Tax Day is looming, and Earth Day comes soon thereafter—two calendar happenings that at first glance don’t share an obvious connection. Yet the ways we spend and save can have a great effect on the planet. 

In our Greening Your Money series, we’ll offer some ideas on how to benefit the early-, mid-, and late-career environmentalist. While all our suggestions apply to greenies at any career stage, we’ll kick things off with some financial advice geared toward the newest workforce entrants: millennials.

Young workers are up against unique challenges: Job security is eroding, thanks in part to new technology and increasing automation; healthcare benefits and retirement plans are no longer standard workplace perks; and, of course, millennials live in an age when the environment is degrading. So, there’s plenty incentive to weave some green thinking into personal financial plans that can result in both wealth and enhanced eco-sustainability. Here are three tips for going about it.

Want to find a better partner? Seek out local credit unions as an alternative to big-institution banks

Leverage your growing consumer muscle by choosing financial partners that line up with your green values. Credit unions are membership organizations providing financial services similar to those of big-institution banks. “They’re socially responsible just by the nature of being a financial cooperative,” explains Redwood Credit Union’s chief of operations officer, Cynthia Negri. “It’s the concept of people pulling their money together for the greater good of everybody within that pool.”

That’s because credit union members are considered shareholders rather than consumers. As member-owned organizations, credit unions’ credit and deposit services are centered on their members’ needs and as such are more personalized. Fees are generally lower, and any profits derived from their operations are passed back to their members/shareholders/customers. While all federal credit union deposits are insured to $250,000, some state-chartered unions are privately insured—so it’s important to take note of the different accounts’ insurance and choose wisely.

Credit unions also provide free financial education to their members and often to local schools and communities, too. They typically provide both personal and small business loans to members and companies within their community. Also, credit unions often go a step further. “We do a lot around giving to our communities,” Negri says. “As an example, our credit union gave back $2.8 million to nonprofits and community groups, and we’ve donated more than 4,100 hours of volunteer service.”

Because credit unions make a point to avoid exposing their members to unnecessary financial risk, they typically avoid large commercial loans. This means they don’t loan money to big corporate interests and thus steer clear of many environmentally detrimental projects. Meanwhile, a cadre of for-profit, big-institution banks like Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and many others are funding questionable projects like the Dakota Access Pipeline. “We have very prudent lending practices, partly because we know the money we lend out is our members’ money,” Negri says. “We maintain and service all of our loans.”

Qualifying for membership is typically easy. Check out the credit union lookup tool A Smarter Choice to find some that suit your needs.

Be smart about retirement planning—invest in green mutual funds

Conceiving of retirement might be challenging right now, but as baby boomers will tell you, it comes in the blink of an eye. Gone are the days when a company-provided pension plan was standard fare. Now, most retirement-planning investment decisions rest squarely on workers’ shoulders.

Yet, with choice comes power. You can invest your retirement dollars in a host of mutual funds, including socially responsible ones that select companies based on their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) policies. Following a U.S. Bureau of Labor Employee Benefits Security Administration’s October 2015 ruling, retirement plan administrators are allowed to add ESG-qualified mutual funds to their investment menu of plan offerings.

If no ESG funds are available in their existing retirement plans, employees can suggest some (administrators are required to evaluate any worker suggestions as potential additions). While you may need to be persistent, your efforts could yield a two-for-one bonus: growing your retirement savings while supporting environmentally sustainable companies.

To find out more about socially responsible investments, check out US SIF, also known as the Forum for Sustainable and Responsible Investing. There, you can find a range of socially conscious investments from well-known mutual fund companies like American Century, Calvert, and Domini.

However, not all socially responsible mutual funds are created equal. There’s an expense associated with finding ESG-qualified investments—one that non-ESG mutual funds aren’t subject to. This expense gets passed on to green investors and comes out of their investment return. But here’s a workaround: Use ESG-qualified index funds that carry lower expense fees to offset added ESG expenses. Vanguard FTSE Social Index Fund and Calvert U.S. Large Cap Core Responsible Index Fund are two such funds with ultra-low expense ratios. Compared to their non-ESG peers, both yield competitive investment returns.

A final thing to keep in mind? Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. ESG policy is still evolving and isn't standardized at this point. Most companies have some sort of issue that renders them outside of ESG guidelines. Determining companies’ ESG qualification is somewhat of a moving target, as companies, naturally, change and grow over time. Meaning that if a once-golden company becomes egregiously socially irresponsible, that investment will be purged from the ESG portfolio, and vice versa.

Carry plastic? Get a greener credit card

These offer an excellent way to build a credit history while you support the environment. Look for credit card services affiliated with major environmental or socially conscientious groups—like the Sierra Club Affinity Credit Card from Beneficial State Bank. You can smile as you swipe, knowing a percentage of your transactions will support projects and initiatives of your favorite trusted, forward-looking organizations. In addition, many green credit cards offer other rewards, like airline, hotel, and car rental discounts.

Keep in mind, many green credit cards are provided through big-institution banks. If your goal is to break ties with big banks, look for green credit cards associated with smaller state or community banks.

This article has been modified since its original publication. 

The Sierra Club is working to raise awareness of sustainable investment strategies, but the Sierra Club is not an investment adviser or a securities broker. It has no expertise in the evaluation of investments, and is not qualified to make (and is not making) recommendations to any person regarding investments (including whether you should invest with any of the funds listed above). You should evaluate a potential investment with any provider based on your personal financial situation and goals, in consultation with your own advisers.