Posts Tagged ‘trash’

Because we are lazy…

Saturday, January 2nd, 2010

We recycle.  Everything we can.  I even bring recyclables home from my travels to make sure that they get recycled and don’t end up in the landfill.  I have ranted on and on about restaurants and food vendors like Starbucks and Chipotle that sell beverages in containers and do not recycle, so if I dine at one of these places I have to bring a bottle or plastic cup home to make sure it doesn’t end up in a whole in the ground.  Sometimes, however, I forget.  Or worse, sometimes I am just lazy and do not feel like hauling that glass bottle with me for the next couple of hours while I do my grocery shopping or whatever.  But we do better than many, and some people (even my friends-yes, you know who you are) still do not recycle.  I die a little each time I see them toss a can in the trash or that plastic container not even reused once before it heads to the curb.

That is why I am a big advocate of the bottle deposit law.  What is that?  Well, if you live in a state with a deposit, some or all beverages that come in a container have a deposit attached.  That means that when you buy a soda, you pay an extra nickel for the container.  When the container is empty, it can be returned for the five (or in some states ten) cent deposit to be returned to you.  This is not a new idea.  When I was a kid, we used to go bottle hunting.  We would scour the areas around the parks, pool, or that spot where the older kids used to hang out and drink beer on Friday nights.  We would take our dozen bottles, cash them in, and buy ourselves a treat.  I grew up in Kansas, that had a bottle deposit until sometime in the 80’s.  In most of the states on the west coast, it is still a law.  Just look at your can of Coke and you can see the eleven states that offer deposits.  But why should every state have a bottle deposit?  Because we are lazy (and greedy).

Why do we even have this debate at this stage in the game? It seems natural that we should all be recycling, so we do not need a deposit bill, right? Wrong. While those reading this may be avid “greenies” we often forget that we are still in the minority. The only way to get more recycling to be done is by making it easy, mandatory, or profitable. By adding a 5 cent deposit to every container of soda that we sell in the US, most of us would not feel it a bit. Beverage producers would need little to add to their system, as they have all the tools to implement a program in every state, as they do it already in some. Your case of beer or soda would cost you an extra $1.20. But when you return to the store, you return the cans and get your $1.20 back. In places like Oregon, I saw folks at a more difficult stage of their lives surviving by collecting those nickel containers. Parks are cleaner, roadsides have less litter, and recycling is up. Way up according to the Container Recycling Institute.  According to their numbers, states with mandatory deposits have recycling rates hovering around 60%.  On the other hand, states that do not have deposit laws have recycling  rates that only reach about 24%.  That includes progressive states like Washington that recycle well, but still have no bottle deposits.

So with the stroke of a pen, we could increase recycling rates in all states.  Why do we not do it?  Once again, laziness and greed.  Store owners hate bottle deposits as it does add to their operating expenses.  Does that mean stores in Oregon are less profitable than those in Ohio?  No.  The impact on the bottom line of stores is minimal, as they do not have to pay that deposit refund, it comes from the manufacturer.  With the simple addition of automatic bottle counting machines, the work goes back to the consumer in most cases-and consumers are lazy.  Besides, if we had to rely on store owners to do the right thing on their own, I am sure there would be complaints of food expiration dates and mandatory breaks as eating into their profits.  The real opposition comes from big business lobbying.

The American Beverage Association has gone so far as to produce a report.  But this report has issues for me.  First off, I never rust a report that is produced, commissioned, and reported by itself.  Secondly, I do not support their conclusions.  According to the report, money would be better spent to expand community recycling programs than spent on bottle deposit implementation.  While that may be true, ABA member companies would be forced to invest in bottle deposit programs, while there is no way legislation will be passed that will force bottlers to give money to the communities of the country to expand their recycling efforts.  Their report also states that 73% of Americans have curbside recycling and 83% have access to drop off recycling.  I find those numbers hard to believe, but considering the high population numbers in urban centers it could be true.  That being said, it really is slight of hand.  Even in Cleveland we have access to drop off locations and some access to curbside.  Even I find recycling difficult in this town.  So those who are less motivated or who have less time are even less likely to recycle.  But, were there a bottle deposit in place, even my non recycling friends would be likely to start.  Or at the very least, would be likely to put their cans out for the homeless to pick up and return for cash.

The ABA is a lobbying group that represents its members.  They say,“three decades of data and practical experience have undeniably demonstrated that imposing mandatory deposits on beverage containers is a poor way to increase recycling and address solid waste issues.”  Of course mandatory deposits would force their members to implement deposit programs, so not a huge surprise that their findings fell this way.

The truth of the matter is that we sell 200 BILLION beverage containers in the US every year.  Out of these, 130 billion end up in the landfill or are incinerated.  We know what we are doing, yet are too lazy to do anything about it.  That is why I support a national bottle deposit.  In a time when national corporations are doing just fine, but local recycling programs are struggling, I say that we can let Anheuser Busch and Pepsico pay the bill to take some of our waste out of the waste stream.

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Pay to throw away?

Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

File-VuilnisI wish I had been more diligent in following the agenda for city council meetings. If I had, then I would have known about the meetings in which Cleveland City Council discussed the trash collection fee. It has passed. Starting in 2010, city residents are going to start paying $8 a month to have their garbage picked up. The council did this with much reluctance, but found that the gaps in the 2010 budget needed to be filled, and were it not for this fee, we might lose a firehouse, a few police officers or something else. Since I am never short of opinions, here are my thoughts on this issue:

It is about time. In Portland, where we last lived, we paid over $35 a month per can to have garbage picked up. I was astounded when we moved here that nearly anything unwanted could simply be piled onto the tree lawn. Cleveland should have implemented this fee a long time ago. Paying makes citizens invested in their services, so by making them completely free, they are abused and over used.

Speed up the rollout of the curbside recycling program. This fee should not be thought of as a budget stop gap measure. If Cleveland really wants to make this a Green City on a Blue Lake, it needs to start taking garbage and garbage service seriously as an issue. This money raised needs to be earmarked to cut the costs associated with this department, and the start is by increasing recycling. Charging for garbage collection is great first step, but we also need to decrease the sheer volume of trash in this town. We need to limit what that monthly fee will pick up, and offer limitless recycling. Moving products from the waste stream into the recycling stream can decrease costs. Furthermore, recyclables are a commodity that can add to our city coffers, not draw from them. As long as we look at our waste stream in the same way, we are only putting a bandage on a flat tire.

How much will dumping cost? Unfortunately, Cleveland residents are selfish and poor. We already see people dumping their trash in alleys, empty lots, wherever. This has been going on while garbage service is free. So what is going to happen now that we have to pay for this service. Will the extra money cover the costs of cleaning up the city dump sites that appear? I hope that I am wrong in this area. My hope is that everyone will start taking responsibility for their waste and take it more seriously, but I am leery.

How will this law affect our already cash strapped citizens? It is a small fee. For most of us, $8 a month is small price to pay. That being said, many Cleveland residents can barely pay for food. There is an exception for elderly and disabled, but what about those who are already using food stamps and section 8 housing to stay alive. I worry that unscrupulous landlords are going to raise the rents of those most in trouble right now, in order to pay for the garbage service. Were we living in a city that had a good cross section of incomes, this would be less of an issue. However, it that were the case, we would not be having this budgetary crisis to begin with.

No matter what I have to say, Cleveland is still operating in the black, without raising taxes or firing police officers. Let’s hope that this trend continues, and Mayor Jackson and the City Council deserve Kudos for that! Read the council’s release.

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What’s in your garbage can?

Thursday, November 19th, 2009

While spending all that time sorting your recyclables and picking out the plastics, sometimes we forget the most obvious thing of all: the liner. Since we do not have curbside recycling, I have to transport all my recycling to the nearest drop off location. While I have made my peace with this, there is still something that nags at me. I have to bag my recycling, adding more plastic to the batch, and I worry what that does to the process.

Did you know that the plastic that makes up the lid to your plastic bottle and the bottle itself are different plastics? This means they cannot be recycled together, so I always take the lids off of my bottles. Same with glass jars and metal lids, etc. I have heard stories of cities that toss out bottles with lids rather than take the time to unscrew the caps. That make me wonder what happens when I drop off my recycling in a plastic bag. Also, while I stuff my bags full before putting them on the curb, my garbage is still more because of the plastic bag that I have to put it in. What’s a guy to do?

So I was thrilled while walking down the aisle of the local store (yes, it WAS a Wal Mart) and I found these bags by GoodSense. I used to buy them on the West Coast, but have never seen them in Cleveland before. They are made with 60% recycled plastic. That means less virgin plastic was manufactured for me to put garbage in. To top it off, these bags were comparably priced to many of the other brands on the shelf.
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One of the big things that people often fail to consider when make their purchases is what the product is made of and what the packaging is made of. By buying products with recycled content you help to close the loop. What good is recycling, if no one is making anything out of all those plastics that are being lovingly sorted? And why isn’t every box made from recycled content? It isn’t like we need a brand new box made from tree fiber to hold something for a few months and then toss it. These great little bags come in a box made from 100% recycled paperboard. So by buying this product, you can basically reuse the plastic bottles and office paper that you recycle every day.

So if these bags are not available at your local store, ask the manager to stock them. They are manufactured by:
Webster Industries, Inc
A Division of Chelsea Industries, Inc
Good Sense Division, Dept RT20
PO Box 3119
Peabody, MA 01961-3119

Close the loop!

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Should we eliminate Halloween?

Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009

Halloween is fun. I enjoy costumes and dressing up. I especially like seeing all the kids come to the door in their cute costumes, while their bundled up parents encourage them to say “Trick or Treat.” While I may go on the hit list of M&M/Mars for saying it, I think Halloween can start to go away. When I say that, I don’t really mean go away entirely, but maybe it is time for it to reinvent itself. I LOVED Halloween and trick or treating when I was a kid. After all, I was a pudgy little kid (to put it mildly), so a holiday where free candy comes to those who put on a plastic mask and go to the neighbor’s doors was just right for me. But let’s face it, times have changed. When I was a kid, we also chased the mosquito truck around playing in the stream of toxins it was releasing, bought explosives at the local stand to benefit the Jaycees, and went without supervision for most of the day after we got out of school-even in 1st grade. Things are different now. More conservative families are opting out on Halloween celebrations altogether, I am merely advocating we change the holiday to get rid of the trick or treating aspect. Here are my reasons to change Halloween.

Aren’t our kids fat enough? Studies show that childhood obesity is a huge problem in America. Stack that on top of a few hundred television stations and PS3 as the most popular babysitter in America, and you have a recipe for disaster. Do we really need to have a night where we give our already under nourished, yet overweight kids a reason to chow down on thousands of empty calories? What ever happened to bobbing for apples?

Are begging and threatening really the values our kids need to learn? “Trick or Treat.” Pretty self explanatory. Give me candy or we will conduct mischief on you or your home. In today’s society, there is already ample opportunity for kids to get up to mischief. In my neighborhood, the kids rarely even wear costumes anymore-and most are way too old for this type of fun. Yet they believe that it is their right to be given free stuff, just because they have the nerve to knock on your door. We were allowed to trick or treat until about 10 or 12 years old. Every year, I am seeing high school age kids at my door. What are we really teaching these kids?

Couldn’t our money be better spent? According to an article on the University of Nebraska Omaha’s Gateway, $1.9 billion dollars is spent on candy in the Halloween season. What could we do to promote local foods, weatherize buildings, rebuild the electric grid, or feed and educate our country’s poor with nearly 2 billion dollars?

How much garbage does this holiday generate? It is estimated that we in the US buy about 598 million pounds of candy around Halloween. That is as much as nearly 150 thousand average cars weigh. Most of that candy is bought in bags (plastic) that holds a bunch of tiny little individually wrapped sweets. Some even have a couple of layers of wrapping. Add to that the enormous amount of generated waste from the store displays and trick or treating becomes a real landfill nightmare. Not to mention that costumes come in packages and that after the day, many of these costumes are thrown out, as we choose cheap stuff over rental or reuse.

I know that I sound like an old curmudgeon, but it is time for us to evolve. While I don’t relish the thought of some of the traditions of our youth going away, we need to rethink things these days. If we continue down the paths we are following, our kids won’t have much of a future to celebrate Halloween in. Besides, with the rise of juvenile diabetes, we won’t be able to give out candy soon anyhow…..

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Life can be fun…

Monday, October 12th, 2009

Kudos to those guys at DDB Stockholm. They are the geniuses behind the new VW campaign, The Fun Theory. The idea behind the campaign is that if you make some things in life more fun, you can change the world for the better. Visit the site to see people opting to take the stairs, rather than the escalator, when it was made fun. It is a whole new take on looking at sustainability. I often wonder how we can get more people engaged and involved. How do we get the average person to just care enough to want to recycle their pop bottles or eat a vegetable. One of the viral videos making its way around the net, is the one I have embedded below. Maybe if we stop touting figures and facts and just try to make sustainability a more fun exercise, then we can start getting more people to think and care about it.


FYI, you have to visit the blog to watch videos, they do not come across in the feed, and this one is worth it!

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This Saturday is your chance to give it up.

Thursday, October 8th, 2009

Most people have stuff laying around that they can’t get rid of. I have had stuff like varnish and some old roof tar that I simply do not know how to get rid of. Hurray! This Saturday (October 10, 2009) is the Household Hazardous Waste Round-Up! If you are looking for a safe way to dispose of things like oil based paints, spray paint, motor oil, pesticides, paint thinner, glues, fluorescent bulbs or some other hazardous waste, come down to the Cuyahoga County Fairgrounds this Saturday and drop it off. Plan ahead, the times are 9am to 4pm. If that is a long way for you, check out the site for the county’s Solid Waste District, or call 216-443-3749 and see if there is a closer locale for you.

What is the big deal, anyway. Why not just toss this stuff in the garbage, buried under other trash? Remember when the river caught on fire? The reason that it did was the chemicals and pollutants that were being dumped into the river. Now, there are plenty of mandates to keep this from happening by industry, so we need to watch our household waste and keep our toxins out of our watershed. Lake Erie, the Cuyahoga River, and all our assorted streams, ponds and waterways are important to the region. They are one thing that makes NE Ohio special and beautiful. Still, every year the run off from our streets and land development add tons of pollution to these water features every year. Do your part. When hazardous household waste is sent to the landfill, it can leach into the water shed. Not only does this pollute our beaches and scenery, it can have a lasting effect on our drinking water. There is an economic impact, too, beyond just that of having to spend the dollars to clean up our mess. If we don’t keep the natural beauty of the area, we will not be able to attract new businesses to the region and make this a profitable and progressive place to be.

In case you can’t make out the details on the flyer, my pal, Beau Danne sent me this reminder email:

Residents of Cuyahoga County can bring oil or solvent-based paints, sealers, primers, varnish, polyurethanes, shellacs, spray paint, automotive fluids, kerosene, gasoline, lighter fluid, pesticides, herbicides, insecticides, paint thinner, mineral spirits, turpentine, caustic household cleaners, adhesives, roof tar, driveway sealer, mercury, fluorescent bulbs, etc. to the Cuyahoga County Fairgrounds in Berea this Saturday 10/10 from 9 to 4. Call your service dept. for additional locations.

No Latex Paint
No Business Waste
No Medical Waste

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One plus one= a lot!

Wednesday, October 7th, 2009

Everyone can make a difference. I have alerted you to some of my favorite bloggers out there. Each trying to get the message of sustainability out there for everyone. One of my favorite is The Daily Ocean. Sara Bayles started this as an experiment to raise awareness of the plight of beach and ocean pollution. In Santa Monica, California, Sara goes out and picks up trash for 20 minutes. She has committed to a year of trash collection. Every day, she weighs her trash and shows everyone just how much garbage is left behind on an average beach. She takes pictures of some of her most beautiful moments, like some stunning sunsets, and her most bizarre or common finds. Mind you, she is not the main caretaker for this beach that she patrols. This is just the stuff that is missed by the parks folks. Additionally, there are plenty of garbage cans on the beach. This is not an area where there is no place to throw something away.

Another blogger that I read everyday is Green LA Girl. An avid bicycle enthusiast and all around eco living supporter, Siel writes about events, news and products. Many of her articles have to do with just LA, but some are important to everyone. I especially like the way she reviews green products. In fact, she is the blogger who turned me on to The Daily Ocean. After reading Sara’s blog, Siel decided to join her for a round of trash pickup. The friendship inspired by this meeting, has led to more. Now they have organized the Blogger beach Cleanup.

They have managed to organize a collection of bloggers who are all encouraging their readers to volunteer for a day to pick up trash from the beach. As part of the Daily Ocean project, the clean up will only last for 20 minutes. The idea is to show just how much impact you can have on your environment in as little as 20 minutes a day. They are creating quite a buzz, too. They have managed to get some cool gift certificates as prizes, and are organizing a post clean up party.

When: October 24, 2009. Meet at 4 pm; cleanup begins 4:20 pm; more fun ensues 4:40 until ?
Where: Santa Monica Beach at Ocean Park, between lifeguard stations 26 and 27.

If you live anywhere near Santa Monica, please go and pick up some garbage, and meet some of the coolest people in LA! If you don’t, then I encourage you to think about what YOU can do in 20 minutes a day to help save the planet.

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If they won’t recycle, make em pay!

Monday, June 29th, 2009

500px-recycling_symbolsvgHave you ever noticed the little print on the side of your can of Pepsi that says things like OR deposit 5 cents? Ever wonder what that is all about? It is called a recycling deposit. It has been around for decades in many states, and I do not know why on earth it isn’t a law in every state. Here is how it works: Every time you buy a carbonated beverage (or sometimes juices or other non-carbonated drinks) in a container you pay a small deposit. No big deal. In most areas it is a nickel per container. It is called a deposit, because when you return the container, you get it back. This whole idea goes way back. When we used to use glass bottles for everything from milk to soda, it was a simple way to make sure that the empties got back to the bottler where they could be sterilized and reused. Lucky for us, we discovered space age polymers and aluminum cans. Gone are the days of expensive steel and glass. Now we can litter our landscape with cheap aluminum beer cans and fill our landfills with plastic pop bottles. Yippee!

What does the deposit law do for the environment? Lots. People have a tendency to recycle if there is a monetary impetus. States that have a deposit law recycle more cans and bottles. It is a gimme. Hate to recycle? No worries, set your cans on the curb and people will gladly pick them up. Homeless persons in Oregon survive simply by picking up others trash. That means less garbage on the street and the side of the road. I can remember growing up in a small town in Kansas and the thrill of going to the park to look for bottles. If we found enough, we could take them in to the grocers and get enough money for a pack of gum, a handful of tootsie rolls or perhaps the Holy Grail: a balsa wood airplane powered by a rubber band! I would gladly scour the baseball diamond for Dr Pepper empties left behind or dig in the bushes for a beer can tossed away just at the prospect!

Deposit laws (sometimes called bottle bills) are common in many states. So what is the deal with Ohio? Why don’t we have them here? Retailer hate them. They say that they cannot keep up with the issues surrounding collecting the empties. With the automatic machines that are available now, this is simply not true. Besides in most states with a bottle bill, retailer have an agreement with the bottlers that they split the cost of collection. Enter the second reason. Bottlers hate them. Why wouldn’t they? Anything that impedes the free flow of their products in a disposable cheap manner is a danger to their bottom line. Who cares about the damn planet anyway? Lastly many consumers stand opposed to bottle bills. There is always an issue when you have to pay for something. We hate sales tax. We hate income tax. We hate property tax. These are all necessary evils in today’s economy and I say so is a bottle deposit. Besides, you get the money back, and if you can’t be bothered to recycle then I say you should be forced to pay the nickle a can. Suddenly when you have to pay by the bottle, you start buying in bigger packages. When you can get the nickel back, you start to think before tossing out that beer can or pop bottle. It isn’t like it is something new, the programs are all in place in other states, so it is just a matter of bringing them across the border.

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Solar powered trash cans are a big hit!

Wednesday, June 17th, 2009
Solar powered garbage compacting cans from Big Belly Solar

Solar powered garbage compacting cans from Big Belly Solar

When we went to the Greenbuild conference last fall, one of the coolest products I saw was a solar powered trash can. A trash can is a trash can, right? Why does it need solar power? The Big Belly Solar garbage can is a can that will compact its contents on a regular basis. And it does it with solar power, so it does not need to be plugged in to the grid. This makes it ideal for parks, bus stops, sidewalks, even the outside of stores and malls. Ever pass by a garbage can that was so full and overflowing that nothing else would go in, and to make matters worse, garbage is falling on the ground to be blown away bey the wind and dirty up the landscape. That is the perfect spot for a Big Belly Solar can. The other advantage is that compacting garbage means fewer pickups for cities and fewer emptying for retail. That is good news for both as emptying the cans is the hardest thing to get accomplished. It is also a big expense for cities and may be one reason why there are so few public garbage cans in this town. These compacting garbage cans can hold something like 5 times the amount of trash as conventional cans. When full they send a wireless signal that they need to be emptied, so no needless pick ups and that cuts down on the carbon footprint of retrieval. They have similar products for recyclables. While I wish we could get them both here in Cleveland, I would settle for a comprehensive curb side recycling program that doesn’t have a 6 year roll out.

Waste Management is going to install them in Houston to make their waste programs more efficient. Philadelphia is adding 500 of them to their city center. Fenway Park is adding them to cut down on pickups during games. The NSA is adding them to their facilites. Fairfax, VA is adding them to schools. We all need garbage cans, so why not them do the work of compacting and monitoring for us?

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There goes the neighborhood…

Saturday, May 16th, 2009

Sometimes the challenges of living greener can be difficult.  We live in a society that embraces convenience an profit, and our whole lives have been built on that. Our homes are built faster and cheaper, rather than built to last for hundreds of years. When demolished, they are put into landfill, instead of salvaged for all the parts. It is cheaper to buy new than to repair appliances. We buy new cars every few years: the whole leasing program is built on changing the vehicle that you drive on a regular basis! In Cleveland, not all neighborhoods even have curbside recycling (yes, my biggest pet peeve.) In the face of this kind of environment, it can be difficult to stick you your convictions and do what is right. It often feels like no one person can make a difference. One thing that has come our of the recent election cycle is the realization that one person CAN make a difference-just look at Minnesota elections as a prime example. One person added to another, added to another, etc and the results are staggering. We took a long time to get into this mess, and now we can all take some steps to get us out of it.  Just to keep you in the right frame of mind, I am including some interesting perspectives on how we are affecting the planet.

250px-compact_fluorescent_transpa

For every incandescent bulb that you replace, you will save about $30 a year in energy costs. If everyone in a city the size of Chicago replaced just one main light bulb with a CFL bulb, we would save the greenhouse gas emissions of about 200,000 cars on the road. If everyone in the country did it, we would save enough energy to light 2.5 million homes for a year and it equates to the emissions of over 3/4 of a million cars.  Replacing just 16 bulbs is like not driving your car for a year.  Trade out one in four bulbs in your house and the amount you spend on lighting will be cut in half.  Only 10% of electricity used in an incandescent bulb is given off as light, the rest is heat:  a big waste on a hot summer night!

Americans can’t stand to wait a second for an appliance to warm up.  We installed a new breakthrough technology called “stand by” mode.  This allows everything from your TV to your microwave to be ready and at your fingertips at a moments notice.  Unfortunately, that means that when you are gone, asleep, or just not using these items, they are drawing power.  Chargers are no different.  We now have more people with cell phones than land lines in this country.  That means millions of cell phone chargers.  When these guys are plugged in, they are drawing power even though it isn;t going anywhere.  Unplugging your cell phones and appliances can save you energy and money.  It is estimated that “vampire appliance” energy use results in 12 tons of CO2 emissions every year.  40% of electricity used by electronics is consumed while they are off-that is about 17 coal power plants that could be eliminated in America.

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We waste paper at an alarming rate.  Paper accounts for 40% of the solid waste in America every year.  That is about 72 million tons.  Making a ton of paper from recycled stock saves 50% of water used and 17 trees.  For every 38,000 bills paid online, 5,058 pounds of greenhouse gases are avoided and two tons of trees are preserved.  Stop your junk mail!  17.8 tons of junk mail is delivered every year by the postal service.  44% of that goes unopened and less than 25% is recycled.  Over 48 % of the Earth’s surface was once covered with forests.  Half of those forests are gone and only 1/5 of native forests are left.

We drive too much.  Think about combining trips and making the most of your car miles.  Every 10 miles you save a week is a savings of about 500 pounds of co2 emissions.   We drove enough miles in 2002 to go to the sun and back 13 1/2 thousand times.  Every gallon of gas used emits 20 pounds of co2, so no idling and stop that warm up from inside the house!  Remove that roof rack when not in use, it can reduce efficiency by 5%.

Support renewable energy!  Most of the mercury contamination in the world comes from coal burning power plants.  In the US, over half a million miles of streams rivers and coasts and 12 million acres of lakes and wetlands are contaminated.  Every wonder why fish is bad for you these days?

500px-recycling_symbolsvgRecycling saves resources, energy and money.  we genrate 4.5 pounds of trash every day, per person, on average.  That is twice what we used in the 60’s.  In the last 40 years, residential and commercial waste together has tripled.  The recycling industry creates 1.1 million jobs in the US.  Recycle your water bottles, about 80% end up in landfill.  Better yet, buy a permanent water bottle and switch to tap-a third of water brands tested contained contaminants like arsenic and bottles themselves can leach chemicals.  Buy items in aluminum cans.  Recycling cans is cheaper and easier than plastics and recycled cans are back on the shelf in as little as 90 days.  It takes 95% less energy to make a recycled aluminum can than from scratch.  Buy products with recycled content.  If every household switched to recycled napkins for one package, we would save a million trees a year.

Think about water.  The world is running ourt of clean water.  We don’t think about it much in the US, but in some countries clean water is a luxury.  One billion people (that is one in 6) do not have access to clean drinking water.  A family of four using a low flow showerhead can save as much as 20,000 gallons of water a year.  The average American uses 100 gallons of water a day and 40% of clean drinkable water used in the average home is flushed down the toilet.  By 2016, it is estimated that 36 states will be having a water shortage.  A leaking faucet can wste 20 gallons of water a day.

Think about these fun facts.  It  would be easy for us to save significant amounts of resources and energy by making some simple changes.  Remember them, too.  You can show off your Green IQ at parties!

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