Editor's note: The Student LoanDown is thrilled to welcome back Caroline Hanson from family leave — and just in time for all the earth-friendly festivities happening this week!
When I graduated from college 14 years ago, people weren't all that serious about "going green." Most of us recent grads were driving giant gas-guzzling cars from the '70s and early '80s. And back then, being a "granola" was much more about wearing flannel shirts and Birkenstocks 
than saving the environment.
For those of you in college now, you really have a great opportunity to live "green" for your whole adult life. For me, I've really only recently become more conscious of living "green." The cool thing I've noticed is that doing things that are environmentally friendly will almost invariably save you money.
It's almost like if you just make a conscious choice to spend less money, you'll automatically be doing things that are also good for the environment, whether it's buying a car that gets great mileage, turning down your thermostat, or using compact fluorescent light bulbs .
Conversely, if you struggle with saving money, try shifting your focus to living eco-friendly instead. You might find that living green saves you green.
What environmentally-friendly things have you done that saved you money?
As someone who sells bulbster.com light bulbs for a living, I am less enthusiastic than most about compact fluorescent bulbs. This is due to the fact that the ones currently available contain significant amounts of mercury. If one of these bulbs should break inside of a person’s home, it could cause a challenging disposal situation. It is my belief that the technology should progress to a point at which the mercury levels are low or nonexistent before people changeover their entire homes. Another consideration is that as these bulbs burn out, they will most likely be thrown away as though they are normal rubbish and landfills will have incredibly high levels of mercury in their soil as a result.
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Most CFLs today on the market contain less than 5mgs of mercury and there are CFL options out there that contain as little as 1.5mgs of mercury- which can hardly be called a “significant amounts of mercury” considering that many item in your home contain 100s of times more of mercury including your computer. Mercury levels in CFLs can never be “nonexistent” since mercury is a necessary component of a CFL and there is no other known element that is capable of replacing it. But CFLs actually prevent more mercury from entering the environment. According to the Union of Concerned Scientist, “a coal-fired power plant will emit about four times more mercury to keep an incandescent bulb glowing, compared with a CFL of the same light output”.