Electricity saving tips - At home - AC

- You don't really need the AC at 16 degrees throughout the night. Use an appropriate temperature judiciously. Normally a 25-27 degree setting can suffice. 

- Regular service of AC can save lots of energy as well as electricity bill.

- Using appropriate curtains can also help your AC perform faster & more efficiently.

- If buying a new device like AC or refrigerator, look for star rating on the product.

Electricity saving tips - At home - Refrigerator

- Adjust your refrigerator setting as per the requirement. For e.g., during a normal day, you won't really need to have your refrigerator set at minimum temperature. So select a moderate setting. Minimum setting might be applied on the days when you've some guests visiting your home & there may be frequent demand for cool thirst quenchers.

- Keep multiple water bottles in refrigerator. This way, you won't need to refill water bottles frequently. Refilling, then can be done once in a day. For e.g., if I can manage with just three water bottles, I keep five of them; and refill all of them in the night. This way, the electricity needed for cooling water bottles is required only during night; and since at that time the refrigerator is not being operated by anyone; it happens efficiently.

- Don't keep hot or warm food in refrigerator. Allow the food to come to room temperature first. This would help the compressor in efficient cooling & lesser energy consumption.

- Keep sufficient distance between back of your refrigerator & the wall.

- Whenever going out for some days, empty your refrigerator & switch it off. However, you must ensure that absolutely nothing remains in the refrigerator otherwise you will have to deal with whole lot of mess upon returning.

- If you've kids at home, then you would need to be extra vigilant to ensure that the refrigerator door doesn't stay open. Besides, opening the door every now & then would also reduce the performance & increase the power consumption.

Happy Holi - Dry Holi

Holi is just around the corner & Rang Panchami at the next, so here are some things to keep in mind from environment point of view:

- Remeber the need of the hour (& every other hour in the queue): Save water.

- If you can, then go for Dry Holi. Indore has come up with an even better version: Tilak Holi.

- If you must use water, then try to keep the water wastage at a minimum.

- While kids are playing holi, be there to keep a vigil. That is not just important from safety point of view, it will put a little cap on amount of water being waste as well.

- If feasible, then arrange a gathering at some common place for playing Holi. This would significantly reduce the amount of water consumed.

- Go for herbal colours. Amount of water used to get rid of herbal colours is quite less than chemical colours.

- In case you are too reluctant to go out and purchase herbal colours, you can prepare some at home also.

- Apply lots of oil / moisturiser before going out to play colours.

- Wear full sleeve clothes, put on a cap or bandana also.

- If travelling then keep car windows closed.

- Avoid using two wheelers.

Electricity saving Tips - At Office

- Change your laptop's display setting for an optimum brightness; with full brightness the electricity consumption increases, hence the battery drains out quickly & need to recharge it increases. Same thoughts apply to mobile phones as well as your computer's monitor

- Switch off your monitor while leaving workplace

- Similarly, if you're listening to songs on your system, ensure to close the application (or put the currently playing song on pause) if you've to move away from the system for a while. The idea is minimum amount of hardware should be in use (preferably zero), when the user is not around

- If possible, preferably shut down your PC when leaving office

- Instead of keeping your laptop connected to main power supply continuously, do it only when required

- Same concept applies to charging your mobile phones also

- Whenever not using, shut down the PC or laptop; instead of putting it in sleep mode

- If you've to come to office on a holiday, then avoid bringing up the central air conditioning system (if feasible)

- Similarly, on a holiday, switch on the lights of only your area. I've seen people switching the lights on of entire hall, even during daytime

- Instead of using automatic hand dryer or paper towel in washrooms, go traditional - bring and use your own handkerchief

- Avoid lift, use stairs. Good for health also & might reduce medical bills as well :)

Water saving tricks

Well, there are plenty of tricks available; here a few that I found interesting (& use them myself):

- Take 1 or 2 plastic bottles (that are to be thrown as garbage), put cap on them tightly & throw them in flush. That way the amount of water to be used with each flush would reduce significantly. Experiment with no. of bottles suitable for your flush

- Use bucket for bathing instead of shower

- If you must use shower, then use the 3-minute rule: i.e. the shower should be in use for maximum 3 minutes. Water should not be wasted while you're applying soap / shampoo etc. If you feel that 3 minutes is too small duration for you then figure out the minimum time suitable for yourself (but keep in mind, lower the time used, lesser would be the water wasted)

- If you intend to use bathtub, then fill water only upto 1/3rd level

- Keep the taps closed while shaving / brushing your teeth. Open them only when you actually need water

- Don’t throw away the water after washing vegetables & clothes; use it in the garden

- Use washing machine / dishwasher only when they're loaded to full capacity. This would help with your electricity bill also

- Similarly, if you're changing water from your aquarium, use the old water for your plants

- Use bucket for cleaning your vehicle (i.e. don't wash your car/bike using hosepipe). Use body covers for car so that you won't need to wash the car daily

- Go for rain water harvesting or water recharging in your home (very very efficient way of sav
ing water). I know this because I live in a place where water is scarce; and after I got this system installed at my home 3 years back, I haven't faced any water shortage

- Teach kids about the importance of saving water. Kids could be very effective sources of wasting as well as saving water :)

Self Care - Constipation

This has been long pending. Many people have asked me if I've any tips related to constipation. So, here is a small list; compiled from various sources (including grandma's tips).

First, some of the common causes of constipation:
- Irregular eating habits
- Lack of physical exerices
- Inadequate water intake
- Lack of roughage in meals
- Regualr intake of spicy food, junk food
- Mental tension

Now, some techniques to help in constipation:

- Increase your water intake

- Increase roughage in your meals

- Have at least 2 glasses of lukewarm water in the morning; then walk for few minutes

- Soak a teaspoon cumin seeds in water for 10-12 hours; boil the water, strain it & drink (when it becomes lukewarm) in the night before going to bed

- Drinking hot milk with honey in night also helps

- Isabgol husk can also be taken with warm milk / water before bedtime

- Grapes also help in constipation. Alternatively, soak few kishmish (golden raisins) for few hours; later chew them and drink the water in which those were soaked

- Have Amla (Goose Berry) during its season to get rid of constipation

Self Care - Breathing Therapy

This one came to me via a forwarded email:

The nose has a left and a right side and we use both to inhale and exhale. Actually they are different; the right side represents the sun, left side represents the moon. In other words, right side belongs to 'hot', so it gets heated up easily; whereas left side belongs to 'cold'.

During a headache, try to close your right nostril and use your left nostril to breathe. In about 5 mins, your headache would be gone.

If you feel tired, just reverse, close your left nostril and breathe through your right nostril; after a while, you will feel your mind is refreshed.