Compact fluorescent lightbulbs contain a small amount of mercury, so if you accidentally drop one in your home, take these steps from the Environmental Protection Agency to protect yourself, your family and your pets. Start by having everyone leave the room. Turn off your central air/heating system and open a window to air out the room for 10 minutes. Do NOT vacuum -- vacuuming can spread mercury even further in the room. Use sticky tape to pick up fragments and powder, and use stiff paper to scoop up broken glass. Repeat until all traces of glass and powder are gone. Place everything in a glass jar or freezer bag, and then wipe all of the surfaces down with a damp rag. Finally, toss the remains in the trash, and replace your CFL bulb with a greener and cleaner LED one.

Do you drink your hot coffee or tea through a straw to prevent staining your pearly whites? It might be time to stop. Plastic straws are often made with the chemical BPA, the chemical that has been phased out of food storage containers and reusable water bottles because of the possible link to endocrine disruption. Not all plastic straws are made with BPA, but since they are not marked with a recycling code, you can never tell. So it's best to skip using a straw -- they aren't eco-friendly anyway! -- and sip your hot brew from a reusable mug instead.

Computer recycling used to be very difficult. But with major retailers like Best Buy and Staples and manufacturers like Apple and Dell making it easy, it's a cinch to keep e-waste out of landfills. If you're concerned about your personal information getting stolen, take the step to wipe clean your old system before recycling it. There are free programs that you can download online that overwrite your files with snonsense data." Find these programs by searching the web for "hard drive scrubbing software."