Alberta's electricity is as dirty as it comes. As an Edmontonian, when you're using power you're almost certainly causing coal to be burned.

Coal is the dirtiest electricity source in terms of poisons (Sulfur Dioxides, Mercury, Nitrous Oxides) and Carbon Dioxide, the most problematic greenhouse gas.

One of the cheapest actions you can take to reduce your impact is to start hang-drying your clothes. Buy a drying rack (or two) like the one pictured above. I got mine at Superstore. The next time it's time to waste a bunch of coal by tossing your wet clothes into the electric dryer, pull out the rack instead and start hanging.

The average dryer sucks about 900 KWh per year (details), so drying your clothes on a rack for a year will save almost 1 tonne of coal, which is about 1 tonne of Carbon Dioxide.

Go ahead and try. It takes a bit longer, but once it becomes part of your routine you forget that you used to turn on a machine for something as simple as drying clothes