Author says living green will lead to saving green

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Author David Bach has written 10 financial advice books in as many years, but his latest takes a different tack on how singles and couples can change their lifestyles at any age and end up wealthy.

In his “Go Green, Live Rich,” Mr. Bach aims to teach readers that living an environmentally-conscious lifestyle isn’t just a luxury for people who can afford it. Rather, he says it’s a way to save thousands of dollars each year while turning the tide on global warming and getting on the path to becoming a “green millionaire.”

“There was a disconnect that most people believe you have to be rich or famous to go green,” the author said in an interview last week. He’s discovered that that’s not true.

While his Prius, a hybrid gasoline-electric car, did cost him more up front at the car dealership, he said he’ll probably recoup the up-front investment in less than a year, considering the trend in gas prices. He used to drive a Range Rover. Now, rather than 15 miles to the gallon, he gets 45. He drove from New York City to the Hamptons for a weekend of driving around town, then back to the city on just half a tank of gas, he said. He expects to save $1,000 on gasoline this summer.

The savings over the next nine years he has the car will be tremendous, he predicted.

Energy Star appliances, which cost a bit more, but offer more energy efficiency, are also a sound green investment with the cost of utilities on the rise, Mr. Bach added.

The author acknowledged that green products, such as eco-friendly laundry detergent, have historically cost 20 to 30 percent more than their non-green equivalents. However, as demand has risen for green products there is starting to be parity in prices, he said.

And Mr. Bach said going green has not only saved him money, it’s improved his well-being.

A few years ago he moved into The Solaire, “one of the greenest apartment buildings in the world,” located in Battery Park City in Manhattan. “It radically changed my health and my son’s health,” he said. “My son’s asthma went away when we moved in.”

In fact, he said his 4-year-old son, Jack, was his inspiration for “Go Green, Live Rich.”

“I just felt that this was something that I had to put my time and effort into for his sake,” he said, explaining that he wants to preserve the planet for his son’s future.

While his previous books have been more than a couple hundred pages and taken a bit of a commitment to read all the way through, he said “Go Green, Live Rich” (printed on recycled paper) was designed to be an easy hour or two read that will teach how to start going green.

It all begins when readers calculate their carbon footprint, the amount of carbon dioxide, or CO2, they produce in their daily lives.

Next, he asks readers to figure out their “litter factor,” a take-off of another phrase he coined, “latte factor.” The latte factor consists of what people spend their money on each day without even thinking about the drain on their pocketbooks—coffee, cigarettes, bottled water. He pointed out that the things that have been hurting people’s wallets do the same to the environment.

“Every day we do things that we don’t consciously think about that create tremendous amounts of litter,” he said.

For example, Mr. Bach said, coffee drinkers in America go through 14.4 billion disposable paper cups each year, enough to wrap the Earth 55 times. And the plastic lining in those cups is made from a petrochemical that would produce enough energy to heat 8,300 homes for a year.

“Wasting money and hurting the planet go hand in hand,” he emphasized in the first chapter of his book.

Drinking bottled water can add up to $2,500 a year if one drinks the recommended amount, he wrote. That same amount of tap water in a reusable container costs just a dollar, he noted.

Some other tips save money by taking away temptations. Mr. Bach instructs readers how to opt out of credit card offers and catalogs that come to their homes. Stopping the junk mail before its get to their house will not only reduce the inclination to spend money on things they don’t need, but it also saves on the trees and transportation to get the junk mail into the mailbox, he wrote.

Green will soon be the new norm in real estate, too, according to “Go Green, Live Rich.” Nearly half of all home buyers are looking for a green house, but only 2 percent of existing homes meet the criteria. It makes no sense to build a new home any other way but green, Mr. Bach said. In his book, Mr. Bach writes that home values increase $20 for every $1 of annual energy savings, and green building materials such as recycled glass tiles and recycled marble floors can increase value even more.