6 Ways Your Home Contributes to Pollution (and How To Stop It)

The struggle to curb and control pollution begins at home. Here are six types of household pollution you can actually do something about.

Water PollutionNARVIKK/GETTY IMAGES

In the 1950s, pollution wasn’t on the minds of most people. At the time I lived in a house on the shores of the Detroit River. In those days, the river was considered a good place to swim as long as you stayed close to shore and out of the swiftly-moving currents.

By the mid-60s, parents started telling their kids to stay away from the river kids because the water was “polluted.” I didn’t even know what that meant when I first heard it.

But only a few years later, news stories about rivers catching fire, lakes dying, smog and holes in the ozone layer were commonplace. By the 1970s, pollution had become big news.

Jump to the present, and pollution has become a global crisis. Industry and technology receives much of the blame because factories, power plants and automobiles pump enormous quantities of pollutants into the air and water.

But households also contribute to the problem. And when you consider a good-sized city can have a million or more homes, that contribution is significant. (Also, discover what are 15 minute cities.)

The World Health Organization estimates household air pollution causes 3.2 million deaths annually from things like stroke, heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer. Poor sanitation practices fill waterways with dangerous prescription medicines, microplastics and other toxins. Improper landscaping and gardening practices sully the soil, and excessive noise and light afflict crowded cities.

What can you do to reduce your household pollution? Here are six types, and what to do about them.

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gas stove
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Air Pollution

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published a list of thirteen common indoor air pollutants, but the agency missed an important one: water vapor. Excessive humidity promotes mold and fungus growth and respiratory ailments, making it potentially as harmful as volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and other better-known pollutants.

Here are some ways for homeowners to keep the air indoors cleaner and more healthy:

  • Keep your home well-ventilated.
  • Clean or replace your HVAC filters frequently, especially when there’s smoke from a wildfire in the local atmosphere.
  • Use low-VOC paint when remodeling.
  • Stop cooking with gas. That’s the direction government regulations are pushing, so maybe now is the time for that new induction cooktop.
  • Consider upgrading gas appliances with high-efficiency electric ones, like a heat pump for home heating/cooling and a hybrid water heater.
  • Don’t spray pesticides. There are safer, more effective ways to handle ants and other pests.
  • Smoke outdoors.
  • Use unscented cleaning products. Some fragrances combine with ozone (itself a pollutant) to form formaldehyde.
  • Avoid products that generate ozone, like vegetable washers, and hair or facial tools.
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The drum of the washing machine is a close-up. The washing process. The washing machine is in operation. Foam on the door of the washing machine.
Grigoriy Negreskul/Getty Images

Water Pollution

The average household uses 300 gallons of water per day, 70 percent of it indoors. People need water for showering, using the toilet, and washing clothes and the dishes. Outdoors, we use it for maintaining plants and general cleaning.

Outdoors, water soaks into the ground or runs into storm drains or neighboring properties. Indoor water drains into a septic field, or goes through a processing plant en route to the ocean.

Here are some ways to protect the groundwater and the oceans:

  • Do not flush hazardous materials, including prescription medicines, most household cleaning products, paint and paint thinner. These should be handled as hazardous waste. Contact your local health authority to learn the best ways to dispose of these in your community.
  • Use environmentally safe, phosphate-free laundry detergent.
  • Compost food scraps rather than push them into the garbage disposal.
  • Use less water so there’s more for everyone. Install low-flow toilets, take shorter showers, landscape with drought-tolerant plants, irrigate with drip technology and keep your grass at least three inches high so it retains water.
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spraying pesticide with portable sprayer to eradicate garden weeds in the lawn. weedicide spray on the weeds in the garden. Pesticide use is hazardous to health.
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Soil Pollution

Contaminated soil and water pollution are closely connected. Underground water currents carry hazardous gardening materials to neighboring properties and and local bodies of water.

If you use a herbicide to kill weeds rather than pulling them, there’s a good chance that herbicide will end up in the groundwater. Here are some best practices for healthy soil, landscapes and gardens:

  • Spread sand rather than salt on icy sidewalks and driveways. The surrounding soil usually absorbs that salt. If there’s enough of it, nothing will grow.
  • Build healthy soil via organic materials like compost and manure rather than synthetic fertilizers.
  • Plant more trees and less grass or other thirsty ground cover. Trees control erosion, provide shade for a more diverse landscape and improve air quality.
  • Avoid commercial pesticides and herbicides. Use natural methods to control weeds, like hand-pulling or solarization. You can solve most bug problems by spraying a non-toxic soap solution.
  • Install permeable hardscaping. When you use gravel or pavers for walkways and patios, rainwater can seep into the subsoil and keep it healthy, rather than running off into storm drains.
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Household hazardous waste products and containers
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Hazardous Waste Pollution

Most people are familiar with the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an island of plastic waste between California and Hawaii that covers three time the area of France. Every piece of plastic you throw into the trash at home has a decent chance of one day ending up there.

Plastics are ubiquitous and still used extensively for packaging, so they’re hard to avoid. But if you have a choice, go for the product that doesn’t come wrapped in plastic.

In addition to plastics, there’s a long list of waste items that shouldn’t go in the trash or down the sink or toilet. They include:

  • Automotive products and fuels, including gas, oil, kerosene, antifreeze, brake and transmission fluid.
  • Household cleaning products like rust remover, furniture polish and oven cleaners.
  • Paint products, paint strippers, solvents, thinners and adhesives.
  • Yard and garden products, including chemical fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides and insect repellents.
  • Miscellaneous household items like prescription medicines, batteries and anything contain mercury, like fluorescent light bulbs and old thermostats.
  • Ionization-type smoke alarms that contain radioactive material.

Consult your local health authority for the best way to dispose of these items. Here learn about the concept of a circular economy.

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lawn mowing
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Noise Pollution

If you live in a crowded neighborhood, the noise you make affects your neighbors and vice versa. Even if you live in a cabin in the woods, you have to live with the noise you and your family make in the house.

Loud or persistent noises rob people of their peace of mind and jack up stress levels. Here are some things you can do about noise pollution:

  • Cover the floors with carpeting. It absorbs the sounds you make, as well as those coming from outside.
  • Swap your gas-powered garden tools for cordless ones. Besides creating fewer emissions, they’re quieter and easier to operate.
  • Turn down the bass. Low-pitch vibrations pass through walls more easily than high-pitch ones, and your neighbors might not enjoy the thumping as much as you do.
  • Put weatherstripping on your doors and windows to control sound transmission.
  • Upgrade your appliances. Besides using less energy than older ones, new appliances run quieter.
  • Plant trees, which absorb errant sounds.
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Small Solar Garden Light, Lantern In Flower Bed. Garden Design.
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Light Pollution

How many stars do you see when you look up at the sky? If you live in a crowded city, probably not many, and that tends to make you feel claustrophobic and anxious.

You can’t turn off the streetlights, but you’ll see more of the night sky if you can reduce the ambient light on your property and in your vicinity. Here are some ways to cut down on light pollution:

  • Start with darkness and add lighting only where you absolutely need it.
  • Use fixtures with the lowest light output possible. “Warm” lighting with more of the infrared spectrum is better than bluer “cool” lighting.
  • Install covered fixtures only and keep landscape and mood lights pointed to the ground.
  • Use flashlights.
  • Install motion sensors on all security lights and angle the lights toward the ground. Never point lights at a neighboring house. That’s called “lighting trespassing,” and it’s an invasion of privacy.
  • Keep the porch light off unless you really need it.
  • Develop your night vision. If you can see in the dark, you won’t need as many lights.
  • Hang drapes on your windows to block illumination from streetlights.

Chris Deziel
Chris Deziel has been building and designing homes, and writing about the process, for over four decades. He developed his construction and landscaping skills in the 1980s while helping build a small city in the Oregon desert from the ground up. He's worked as a flooring installer, landscape builder and residential remodeler. Since turning his focus to writing, he has published or consulted on more than 10,000 articles and served as online building consultant for ProReferral.com as well as an expert reviewer for Hunker.com. Though his specialties are carpentry, cabinetry and furniture refinishing, Chris is known by his Family Handyman editors as a DIY writer with a seemingly endless well of hands-on experience.