Avoid plastic, fill your glass or metal bottles with water or other liquid.Bring you own bag
Enjoy this video, as an individual makes a statement on our consumerism. Each American(USA) consumes 4 1/2 pounds of trash a day. As I shop at grocery stores and Menards, I am overwhelmed by the amount of packaging and waste that goes into our purchases.
What can you do to reduce that 4 1/2 pounds a day? I have just returned from a bus zero waste food coop shopping trip, filling my own bottles, and using only packaging that can be composted(paper not plastic). I work everyday to be a climatarian. You don’t need to be as extreme as I am, just become aware! How can we consume less?
Use reusable cotton sacks or paper bagsPlease recycle plastic bags at grocery stores!
A Climatarian diet involves choosing what you eat based on the carbon footprint of the food, and using your power as a consumer to drive down the production of beef and lamb which have the biggest impact on our climate. A climatarian is about eating local food to reduce transportation and reducing food waste.
My easy suggestions on being a Climatarian:
Walk or take the bus to purchase groceries.
Participate in Meatless Monday, and go meatless other days, also!
Eliminate beef and reduce cheese consumption.
Work to reduce all food waste and compost any food waste you have.
Choose minimal packaging, and recycle as much as possible.
Use real dishes, and reuse jars and products.
I love “clean out” the refrigerator stir fry and ideas from Tom Colicchio
The below ideas for protecting our lakes is from the Superiorforum.org , Sigurd Olson Institute, Northland college, and the EPA, and Great Lakes Restoration Initiative:
1 .Be conservative with your water use.
2. Recycle as much as you can with the 4 Rs: reduce, reuse, recycle and repair. And….NEVER burn trash.
3. Curb Yard Pollution. Put your lawn on a chemical-free diet!!
4. Stop aquatic invasives by cleaning plants and animals off your boat.
5. Plant native plants, and reduce turf grass.
6. Plant native trees According to Audubon, oak trees are the best for attracting insects and birds.
7. Install a rain barrel
8. Create an energy-efficient home.
9. Bring hazardous waste to waste collection sites.
10. Love our lakes!
I would add several more:
1. Rain gardens are excellent for capturing harmful water runoff.
2. Keep leaves and trash out of streets and storm drains-Adopt a storm drain!
Love our lakes, rivers and streams. Take care of them!
3. Never use cleaning products or hand sanitizer with triclosan.
4. Reduce all plastic use–If you must use plastic bags and bottles, be sure you recycle them. 5. Pick up all liter.
An important thing you could do for the earth this week is recycle those plastic bags and plastic wrap, but DO NOT place them in your regular recycling! They need to be recycled at the stores that issued them.
Landfills are full of plastic bags. The best thing is not to take a plastic bag at all, but sometimes they are hard to avoid. Most groceries and big box stores now have places to recycle bags. Ask if you don’t see plastic bag recycling.
What is organics? Organics recycling includes collecting fruits, vegetables, bones,
Food Scraps Turned Into Compost
meat, breads, eggshells, non-recyclable and food-soiled paper, and more for composting. The new organics recycling program is an easy way for residents to reduce waste. The trucks haul this waste to the compost site where it is turned and heated and it turns into valuable compost to be used for gardening.
Please come to the event below to learn about Minneapolis’s new program and how to participate in this great program!
The Tangletown and Lynnhurst Neighborhood Associations are co-hosting a celebration of Minneapolis’ new organics recycling program on Saturday March 19th from 10am-1pm at the Lynnhurst Community Center (1345 W Minnehaha Parkway). Enjoy free pizza, games, children’s activities, and demonstrations. Stop by briefly or stay to catch a workshop at 10:30am or 11:45am.
Get your questions answered, sign up to be a volunteer Compost Captain, and enter to win a door prize. The first 200 attendees can also pick up free compostable bags. More info (and RSVP) at https://www.facebook.com/events/550666345107610/ Hope to see you there!
A river of plastic bottles on the way to the Aegean Sea
A recent study by the Ellen Mac Arthur Foundation has found that by 2050 there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. This is a terrible man-made crisis, and not enough is being done to stop the cascade of plastic. Everyone of us needs to take personal responsibility to reduce our plastic consumption. The plastic industry is unchecked, and never should such a nuisance product been put into society without a plan to clean up or reuse. We are stuck with plastic, but we can all reduce the amount of plastic we use today and every day from now on. Especially think carefully before you purchase a plastic tubes that cannot be recycled. There is too much information in this post, but I hope you can find one thing below to help you to reduce your plastic consumption!
The MPCA study says recycling pumps billions of dollars into the Minnesota economy. The 60,000 jobs and the new products created from recycling are worth billions to Minnesotans. Products created from recycled materials are the most exciting! When you purchase products from recycled materials, you are closing the recycling loop.
What happens when you close the recycling loop? The first arrow
represents the first step of recycling, Collection of materials for recycling. Arrow two represents the manufacture of new products from the recyclables. Arrow three is the purchase of the products made from recycled items. This is “Closing the loop” or a circular economy. A win- win!
Why do we recycle? It saves valuable resources, keeps material from the landfills, reduces polluted landfills and as this report (below) shows produces economic opportunity and jobs!
“If everyone does a little bit, it adds up to a whole lot!” health4earth
What can you do?
We all need to take some personal responsibility to make ourselves and our planet healthier. Below are some of the things I work for everyday, and I hope you will add a few of them to your 2016 agenda. Please respond with your clean climate ideas.
My series #31daysoflesswaste continues:
1. Buy less stuff, reuse, reuse and reuse the things you have.
2. Stop idling your car, bundle your car trips together to drive less, and carpool more! Or take the bus!
3. How can Iuse less electricity?
4. How can I prepare for drought and inundation? Save water run-off by planning and building a rain garden with native plants. http://bluethumb.org/raingardens/
6. Recycle and donate your unwanted stuff “More and more people understand that there is no “away” in the finite system that is planet Earth and that we can’t keep using our precious air, water and land to dump the stuff we no longer want. If something can’t be reused, repaired, refurbished or otherwise repurposed, the next best thing is to recycle it.” David Suzuki www.earth911.com or donate to your local donation non-profit
7. How can I reduce single-use consumption of plastic bottles/containers, and reduce my consumption of plastic bags?
What do you do for our planet and yourself to be healthier?
We can all do something about this tremendous influx of trash and I will be posting ideas for 31 days on how to reduce trash and waste:
Plastic, what an amazing and awful product at the same time.! It is cheap and it is light. Unfortunately, it has become an enormous environmental problem. Many lack the personal responsibility to get single-use plastic bottles and bags to the recycle bin. Many developing nations I visit seem oblivious to it, except in tourist areas! Days 6 through 11 of #31daysofreducingwaste are going to focus on how we can have less plastic pollution.
So what is the problem with plastic? Many say the materials in plastic cause cancer. Plastic will never dissolve, but will break into thousands of pieces of litter. The plastic in the oceans will be here on earth for hundreds of years and it will be found in the intestines of many fish, turtles and birds. Plastic creates a terrible waste and litter problem. According to the http://blog.oceanconservancy.org/tag/plastic/ If left unchecked, there could be 250 million tons of plastic in the ocean by 2025 — about one pound of plastic for every three pounds of fish. We can’t let this happen.
Avoid plastic, fill your glass or metal bottles with liquid
** The best way to reduce plastic trash is NOT to drink bottled water. Bring a reusable water bottle to work, school, and for all your adventures.
**Avoid plastic bags. Always bring your reusable shopping bags.
Shop with reusable bags
** How can you avoid baggies? I love these compostable wax paper bags
** Reuse and recycle all plastic bags.
Please recycle plastic bags at grocery stores!
* Reduce packaging: Try to purchase items with no packaging or packaging that can be recycled.
From Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day, household waste increases by more than 25%. Added food waste, shopping bags, packaging, wrapping paper, bows and ribbons all adds up to an additional 1 million tons a week to our landfills. (Source: EPA)
“A strategy needs to be something that can be sustained!” President Obama on fighting ISIS
How are we as a society failing our twenty-some year old young men? The shooters in San Bernardino were living the life the men I talk about below wanted. Where can we find a life of hope and purpose for these young men? How can they be encouraged to connect to the world around them?
This is a blog I wrote after the Paris terror attack:
Today I am writing about the young men I met on a recent trip, and I am calling on the wealthy, big corporations, the United Nations, and the World Bank to help them by creating jobs.
The Macedonian flag
My husband and I have just returned from Albania, Kosovo, and Macedonia. In the past few years we have also travelled independently to Serbia, Bosnia, Romania and other Eastern European countries. These countries are democracies, but are still struggling after Soviet domination for many years. The message we hear from the frustrated twenty-some men is, “We have NO hope!” These English-speaking locals approach us as we wait for buses, ride ferries, trains, or are looking at a map on the street. Unemployment is very high and most we talk to are unemployed or a few are in a low wage jobs. They have no confidence in their governments, and feel hopeless about their futures They say they have to pay bribes to get jobs, and to get into the military. Some of these young men are Muslims, and some are Orthodox Christians. They think the only solution is to move to Western Europe, Canada or the United States. What is upsetting is the place and time and people change in these discussions, but their message stays the same! I need to leave to find a better life!
Their frustrations are so enormous that it frightens me they will take any avenue to escape their situation. Clearly, the answer is not with their governments. Kosovo can’t account for all the funds NATO has given them to rebuild from their recent war.
The solution needs to exist inside their own countries. If companies are looking to expand, don’t forget Eastern Europe. Large corporations expanding and creating jobs in these countries could make a big difference! The men we speak to appear to be educated and have good communication skills, and say they are willing to work hard.
It is such a waste of human energy to have energetic minds struggling for a future! The roots of terrorism are very complicated and my ideas are simplistic, but how can these individuals feel they are important, that their lives matter, and that they can contribute worthwhile things to society? What are some sustainable jobs and industries NGOs or private business can start or create in Eastern Europe?
After a soccer win, Albanians adorned with excitement and their flag.
Much needs to be done, but as I ride buses through the countryside these are the things that could be win-win for Europe and the entire world:
Solar is a natural for this area. Wealthier areas have solar water heaters.
Recycling is lacking and plastic litter is an enormous problem. How could these plastic bottles and bags be made valuable?
ECO Tourism. Albania is on the Adriatic Sea and the ancient and historic sites make for some fabulous tourist attractions.
You ask me, “Where are the girls and women?” I can’t answer that question. Sometimes on the street you see a hundred men to one woman. Some women do have jobs, and girls are going to school, but overall this is a place where the men seem to dominate.
Health4earth 