4 foolish ways to go 'green'

3/30/2011 12:45 PM ET

| By Liz Weston, MSN Money

Being frugal and trying to save the planet are all well and good -- but some efforts to save energy can backfire on you big time.

Related topics: homes, hybrid, energy, save money, Liz Weston

Katy Wolk-Stanley revels in her frugality and is proud of the ways she's gone "green" to save money as well as the planet. One of those ways, though, recently backfired spectacularly.

Wolk-Stanley, who blogs at The Non-Consumer Advocate, received a 32-inch Sony Trinitron television from a friend and plugged it into the surge protector she uses to prevent "vampire" electricity usage. But then she unthinkingly switched off the surge protector while the television was still on, overloading the Sony's circuit board.

"Zzzzp, I fried our big TV and transformed it into a huge paperweight," Wolk-Stanley wrote on my Facebook fan page. "And if that doesn't qualify as a 'go green' fail, I don't know what does!"

Actually, there are plenty of ways your efforts to be more environmentally friendly can cost you big time. If you really want to save your wallet as well as the planet, avoid the following moves:

Liz Weston

Hybrids sell for a premium over similar gasoline models, and these days that premium is rising thanks to higher gas prices and parts-supply disruptions in Japan because of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear emergencies.

How long the supply disruptions will last isn't clear. Nor do we know what will happen next with gas prices. The current high costs at the pump are due to oil traders' worrying about instability in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf, rather than any systemic problems such as a curtailed oil supply. Some analysts don't think the current surge is sustainable and predict gas prices will soon settle back to less than $3 a gallon.

So trying to calculate how long it would take you to break even is problematic.

But it rarely makes financial sense to trade in a relatively new car just because you want another one, even if the replacement is more fuel-efficient. You take the biggest hit in value in the early years, since depreciation is so steep. Plus, you haven't started to experience the higher maintenance and repair costs that come with older cars and that can make a replacement more financially justifiable.

In general, the smartest way to own cars is to buy them slightly used and then drive them for 10 years or so. Continually swapping out one new car for another is just a way to burn money.

If your current car isn't worn out yet and you want to save money on gas, consider:

All the usual ways to drive less: carpooling, using public transportation, grouping your errands.Driving more sensibly. Speeding and jackrabbit stops and starts burn fuel.Making sure your tires are properly inflated. Flabby tires take more fuel to turn.Cleaning out the junk in your trunk to reduce your car's weight and fuel usage.

Replacing inefficient, single-paned windows with energy-efficient ones can save you 10% to 25% a year on your heating and cooling costs, according to Consumer Reports. Impressive, right? Unfortunately, the costs of buying and installing new windows are so great -- figure $7,000 to $10,000 for a typical house -- that you may need 20 years or more for the savings to outweigh the costs.

New windows do add to the value of your home, but you still won't recoup what you paid. The typical return for window replacements is about 72% of their cost if you sell within a year after installing them, according to Remodeling magazine's annual Cost vs. Value report. The longer you wait, the lower the payback.

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