Create A Green Workplace -- At Home

For more than 20 years I have often been the only person of working age at home in our neighborhood from 9 to 5 on Monday through Friday. My daily commute to work: 25 feet – not 25 miles or 25 minutes.

We entrepreneurs and telecommuters who work from home can tell you it takes discipline to keep from visiting the refrigerator every half hour, to keep phoning clients instead of doing the laundry, to fend off friends who (for some mysterious reason) cannot understand anyone being home not being available for chit chat at all hours. Most of us who work from home will tell you the rewards are well worth the self-discipline.

As a business entrepreneur working from my home office, I have developed time management skills and healthy income from multiple businesses. New projects -- particularly ones centered on environmental issues and ideas to help Boomers succeed for retirement -- keep me focused and motivated.

One of my sisters, who is also green-friendly, finally persuaded her boss to let her move her medical transcription job home. She is not only enjoying regaining the time and money spent commuting to that distant office, she is also thrilled with the reduction in her own carbon footprint.

Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia defines carbon footprint as, "a measure of the impact human activities have on the environment in terms of the amount of green house gases produced, measured in units of carbon dioxide."

Carbon foot-printing provides a mental handle for understanding the ways we impact Planet Earth by our use of fuels.

When I note my odometer log -- mileage records for tax purposes -- I realize how my carbon footprint has been minimized in those 20 plus years of 25-foot commutes from the bedroom to the home office.

A simple 25 mile one-way daily commute adds up to over 12,500 miles a year for the average worker. My own yearly mileage for errand-running and trips is less than 5,000 miles. Add the 12.5K miles of a normal commuter to my 5K and it would be easy to put on over 17,500 miles on a vehicle in a year.

In researching this article for SelfGrowth.com I looked all over the Internet for figures on the average yearly mileage in the US and the UK. The results run anywhere from 12,000 miles per year to 20,000 for each driver. Some reports state that the average person in the US produces approximately 7.5 tons of carbon dioxide every year. Every mile a car is driven produces nearly a pound of carbon dioxide.

There are, of course, hundreds of simple and creative ways for us to reduce our impact on the environment: planting trees, consistent recycling, composting, avoiding plastic bags (re-using our own shopping bags), adjusting thermostats and controls to use less heating and cooling energy (solar panels, anyone?), keeping our vehicle tires properly inflated, using public transportation when possible, eating locally-produced organic foods, and the list goes on and on.

In your own career, if it is possible to work from home, please consider it. With sky-rocketing gas prices, no commute makes obvious sense for your pocket book. And, if you have the self-discipline to accomplish your work from home, you will no doubt enjoy the time savings.

But the true benefit of working from your own home office, in the bigger scheme of things, is how much less gasoline you will use each day and how much just your daily difference can help our Mother Earth.

Cait Stanley|green-friendly|boomer retirement|gas prices|no commute|work from home|green business|carbon footprint|entrepreneurs