To fight global warming, some hang a clothesline!---From the New York Times

To reduce energy bills and carbon emissions ,the author (Kathleen A. Hughes) secretly hung a clothesline in her backyard. Like many homeowners' associations, hers restricts their use. According to the authors own experience, as a child she used to hung clothes outside on the clothesline with her mother every time they washed their clothes. Her teacher told her she should use a clothesline to dry her clothes instead of the dryer. Since 1991, Kathleen hasn't seen people using clothesline. More buildings are build so that there's not even space for us to hang clothes outside. In the authors opinion, in order to use less energy and to reduce our monthly electric bills, using clothesline is possible.

There's a clothesline fan, Alexander Lee, a lawyer and 32-year-old clothesline activist in Concord, N.H. His web site, laundrylist.org, is an encyclopedia on the energy advantages of hanging laundry. Mr. Lee sponsors an annual National Hanging Out Day on April 19. The clotheslines are in a lowered corner of the backyard surrounded by hedges, they cannot be seen from the street, so it's not ugly for the neighborhood. There were more than 88 million dryers in the country in 2005, the latest count, according to the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers. If all Americans linedried for just half a year, it would save 3.3% of the country's total residential output of carbon dioxide, experts say. It's one of the simplest things to do to help with global warming. In Hollywood movies, they even use clotheslines as a kind of decorator, like in the films "Angela's Ashes," "Children of Men" and "Pearl Harbor." As to the author, she completely agrees, she thinks that maybe more people will join in to the group of clotheslines fans.

In my own point of view, using clotheslines rather than dryer is a good way to fight global warming. Clotheslines are actually a kind of "beauty". It gives a homey, close neighborhood feeling. Especially in summer or spring time, hanging your clothes outside the yard is a way to be close to nature. Some people might think that seeing laundry at the neighborhood is an ugly flag of poverty. In some countries, hanging out the clothes is almost a traditional. Like in China, few people use dryer to dry clothes. Although we have drying machines at home, but it's not necessary to use it when we have a balcony. Why not feel the smell of nature? The smell of machinery isn't good...is it? In most of the developed countries, people mostly prefer to use dryer. Because it's fast and convenient. But think of it, using dryer is a waste of both energy and money. Give ourselves a break, try to dry your clothes on a clothesline some day. You can exercise at the same time! Feel the feeling of closing nature, and enjoy the moment hanging clothes with your kids!