Plastics Make It Possible

Remember that ad campaign? Apparently it’s still around and now has its own website under the same name.

Last weekend, we watched No Impact Man, a documentary about a man and his family who set out to live without any net impact on the environment for 365 days. I first heard about the documentary on Young House Love, and I’m glad it piqued my interest. It opened my eyes to all the waste we discard every day. Really, why does everything we buy have to be packaged in plastic? Why do we use those crummy produce bags at the grocery store instead of something reusable like this? 

This past weekend, we also bought new bins for separating our recycling. We used to half-heartedly recycle, because we were too lazy to find recycling bins that worked for us. Now that we separate out all our plastics/packaging (including aluminum, styrofoam, etc.) and paper, we discovered most of the rest of our trash is compostable. There’s a bin for compost in our trash area downstairs. However, the idea of having a can of nasty rotting food in my kitchen disgusted me – that is until I (somewhat slowly) made the connection that that’s what the kitchen trash is anyway. Because I don’t want to have to scrape out a trash can full of rotting food gunk everytime we take the bin down to the compost, I started researching options and found these bags which are biodegradable and compostable. They are made from cornstarch, vegetable oil and other renewable resources ,and they get good consumer reviews.

Additionally, we are looking into storing our leftovers in glass tupperware-like containers like these, because I don’t like the idea that chemicals are probably seeping into my food from the plastic. And unfortunately, while doing research yesterday, I found reports that canned goods are often contaminated with BPA in much higher levels than what was found a few years ago in Nalgene bottles and other plastics. For more information on that, click here to read an article from Consumer Reports, here for information from the Environmental Working Group, and/or here for an article from NPR.

It is interesting how this whole change in attitude began. I think it started with our car breaking down, so thank you, Nissan, for the manufacturer defect. Ironically, this is the description of the defect according to LemonAuto.com: “The fuel pump terminal on the fuel-sending unit can develop a crack in the plastic molding. this can cause the terminal strip to corrode under some environmental conditions.” So for us, plastics made it possible for our eyes to be opened to change.

As a result of being carless for 22 days (we just got it back on Tuesday), we wound up buying bikes and learning the joy of biking around to dinners and errands nearby. Second, I want to thank whomever dumped too many recylables into our stairwell’s trash bin, which resulted in us getting two bad notices from the community. If we had gotten a third, our stairwell would have been in some trouble. From the looks of the recycling bins this morning, everyone has started to do a much better job with their recycling, including us. If we hadn’t gotten those warnings, we probably would not have gone to get separate recycling bins for our packaging and paper. I also want to thank Young House Love for mentioning No Impact Man. Finally, I want to thank No Impact Man, Colin Beaven, and his family for opening our eyes to all the useless waste we leave behind.

A tangent but still relevant part of the change in our perspective derived from our garden, which originally began because we wanted to beautify our building. Once the project took shape, we ended up planting fruits and vegetables instead of a garden full of flowers. Now you can find us working in our garden several times a day, and for us – John especially – it’s an effective stress reliever as well as a great joy in our day. I guess we never believed that we could grow edible fruit and vegetables on our own. Sure, we could have a token herb plant here or there, but who knew we would have upwards of 30 growing tomatoes on five little ol’ tomato plants or that we would have harvested four delicious strawberries from just two strawberry plants yesterday.

Moving forward, we want to make the following changes permanent, rather than a passing trend:

• separate out all plastic/packaging and paper for recycling
• reduce use of plastic, period
• compost
• use only reusable produce bags
• minimize use of canned goods utilizing liners containing BPA (note: Muir Glen will be switching to metal packaging that doesn’t contain BPA)
• bike to local restaurant/errands
• expand our garden
• buy milk and sodas in glass containers (in Germany you can return these for a deposit refund)
• buy local when possible and use seasonal fruits and vegetables

I would also like to switch to mineral make up. Does anyone have any recommendations?