Environmentalism
In the last thirty years, America has witnessed an environmental
revolution. New
laws like the 1963 Clean Air Act and the 1974 Safe Drinking
Water Act forged new
ground in political environmentalism. Social phenomena
like Earth Day, organized
by Dennis Hayes in 1970, and the beginning of
large-scale recycling, marked by
Oregon's 1972 Bottle Bill, have help
change the way Americans think about the
environment. As we approach the
third millennium, however, we must reconsider
our place on the planet and
reflect on our efforts and progress towards a
sustainable society. As global
warming becomes a scientific reality, natural
disasters make monthly
appearances in the headlines, and communities continue to
find their
ground-water contaminated by industrial and nuclear waste, we must
ask
ourselves: are we doing enough? The environmental movement in the past
has
largely been a social and political phenomenon. While many of us recycle
(yet
still only 35 percent of us) and take dead batteries to our town's
Hazardous
Waste Day, most Americans have not made the environment a
personal issue. Very
few of us have taken the kind of personal life-changing
steps that are necessary
to create an environmentally sustainable society. It
is simply naive to believe
that America's present rates of consumption, waste
production, and environmental
contamination are sustainable. The kind of
social change required can only
happen when we as individuals embrace the
effort in our everyday lives. Only
then will corporate America and the
government realize that they too must change
to maintain their customer base
and public support. This kind of personal
commitment to change would also
create a new social ethic based on the
environment under which people and
companies who do not care for the earth would
be held socially and
financially responsible. In six parts, this article will
re-examine our place
in the environmental movement and investigate exactly what
changes we can
make in our personal lives to bring about positive change. These
areas are
transportation, energy, recycling and waste management, toxins and
pollution,
food, and water. Some of the changes discussed will require
sacrifice. But,
more important, these changes will often simplify our lives,
bring our
families and communities closer together, and help us to better
understand,
revere, and coexist with the world upon which each of us is
directly
dependent. Transportation The invention of the automobile is one of
history's
greatest environmental disasters. The automobile decentralized our
society.
People with cars moved out of the city and drove to work from
their suburban
homes. Before the automobile, agriculture was local. Food was
grown by farmers
living in what was soon to be the suburbs, and delivered
fresh to markets in the
cities. Because of the short distance food had to
travel, farmers didn't need to
add preservatives or other additives to
maintain freshness. Clearly, the
automobile, like other harmful inventions,
makes our lives easier in many ways,
but how often do we consider the
environment when weighing these benefits?
Fossil fuels account for the
automobile's most significant effect on the
environment. Not only are the
emissions from cars and trucks toxic to every
air-breathing organism, but
every step of the fossil fuel process, from
extraction to disposal, is bad
for the environment. According to the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), millions of gallons of untreated water
contaminated by the
drilling processes are dumped into waterways and oceans
annually. Once
extracted, fossil fuels are frequently refined on site, burying
179
million tons of toxic waste annually. During transport, an average of
1
million gallons of oil is spilled into the ocean each month. Upon
arrival,
fossil fuels are usually burned in automobiles or power plants. The
average
coal-burning power plant burns about 10,000 tons of coal in a single
day. With
even a low estimate of five per cent waste, that leaves 500 tons of
toxic waste
produced each day by a single power plant. If used in cars, oil
must be refined
further, wasting more energy and creating more toxic waste
before drivers
purchase it. The combustion engines used in cars and trucks
emit toxic gases
that contribute to the greenhouse effect and acid rain,
deplete the ozone layer,
and create more than 50% of the smog producing
toxins that city-dwellers breathe
every day. Even if we disregard the
environmental damage caused by fossil fuels,
we should recognize that, as a
non-renewable energy source, the earth's reserves
will eventually run out.
Hundreds of millions of years of organic decomposition
will be wiped out in a
single century. Conservative estimates say we have 30 to
50 years left of
oil use. With more and more developing nations rapidly
increasing their use
of fossil fuels, and the continuing growth rate of fossil
fuel use at four
times the population growth, our time with fossil fuels could
be
significantly less. Just imagine the economic and political upheaval a
major
oil shortage would cause. Simply put, the country that depends on
fossil fuels
the least will be the most likely to survive the economic strife
and wars
resulting from global depletion. Fossil fuel consumption is deeply
entrenched in
the American mode of life. We rely on automobiles for almost
all of our
transportation needs, enjoy motor boats and jet skis on our
vacations, and use
gas-burning engines in most of the tools we use in the
yard. (Although
electricity is another major consumer source of fossil fuel
consumption, that
will be discussed in the Energy section.) Yet we can make
numerous changes in
our lifestyle that will significantly decrease our
personal consumption of
fossil fuels. Let's return to America's biggest
weakness: the automobile. Simply
not driving is the best and most obvious
solution to the problem of automobiles.
Americans have gotten used to
their cars and seldom walk or bicycle even short
distances. Gym class became
a federal requirement in the 1930s because students
were being driven or
riding busses to school instead of walking. Americans have
also become
significantly more overweight since we started driving. Consider
your
Saturday errands around town. Most errands we make are to destinations
less
than a few miles away and frequently involve dropping off or picking
up
something small. These kinds of errands can just as easily be accomplished
by
walking or bicycling. Your body will thank you, and so will the
environment.
Public transport, if available, is also a great way to stay
out of the car.
Consider an area's public transportation system in
choosing a place to live, as
some cities have significantly better systems
than others. When your destination
is too far to walk or bicycle, there are
still numerous ways to minimize the use
of automobiles. If you drive to work,
find other people at your company or other
companies near you that live in
your town and start a carpool. Even carpooling
once in a while makes a
difference, so don't get discouraged by occasional
scheduling conflicts or
other obstacles. When running errands, plan ahead to
consolidate them into
one trip and consider the most efficient route. If
possible, park in a
central location and walk to multiple destinations. Ask a
neighbor or friend
if they need to go out (everybody has to go to the grocery
store, for
example), and share a ride. For every ride you share, the fuel
consumption
and emissions for that trip are cut in half. There are also many
ways that
your driving habits effect the fuel efficiency of your car. Try to
avoid fast
accelerations, for instance. They use significantly more fuel than
gradual
accelerations. Likewise, avoid driving at excessive speeds. Every car
engine
has an RPM (revolutions per minute) at which optimal fuel economy
is
achieved; you'll find it in your car's manual. Check your tachometer and
try to
maintain that RPM while driving. Minimizing the work-load on your car
is another
way to increase fuel economy. Remove any unnecessary heavy objects
from the car,
and avoid using the air conditioner when possible. Finally,
turn off your engine
if you expect to be idle for even a short while.
Starting a modern fuel-injected
car uses less gas than idling for 30 seconds.
Did you know that warming up your
car by letting it idle in the driveway in
cold weather actually causes engine
damage? This is also when your car's
emissions are at their worst. The best and
fastest way to heat up a car is by
driving it. When it's time to buy a new car,
there are many ecological
alternatives to the gas guzzling beasts typically
driven by Americans. Many
compact cars on the market today achieve stunning fuel
economy. The
four-wheel-drive trucks so popular in today's market get
comparatively bad
gas mileage and usually carry one person over a paved road.
Buy the
smallest car you can, and don't buy a larger car for
infrequent
needs—consider buying a used trailer for infrequent cargo hauls.
If you've
been putting off the purchase of a motorcycle as whimsical, think
again. Many
motorcycles (and scooters in particular) achieve significantly
better fuel
economy compared to even the most fuel-efficient cars, resulting
in less
over-all consumption and emissions. Maintenance is the final step in
minimizing
the environmental impact of automobiles. Modern cars have very
sophisticated
emissions systems and engines that must be finely tuned to
achieve maximum
efficiency. Regular check-ups for your car will protect your
investment and
ensure the car is in its best possible working order. The
longer you keep your
car, the more value from it you receive and the less
waste is created and energy
spent in the production of a new car. If you have
to commute to work every day,
consider an electric car. Electric cars have
come a long way in price, distance
and efficiency, and will soon be available
from large manufacturers like Ford
and Toyota. Several small companies around
the country convert small gas powered
cars and trucks to electric,
zero-emissions vehicles and sell them for slightly
more than a gas-powered
car. As electric cars become more common and are
manufactured on a large
scale, their prices will drop significantly. Many
hobbyists, with no prior
automotive or electrical expertise, have created their
own electric cars from
their used gas-powered vehicles. Check your local library
for one of the many
conversion guides available. Today's electric cars take
about four hours to
charge, plugged into a standard outlet, and can go anywhere
from 50 to 200
miles on a single charge. While you wouldn't want to take an
electric car
across the country (though this has been done), their distance per
charge is
plenty for a typical commuter to get to work and back. Most electric
car
owners keep a gas-powered car around for longer trips. Owners of
electric
cars generally find the increase in their electric bill minimal
compared to the
amount they save in gasoline. While electric cars create no
emissions
themselves, and create almost no waste (even the batteries are
recyclable), the
electric company is still burning fossil fuels to create the
electricity needed
to charge the car. Nevertheless, electric companies are
capable of converting
fossil fuels to energy much more efficiently and with
fewer emissions than a
gas-powered car. Electric cars also leave room for
improvement in any method of
large-scale energy production, such as biomass,
hydro, and solar (see the Energy
section). This section has focused primarily
on cars, but Americans also use
many other gas-powered engines. The small
engines in motor boats and lawn
equipment do not have to meet the emissions
standards of cars, and thus, emit
far more toxins into the air. Consider
using a quiet, powerless mulching mower
on your lawn if you have one, and an
electric weed whacker rather than one that
is gas powered. If you enjoy the
water, consider learning to sail rather than
motoring. Motorized water
vehicles not only emit air pollution, they also
pollute the water, contribute
to sound pollution, and injure fish and other
animals in the water. Energy in
the Home Automobiles are not the only consumers
of fossil fuels or sources of
air pollution stemming from our personal lives.
According to the EPA,
furnaces, hot water heaters, and other fossil fuel burning
appliances in
American homes produce 20% of all U.S. carbon dioxide, 26% of
sulfur dioxide,
and 15% of nitrogen oxide emissions, the leading causes of acid
rain and
global warming. Note that these figures do not take into consideration
the
power our homes draw from fossil fuel-burning power plants. By making
our
homes as energy-efficient as possible and minimizing our personal use
of
electricity, we can significantly reduce our personal impact on the
environment.
The main sources of power consumption in our homes are the
heating, ventilation,
and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. Maintaining,
repairing, or upgrading these
systems will not only save us money, but also
reduce the amount of energy needed
to run our homes on a day-to-day basis.
The EPA's Energy Star Homes program
brings environmentally aware developers
and manufacturers together to build
homes that are better insulated and
utilize 90% efficiency or better HVAC
systems. If you are looking to build a
new home, call their toll-free hotline,
(888) STAR-YES, for literature, or
save paper and visit their Internet site at
www.epa.gov for more information.
Unfortunately, building new homes is not an
environmentally sound thing to
do. New homes require previously undeveloped land
or disposal of the
property's old construction. Further, new wood and materials
must be used
unless costly measures are taken to restore materials from an
old
construction. Beyond environmentally unsound, new construction is many
times
more expensive and time-consuming than renovation and repair of most
existing
houses. Even if your house is too costly to upgrade, consider buying
an already
renovated house or one easily renovated before building new
construction. A
furnace using heating oil, natural gas, or electricity heats
most American
homes. Still others use a wood or pellet stove. Of these,
electricity is by far
the least efficient. One truth of energy conservation
is that electricity should
not be used to produce heat, whether in a stove,
water heater, or central
heating. The exception to this is the microwave,
which is the most efficient way
to heat small amounts of food. Edward
Harland's book, ECO~RENOVATION: the
ecological home improvement guide, an
excellent resource for anyone interested
in environmental renovations,
provides this revealing chart: Fuel Kg of CO2
Emitted per Useful Kilowatt
Delivered (approx.) Gas 0.27 Oil 0.35 Coal 0.40
Electricity 0.83 As you
can see, electricity is more than twice as polluting as
a coal burning
furnace. Electricity is even worse if you take into consideration
the amount
of energy created by nuclear power, which creates nuclear waste
instead of
carbon dioxide (CO2). There is also a significant amount of energy
wasted in
cooling power plants and lost in the power grid, which further
degrades
electricity's viability as an environmentally sound energy source. As
the
chart shows, natural gas, or methane, is the cleanest burning fuel.
While
most of the natural gas used in America is drawn from non-renewable
reserves, it
can be produced renewably through biomass production, a method
currently used by
China. Methane is produced in massive quantities by
decaying waste and
agricultural operations, so much that methane is one of
the most serious
greenhouse gasses. If methane could be captured from these
sources, we would be
slowing the greenhouse effect and using clean-burning
renewable fuel at the same
time. For these reasons, if you have an aging or
inefficient oil burning
furnace, consider converting to an efficient natural
gas furnace. Wood or pellet
stoves still fuel many homes in America. Wood, if
used wisely, is a renewable
and relatively clean-burning fuel. While burning
wood does produce CO and CO2,
new technology allows wood stoves to reuse
unspent output by re-burning it
before emission. Pellet stoves, quickly
replacing log-burning stoves, use
pressed recycled paper and wood pulp that
look like rabbit pellets. Pellets,
while more expensive, are more efficient
to burn and take up less space during
storage. Before investing in a wood
stove, however, be sure to investigate which
brands are most efficient and
emit the least gases and particulate. Also, wood
stoves must be used
carefully and maintained properly to avoid inefficient
operation, excessive
emissions, and leakage of carbon monoxide into the home.
The best way to
minimize the amount of fuel-produced heat your home requires is
to insulate
it properly. Insulation is the most important factor in the amount
of energy
required to heat your home. Consider a hypothetical home with 100%
perfect
insulation. This home would need to be heated only once, and never
again.
This puts into perspective the idea that we only need to heat our homes
as
much as heat escapes to the outside. Most houses in America are
poorly
insulated at best; only one in four houses have insulated walls.
Consider the
fuel savings if you increased your home's insulation quality by
even 20%, which
in many cases is a realistic goal. Initially, insulation
costs time and money,
but it pays for itself quickly in reduced fuel costs
and a warmer, more
comfortable home. Unfortunately, the finer points of
insulating a home are
beyond the scope of this article. An excellent resource
on maximizing your
home's insulation is Home Insulation by Harry Yost. Your
local library should
have, if not this book, several books on insulation that
will at least get you
started. Beyond updating your furnace and insulating
your home, consider your
personal use of heat in the home. The average
American household's temperature
during the winter is slowly rising because
of increasingly sedentary lifestyles
and lighter dress. The healthier we eat
and the more exercise we get, the more
internal heat our bodies will produce.
The more above the outside temperature a
home is heated, the less efficient
its heating system becomes. If we simply wear
more clothes, we will need
substantially less heat. Wearing sweaters and
slippers, eating nutritious
food, and getting plenty of exercise are simple but
frequently overlooked
ways we can reduce our heating energy needs. Next to
furnaces and stoves, the
air conditioner is the second most energy-hungry
appliance in American homes.
Unfortunately, air conditioners rely on lots of
electricity, the most
polluting form of energy available. The use of air
conditioners should be
avoided at all costs. If you live in a climate with
extreme heat, consider
your air conditioner and its placement carefully. The EPA
has outlined
efficiency standards for most household appliances, air
conditioners
included. Make sure, if you buy an air conditioner, that it has the
EPA's
Energy Star mark of approval. This does not mean that the air conditioner
is
good for the environment, but that it uses its electricity
efficiently
instead of wasting it as many older models do. If you must have
an air
conditioner, purchase a small, efficient model and place it in a
small,
closed-off room where you spend most of your time. Make sure this room
does not
contain any heat-producing appliances like a washing machine or
clothes dryer,
and that sunlight does not enter through windows. Under these
conditions, air
conditioning can be relatively efficient and economical.
Central air
conditioning, on the other hand, is extremely inefficient and
usually goes
largely unused. Outside of heating and air conditioning, almost
all of the
energy used in our homes is electricity. Many Americans take
electricity for
granted, leaving unused lights and appliances on without
thinking. A simple
awareness in turning things off can greatly reduce our
electric bills. Further,
choices can be made in the kinds of lights and
appliances we use, and whether
they need to be used at all. As for lights,
there are several high-efficiency
bulbs on the market that, for slightly more
money than a typical light bulb, can
get by on a fraction of the electricity.
Fluorescent lights, for instance, are
five times more efficient than
incandescent (typical) lights. Standard
incandescent light bulbs use
electricity to heat a filament that glows to create
light, whereas
fluorescent lights send very rapid and brief charges of
electricity through a
filament. The days of flickering long tube fluorescent
lights are over.
According to Edward Harland, new Compact Fluorescent Lights (CFLs)
flicker at
more than 20,000 cycles per second (compared to 60 in tube lights),
are 30%
more energy efficient than tube lights, and come on almost
instantly.
These lights, while more expensive, will significantly reduce
your electricity
bill and last five to ten times longer than standard light
bulbs. Before even
turning on the lights, make the best possible use of
natural light in your home.
Place your reading chair by a sunny window
instead of in a corner facing out a
window. Consider adding skylights to your
home. These can create a surprising
amount of natural light during the day,
and contribute to your house's heat
during the winter. Mirrors strategically
placed on walls can also make better
use of light and heat from the sun
coming in through the windows. Use only what
electric lighting is necessary:
low-wattage task lights for individual
applications instead of high power
lights to illuminate a large area. If you
must use outdoor lights, consider
purchasing a motion detector that will turn
the light on and off only when it
senses movement. When purchasing appliances,
check to see that they are EPA
Energy Star approved. These appliances use energy
more efficiently than
others. Most refrigerators, for instance, have compressors
at their base
which produce significant heat and cause the refrigerator to work
against
itself. During fair weather, consider drying clothes on a line
outside
instead of using a dryer, which inefficiently uses electricity to
heat cold wet
clothes. Your clothes will last longer, and you'll see the
difference in your
electric bill. When undressing at night, ask yourself
whether your pants can be
worn again before washing. Americans, in
particular, tend to balk at this sort
of a suggestion. Allowing ourselves to
think logically beyond social qualms and
customs will allow each of our
personal environmental movements to transcend
many of our unsustainable
habits. If you work in an office or at home, chances
are your clothes aren't
that dirty at the end of the day. You'll be surprised at
the decrease in your
weekly laundry load. The last big source of energy
consumption in our homes
is our favorite appliance of all. The average American
household television
is on 7 hours and 20 minutes per day, and 98% of all
households have at least
one television. At 170 watts per hour, that comes to
452,965 watt hours
(or 453 kilowatt hours) of television use per year in an
average household
using one 25" television. Look at the breakdown of your
electricity bill to
put this number into perspective. You'll see that America
could save a lot of
electricity and money by simply turning off the television.
Instead, we
can read a book, go for a walk or hike, work in a garden, or talk or
play a
game with our families. Quite simply, the less television we watch,
the
richer our lives will be, the less we will spend on electricity, and the
more we
will be doing for the environment. All of the information in this
section has
focussed on minimizing the use of energy in the home. Imagine if
you could use
electricity in your home without burning any fossil fuels and
without any
monthly electric bills. This is not only possible, but a reality
for thousands
of Americans. With one initial investment in a photovoltaic
system (silicon
cells that convert the sun's light into electricity), you can
end your
dependence on polluting power companies and begin a new life of
clean energy
self-sufficiency. You can get started with a simple photovoltaic
setup for a
single zone of your home for less than one thousand dollars, or
go all out with
a top-of-the-line fully self-sufficient photovoltaic power
center for about
$13,000. If these prices sound high, consider the savings.
If your monthly
electric bill is $100, a top-of-the-line system that requires
only a moderate
degree of energy efficiency would be paid for in less than
eleven years. And
there is a whole spectrum of cheaper systems that can
easily power a typical
home. For less than four thousand dollars (paying for
itself in about 3 years)
the Real Goods Trading Corporation sells a system
"designed to handle all
the lighting, entertainment, and small kitchen
appliances for a modest,
energy-conserving household of one to four people in
a full-time home."
This description is taken from the Real Goods Solar
Living Source Book, 9th
Edition. This seven hundred page tome covers
everything from taking care of the
land to water conservation and every
alternative form of energy from solar to
hydro to wind. It is a must-have for
anyone who wants to live lightly on the
earth, and is available at most major
book stores and libraries. Recycling and
Waste Management There is no
environmentally sound method of dealing with the
200 million tons of
municipal solid waste produced in America each year. There
are many things we
can do, however, to minimize, if not eliminate, our personal
4
1/2lb-a-day contribution to that figure. The now ubiquitous threesome,
Reduce,
Reuse, and Recycle, still defines what we all must do to bring
our personal
trash production down to a sustainable level. With the media and
certain
high-positioned nay-sayers claiming that recycling is worse for the
environment
than it is good for it, and laws making recycling just another
stupid rule
rather than a social imperative, perhaps a redux of America's
trash situation is
called for. Households and other residences produce 100 of
the 200 million tons
of annually produced garbage in the United States. Most
of that goes to
land-fills, where it is covered up (if not purposefully
sealed to prevent
leakage) and starved of the oxygen needed for
biodegradation. Here is just a
taste of some garbage statistics from Geoffrey
C. Saign's well-researched book,
Green Essentials: More than 1/2 of U.S.
landfills have closed in the past 10
years, and nearly 1/2 of the remaining
5,800 landfills do not meet federal or
state standards for human health and
environmental protection. More landfills
are being closed as they fail to
meet 1993 and 1994 guidelines and as
communities resist allowing new
landfills in their area; 22 states will run out
of landfill capacity within
10 years or less. The nation's 10 largest cities use
a land area for their
garbage that is larger than the state of Indiana. And this
is just landfills.
Incineration is quickly becoming the chosen method of dealing
with garbage.
Incineration actually concentrates the toxicity of garbage by
mixing volatile
chemicals at high temperatures and reducing its harmless biomass
content.
Approximately 1/4 of the ashes produced in a typical incinerator escape
into
the atmosphere, where they combine with the toxic gases emitted to cause
acid
rain, smog, and global warming. The remaining ashes are highly toxic
and
dumped in landfills or stored in toxic waste facilities. A few states mix
this
ash with pavement, where it will slowly decompose and leach into the
ground. The
simple fact is that most of this waste could be recycled or
composted instead of
burned or buried. Green Essentials offers this breakdown
of garbage ingredients
by weight: Ingredient % by weight Alternative disposal
methods available Paper
and paperboard 34% Recyclable Yard trimmings 20%
Compostable Plastic 9%
Recyclable Food waste 9% Compostable Metals 8%
Recyclable Glass 7% Recyclable
Wood 4% Compostable, can be used as fuel
Rubber and leather 3% Recyclable
(tires) Textiles 2% Donate Other 4% ??? As
this chart displays, 58% (not
counting the 3% for rubber and leather) of our
garbage is recyclable; 33% of the
remainder could be composted. That means
that 91% of all the garbage produced in
this country (that's about 182
million tons annually) could be kept out of
incinerators and landfills. Even
a fraction of this ideal estimate would have a
profound impact on the
environment. Despite the amazing potential for waste
reduction that recycling
makes possible, The New York Times joined the media's
misinformed recycling
myth extravaganza in their June 30th, 1996 article,
"Recycling is Garbage."
From the beginning, pessimists and
special-interest industries have spread
incorrect "myths" about
recycling. These claims frequently charge (among
other things) that landfill
space is abundant and cheap; there is no market
for recycled goods; and
recycling doesn't pay for itself. Consider the facts
on these three points:
Landfill space has become a precious commodity in
the U.S., with many states
paying to export trash to other states or
countries. Recall Geoffrey Saign's
statement that "22 states will run out of
landfill capacity within 10 years
or less." The market for recycled goods,
while fluctuating like any
burgeoning market, has increased with the amount
of recycled goods available to
create a powerful new industry. According to
the Environmental Defense Fund,
"U.S. pulp paper manufacturers have
voluntarily built or expanded more than
45 recycled paper mills in the
1990's, and are projected to spend more than $10
billion on such facilities
by the end of the decade." To argue that
recycling doesn't pay for itself is
like arguing that landfills and incinerators
don't pay for themselves—of
course they don't. Recycling plants, even in the
industry's infancy, cost
about as much to operate as conventional disposal
methods, but are
considerably more environmentally sound (costing less when
environmental
damage and cleanup costs are considered) and reduce pollution
from
manufacturing and mining for new production. Recycling is an easy thing
to do,
and good habit to get into as many towns and cities are requiring
their citizens
to recycle by law or charging by the pound for non-recycled
garbage. First, find
out what your town recycles by calling your local waste
management facility. If
your town or city doesn't recycle or recycles only a
few materials, consider
getting a "recycling-only" dump permit for a near-by
pro-recycling
town or city. Next, reorganize your home's main trash area to
include
receptacles for all the different materials you will recycle. Food
containers
like tin cans and bottles should be rinsed to keep your recycling
receptacles
from smelling. You'll be amazed at the decrease in waste the next
time you take
out the trash. If we make a commitment to recycle our garbage,
we must support
the effort on the other end by buying recycled goods. Many
products' packaging
claims "100% recyclable." This is good, but keep in mind
that it
doesn't mean the material is recycled. Look for the percentage
of
"post-consumer waste" to tell you if it is and how much of is
recycled.
Recycled products like paper and cardboard have come a long way in
quality
and price. Seventh Generation, a producer of a full line of 100%
recycled and
earth-friendly household products, posts a convincing advertisement
on the
side of their bathroom tissue packages: If every household in the
U.S.
replaced just one 4-pack of 430 sheet virgin fiber bathroom tissues with
100%
recycled ones, we could save 1 million trees, 4.1 million cubic feet of
landfill
space (equal to 4,618 full garbage trucks), and 427 million gallons
of water (a
years supply for 12,300 families of four). About 33% of the
garbage we produce,
like food scraps and yard trimmings, can be composted.
Composting is nature's
answer to garbage control, converting organic waste
back into the soil it came
from. While many people compost to create
nutrient-rich soil for their garden,
you don't have to be a gardener to
compost your organic waste. You should cover
your compost pile, but not
suffocate it. The organic waste needs plenty of
oxygen to feed the microbes
that decompose the matter. You can build a box for
your compost, or buy one
pre-made at your local garden shop. Look for an organic
gardening book at
your library for instructions on building a composting
container. While
recycling and composting can help many of our waste management
problems, the
Reduce and Reuse methods are still more environmentally sound.
Recycling
does take energy and cost money, and material quality (especially
plastic)
typically degrades each time it is recycled. Avoiding garbage
altogether is
the best answer to our waste management problems. This means
reducing our
personal consumption levels and changing some of our buying habits.
When
shopping, choose products that use the least packaging, and buy
products
whose packaging is wholly recyclable. Packaging makes up
approximately 30% of
all U.S. garbage. Many grocery stores now carry a
significant amount of food in
bulk, allowing consumers to reuse durable
containers for food rather than
disposable cardboard or plastic containers.
An easy way to change wasteful
habits is to put a note by your home's garbage
and recycling center. Every time
you throw something away, ask yourself if it
could have been replaced by
something reusable like a sturdy container or
cloth rag. You'll soon find
yourself collecting and using reusable items for
many common tasks that once
required disposable materials. You can also
extend your garbage-awareness to
your work place. Advocate for a double-sided
printer, for instance, if you work
in an office. A convincing letter to your
boss (if you're not the boss) might
convince him or her that the amount of
money saved in paper will eventually pay
for the printer. When you go to the
grocery store, bring your own bags instead
of using paper or plastic.
Consumers often wonder which of the two is better;
the answer is: neither.
When shopping for smaller items, tell the clerk not to
give you a bag
(frequently their default action) if you can simply carry the
item in your
hand. Buy durable, quality items that will last and lend themselves
to repair
when broken. When things do break, remember that fixing is almost
always
cheaper than replacing, and you'll have the satisfaction of minimizing
your
garbage output. When you no longer need something, give it away instead
of
throwing it away. Organizations like The Salvation Army will gladly
accept
almost any used household item. Remember that Benjamin Franklin's
maxim, "A
penny saved is a penny earned," goes for the environment, too.
Every time
we reuse something, we've saved another like it from having to be
made. Every
time we recycle something, we've saved energy, pollution, and the
materials from
being mined from our natural resources.