Recycle - seriously. Yes, it's almost painful to say it to you, because of course you already separate out the paper and the plastic, right? But just in case you don't, soda cans make it clear why you should: Aluminum has a 99 percent recycling rate. "You can recycle it forever," says Novacovici. And recycling just one little aluminum can saves the same amount of energy it would take to run a TV for three full hours. One can!

Put the kibosh on junk mail and catalogs (as much as possible). Direct marketers send out about 60 catalogs for every man, woman, and child in the United States annually, according to Novacovici. And all that junk mail? There's 100 million trees' worth sent out per year, which is "equal to deforesting the entire Rocky Mountain National Park every four months," says Wise. Stop in at the Direct Marketing Association's Consumer Assistance site (www.dma ­consumers.org/cgi/offmailing) to opt out of mailings from the association's members, and visit the Center for a New American Dream's "Declare Your Independence from Junk Mail" page (www.newdream.org/junkmail/index.php).

Paper or plastic? Go fabric instead and you could keep up to 1,500 plastic bags per year from making their way into landfills, says Wise, adding, "It takes 1,000 years for plastic bags to biodegrade."

Layer on clothes instead of giving your thermostat an extra twist. Take your thermostat down a mere two degrees this winter (and up two in the summer) and you'll save 2,000 pounds of carbon dioxide each year. And if the environmental benefit isn't enough to get that thermostat moving, just think how much money you'll save. "Being green doesn't take more green," says Wise. "You can actually save a lot of money."