Studies show that 1% of trips are by bike. If that number went up 1/2%, we’d save 462 million gallons of gas per year.
Fast Fact courtesy of the No Impact Project.
Posted in 3 Rs, fast facts, transportation
If you have only a small item to cook, your toaster oven is a more energy efficient option than your regular oven. For more info, click here.
Posted in 3 Rs, fast facts, food, house stuff
The purpose of sharing the email exchange below is twofold:
1) the right environmental action isn’t always obvious, so it’s GOOD to ask around and see what other people are doing–one of the main reasons the Eco Women run this website.
2) acting right by our environment is a learning curve. We aren’t born granola crunching-hemp wearing-bicycle riding-fair trade coffee sipping-zero environmental impact people. We evolve. One step at a time. One change at a time. And those changes cycle through our lives making a greater and greater impact on our own behavior and on other people’s behavior.
Take hope, readers! The little things we do matter!
Subject: Environmental Question
Dear Enviro Girl:
Hi, I have a quick question for you since I am not the most environmentally correct person but I am trying to become more aware. I have about 1 cup of paint thinner I poured in an old glass to try and soak a paint brush in to see if the dried paint would come off the brush. It didn’t work but my question is now how do I get rid of that little bit of paint thinner?? Seems too harsh to dump it down the sink…do I just dump it behind our fence or down the toilet?? Hate to pour it in the ground. But wow, I have no idea how to get rid of it. I have it in an old glass I was going to throw away after I used it so I can’t transport it anywhere or it will spill. Any ideas?
Thanks, Carolyn
Subject: RE: Environmental Question
Dear Carolyn:
I’m flattered that you would ask! And I totally had this SAME issue a couple months ago! I had the exact same thought process…so I threw it away, well wrapped in newspaper so it wouldn’t break, reasoning that the landfill would have enough layers of clay, trash, etc. to really prevent it from getting into the groundwater or anything else. I think drains are bad places to pour toxic substances because most water systems are closed, so that will get cycled through the system. Filtration systems can take out a lot of impurities, but there’s no point in introducing more than are absolutely necessary, right? And as for the ground, I wondered about that too, but opted for the controlled landfill environment.
Best, Melissa AKA Enviro Girl
Dear Melissa,
Thanks for the response. I’m working lately on budgeting and it is funny how it snowballs into affecting other areas. By slashing my grocery budget means I buy less prepared/boxed food…so less packaging equals less trash and so forth.
Thanks, Carolyn
As the Christmas season approaches, Recycla is taking a good long look around her house and giving the stink-eye to clutter. You see, this is Recycla’s 12th Christmas as a parent and she knows what’s coming — a huge influx of gifts for her daughters from their doting grandparents, aunts and uncles, one great-grandmother, and of course Santa Claus.
Recycla and her husband both come from large families, so even if every grandparent, aunt, and uncle gave Recycla’s daughters only one book each, that would still be a lot of books. However, they all give more than one book, so the flood of new things coming into the house can be a bit overwhelming.
Thus, this time every year, Recycla sorts and purges as much as possible. She goes through her children’s clothes, pulls out what no longer fits, and then donates them to a local charity. She goes through her children’s books and toys and does the same thing. And she definitely tackles the girls’ bedrooms and deals with squirreled-away papers, crafts, and other accumulated detritus. This is a pretty thorough event that Recycla once likened to Sherman’s march to the sea (minus the pillaging and burning).
Lest you think that Recycla is only targeting her children’s possessions, she assures you that her own possessions get the same treatment. She recently went through her craft supplies and Freecycled the surplus. Then, she and her husband went through closets and storage and Freecycled various items, including some small pieces of furniture. Now Recycla’s house feel organized and tidy in preparation for the holidays.
What about you? Are your closets and drawers bursting at the seams? Do you have extra stuff that you don’t need? Why not donate that surplus to a local charity? Or, Freecycle it so that another person or family might get good use out of something you’re not using.
Tell the Eco Women: Are your closets bursting at the seams or have you kept things clean and tidy? When you do clean things out, what do you do with the surplus?
Posted in 3 Rs, house stuff
A few weeks ago Enviro Girl stumbled across PERF Go Green biodegradable tall kitchen garbage bags for sale at her local hardware store. She’s noticed this store stocking many environmentally friendly products; no surprise, as the owner seems to appreciate nature and wildlife. (If the three aisles of bird seed and bird feeders indicates anything.) When her roll of garbage bags ran out, Enviro Girl remembered the “green” garbage bags and grabbed a box.
Her box of PERF garbage bags totaled just under $6.00 with tax, but Enviro Girl is used to paying a little more green for greener products. She shrugged it off and brought it home. The bags fit her kitchen wastebasket like a glove, the handles slightly elastic and gripping the top of the container. Maybe they were a better bargain, she mused, they were much stronger than the cheap roll of “Ruffles” bags she usually bought.
Enviro Girl’s family of five (plus one semi-stray cat) generates 1.5 tall kitchen garbage bags of waste every week on average. About 20.5 gallons of trash total each week — a little more during the holidays and less during the summertime — so she estimates their landfill contribution at 1,066 gallons of trash a week. These bags are made from recycled plastics and within 2 years they are completely broken down.
Feeling virtuous with her new “green” trash bags, Enviro Girl consciously upped her compost heap contributions. At $0.50 a bag, these babies weren’t cheap and she would try to save both money and garbage by committing to filling only ONE 13 gallon bag per week. She’d pay extra for these greener bags and that would be an incentive to use fewer trash bags, all good for the environment, right? By reducing her garbage by 1/3, she’d have to become an even more vigilant consumer and recycler, but she’s Enviro Girl, it’s what she does!
And then realization smacked her in the face like a bamboo bo staff! Enviro Girl was the hapless victim of green-washing. She’s embarrassed and mortified to admit it. She should have known better. She began thinking about her self-righteous investment into biodegradable plastic bags made out of recycled plastic and realized the contradiction. Biodegradable plastic? There is no such thing! Plastics are not biodegradable — they are “oxo-degradable.” They don’t degrade into nothing or even into anything helpful or harmless. According to this article in The Guardian, these biodegradable plastics require very specific temperatures and humidity to break down, neither found with any reliability in a northern Wisconsin landfill. And these special bags take a lot of energy and oil to make. They’re not a “green” choice for the environment by any stretch of the imagination. Enviro Girl was as well off using her “Ruffles” plastic bags for 7 cents a bag for all the environmental benefits of either option. And arguably the best option is NO trash bag, or reusing bags.
Enviro Girl will use up her expensive green-washed trash bags and return again to using “Ruffles” until she can find a better option. And she’s going to speak to the manager of the hardware store and tell him what she learned. For all she knows, he’s a hapless victim, too.
Thanksgiving is The Green Mommy’s favorite holiday. It takes place during her favorite time of year and she loves that it’s a day when most Americans celebrate together. Even though it’s been 17 years since she’s dined on the main course of turkey, it hasn’t diminished her love for the holiday’s cuisine.
Do you plan on having a vegetarian guest this Thanksgiving? Interested in trying something new? You could always go with a Tofurky with vegetarian gravy, but here are some other worthy creations that would satisfy both meat eaters and vegetarians!
Winter Greens Lasagne
Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie
Pumpkin Stuffed with Vegetable Stew
Butternut Squash-Chestnut Soup with Caramelized Pears
Savory Ricotta-Squash Tart
If you really want your vegetarian guest to be able to enjoy everything you offer this holiday, remember to watch for meat ingredients that sometimes are added to side dishes, such as meat or meat stock in stuffing or bacon on vegetables.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
You’ve heard about the Pacific Garbage Patch, but do you know what it looks like? Take a look at this excellent photo essay in the New York Times to look and learn.
Posted in issues, quick link
With Thanksgiving around the corner, many of us are planning our menus. What will it be this year – traditional fare or something new? Whatever it may be, effort and care will often go into the preparation. After all, it’s a special day that centers around a special meal.
So why not also make it just as special for your little one? Which would you prefer on Thanksgiving Day – a meal processed months ahead of time or one that was made from fresh vegetables and produce? If you’ve never made your own baby food, please take a look at an earlier post I did on how easy it really is, not to mention a lot less expensive than what you buy in stores.
Did you know that so many fruits and vegetables can be made easily by just steaming them in a steamer basket and then pureeing them? Why not consider giving your baby any of these listed below on Thanksgiving Day? (Remember to always give your baby a new food for 3-4 days in a row to test for allergies – this will mean planning ahead if your child has not had any of these foods yet.)
Simple steamed vegetables:
Or, make some combinations:
To make turkey:
If your baby is a vegetarian, for protein sources, you can serve any of these:
For dessert, how about some:
So consider a home-made meal for your baby’s first Thanksgiving – you just may end up sticking with it long after the holiday is over.
There’s chatter in the news and on Capitol Hill about Cap & Trade–and while some surveys say the majority of Americans support it, the same surveys say only 23% of Americans really understand what Cap & Trade is.
What is it? According to the EPA, Cap & Trade is an environmental policy tool that “Caps” or limits total carbon emissions. The benefit of capping emissions includes cleaner air, cleaner water, more incentive for alternative fuel sources, reduced acid rain, and a slower march towards climate change. All good, right?
The “Trade” part is where companies that produce emissions can trade their emissions levels, buy or sell the right to emit more carbon. Companies buy or sell permits to emit CO2 and the price of permits gradually rise over time to discourage emissions altogether.
All good, right? So why the big debate? The point of Cap & Trade is to increase the cost of fuel so that Americans use less. Higher prices will trickle through the economy. CEOs will not eat the cost of producing emissions, they’ll pass the cost along to consumers by raising prices. Higher prices will lead to a cut back on consumer spending in turn leading to cutting back production which begets fewer jobs. Not exactly the recipe for economic recovery. In fact, the bulk of the financial burden of Cap & Trade will be shouldered by everyday citizens, many argue that low-income families will be hardest hit because most of their disposable income goes towards goods and fuel costs.
Yet, Enviro Girl argues, we already pay the price for emissions, why not apply a Cap & Trade program that directly links the costs of pollution and fuel to consumption? We’ll pay for it eventually anyway, whether through taxpayer-funded clean up or through diminished water and air quality. And higher fuel prices is a pretty powerful incentive for America to begin taking renewable fuel resources more seriously. If it costs too much to use coal or oil, solar, wind or hydro power might finally become a more viable option.
While the debate rages on, Enviro Girl believes an educated consituency should make their feelings known to their elected representatives. Still confused about Cap & Trade? Planet Green has the Short Attention Span Version here.
A lot of us are planning to get a new dress, a new haircut or add some color to spice up our appearance for the up-coming holidays. We can get a little glitz, glitter and glam and still be green. But there’s no need to be wasteful in our holiday celebrations.
So go get your hair highlighted or even lowlit without any guilt because although we might not have enough hair to make a donation to Locks of Love that doesn’t mean the hair needs to go to waste. We can still donate those locks and help a good cause at the same time.
Hair is an amazing substance. It can absorb oil right out of the air. That’s why we need to wash our hair so often. But we can use that absorption ability to help the earth. We’ve all heard horror stories about horrible oil spills. Well, when we get our hair cut, we can help clean those spills out of the environment by going to beauty salons that sweep up those strands of hair and donate them to Hair for Oil Spills Program. Just click here, and tell your local salon about this EZ-smeazy program. You’ll help the salon go green and keep our world clean–at the same time!
