Greener Apartment Living

Luxury living doesn’t mean you need to sacrifice your commitment to a healthier environment. There are many ways you can enjoy modern luxury while conserving the Earth’s limited natural resources right in your own apartment home. Utilizing the latest environmentally-friendly technology and making a few small adjustments to your habits can result in significant benefits for the natural environment.

Switch to CFLs

Regular incandescent light bulbs were once the easiest go-to when you needed lighting in your apartment. However, incandescent bulbs aren’t the most ecologically-friendly lighting solution. Today, compact fluorescent lamps (also called CFLs) offer bright, steady light using a fraction of the energy eaten up by incandescent bulbs. CFLs aren’t much more expensive than incandescent bulbs, but will use up to 66% less energy and last ten times as long. These green lighting choices will save you money on both energy costs and the cost of bulb replacement while reducing the amount of energy required to light your luxury apartment.

Start an Apartment Garden

Greenery adds a natural element to your apartment while providing free and organic herbs, spices, and produce for your table. Creating a container garden on your balcony or patio is both easy and fun. There are endless ways to recycle old containers and materials into containers for your garden to save money and resources. If you don’t have a balcony or don’t prefer to use it for gardening, there are a number of herbs and spices that will grow well in small pots set near a window inside your apartment. Popular herbs that flourish indoors include basil, bay, chives, dill, mint, rosemary, parsley, and oregano.

Unplug Unnecessary Electronics

In today’s technological age, the outlets in your apartment can become crowded with chargers, gaming devices, televisions, computers, and more. Unfortunately, many of these electronics use energy even when they are switched off. Some of the most common “power vampires” include cell phone, computer, and camera chargers, TVs, DVD players, and cable boxes. You can save energy by unplugging chargers when they are not in use to prevent them from draining additional power. Hook your media center up to a single power strip or surge protector that features an on/off switch, which makes it easy to power up everything at once when you want to watch TV or play a game. Following these practices can save you enough energy to power your apartment for two months or more!

Use Window Treatments

Window treatments are a stylish way to dress up your apartment’s windows and tie them into the rest of your décor. However, window treatments also provide beneficial insulating properties that can help you save energy in your apartment all year long. During the summer, close your curtains or blinds during times of direct sunlight illumination to reduce the amount of heating in your apartment from solar radiation. In the winter, reverse this process—keep the curtains open during the day, then close them at night to prevent the leakage of heat through your windowpanes into the cooler air of the outdoors.

At Carmel The Village, our dedication to conserving the environment is visible in our energy-efficient appliances, eco-friendly building materials, and ample community greenspace. You can learn more about living a luxurious, eco-friendly lifestyle near San Jose and Palo Alto when you visit our website to check out our full list of apartment features and amenities. We invite you to check out our gallery and floor plans online as well so you can better picture yourself living in your new Mountain View apartment home!