Okay, first, you’re going to need to find an unused piece of property in the remote wilderness, squat until you can legally claim ownership, and then spend years working to make it self-sustainable….

Jk jk, yo.

Plenty of people enjoy that lifestyle, but it’s not realistic for everyone, especially urban dwellers, millennials, and the everyday suburbanite. Which, you know, is a vast majority of the population. So I’ve compiled a list of tools and resources that make it easy for almost anyone to have a positive impact on the environment.

Before I share it with you, please allow me to guilt trip you with a few statistics:

• According to TreeHugger, the U.S. is comprised of less than five percent of the earth’s population, yet we consume over 30 percent of its resources.
• According to The University of Nevada, Reno’s Public Health program, climate change is the biggest threat to global health, both currently, and in future projections.
• National Geographic reports that global warming will wipe out 15 to 35 percent of the globe’s species by the year 2050.
• John Moore Services reminds us that we don’t have an infinite supply of water, despite the fact that the earth is covered with it: 97 percent of the globe’s water is salt water, and of the three percent left, only one percent of it is drinkable. That percentage shrinks even more when you remember that humans are only a small portion of the life on earth that requires clean water to survive.

So, you know… the world is kind of in dire straights. Things are so bad that a lot of individuals feel like there’s really nothing they can do to save it. And it’s true: no one human can save the earth and all of the life on it, especially with the way things are currently careening out of control. However, each of us can do things that will have a positive impact, and there are realistic ways for us to keep track of our impact and make sizeable differences in our daily lives. Here are a few small ways almost any average American can make a difference:

Solar Power Is Within Reach

A mere ten or twenty years ago, it cost the average family tens, if not hundreds, of thousands to implement solar power. Those large investments always paid for themselves in the end, but if you didn't have a bunch of money to drop in the first place, you were out of luck.

Solar panels still aren’t what anyone would consider cheap, but recent developments have actually put them within reach for most average Americans. An average-sized home can get a basic solar setup for a few grand, and there are even solar companies that offer loans, leases, and PPA plans that require no upfront or installation costs at all, which means you just pop all the savings into your pocket.

Advocating Is Everything

Even if you’re not in a place to set up or utilize renewable energy in your own home, you can advocate for it in the rest of the world. The fact of the matter is, fossil fuels are a limited resource that will one day run out. We need to shift to more sustainable forms of energy if we’re going to make it another hundred, let alone thousand, years on this planet.

The first thing you can do is educate yourself on the different types of renewable energy available and what they have to offer, and then do your part to educate others who are interested. Next, get in touch with your lawmakers (it’s easier than you think) and let them know that you support renewable resource and energy efforts in your country, state, and municipality.

R and R

Yeah, I know you’ve heard the phrase “reduce, reuse, recycle” a million times before, but there’s a reason for that: it really is one of the easiest ways for the average american to make a difference.

Most of us are probably recycling the basic items in our homes and workplaces, but did you know that there are so many more average, everyday items that are also recyclable? This Recycling 101 Guide will give you the rundown on what can be recycled and where. There’s also an app available called iRecycle, which helps Americans find out how and where to recycle over 350 different types of materials at over a million different locations.

There’s An App For That…

Speaking of apps, how about we delve into the world of smartphone applications that help the average, everyday American go green? There are a number of really good ones available, and we’re already interacting with our phones all day, so why not use some of that time to make the world a better place (and maybe enjoy it a little, too?)

This list from Cheatsheet has seven stellar apps that make it super easy to go green, including GoodGuide, which allows you to look up and review the environmental ethicality of the products you use everyday (you can even scan barcodes and look things up in-store before you purchase them.) There’s Ecoviate, which helps you implement sustainability education and efforts into your social media life, and Dropcoutr helps you conserve water by connecting your smartphone to your utility company so you can keep track of usage and detect leaks early.

There’s also Oroeco, which helps you track your impact on the environment and reduce your carbon footprint in easily attainable, bite-sized chunks. The best part is, if you get your friends and family involved, you can compete with each other for glory (and also real prizes… but let’s face it, the glory is really where it’s at.)

Let’s Make An Impact!

So we can’t all wear capes and fly around saving the world from pollution and overconsumption, but we can each make an impact, and it’s really not as difficult to do so as anyone might think. If you’ve got any of your own ideas about easy and accessible ways to go green, please share them with us in the comments!