Jon’s 2009 Green Gift Guide

• The Energy Detective TED-5000 home energy monitor From my research this home energy monitor is the right balance of affordable, expandable and practical for that eco person who wants to know when and how much electricity being used in the home.  The TED-5000 is compatible with Google’s PowerMeter, so you can access your logs from anywhere on the web.  Check out the TED-5000 in action.
  You can typically save 10-20% on energy use from simply measuring and being more aware of what behaviors result in more or less energy use.
• Solio Classic Universal Hybrid Charger

  Turn his/her cell phone into a solar phone by charging the internal battery in the Solio during the day from the sun and then charging the phone at night. Of course this only eliminates emissions from one side of the equation for cell phones, but it is a start.

• USB Powered Heated Gloves
  

Keep his/her hands warm while typing away on the computer. Have you ever been working on the computer and realized that your fingers were freezing? With these gloves, your friend can stay warm even in a cold office or when they turn down the heat to save energy.

• Wonderworld Eco-Friendly Dollhouse from Smart Gear (Treehugger Gift Guide)
  
  Not your average doll house.  Though a bit on the pricey side, this helps inspire young minds to think about including things like solar and wind on homes. 
• Power House Green Essentials Edition from EcoPlanet (Treehugger Gift Guide)Empower that kid in your life with this sustainable and renewable project kit.The ten buildingprojects include: the power house itself, a greenhouse, a solar cell array, a passive solar collector, a solar oven, an air conditioner, a refrigerator, a hydrometer, a lemon battery, and a wind power generator.

  Let them experiment with the heating, cooling, and insulation of the house and greenhouse. Test passive solar collection methods with a solar collector. Assemble a solar power array to explore active solar power with photovoltaics. Build a model refrigerator and air conditioner to learn about heat transfer. Experiment with a lemon battery to learn about power storage. Set up a wind turbine to generate electricity from the wind.

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  Wind Turbine Neck Tie – Give him the gift of eco flare for that next dinner party or tie requiring event.

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  Kill-a-watt I use it to measure everything from the dishwasher to my iPhone charger.  You can quickly seem how much power a device is using or leave it plugged in over time to measure things that have variable loads, like a refrigerator.  If you can measure it, you can reduce it.
• Smart Power Strip
  (if they’d use it)A smart strip is great if you have associated peripherals that you would otherwise have to turn off manually when shutting down a primary device.  Some common examples are a printer for your computer or DVD player for your TV.  The smart strip will sense when the primary device (computer or TV) is turned off (or into a low power mode) and then switch off power to the controlled devices.

If you must buy gifts this season, hopefully these will help inspire some ideas.

Happy Holidays!
Jon