I learned the evils of the 'drying cycle' during my bachelor days.

I was performing the then-weekly task of doing the dishes, quickly tossing my wares into the machine before heading out for some killer rollerblading weather- a rarity for where I lived at the time.

After coming back from a solid two hours on skates, daydreaming of enjoying a cold beer on the deck as soon as I got home, I arrived to light smoke sticking to the ceiling of my kitchen and an awful, acrid smell permeating the apartment.

It only smelled worse as I neared the dishwasher. Upon opening the offending appliance, I discovered the culprit- a plastic slotted spoon (the kind for scooping out pasta) had fallen into the heating coils that dried the dishes, and subsequently melted.

So, for a few weeks my place stunk of burnt cheap plastic. Fantastic!

As a result, I was terrified of using the "dry" mode of my dishwasher for several weeks, fearing the result of leftover plastic pieces that I wasn't able to remove from the heating coils.

In my typical absentminded way, I forgot to turn the "dry" cycle on again, and by accident, ended up saving a little bit off my electric bill. The dishes still got dry, in their own way, so exactly why did I need to leave it turned on?

Years later, I'm doing research for Project Green, and find that I was unwittingly helping the environment.

Did you know the heating cycle of your dishwasher consumes 15% to 50% of your dishwasher's energy usage? The older your dishwasher, the more energy you should save by not using that dry cycle.

Now that I've evolved and I'm actually running the dishwasher daily, it's sure to be saving even more energy, and thankfully, money.

This was among the many tips I've found lately on my local electric utility's website- most local utilities publish tons of tips on their sites, which I always thought was kind of strange, but refreshing in today's times: a company actively encouraging its customers to use less of their product.

Take a look at your local power company's website- you'd be surprised what you can find that might help save more than one kind of green. We've got a few links for them on the right.

Or, you could just find out the way I did: accidentally while getting out of the house to go rollerblading.