Carnival of Trash #3

Hello my trash-talkin' friends. As promised, here is the the third monthly Carnival of Trash, which was hosted last month at Mrs. Green's My Zero Waste blog and will be hosted next month at Wiggly Wigglers The Rubbish Diet on Monday, October 13. If you'd like to contribute, please get your submissions in by the 6th.

I haven't written a post specifically for this carnival because I figure this whole blog is about trash, but I will share one thought. As I read through these many posts dealing with the physical waste that we generate and solutions for reducing it, I am reminded of my meditation teacher a year ago who pointed at his head and said, "Remember. The real trash is in here."

Let's take care of our messes -- both inner and outer. And so, with that thought, I'd like to share not a post of my own, but an article that was read aloud in my monthly Green Sangha group yesterday. It's a very short, beautiful piece by Pico Iyer which appears in the September/October issue of Orion Magazine and is entitled "The Inner Climate."

And now, bring on the Carnival!

Reflecting

Marguerite Manteau Rao presents Garbage Society on La Marguerite, in which she compares the throw-away culture she lives in now with the simpler, nearly waste-free days on her grandparents' farm in France.

Rejin presents Here Today, Garbage Tomorrow posted at Urban Botany in which she argues that our efficient garbage removal system actually helps produce more waste. In her words, "...the mass production system, as it is designed, relies on the regular removal of stuff that never should have been made in the first place. For the inane reason of making space for yet more stuff."

Composting

Jenn presents Four Ways To Compost Indoors at Tiny Choices and then follows up with NatureMill Indoor Composter: All That? analyzing the pluses and minuses of this particular method.

Deanna Caswell presents Little House in the Suburbs: Free Super Fertile Flower Beds posted at Little House in the Suburbs This post is not just about composting, but about the creative ways she goes about getting the material that goes into making her beds so rich.

Sustainable Dave presents Worm Composting - The Video posted at 365 Days of Trash, which is exactly what it sounds like!

It seems Carolyn from Juggling Frogs also has worms, and tells all about it in the very detailed and cute post, I've got worms!

Recycling

Burbanmom presents Drawing Conclusions at Going Green about how to recycle old crayons.

Village Green presents Polyflow to keep plastics out of landfills posted at Long Live the Village Green, about a new method for recycling all plastics. This is definitely something I am going to have to look into. (Adding to the Fake Plastic Fish "to do" list.)

Reducing Waste

Green Bean presents Trimming My Waste Line at Green Bean Dreams, listing all the ways she's found to reduce waste in her home in the last twelve months.

Kristen presents A Napkin Alternative posted at The Frugal Girl about using cloths instead of paper napkins. I love what she says about hanging cloths to dry each night so they don't get gross. (Hint to a certain DH.) Not so sure about needing to wash them every day though. Read her post and see what you think.

Katy Wolk-Stanley presents Waste -- Is It Inevitable? posted at The Non-Consumer Advocate, listing ways to reduce the amount of food waste we generate.

Reusing

Wenchypoo presents Cheap Diesel From Trash posted at Wisdom From Wenchypoo's Mental Wastebasket about a company that has begun generating fuel from trash.

Myscha Theriault presents Garbage Into Gold: Great Ways to Recycle Old Containers | Wise Bread posted at Wise Bread. Myscha is one of my favorite Wise Bread writers because her articles often combine the thrifty and the green.

Condo Blues presents 12 Ways to Reuse Plastic Bottles posted at Condo Blues.

Katie presents Plastic Bags, Endless Uses posted at A Green Fire, saying, "26 ways to reuse plastic shopping bags." My favorite is #26, reusing them as shopping bags!

Zero Waste

Mrs Green presents Can a zero waste lifestyle save you money? posted at MY ZERO WASTE, saying, "Frugal and eco friendly can go hand in hand, as we've discovered on our own journey of reducing our waste."

Condo Blues presents Zero Waste Road Trip - Can It Be Done? posted at Condo Blues, saying, "I wanted to make an upcoming road trip Zero Waste but first I had to ask myself, what the heck do they mean by Zero Waste anyway?"

Almost Mrs Average (the founder of this blog carnival) presents Life after Zero Waste Week: 6 months on posted at The Rubbish Diet, saying, "Just shows how life can change"

That concludes this edition of the Carnival of Trash. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Carnival of Trash using the carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on the blog carnival index page.
 

 

CRRA: They know how to do a conference!

As I mentioned, I had the privilege of presenting the Take Back The Filter campaign as part of a panel on zero waste grassroots activism at the conference of the California Resource Recovery Association this past Wednesday. I'll tell you more about the presentation itself in a second. But first, I need to gush a bit about how the waste was handled at this conference, vs. the Blogher conference I attended a few weeks ago, and how easily other organizations could adopt this model for their gatherings.

Granted, CRRA is all about zero waste. It's the whole point of the organization, after all. But so what? Just because other organizations might not cite waste reduction as their purpose for being in existence doesn't mean they can't make it one of their values and strive for zero waste at their gatherings. So, that said, here are a few things I saw that made me smile:

The requisite recycle/compost/trash stations throughout the hotel:



Water stations in every meeting room with actual glasses and no bottled water in sight. There were (unfortunately) bowls of plastic-wrapped hard candies. I wonder how many people actually took them.



Amazingly, there were even compost bins in the bathrooms for paper towels!



At the front registration desk was a box for returning the plastic nametag holders to be reused, as well as a white board tallying how much recycling, composting, or trash the conference has generated over it's 4 days and the total diversion rate, which by Wednesday was an impressive 94.9%.



And by the way, the lunch was served on durable tableware with cloth napkins. There was not a disposable anything in sight. I was told there were 800 registrants at this conference. (Blogher had 1,000.) So, it is possible to feed a large number of people sustainably without resorting to disposable boxes, whether those boxes are compostable or not.

Our presentation itself went really well! Here's the description from the conference brochure:

Working Together Toward Zero -- Grassroot Outreach Efforts/Coalitions With National Impact

In Carbonopoly, whatever card you select, collaboration is the key. To pass Go and to collect a functional future, coalitions, grassroots efforts and the new media — social networking websites like YouTube, Myspace, Facebook, as well as email and even cell phones — are some of the best ways to implement change in your community.

* Sierra Club National Zero Waste Committee, Ann Schneider,
* Clorox/Brita - Take Back The Filter, Beth Terry
* Zero Waste, the "New Media" and The Success Of The Story Of Stuff, Portia Sinnott, LITE Initiatives/Waste Reduction Project
* Zero Waste Los Angeles, Reina Pereira, City of Los Angeles
* Moderator: Stephanie Barger, Earth Resource Foundation

Each of us had about 15 minutes to present the work that we have been doing with a question/answer period at the end. I wish I could tell you more about it, but I was so nervous -- about presenting and also about my kitty -- that once it was over I promptly forgot the whole thing. Kinda like my wedding day. Fun and exciting and I wanted to throw up. Can't wait to do it again! (Present the campaign, that is, not get married.)

Plastic tallies for last week and this week coming up Sunday night, barring anymore unforeseen disasters. My sister and her husband are coming from Maryland to visit, so I may not post a lot next week either. But I do have at least one guest poster coming up, so stay tuned. And if anyone else wants to fill in with a guest post, let me know. I'd be happy to take a little break.

Clif? Are you listening?
 

 

Take Back The Climate

I've been asked to present the Take Back The Filter campaign (urging Clorox to take back and reuse/recycle used Brita water filter cartridges) as part of a panel at the California Resource Recovery Association's (CRRA) annual conference next week. I am excited to have the opportunity to share the campaign with this audience, and when initially asked, wasn't at all nervous about speaking: I've been talking about not much else for the past 3 months!

Not nervous, that is, until I found out that the theme of the conference is CARBONOPOLY: Climate Change Is Not A Game We Can Lose.

Oh dear. I know about zero waste. I know about the problems of plastic. I know why I don't want Brita filter cartridges to continue to be landfilled or incinerated. But I hadn't related the issue to climate change. In fact, I actually knew very little about global warming except that we're all supposed to use less energy, buy fewer things that need to be shipped, and purchase locally to avoid fuel costs. I've been on the Low Carbon Diet with some friends for several weeks now. But still, I hadn't ever thought about the connection between recycling and global warming. What the heck was I going to say to this group of industry professional?

Thanks to Ann Schneider of Sierra Club's Zero Waste Group for referring me to a fantastic report called, "Stop Trashing The Climate," a joint effort among the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, Eco-Cycle, and Global Anti-Incinerator Alliance, which was published in June of this year. This report describes the multiple ways that waste affects our climate, some obvious, and some that may not immediately come to mind.

First, of course, there are the gases produced by landfills and incinerators. These gases are the direct effect of dumping or burning our waste. According to the report, "Landfills are the largest source of anthropogenic methane emissions in the U.S., and the impact of landfill emissions in the short term is grossly underestimated -- methane is 72 times more potent than CO2 over a 20-year time frame." But what about methane captured for energy? At the Hay Road landfill that I visited with Janice Sitton last January, we were told that the methane from the landfill is captured. But according to the findings of the Stop Trashing The Climate report, "The portion of methane captured over a landfill's lifetime may be as low as 20% of total methane emitted."

And incinerators emit not only CO2 but also nitrous oxide (N2O), a greenhouse gas that is 300 times more potent than CO2 at trapping heat in the atmosphere. In fact, the authors of the report recommend that "Existing incinerators should be retired, and no new incinerators or landfills should be constructed." But what about filters on incinerators that trap the gases and other pollutants?

Here's where we come to the main point of the report, the indirect results of landfilling and incineration that trapping the gases and other discharges from landfills and incinerators doesn't address: "Wasting directly impacts climate change because it is directly linked to resource extraction, transportation, processing, and manufacturing."

The more materials we send to the landfill or incinerator, the more materials must be extracted in order to replace them. And transported. And processed. And every step along the way uses more energy and produces more greenhouse gases than reusing or recycling the materials we already have.

In the case of Brita filters, that means more drilling for oil to make plastic and all the problems associated with that process. It also means transporting the oil, usually from places that are very far from where the oil will be used. And then processing the oil into new plastic pellets. And then shipping the new plastic. Then creating the new plastic filters. And then shipping the filters.

If Brita filters were designed to be reused instead of trashed, many, many greenhouse gas-generating steps in the process could be avoided. And even if, due to regulatory impediments related to the purity of plastic that comes into contact with drinking water, the filters themselves can't be reused, Clorox's development of a way to recycle the materials would still slow the need for more oil and creation of new plastics for other products.

It becomes clear to me that folks who criticize this campaign, or any other extended producer responsibility campaign, on the grounds that it takes energy to ship the used products back the manufacturer are not taking into consideration the environmental costs of creating brand new products to replace those that are trashed.

Of course, there are other major environmental costs to creating new plastic which I haven't addressed in this post, since the focus here is on global warming. I discussed some of them (including harm to the marine environment) in my post, "Plastic is made from oil." But the new (to me) information from the Stop Trashing The Climate report both heartens and saddens me. The link between waste and global warming re-energizes my commitment to source reduction and recycling and gives me an additional argument in support of the Take Back The Filter campaign. But the information also grieves me to think of one more way that we are trashing our world.
 

 

Berkeley's Green 4th of July

I love living in the Bay Area. Especially after reading Life Less Plastic's post about all the plastic and Styrofoam at her city's Taste of Chicago festival.

Here are some images from Berkeley's Independence Day celebration at the Marina:








I especially love that the garbage containers are labeled "Landfill" and explain what goes to the landfill and why it's important to choose recyclable or compostable alternatives. All the disposable dishware at the event were compostable. And there were water stations for filling up reusable bottles.

The "greening" of this event was the doing of my friend Mary Munat, aka Green Mary. In February, I wrote about Janice Sitton, my event greener friend in San Francisco. Mary is my other event greening friend, and she's been doing it since 2000. Here's how she got inspired to do this work, excerpted from her web site:

Mary's epiphany came in 2000, while listening to Julia Butterfly-Hill at the annual Health and Harmony Festival, in Santa Rosa, California.

As Butterfly-Hill recounted the tale of her attempt to save her beloved Luna, a heroic mission during which she lived hundreds of feet off the ground for nearly two years--all to save a tree, the audience wiped their tears with virgin paper napkins and relieved their thirst from single-use plastic water bottles. They quieted their hunger with non-organic foods, enjoyed while served ironically on the tree-destroying paper plates which may have killed Luna, and walked away from her talk, perhaps talking her talk, likely not walking it.

This was Mary's opening, a green rebirth.

Deeply affected, Mary entered the zero-waste arena on that moment. She has walked her talk through festivals around the state ever since.

By 2005 her experience included several years of festival volunteer coordination. She has since focused on people and resource management, with a keen eye for waste reduction at San Francisco Bay Area events, coordinated with local municipalities, attended meetings and affected gatherings large and small.

2005's Harmony Festival also succeeded in diverting approximately 85% of the "trash" from the landfill. Five tons of compost was separated from the waste stream.

Additionally, free water refill stations placed throughout the festival grounds helped to divert upwards of 30,000 single-use water bottles from the "recycling" stream. Even the sale of single-use water bottles was banned. "They ask at the table, 'Do you have a glass?' In the new ethic of re-usability, they must bring their own--then also carry it home. Or we provide biodegradable cups."

Mary wrote to me:

My primary filter through which I view the world is trashy. I see plastic bags blowing where others see the wildflowers beyond the barbed wire fence; I think of the Himalayas and the oxygen tanks littering the majestic mountains; I see the ocean and think of floating pellets; I go grocery shopping and try to get local cheese in a dairy state and cry over the selections from New Zealand, the Midwest and Ireland. I teared up when a woman in front of me in line said she didn't care whether her groceries were bagged in paper or plastic and cried when I left the store.

Mary's an energetic inspiration for me, and I was thrilled to run into her at the Berkeley festival on Friday and to realize that she was responsible for making the event as trash-free as possible. While the food may not have been as great as Chicago's Taste (my grilled chicken kebab was so smoky, I felt like I'd just had a cigarette) at least there was less trash left behind.

Once darkness started to descend, Michael and I left the festival grounds and headed towards the Bay to stake out our spot for watching the fireworks. Our friends joined us on the cold, hard rocks to wait.








While we were waiting, I entertained myself taking artsy fartsy pictures of the moon,


and once they finally started, artsy fartsy pictures of the fireworks








until the fog rolled in...


and we couldn't see anything but foggy light in the sky. At the very end, I figured out how to keep my camera shutter open longer.


Kinda cool but also kinda scary, huh? How's that for your rockets' red glare? A sobering thought at the end of a pretty fun day.
 

 

Announcement: Phone meeting with Clorox tomorrow!

I haven't posted in a few days. Have been feeling under the weather (as opposed to over the weather? Over the rainbow?) and in between coughs, sending emails to folks to sign the Take Back The Filter campaign petition.

Good news: Just got an email from a representative from Clorox and scheduled a phone meeting for tomorrow at 8:30 Pacific Time. As I write this, we've collected 184 signatures on our petition. It's a great start, but I just know we can do better. If you haven't signed yet, now's the time. Can we get 500 by tomorrow morning???

I don't care if you are not a current Brita customer. You could be in the future if they would take care of their waste, right? And I'm not requiring your email address or even home address (although those are helpful to us to have.) Just name, city, state, zip code.

Sorry to hound you. By next week, I'll be back to my regular plastic-blogging self. And tomorrow I plan to announce the winners of the two children's books. But for now, please help by signing the petition and forwarding it to everyone you know!

Thanks. You guys rock. Now stop rocking for a second and go sign!
 

 

Brita: Take Back The Filter campaign has begun!

Okay, remember all my posts about how frustrating it was that Brita filter cartridges can be recycled in Europe but not in the U.S.? And how we had our water tested and found it perfectly fine without plastic water filter cartridges? Well, giving up water filters was a fine decision for us here in the SF Bay Area where we have some of the best water in the nation. But it's not a great solution for folks in other areas of North America that may not.

If you'll recall, I set up a recycle_brita Yahoo! group to plan strategy for a campaign to urge Clorox, the company that owns Brita in North America, to develop a similar Take Back Recycling Program for Brita cartridges here. Now, after several months of writing to Clorox and planning our strategy, I'm happy to announce that the Take Back The Filter campaign has officially begun. Join us in asking Clorox to:

1) Redesign its Brita filter cartridges so that the plastic housing can be refilled rather than discarded each time the filter is changed.

2) Provide a take-back program, such as the one that exists in Europe, so that used cartridges can be returned to the company for recycling.

3) Create a system for the cartridges to be dismantled and the components recycled/reused domestically rather than landfilled, incinerated, or shipped overseas.

Please visit the new web site: http://www.takebackthefilter.org for complete background information and to take action.

What are we asking you to do?

1) Sign the petition at www.takebackthefilter.org.

2) Send me your used Brita filter cartridges. I have set up a mailbox specifically for this purpose. Or, if you live in the Bay Area, you can email me to arrange pickup. Instructions are at www.takebackthefilter.org. At some point, we'll deliver them all to Clorox (whose corporate office is just down the street from me in Oakland) to make a strong, visual statement.

3) If you're feeling really motivated, please write a letter to Clorox. A sample letter is also included at www.takebackthefilter.org, of course.

4) And finally, spread the word. Tell everyone you know. Collect their used cartridges and ask them to sign the petition. We even have a sample e-mail at at www.takebackthefilter.org for you to cut and paste.

If you have a blog, please use the following code to paste this badge onto your site:

<a href="http://www.takebackthefilter.org"><img src="http://www.fakeplasticfish.com/takebackthefilter/images/take_back_the_filter_badge2.gif"  width="160"></a>

Even better, write a blog post and encourage your readers to sign the petition and send us their filters. Wouldn't it be amazing if a truly grassroots campaign like ours could help create change in a major corporation like Clorox?

So who is this "we" I keep referring to? We are Beth, Seth, Juli, Becky, Tom, Nicole, Barb, Margaret, Susan, Cat, and others who joined the recycle_brita Yahoo! group, wrote letters to Clorox and, when Clorox's responses were less than encouraging, created this campaign. You can also read Clorox's form letters to us at www.takebackthefilter.org.

Why am I not giving you more info in this post and why am I not linking to specific pages on the site? Because I really, really, really, really hope you will go to the site and browse around and check it out. It's taken many sleepless nights, but I'm hoping it will be worth it.

Do I believe that getting a company to recycle a few (actually millions, but still) water filter cartridges is the biggest environmental challenge we face? Heck no. But I believe in the principle of Extended Producer Responsibility (which Seth brought to my attention), and this is my contribution towards creating a world in which companies consider the entire life cycle of the products they create, rather than simply pumping out more and more stuff and allowing it to pollute the planet at the end of its useful life.

I wish you could see me bouncing in my chair. I'm so excited to have this campaign finally sprung on the world. Can't wait to find out what happens!
 

 

Environmental Children's Books, Part 2: Teach Them To Recycle and Bring Their Own Bag

Here are the next two environmental kids' books, as promised.

Michael Recycle, by Ellie Bethel, illustrated by Alexandra Colombo. Green Bean may think that my Michael is a super hero for encouraging his firm to stop buying bottled water. But this big picture book is about a new super hero, Michael Recycle, who flies into trashy towns in his green cape and colander hat and, in Suess-like rhyme, teaches everyone to recycle and garden and collect rainwater. Then, when the town is sparkling again, they throw a big old party to celebrate. In fact, instead of buying streamers,

They covered the town
In green toilet paper
Then rolled it back up
To use again later.

You may think that's yucky
But these folks don't agree
In Abberdoo-Rimey
Recycling is key!

While the pictures in this book are fantastic fun and the Go Green Tips at the end are useful, I would have liked to have seen more emphasis on waste reduction and reuse before recycling.

They recycled their paper,
Their plastic and cans,
And even old junk
Like used pots and pans!

I'm not crazy about the word "junk" used to describe stuff that we may not need to keep for ourselves anymore. And recycling pots and pans? Doesn't Michael know about Freecycle? He is, after all, a super hero. But maybe I've become more hardcore than the average bear. And from what I see on the streets of Oakland, it's challenging enough to get kids to put their trash in a garbage can, much less recycle it. This book is a good start for getting the environmental message across.

I'll be donating it to the Oakland library this weekend, per Burbanmom's Giving Challenge.

Oh, and yesterday, when reviewing the two animal books, I forgot to talk about the production of the books themselves. One was printed in Mexico and the other in Singapore. Michael Recycle was printed in Korea. And, for a book about recycling, I was surprised that it's not itself printed on recycled paper. Or if it is, that fact was not mentioned anywhere in the book or press materials I received. Hmm... sort of like the seminar on "greening your law firm" that Michael and I attended where bottled water and plastic-wrapped sandwiches were served while the panelists talked about eliminating plastic bottles from the workplace. There are the ideals that we espouse, but if they don't translate into concrete changes, what good are they?

Okay, enough soap box. Michael Recycle is a really cute book and I think it would be a good addition to any school library.

The next book, which coincidentally organicneedle mentioned in a comment on my post yesterday, is My Bag and Me!, by Karen Farmer, illustrated by Gary Grant. It doesn't say what ages it's geared toward, but the heavy cardboard pages and pictures of the little boy suggest to me (a non-parent) that it's for small children. This book encourages kids not only to recycle, but to refuse disposable bags in the first place:

Let's take a trip
to our favorite store,
where My Bag and Me say,
"Paper and plastic no more!"

The secret to My Bag And Me is the hidden pull-out tray in the back that contains a child-sized resuable bag they can take to the store with them. I love the idea of this, not to mention the cuteness. But I'm less enthusiastic about the materials.

The reusable bag is made of Dupont Tyvek, the type of plastic that many large postal envelopes are made from. The cover of the book states, "This book and the reusable Tyvek bag are 100% recyclable!" What you don't realize until you read the fine print (if you read the fine print) is that Tyvek is only recyclable by mailing it back to Dupont. I devoted a whole post to Tyvek in October of last. It's worthwhile to read if you haven't already.

And notice that the book is advertised as "recyclable" rather than being made from recycled materials. So I contacted the PR rep who sent it to me and asked about the materials used as well as the decision to have it printed in China. These were her responses:

1) On using Tyvek to make the bag: Natural fibers, like cotton or hemp, were too bulky. The book would have been enormous and very heavy, not to mention the extra amount of paper needed to create the tray cavity. There is a marking on the bottom of the bag with an 800 number for recycling Tyvek information. Our hope, however, is that these bags will have a very long life as a shopping bag.

2) On the shiny coating on the cardboard pages: The coating is a plastic film, otherwise known as PP lamination. PP, or Polypropylene lamination is non-toxic and the same goes for the glue, ink and paper used in these books. The paper is made of C1S ( coated paper, one side), and Natura board.

3) On having the book manufactured in China: Cost was the deciding factor for printing in China. We would never have been able to produce this book here, and sell it at the cover price of $10.95. The manufacturer is ICTI audited which gives credibility and they can issue a letter guaranteeing that the materials used are non-toxic and certificates for the materials themselves.

Organicneedle wrote a bit about this book back in March, and then she came up with a list of ways to make your own reusable bags for kids out of reused materials or natural fabrics. Anyway, it's a cute idea, perhaps not executed in the manner hardcore environuts like me would prefer, but useful nonetheless for getting kids accustomed to bringing their own bags.

I offer this book as another freebie to a Fake Plastic Fish reader. It's not really appropriate for donating to the library because of the bag that needs to be removed and used. So please leave a comment and let me know if you'd like it. Or email me directly at beth[at]fakeplasticfish[dot]com and let me know.

And finally, here's an ACTION ALERT for anyone concerned about keeping commercial advertising/product placements out of kids' books. Harper Collins has announced its plans to publish a series of books for young girls called MacKenzie Blue, in which, according to this New York Times article, "...product placement is very much a part of the plan. Tina Wells, chief executive of Buzz Marketing Group, which advises consumer product companies on how to sell to teenagers and preteenagers, will herself be the author of titles in the series filled with references to brands. She plans to offer the companies that make them the chance to sponsor the books."

To read about the campaign and to protest the publication of these books, please visit Commercial Alert and take action.
 

 

Terracycle & Clif Bar: Shades of Green

Michael called me at work tonight to say he'd just heard that Clif Bar has a new program to take back its plastic energy bar wrappers and "upcycle" them in a partnership with Terracycle, the good folks who got sued by Scotts Miracle Grow for selling worm poop compost in recycled soda bottles and claiming it was better. (I'm sure it is better. Sue me.) In a joint effort, which I would have known about last week if monitor problems hadn't kept me from reading all my email, Terracycle will send free prepaid energy bar wrapper collection envelopes to anyone who signs up for the Wrapper Brigade Program and will then manufacture them into "unique accessories and other upcycled products." And Clif Bar will donate .02 per wrapper to the charity of your choice.

Sounds good right? Well, it didn't sound good to me. In fact, I got all huffy about it. "Oh great!" I ranted. "Like anyone needs a tote bag made out of Clif Bar wrappers. This is just a way to allow companies to keep creating disposable plastic wrappers from virgin plastic and let consumers feel morally superior for keeping them out of the landfill a little longer. They're still made out of petroleum. They're still made from nurdles, the plastic pellets that are polluting our oceans, harming wildlife, and concentrating toxins in the food chain. This isn't 'upcycling.' It's the same old 'downcycling' we're always bemoaning because the loop never gets closed when you're talking about plastic!"

And then Michael said, "But what about people like me who aren't ready to give up Clif Bars? Isn't this better than throwing the wrappers away?" And I thought, the man has a point.

I get so worked up about finding the absolute best solution to problems that I forget there are also good solutions that aren't necessarily the best but might head us in the right direction. Various shades of green. Terracycle is definitely doing a service by keeping plastic bottles, juice boxes, yogurt containers, and now wrappers here at home where we can take some responsibility for our own waste instead of shipping it to Asia. And yet even Clif Bar admits that the Wrapper Brigade is not the best solution. In their e-mail newsletter, they write:

We're not psyched about the fact that our wrappers end up in the garbage. We've been working hard to come up with a more sustainable solution; since we haven't found the answer just yet, we've partnered with TerraCycle to launch the Energy Bar Wrapper Brigade. Get this: TerraCycle will convert all of the energy bar wrappers they receive into handy accessories and will donate two cents for every wrapper to the charity of your choice. Sign up for free and become a shepherd for the program.

So what do we do? Nothing, if we're trying to live plastic-free. I've switched from energy bars to granola and other cereal that I buy from bulk bins and store in my own containers, leaving no packaging waste behind. But if we're not quite there yet, we can at least divert a little waste from some landfills by using this program. And let others know about it too.

I'm hoping that Clif Bar means what it says about coming up with a more sustainable solution. I'm glad they speak that language. It's my hope that companies are moving towards waste reduction as preferable to recycling. In the mean time, we have what we have. What do you think?

(BTW, I know I said I'd post a recipe today. But Beth Terry is nothing if not opinionated, and when the opportunity and mood strikes, she'll usually go with some kind of rant and save the nice stuff for another day.)
 

 

Week 29 Results: 2.6 oz. of plastic. Making a change.

This past Friday, I attended a planning meeting for Green Sangha's 2008 Rethinking Plastics campaign. At that meeting, one of the members showed us some video footage of what happens to the plastic recycling that we put into our curbside bins. I knew that most of our plastic was shipped to China, but until seeing this heartbreaking video, I didn't think much more about it. Please watch this short clip from Britain's Sky News and then see how you feel about recycling plastic:



(If the embedded video doesn't play in this window, or all you get is a commercial, try this link instead.)

Yes, this story focuses on Britain's plastic waste. But in the U.S., we also ship most of our plastic to China, causing health problems and pollution in our attempts to be "green."

Since I started this project, I have tallied all of my plastic waste, recycling those items that are accepted in Oakland, SF, or Daly City, and holding onto the rest. From now on, I'm going to hold onto ALL of it, recyclable or not. If plastic recycling is such a dirty business, we ought to be taking care of it here at home instead of shipping it off to poorer countries with lower environmental standards.

My new commitment to hold onto all my plastic is similar to that of a new blogger who is collecting and tallying his waste, Dave Chameides at 365daysoftrash.com. He has vowed not to throw ANYTHING away for a year but to tally it all and figure out what it is and what can be done with it. He says, "Any waste that I generate that can be recycled, will also be saved. Recycling is better than 'throwing away' but it still takes energy and creates waste so I think accounting for recycling will be an important factor." Perhaps the video above is another reason to hold onto all of it.

So, that said, here is the tally for this week, the first of 2008:



Non-recyclable items used this week but purchased before the plastic project began:

• 1 Safeway ice bag. This ice was sitting in our freezer for months and months, and we finally used it up chilling a bottle of New Year's Eve champagne.


• 1 cap from a bottle of Safeway rubbing alcohol. See below.

Recyclable plastic bought before the plastic project began (although as mentioned above, they will not be recycled):

• 1 bottle of Safeway rubbing alcohol (#2 plastic). Is it possible to find rubbing alcohol in glass or is it only available in plastic these days? And do we need it? The only thing I was using it for lately was in a homemade ant spray recipe. I could probably substitute vodka or grain alcohol. I can sterilize a needle for removing splinters with a match. My mom used to clean oral thermometers with alcohol, but I just use soap. Cuts and bruises can be cleaned with soap and water. Alcohol seems like a staple of home medicine cabinets, but do we actually need it?

New plastic waste.

• 2 Refresh Endura single-use eye drop containers (#4 plastic). Are my eyes getting better? I haven't been using as many containers of drops because I've just been lazy about putting them in at night. And so far, no traumatic cornea mornings. I'm just seeing how far I can press my luck, I think.


• 2 plastic ties and 1 plastic tag from a bamboo scratching post purchased for the kitties. More on this item in a post later this week.


• 1 plastic bag from inside a box of crackers. These were brought to our New Year's Eve party by a friend, and I ate some.


• 1 Wallace & Gromit cheese wrapper. Very cute. Also brought to the party by a friend. Of course I had some.


• 1 plastic cork from a bottle of Boissonneau Chateau Moulin de Ferrand Bordeaux Blanc. This was the last bottle!


• 1 cap from a glass bottle of Straus organic nonfat milk.

I want to welcome the new readers who have found their way over to Fake Plastic Fish from the 365 Days of Trash blog. I have a lot of exciting things to write about this week, including a trip to a landfill on Wednesday.
 

 

Recycling part 5: Only in San Francisco

Continuing my visits to SF bay area waste facilities, I took a tour yesterday of the San Francisco MRF (material recovery facility, aka recycling center) and San Francisco "dump." What I saw looked pretty much the same as at Davis Street and CWS, so I won't bore you with more photos of sorting machines and baled materials. Instead, I'll sum up the experience with this little video I put together showing both operations, the clean and the stinky. This video is more detailed than the one I made of the CWS operation:


What you don't see in this video, what San Francisco has that other recycling and garbage facilities lack (besides being a whole lot bigger) is an artist in residence! Yep, you heard me. San Francisco Dump has an Artist in Residence program. Artists get space at the dump and access to whatever materials they want to use for three-month periods.

Friday night, Michael and I attended a presentation of the SF Dump artists at the Herbst Theatre. The first half of the show included videos created by the garbage artists. And the second half was an amazing performance of the Junkestra Symphony, a musical piece composed and played on pieces of junk, unaltered. None of the "instruments" were cut or changed in any way from how they'd been found at the dump. It sounded great!

Here are photos from Friday night's performance as well as art displayed in the theater lobby and at the San Francisco dump yesterday. First, photos of the Junkestra after the show. Click on any image to see larger.








These plastic bag dresses were displayed in the lobby during intermission, when wine was served which had come from vineyards using compost from SF's commercial compost facility.



Yes, this dress is made from woven plastic bags!



Here is the artist in residence, Philip Bonner, at home in the studio yesterday, as well as artwork displayed in the lobby of the SF Dump Education Center:






For more information about the SF Dump Artist in Residence Program and to find out about visiting, go to: http://www.sunsetscavenger.com/AIR/index.htm.