You can promote environmental awareness when giving gifts to friends and family. Just try not to be heavy-handed about it.

For example, giving dad a carbon offset for his SUV is about as tactful as giving your teenage son a stick of deodorant. A lot of environmental gifts carry holier-than-thou connotations. With that in mind, here are three ideas for environmentally themed gifts:

• Electricity monitor: Most of us tend to our appliances without really knowing what they cost us. All we get is a monthly bill, with no breakdown. Imagine getting a long-distance phone bill that doesn’t tell you where you called, or what each call cost.

For about $20. a simple, inexpensive electricity monitor helps you get a handle on your consumption. All you do is plug the monitor into a wall outlet, then plug an appliance or lamp into the device. You can immediately read current consumption in watts, or leave it on to let it count kilowatt-hours.

• Folding commuter bicycle: Bicycling is a great way to get around, but parking and storage can be difficult, especially when biking to work or school. New folding bikes feel sturdy on the ride and come with city-bike conveniences like wheel guards and a rack. Some have three speeds, enough for city riding. The bike weighs around 27 pounds and retails for under $400.

• Solar charger: Originally made for hikers or back-country cabin dwellers, solar chargers can juice up cell phones and MP3 players. The charger is about the size of a TV remote. Be aware that it takes 10-12 hours of direct sunlight to charge up an internal battery that in turn then fully charges a cell phone.

Other green gifts can be purchased for $50 or less. Examples would be local artists’ work, local handmade items and donations to green organizations in the gift recipient’s name. CharityChoice gift cards allow a recipient to choose among more than 75 various U.S.-based non-profit organizations.

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Of course, if you are going “extreme green,” you’d give nothing but love: No energy spent to produce, transport or purchase -- and no risk that your gift will end up in a landfill after you leave it behind.

-- Associated Press, Wisconsin State Journal

Starting point

For ecologically minded gifts, prescreened and ranked on an environmental basis, try EVO, www.evo.com. The company ranks products with one to five leaves, based on “green attributes” — what the items are made from, how they’re produced, the distance traveled to reach the consumer, and what type of energy is used to power them. EVO also links to local businesses’ Web sites for purchasing information. In the baby toys section, for example, an organic cotton Labrador from Madison, Wis.-based Satara Inc. merits a top rating of five leaves.