If You Need Help Saving L.A. . . . : Environment: So, you want to reduce, reuse and recycle, but don’t know how? A new directory of environmental products and services may be what the doctor ordered.

Tricia Hoffman and Nan Fuchs are convinced most people in Los Angeles don’t want to pollute the air, waste resources or overload the landfills with throwaway items.

But most people don’t have, or won’t take, the time to track down that little shower gimmick that cuts the water flow in half, scout out the nearest recycling center or bone up on drought-appropriate lawns.

“These things are not listed in the Yellow Pages,” Hoffman notes.

So she and Fuchs produced “Save L.A.,” an environmental resource directory that lists the names, addresses and telephone numbers of environmental products and services that are springing up all over the eco-landscape.

The directory, priced at $8.95 and just out from Chronicle Books, is a first. Combining capsule discussions of environmental problems and solutions with more than 1,000 product and service listings, it’s a how-to guide for any Los Angeles resident trying to reduce, reuse and recycle.

At Chronicle Books in San Francisco, Editor in Chief Nion McEvoy sees the directory as a timely prototype. And he envisions a series of such guides for cities throughout the country: “I don’t even see why it couldn’t be used all over the world.

“Environmentalism is moving into the mainstream. People are concerned and realize that they, too, have some responsibility for their stewardship of the planet.” Advance interest has been good, McEvoy says.

“I think it’s unique to start this book in Los Angeles, which has the image of flashy, plastic Hollywood glitz and is so well known for its smog,” he says. “People would expect a book like this from San Francisco, which still has that Birkenstock effect on people. But Los Angeles also has an informed and aware populace and a caring citizenry.”

“Save L.A.,” which its authors describe as a primer on ways to think globally and act locally, grew from practical experience. Hoffman and Fuchs, who share a 1950s ranch-style house in Santa Monica, wanted to create a Westside version of Eco-Home, the Los Feliz model house for ecological living.

Hoffman, a massage therapist, has been involved in environmental volunteer work for years. Fuchs, a nutritionist-author who has written “The Nutrition Detective” and “Overcoming the Legacy of Overeating,” says she has been increasingly concerned with environmental aspects of food and health.

Says Hoffman: “We were both becoming more holistic.”

They began retrofitting the eight-room, three-bath house--which also is Hoffman’s office--for environmental efficiency last year.

They installed low-flow shower heads and faucet restricters, put a solar water heater on the roof, replaced opaque glass slat windows with dual-glazed glass and insulated a sliding glass door in the den with curtains. Their large lawn has been replaced with drought-tolerant plants, and they have created a bio-dynamic compost pile--which alternates layers of manure and hay--for a garden in which they hope to grow most food for their vegetarian meals.

Early into the project, Hoffman--who estimates that she spent between three and four hours a day on the telephone--started throwing notes into a file drawer. She was turning up hard-to-get items, such as an automatic shut-off valve for a water purifier that wasted water. She was finding people who specialize in such new fields as environmental architecture.

And Hoffman was getting lots of mixed signals. Seeking the best insulation for a sliding glass door, she stumbled across several options: A window quilt? Insulated drapery? Dual-pane glass? Window film? Almost every question had several answers.

“I thought other people might be interested in this information,” she says. That started “Save L.A.,” which not only lists new products, but also tries to sort out some of the confusion.

Says Fuchs: “There are pros and cons to all of these systems. And we discuss them all in the book. We were looking for the people who would address our needs and would give us time to explain what we wanted to do. This isn’t a phone book; we are discussing the kind of service being offered.”

The book’s directory section describes 90 categories of products and services. Some are as familiar as insulation weather-stripping or recycled paper. Others, such as organic baby food, earthworms for composting and a recycling service for auto air-conditioner Freon, are not exactly household staples.

“I think you get a sense from reading the directory of what we experienced, without our coming out and endorsing anyone,” says Fuchs.

“We talked to a lot of these people ourselves, and if we found out they were just interested in the green dollar, we just left them out. (Those listed in the book) are not fly-by-night businesses. To the best of our knowledge, they are people who are seriously committed to making environmental changes.”

Even though they worked nonstop organizing the material, they realized that some listings would be out of date before the book was published. The nature of a guidebook is that it always needs to be updated.

To that end, the book’s final page is a blank form for products or services to be listed in future editions of “Save L.A.”

Just as the book is an ongoing process, so is the authors’ remodeling project.

“I don’t know that we will ever be through,” Fuchs says, “because our consciousness has changed. It’s not a matter of dumping things in different recycling buckets and putting them out. We use tree trimmings for firewood and lawn clippings for mulch. And we’ve reduced water consumption by almost 50%.

“To me it’s dramatic to use so many things we used to throw away.”