Going Green

March 27th, 2009 by Mark Mutschler

Recently our building in Oregon City received a bid to place photovoltaic solar cells on our roof. You might ask what this has to do with being a Pediatric Dentist in Oregon?

Well, I believe that is everyone’s responsibility to help preserve the earth’s energy resources. See EnviroMom for more info. Also, we are converting to a paper-less dental office this year.

The two actions go hand-in-hand because we go through an incredible amount of paper every year just filling out forms and keeping track of every filling, orthodontic procedure, crown, and dental cleaning.

If we could keep all that information on the computer, we would save the trees used to make the paper and the gas used to produce and transport it.

Installing solar cells is helpful to replace the electricity used to run the computers. Now is especially a good time to put solar energy cells in Oregon because of the generous tax credits the Oregon and Federal goverments provide business owners.

Our East Portland pediatric dental office has a steep concrete tile roof and it is not well suited for solar cells. Our Oregon City pediatric dental office is much better suited because of its flat roof and lack of nearby trees.

Other ways we are trying to conserve natural resources is to use fewer disposable plastic covers on our dental chairs, sterilize and reuse instruments rather than throw them away, and use more bio-degradable products. (See Going Green 2)

If every pediatric dentist and orthodontist does their part, we can save enough trees and oil to support a healthy environment and healthy kids.

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