the moment, considering its market price.

To be able to create a cost-friendly model of the said device, Apple plans to use partial components from recycled materials, particularly those disused or old iPhone handsets. Certain changes to its shell casing will also be applied, as it will probably be using a cheaper polycarbonate plastic outer shell instead of the ultralight hard shell aluminum housing that the recent models were built with. It is allegedly expected to drop a market value of about $99 from its costly price before of $149.

Apple just like the other manufacturers that experienced a drop in sales, they are hoping that through this way it will certainly pull back what has been lost from their recent sales. With the emergence of competitive mobile devices from rival companies, a fluctuation in the market causes Apple Inc. to lose its position as the top brand of smart phone in the mobile industry. One distinct reason that this happened is that, there are smartphones now in the market that are much capable of what iOS mobile devices can provide, plus they're far more affordable compared to iPhone's price. Thus pushing the Apple Inc. to create an affordable lower-end smartphone for the masses.

This drastic measure, perhaps considered 'in the works', will result to Apple taking a step forward to become more environment-friendly. Using recycled materials, and switching the aluminum casing into cheaper polycarbonate plastic, means a lot to the environment. Since disused or defective iPhone models will be used for this project, it will certainly help reduce the e-waste we accumulate yearly.

Having it produced through recycled materials doesn't mean it's a cheap device to consider. Still it holds the name of Apple, so rest assured of its quality and performance remains more than enough, but will somehow be reduce. Besides, recycled materials are more sturdy and can perform way better than its original counterparts. One good example are these eco-friendly toner cartridges and ink cartridges, they are made from recycled materials as well but provides the same quality as the original ones.

In order to cut down our electricity bills, we often push ourselves to reduce the machines and appliances we use daily, and if we can't avoid to use them, we tend to reduce the amount of time the machine was used, which in a way helps us to save energy. Everyday we been accustomed to a habit that can supposedly be changed in order to save on our bills. One way we can do is to monitor how much electricity a room consumed for a day, this can help us determine which can be deducted or limit in that particular area of the house.

Regulate the energy consumption of particular household appliances that are used daily. Light bulbs, either they're turn on all throughout the day or just being lit up at night, these bulbs can be replaced by LED lights. These green picks are energy-efficient which makes them less expensive to use in the long run and works for a much longer life span. If you're familiar with a power strip, a block of electrical sockets that allow multiple electrical devices to get power from a single outlet. Why are these power strips important, simply because each includes a circuit breaker that limits the electrical current flowing through it. By centralizing the power source of some of your appliances, you can shut these machines off easily.

Another ideal way is by getting an Energy Audit for your house. This can help you detect the leaks in every corner and spot of the house that causes your electricity bill consumption to rise more than what you expected. According to David Johnston, an energy expert, "air leaks account for 25-30% of an average energy bill". It would be better to pinpoint the areas from which air leaks. Why do you have to this? Air leaks causes your appliances particularly air conditioning unit, heater and thermostat to work harder in order to regulate the proper heat and cold air throughout the house.

Switch to household appliances that consumes less power or called as energy-efficient machines. This will literally drawdown your current electricity bill. If you can't afford to replace all the bulbs then it would be better to invest on renovating your windows. Natural light that comes from the sun is way better than fluorescent lights, plus the air outside may be better for your system. Just make it sure that your new windows is built with insulation to prevent any discomfort during different seasons.

Of course, aside from cutting down your electricity bill will not generate that much savings, so try to think of ways on how to cut down your other house bills. Don't forget to use environment friendly products and consumables with minimal negative impacts on the environment like eco-friendly toner cartridges and ink cartridges for your printing needs. Avoid using plastic materials as much as possible and reduce your own waste. Control your daily habits and think of ways on how you can reduce your carbon footprints.

Based from the recent years, we've been setting or rather climate researchers had been setting records in our climate history. In fact there could be a higher chance that this year 2013 will become more significant in the climate history. This idea comes from Bill McKibben, an Environmentalist, Green Journalist, President and Co-Founder of 350.org.

According to McKibben, "We’re seeing record temperatures, record melting, record storms, record everything: it’s clearly not the same world we thought it was even a few years ago. But we’re also finally seeing record dissent. In the U.S. for instance, students on more than 190 campuses are fighting to demand the divestment of stocks in fossil fuel companies. They’ve peeled back the layers of the onion — they’re not demanding new lightbulbs, they’re demanding systemic changes in the balance of power, trying to weaken the forces of the radical status quo, the ones systematically altering the chemistry of the atmosphere."

Definitely I must agree with the fact that this world we are now living is clearly different from what we had not just with a few years but with almost a hundred years ago. I may not live in that time but based from what the old folks have told to a many, the world particularly the climate we have now is surely not the same anymore. The atmosphere we are living right now, is more damage that it used to be, and continuously getting weaker and weaker as the year passes by. 

Bill McKibben also added, "It’s a hard fight, of course, because those forces are led by the richest industry on earth — the oil, coal, and gas tycoons. So I don’t predict the outcome. Only that the choice for the powerful is going to get harder almost by the week, if we keep building the movements we need to build. We’re not as powerful as Exxon yet, but we’re closer than we used to be, which is the only good news I can think of."

The richest industry, indeed they bring fortune to the country from where they're built, to the people who are making a living through their business, and to all who are benefiting from it. But there's only one thing that this said industry leads us, and that is to the gradual destruction of our own planet. Signs and outcomes are very much visible that we can't even hide the real deal, but still more and more oil/gas facilities and factories are being established.

We've been dealing to a lot of waste management problems, garbage reduction, plastic elimination, and improving our waste stream. And climate change is one of our biggest problem that we need to face and resolve in order to at least diminish or reduce the impacts that it bring to our world. Though there's certainly a point to consider why this oil and gas factories are to blame, there are several factors that form a bigger scale from which we should also be aware.

Recycling is one of the method we could greatly rely on to improve our waste management system. These products that are claimed to be made from recycled materials are way cheaper and also durable just like those eco-friendly toner cartridges and ink cartridges, they're one of the examples to site with. We reduce our own waste plus getting enough savings, two great things are truly considerable. As for the oil and gas plants around the world, I'm pretty sure they know what they're causing to our world that leads to abrupt climate changes.

We've been used to take pictures with our smartphones, iPhone, iPad or tablets cause it's more convenient. Also when you're at some place wherein you want to take pictures but you forgot to bring your camera, a high mega pixel camera phone will do the trick. But given these facts, would it also be nice to have a photo printer that allows you to create printouts on the go without the hassle of wires and inks.

What could be the possible benefits of using this printer? Aside from the advantage that it prints on the go, plus its wireless functionality, it can also help environmentally by producing less chemically infused paper materials. We all know that inks and toners from printer cartridges may cause harm or a possible treat to the environment when not properly disposed of. Paper waste are gradually reducing and it would be better if as much as possible we try to utilize materials that could affect our environment the positive way.

If you're fond of using smartphones and other devices that can take, store and manage photos, this printer will surely suit your style and needs. Hammacher Schlemmer built a printer that is capable of wireless connectivity and can print photos without the requirement for ink, the Wireless Smartphone Photo Printer. It is specifically built for smartphones and mobile devices that can transfer photos and images through their phone's wireless functionality to the photo printer. With the presence of a wireless network, either at home or at the office, you can pair your smartphones and mobile devices to the wireless printer to be able to transfer photos. If you're using iOS devices such as iPhone or iPad, you cans imply connect your devices directly to the printer with the built in dock connector located at the top of the printer.

Now if you're wondering how this printer can produce quality images without the use of inks, then here's the trick, it uses a special photo paper that has dye crystals with all the three colors (Yellow, Cyan, Magenta) you can found from a typical printer cartridge. To start playing with this wireless printer, you need to install an accompanying application required to pair up your iOS and smartphone devices to the printer.

It may seem as an expensive way of printing your special captured photos with the printer's price tag of $219.95. But if you still prefer using your conventional photo printers and you want to save some money while being environmentally conscious at the same time, you may opt to use eco-friendly toner cartridges and ink cartridges for your printer. These printer consumable helps to cut down your printer expense, while keeping your printing experience greener at the same time.

Before we've featured the Eco Printer, an environmental friendly printer wherein you can erase the ink from the printer material by exposing it on a special UV light, then afterwards you can use the paper sheet again for more printing. Through this technology users can be able to save on their paper usage whenever printing. The only drawback is that it uses a special type of ink that is somehow different from conventional inks that are used in inkjet printers.

Now as I've been browsing the net for some cool green stuffs to offer for my readers, I've stumbled from this picture with a description that says "Eco Printer". Since it's eco-friendly and techie which I'm sure green-geeks would love to hear more about it, here's another printer that seems to be based on previous post about the Eco Printer, though this one is named as the "Re-Printer".

Disappearing ink is something not too common either not too surprising, since I've already read a few articles regarding the science behind this amazing machines. Toshiba even made a multifunction printer named "Loops" which will be available next year 2013 in Japan by mid month of February while for the other countries it will be out in the market with a different name in the month of May.

The Re-Printer as the name itself explains its purpose, can produce printouts of different files and documents whether coloured or black, then once you're done with the hard copy and you need to use the paper once more, just use a UV light to erase the text or images that is printed on the paper material. It's more of like you're printing a temporary file on the paper material wherein you can erase it afterwards once you're not satisfied with the output or you don't need the printout anymore. Sounds like having a rewritable CD isn't it? The only difference is that you're utilizing a paper material instead of a compact disk.

Paper recycling could never been this easy and fun, re-using the paper sheet for more printing can really save you a lot from your paper usage and printing expense. Though I'm not sure how much would it cost you to buy the special ink once your printer runs out of it. Unlike when you're using conventional printers either laser of inkjet type, you have the option to choose from OEM, compatible or my most favorable printer consumables the eco-friendly toner cartridges and ink cartridges which are really cost efficient.

Maximizing the use of paper materials over the additional expense from purchasing a special type of ink is fairly a good trade-off. Though are many ways from which you can recycled paper materials aside from using a printer that comes with an erasable ink. But if you're really keeping up on your New Year's resolution to paperless printing, then I suggest you keep your iPad or laptop always at your side to access all those important files you need.

Creating a New Year's resolution would be easy, it's just writing down what you want to do for the next year, what could be difficult is how you will live with it. We've been through a lot of stuffs, rides and journeys from the past years and even from this year, but at the end of the day we never learn from all those things that happened. Although some may have learn and move forward with some better adjustments in their life, there are still a few who still haven't realize the relationship between what you can say, to what you can actually do.

It's easy to list down all the changes you want in your life to happen, maybe from the first day you could practice all the things you listed but what happens at the third week or by next month, would you still cope up on your list? I'm not merely judging anyone, but believe me it's by nature that it happens. If I may suggest, you should make a list of something too easy for you that you can't even break it. Of course, this New Year's resolution will be nothing but a list of green and more environment friendly stuffs for each and everyone.

If you want to save money, you want to reduce your carbon footprint, cut down your waste and improve yourself as a better person for the environment, then here's a list that you might consider.

Reusable First - Always remember to purchase and use reusable materials and consumables. This will greatly reduce plastic usage since they're out of the list of reusable stuffs. It will also help you to be more responsible since you'll be carrying these reusable bags as often as you need it. Aside from bags, there are a lot of reusable materials from which you will enjoy using.

No To Plastic - As it is, if you can't totally banned yourself from using plastic materials then at least reduce the use of it. Drinks that comes in plastic bottles, synthetic toys and materials, packaging and other sorts of materials associated with plastic component. Our waste stream and landfills are already full of it, let's not contribute more.

Walk or Bike - For short trips or places you need to go instead of riding a cab why not consider using bike or walk all the way, besides walking is a form of exercise. It will greatly reduce your carbon footprint by simply walking or riding a bike when going to grocery stores. Aside from that purpose, you'll surely save some bucks since bike don't need fuel or gasoline, plus biking and walking will surely increase your fitness level.

Solar Power - There are several ways on which you can adjust your house to run equipments through solar energy. Nowadays, solar energy can produce higher forms of electricity that can be able to support machines and house equipments that require high voltages to work. It will greatly reduce your electricity bills to help you save money.

No To Meat - It can be hard to remove meat from your daily diet especially if you've been used to it. But if you really need it, like for example you're abruptly gaining some weight, you should really consider this. Red meat can be taken away from your diet, replace it with fruits and veggies but remember to start doing this by reducing the intake of meat day after day, cause you don't want to get upset stomach from instantly changing your diet. Fruits and pancakes for breakfast, fresh salads for lunch, soup and sandwiches for dinner, make your own meat-free diet.

Energy Efficient - Replace your home equipments and appliances with energy efficient ones. Lightbulbs can be replace with compact fluorescent bulb which last longer and consumes less energy. 

Cut Down Paper Usage - Though papers can be degraded easily, it's not easy to raise a tree that would stand tall in just a matter of weeks. Conserving paper materials is something important that we neglect thinking that there are more trees to cut in order to sustain our needs, but that's not the real case. What we can do is to reduce our paper material consumption or recycle what we had used.

Recycle and Upcycle - Use recycled materials, and if you can do recycling then do it yourself, who knows you might have invent something that everyone would consider amazing. Use recycled materials, they're way cheaper and more convenient, like eco-friendly toner cartridges and ink cartridges, recycled materials are cost-efficient yet sturdy.

Christmas isn't completely over, well it's more of like for me it's not, anyway we still have the countdown before New Year's eve. Unlike Christmas, the New Year's holiday has no particular type or kind of decors that you could use to embellish your houses, aside from the fact that fireworks represent the festivity of celebrating New Year. While on the other hand, a Christmas tree literally represents the Christmas holiday. And do you know for a fact that these trees particularly the spruces, pines and firs are unbelievably helping to reduce green house gases?

Lund University and Stockholm University researchers from Sweden discovered that these trees we often use as decorations in our houses, can be able to absorb methane gases. Methane is a greenhouse gas that is 25 times more harmful compared to carbon dioxide. In addition to what they're typical capable of absorbing, the carbon dioxides, they can exceptionally absorb methane gases which contradicts the speculations from previous studies that these trees emit methane.

I know it can't be help to cut down trees every year for Christmas, by nature we find it more perfect to have a real tree instead of synthetic bristly plastic trees that can be bought from the mall. But knowing this fact, I guest it can help reduce deforestation and would encourage people to plant more trees of this type to help save the environment. 

The research which was led by Elin Sundqvist came up with an explanation, ”Our results offer a third explanation: that an increasing amount of CH4 has been taken up by vegetation during the last decades as a consequence of increased greenness." Which means that these trees particularly spruce, pines, firs and all other trees of this type work hard just to absorb methane gases from the atmosphere.

This lives as with the conclusion that by cutting even a single tree that absorbs green house gases, it doesn't only affects the environment but us as well, unless we can replace them or put ourselves on their shoes and do all the absorbing on a daily basis. Once the holidays are through, we shouldn't neglect our responsibility as a human to protect the only place where we can live. We may rejoice and have fun all the way as long as we want during Christmas and New Year, but after we're through let's not forget to clean up every little pieces of waste we made. As a matter of fact it isn't too late, you still have the New Year's holiday to make changes and consider it including on your New Year's resolution. Plant more trees, save the earth, use recycled materials, diminish waste contributing products, be more green by using reprocess products like eco-friendly toner cartridges and other office supplies, and live a greener new year.

Recycling has never been this good, even the holidays connive with it. More and more recycling enthusiast are being recognize through their works and crafts. Especially this Christmas season, several green works and ideas were featured from different sites that promote recycling and waste reduction all around the world. All those nifty artworks and creations were so brilliant that no one could ever resist staring at them, proving to themselves that these things in front of them are actually made from recycled materials.

Since PrintGreen has been featuring a lot of green topics for Christmas season, here's another great and eco-friendly post for each and everyone of you. I've read this article from Inhabitat that features 10 Crazy Manmade Holiday Trees, and from this rundown I chose two of the most eco-friendly Christmas Tree that really took my attention.

First would be the Upcycled Water Bottle "Ice Tree". I was wondering why it was called the "Ice Tree", then by merely looking at the picture or rather focusing on the aesthetic of the tree, anyone would surely recognize that it resembles an ice sculpture of a tree. This Upcycled Water Bottle is being featured in the storefront of Montreal's furniture store the Domison, this holiday tree or as it's called the Ice Tree is made from about 300 water bottles, arranged to form this sculpture. It was created by hanging the water bottles from the ceiling and being illuminated by rays of light to give them an ethereal presence. The Upcycled Water Bottle "Ice Tree" was installed by graphic design studio Paprika.

Next and lastly, the Recycled Cassette Tape and CD Tree. At first glance, I thought it was also made out of glass materials, it was really eye striking with all the glows and sparks that the tree illuminated. This amazing and extremely huge recycled holiday tree is entirely made from used CD's and cassette tapes, as the title of the tree explains for itself. The Recycled Cassette Tape and CD Tree was displayed at the Chelsea Market in NYC during this holiday. The top of the tree was made from CD's and the bed or the bottom if you'll notice was made from black tapes pulled from old cassettes. If you want to see the footage of this recycled tree, you'll find it here.

There are more crazy holiday trees that were made from different parts of the world, I'll try to provide more of this and feature it here in PrintGreen to share for everyone. Does anyone think of creating a holiday Christmas tree that is entirely made of eco-friendly toner cartridges or ink cartridges from your printer? If no one has ever tried it, then I guess I'll be the first one to try.

It's almost Christmas and everyone feels it. We've made Christmas decorations and trees, cards and nativity templates, even gift wrappers, all green and eco-friendly. These crafting ideas and nifty projects are themed with season, and since we still have more days to go before Christmas eve, here's another fun recycling and upcycling craft that we can make so we'll all be ready for the Christmas Eve.

Kids and young at heart, either believing or not in Santa Claus, they still hang stockings and bags on different parts of their house to make sure not a single corner will be missed when the big guy comes and fills it with a lot of toys and goodies. Whether they truly believe on the idea or not, still after the night of Christmas, the next morning all their stockings and bags are full of treats. We'll never know if Santa does really exist and I don't even want to wake you up on your dream of believing in him, what matters is that at the end of the day we have lots of goodies and gifts.

Without further ado, here's what we will do, create a Christmas stockings made out of upcycled old clothing and bags. Think outside the box? It's more appropriate to say think outside the socks, cause we'll be making a bit of a twist on making your own handmade Christmas stockings. I'm pretty sure you have a lot of old sweaters and hoodies there from last year, kids do love to get new clothes and stuffs every year that's why I know you do have some worn out sweaters for sure. Go get them and your eco-friendly crafting tool to get started.

First, choose which from your old sweater should you use for this project. Then cut the sleeves of the sweater and cut the stitched part. Place the first one on top of the other and align them to make sure both edges are equal, if not, try cutting the excess part. Next, get a yarn and a needle cause we'll be doing a fun stitching. Stitch the side of your stocking starting from the top edge, around the side until you reach the the other edge. Flip the top of your stockings outward, then stitch it, this is where we'll place a ribbon that we can pull to seal the bag, just like the red bag Santa always brings with him.

Once done with all the cutting and stitching, you can decorate it by gluing cut outs of felt paper to add more Christmas spirit on your upcycled handmade stockings. Or if you're used to stitch decorating like creating symbols and letters through stitch you can also do it to decorate your stockings. You can make a lot of it to give to your friends and playmates, remember that Christmas is also about giving and sharing. Fill it with toys you're not using or items that you want to share like candies and other treats. For your dad and mom whose always working day and night, fill it with cards and sweet nothings or office supplies like pen, sticky notes and other stuffs. Remind everyone to be jolly this Christmas and always be conscious about the environment, use recycled materials like eco-friendly toner cartridges and other consumables that promotes green living.

According to Earth911.com, “As much as half of the 85 million tons of paper products Americans consume every year goes toward packaging, wrapping and decorating goods. Wrapping paper and shopping bags alone account for about 4 million tons of trash annually in the U.S.” Unless we heard the facts we'll never make a move. Christmas is the only season where gift wrappers and paper bags are flooding the stores, as well as the busy shoppers rushing in and out of the mall. But after this season ends, we'll just add more millions of paper products particularly gift wrappers as trash on the landfills.

How about for this season let's try to reduce our need for gift wrappers, since we can't give it up, cause of course it's a bit informal to hand over a gift that is not wrapped. But there are a few ways from which we can at least reduce the need for paper wrappers this Christmas season. One good idea is by purchasing items in box or products that comes with a paper bag, first we save ourselves from buying a separate wrapper, and second we don't have to gift wrap the item, just place a card on it, plus a ribbon, and it's perfect, but remember to remove any price tag or mall stamps from the box.

Another good idea is by recycling or upcycling gift wrappers that you already have, it may either be from your Christmas last year, from the Thanksgiving celebration, from just any occasion, or even those brown grocery bags, you can still reuse them all for this season. I'm sure you've made a lot of grocery shopping in preparation for the Noche Buena and gatherings, so let's say you've got a pile of brown grocery paper bags and you have no idea what to do with those. Well then, grab your eco-tool-kit and we'll be upcycling those brown bags as our Eco-friendly Christmas gift wrappers.

Prepare some scissors, scotch tapes, markers, scrapbook embellishments (optional), and some twine. Now get all those gifts and goodies you've prepared for wrapping and start making eco-styled gifts. It's very simple, wrap the gift in recycled brown paper or a brown paper bag, tie in twine and adorn it with stickers, glitters, small cards and notes, or use some marker and draw a personalize image that portrays the one who will receive the gift. Very easy right, yet totally unique and appealing, plus the touch of effort and being Eco-friendly.

If your friends are part of those who promote green concepts as well, they will surely love this idea. To double the fun, consider giving them recycled and upcycled materials like bags, accessories, artworks, depending on their personality, and if they're the type of office geek who spend most of their time at work, how about sending them recycled office supplies or eco-friendly toner cartridges which are really cost-efficient and somehow unique as a gift for this Christmas season.