In looking for green suggestions on how to handle the old mattress, I googled ‘mattress recycle’.  Nothing really useful came of my web search, however.  Health department laws prohibit donating the mattress to the Salvation Army or another charitable organization, and I could not find a local mattress recycling company.  I could try a local freecycle group, but the health department restrictions would probably come into play again.  So we have a nice, new mattress, and we just don’t know how to handle the old mattress in an environmentally-responsible way.

I invite you, dear reader, to weigh in on this one:  what’s the best way to dispose of an old mattress?

Photo from my personal collection.

Sheesh. It seems that everybody and their brothers are ethanol experts these days. But what drives me nuts is that when people are talking about ethanol, they don’t seem to know what type of ethanol they’re talking about.

It’s sad because the widespread misinformation and misunderstanding is killing popular opinion for biofuels in general right now and, in particular, mercilessly destroying the good name of the second generation of ethanol — cellulosic ethanol.

The truth of the matter is that cellulosic ethanol will be made from non-food sources (miscanthus, switchgrass, wood waste, and even garbage) that can be grown on marginal land or is already a waste byproduct of society.

The production of cellulosic ethanol could have huge benefits beyond energy independence:

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Company owner Annette Savio offers lovely white biodegradable trash liners with shimmering gold ferns printed on them. The scalloped edge is unique and stylish. As pictured, simply fold the liner edge over for a fashionable wastebasket.

Each liner fits up to a 36 inch perimeter, which is your typical basket size for decorated living, bed and bathrooms. A pack of 12 liners is $9 or retailers can place minimum orders for 36 packages.

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The clock is ticking. On Wednesday, I am to shoot a segment for the Sust Enable film project in which I construct a draft box (alternative to a refrigerator), solar cooker (alternative to a stove/oven), and hot water solar shower, in order to illustrate how easy and cheap it is to build such items for the average person. Once applied, these technologies can divert significant amounts of energy that would normally come from the plugs in your home, to free energy provided by the sun and wind. (Of course, the issue of winter and weather conditions arises, but I believe that every little applied creative technology helps in the approach toward sustainable living.)

But there is one obstacle looming… can I overcome it in the hours before the shoot begins?

How do I sustainably acquire the necessary materials?

If I am claiming to live a 100% sustainable lifestyle, then certainly I cannot acquire anything new–all supplies must be redeemed from the waste stream of others. Or must they? I began to realize that the likelihood of me garbage-picking a 55-gallon drum, spigots, fixtures, tools, aluminum foil and black hose was rather slim in the time frame given, and with the transportation resources I have (i.e., a bike).

Hence, I must consider the tradeoff of my actions as thoroughly as I can. What are the consequences of the manufacturing of a metal spigot, bought new from Home Depot? What’s the tradeoff if I were to continue to use conventional hot water heaters for all of my showers for the next few years of my life?

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With this certain demand, our faithful suppliers are getting geared up and stocked up as well. So as you head down the aisle of your local grocery store or supercenter or what have you, you are sure to encounter lots of possible choices for what to spend your money on. And I can guarantee that most of them will be disposable. Plastic or paper plates, plastic cups, plastic utensils (including the beloved spork), paper napkins and tissues, plastic garbage and grocery bags, styrofoam or plastic coolers, etc., etc., etc. The list is endless…and this is only for party favors!

I do as much as I can to conserve resources and live sustainably. I remember at one family holiday smorgasbord, I believe it was Thanksgiving, I cunningly hid all of the plastic plates, cups, and utensils in a trunk in the closet in order to force my family to use the real, washable ones instead. No one was very happy with me, though I did convince one aunt to play along and stand up in my defense, but by using the normal stuff we reduced the amount of trash that day significantly compared to usual holidays. (And yes, for you cynics out there, I did indeed help out doing the dishes!)

Despite my ecological consciousness and consumer conscience, and despite my stratagems to thwart the forces of disposability, I cringe at the many disposable items that I still use in my own home. For example, disposable razors. These oh-so-convenient, many-to-a-pack, everything’s-a-dollar mainstays of male grooming seem rather benign at first glance (unless you nick yourself shaving, of course). Yet each one consists mostly of plastic, which is made from petroleum, and after a few shaves that plastic and the metal goes into the trash…and so on then to a landfill where it sits amidst all the other non-biodegradable garbage into perpetuity.

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That’s exactly what two men, one from California and one from Hawaii, are now doing. The two — Marcus Eriksen, a Ph.D., Gulf War vet and director of research and education for the Long Beach-based Algalita Marine Research Foundation, and Joel Paschal, a former businessman in Hawaii and a one-time employee of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) — are sailing across the Pacific in a homemade vessel, Kon Tiki-style, to “raise awareness about plastic fouling our oceans.”

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The company has announced that it’s investigating suitable sites for commercial garbage-to-ethanol facilities — leading baby-owners everywhere to rejoice that they may never again have to feel guilty about throwing out enough diapers each day to put the elephant in this commercial to shame (and can I just be the first to say “WTF?” to that commercial).

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A stone throw away from a part of the shore, hordes of tourists from different parts of the world lounge on a sandy beach under a starry night, guzzling away to an antics-filled fire show, unconcerned about the sea’s spew.

Even though there are signs posted throughout the island encouraging visitors not to dump garbage, the sea’s vomit, so to speak, is evidence enough that only a few take heed of the message.

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That’s the question that UCLA Extension looked to answer for about 150 attendees at their “The Business of Green: What’s the Payoff?” conference in Long Beach last week. And, after a rousing opening speech from actor and activist Ed Begley, Jr., we got down to business.

The first session, led by Burt Hamner, owner of Cleaner Production International, was an eye-opening foray into the ways that sustainability can be incorporated into financial statements. This may sound boring to some, but to paraphrase Hamner’s take on an old maxim, the things that get measured and reported in a company are the things that get managed.

For example, if no one knows what percentage of “waste” materials are recycled, it’s difficult to improve that figure. This points to an easy place to start in greening your company: the garbage. Compare your waste bills to what is actually being picked up to look for inefficiency. Check the contents for recyclable or reuseable materials, which may be turned into a new revenue stream. Determine the costs to dispose of hazardous waste, and add that to the up-front cost of the product - it may cost less to buy a less hazardous alternative, even if it has a higher up-front cost. Keep in mind that saving money may not be as sexy as sales, but it has the same effect on the bottom line.

Other panelists and speakers focused on how their companies approach going green. A few key ideas:

• Consider the entire life cycle of your products and those you buy, including distribution and end of life (from Honda)
• Engage your business partners, like your utility company, to find new ways to conserve, and thus, save money (from Xerox)
• Realize that it’s often less expensive to recycle materials from your own worn out products than to manufacture new ones from scratch (from Xerox, who recycles 98% of their equipment)
• Try simple interventions to change behavior, like letting people know the impact of their actions. Think Prius: does the unique dashboard change your driving behavior? (from Gil Friend, Natural Logic)

For companies that decide to go green there is certainly a payoff, both in the traditional sense, like improved financial performance and employee retention, as well as in the broader sense that affects us all.

Image credit: UCLA Extension

My son, like many boys, adores trucks. He enjoyed William is Going Green when his sister read it to her, but there is one thing about the story I find a bit awkward. I do think that city garbage trucks should have hybrid motors, but as mentioned in the book, the cost to convert a truck is expensive and not readily available. William’s reward for rescuing a cat is not the solution for most city garbage trucks, and I think it is a little misleading to children who really want to see change. Perhaps there is another way William could have gotten a new hybrid motor from recycling proceeds, donations, gas taxes, etc. Maybe I am too much of a realist, but I like my green children’s fiction to address the realities of environmental change. This part of the story didn’t bother my children at all, and they really did like it.

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Dwell on that quote for a minute. Dwell on it because we, as a society, are hopelessly, recklessly addicted to plastics. According to Charles Moore, every year, about 250 billion pounds of plastic pellets are produced for use in the manufacture of plastic products. After taking a tour around my house, I was dismayed to discover that I could not even count the number of items in my house that are made, at least in part, of plastic, because there were just so many. Just sitting here at my laptop, I can touch a dozen plastic items in close range: Laptop keyboard parts, plate for my toast, rims for a wagon wheel, spoon handle, air conditioner exterior, backing of rug, cordless phone, bin in which I keep my mail, power strip, shredder, vacuum cleaner, slippers, fake apples in centerpiece…. need I go on?

I think we’ve all been hearing it for years: plastics are not biodegradable. In fact, they only photodegrade, which means that the sun breaks them down into smaller and smaller bits, until they are only one molecule large… but then there is no voracious bacteria, no known organism, that can then act on that molecule. We have created, in essence, an ecological invasive “species” that no organism native to our planet can deal with.

I can remember growing up in school in the 80s and learning about the problems with plastics. That was over 20 years ago, and our plastic consumption is only increasing. The use of disposable plastic water bottles has significantly increased the vast extent of our plastic waste.

I just came across an article that scared me. It was published a few years ago, and so does not even contain the most recent statistics, which have probably worsened significantly, and it is still terrifying. Charles Moore was on a research vessel in the North Pacific Gyre, between California and Japan, when they came across a vast wasteland of ocean covered as far as the eye can see in floating plastic debris. Because a gyre is an area that has little wind and current action, once garbage floats there, it tends to stick around. I had trouble comprehending the sheer enormity of the possibility of an area the size of Texas covered in plastic garbage. It made me stop and think: I HAVE to stop using so much plastic, and we HAVE to come up with a more ecologically sound alternative to PET plastic.

Please read Charles Moore article Trashed. I think you will find it eye-opening. Then try to come up with one way you can reduce your consumption of plastic. Here are some possibilities:

* Don’t take a to-go lid or a straw when you buy a drink somewhere. If you are going to a Starbucks or similar coffee shop, they will most likely allow you to bring your own resusable coffee mug and fill that (when my husband does this at Starbucks, he even gets more coffee than he would for the same price in a to-go cup, they knock off 10 cents from the total cost, and they steam-wash your cup for you before they fill it!)
* If you or your child often take sandwiches to work or school, look into a reusable sandwich bag like the Wrap-n-Mat from Resusablebags.com.
* Buy glass (Pyrex work great!) containers for left-overs instead of plastic. I hear a lot of complaints that it’s hard to take glass in a packed lunch, but as long as you buy a sturdy lunchbox/bag, and are mindful of the fact you have glass, it is totally possible, and you eliminate the possibility of toxins leaching into your food from microwaved plastics!
* Stop buying plastic disposable water bottles! Stop buying plastic disposable water bottles! Stop buying plastic disposable water bottles! Stop buying plastic disposable water bottles!
* Instead of plastic disposable water bottles, check out the newcorn-resin PLA refillable water bottles with filters from TheGreaterGreen.com. And while you’re at it, check out my blog post on PLA plastics, which reveals both the positives and the negatives of this new plastic.
* When you can’t avoid plastics, be sure to recycle them. The most easily-recycled plastics are those with a 1 or a 2 inside the recycling triangle on the bottom of the container.
* Look for alternatives to plastic bottles and packaging for common food items like ketchup. It might not be easy!! The only mustard that came in a glass jar at my local grocery store was Grey Poupon…. so guess what we are spreading on our sandwiches these days!

The most important thing is that we simply start becoming more aware of our plastic consumption. When I started looking around my surroundings and in my cupboards, I realized we were using a lot more plastic than we needed to. It’s not realistic to stop using plastics altogether- they are very useful for many purposes! But cutting down on plastic consumption significantly will help us solve our impending plastic crisis, as will creating recycling systems that recycle a larger percentage of plastics than are currently being recycled.

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Warning: so, as the video and Oprah’s darling du jour and guerrilla closet warrior Peter Walsh so clearly outlines, our pack-rat habits are making us chubby. They can also be a barrier to us going green. Not surprising, did you notice that your lean and toned friends also tend to have pretty darn spotless, sustainability-forward and organized homes, while your plumper friends tend to lavish in “chaotic creative” spaces. Hmmm…

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“Hilton San Francisco, the largest hotel on the West Coast, removed all of its garbage disposal units in 2002, and Jo Licata, community projects manager, says it has made a big difference in mechanical and water expense.” (SF Chronicle)

So what are the alternatives? Can a single user without the ability to compost in the traditional pile way still do the ultimate recycling - turn food waste back into food?

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Photo courtesy of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation

Image courtesy of user Gengiskanhg at Wikimedia Commons.

What’s the background to this?

How has it been allowed to happen?

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Here’s the green beat: CDs contain aluminum, polycarbonate, lacquer, dyes, nickel, and chemical feedstock from oil, none of which are particularly groovy for the environment. And the jewel case and shrink-wrapping don’t make CDs any healthier for the planet. Plus, with iPods and similar technologies abounding, how often do we buy the CD, upload the songs to our computers, listen to the tunes on our laptops and handheld devices, and never again touch the CD itself? These days, as this green blog puts it, CDs are nothing more than extra packaging for the music we buy. Spare the waste and the toxic materials by downloading your music directly.

By now, High Fidelity fans everywhere are groaning. Forgo the experience of music shops? But consider this a fresh spin: with a music library on your computer and not all over your house, it’s much easier to arrange your music — not alphabetically — but chronologically in the order that you discovered the musician, or however you like.

Many readers will also ask, justifiably, whether it’s actually more environmentally friendly to use a computer or handheld MP3 player to listen to music than it is to buy CDs. Let’s look into this a bit because it’s a good question. As per the computer, we’ll assume that no one actually buys a computer just to listen to music. Rather than buying a CD player and hundreds of CDs, we can get all of our music using a single instrument that we would have purchased in any case. Therefore, even if it takes more juice to run a computer than a CD player, we can safely say that listening to music on your computer is better than buying CDs and playing them on your computer or CD player. Just remember to turn the computer on to use it and turn it off when we’re done. If you mostly like to listen to music on the computer, problem solved.

But what about handheld MP3 players — are they better for the environment than CDs? Greenpeace has an interesting article full of both criticism and praise for Apple’s iPod. The bad news for iPod users? These devices too are made with toxic chemicals, and when they break, they are cheaper to replace than to fix. On the other hand, CDs also have a definite lifespan and will sooner or later become landfill. But here’s the good news: iPods are recyclable. The final factor that gives MP3 players the edge over CDs is simply that they hold so many songs. The iPod classic holds up to 40,000 songs. At about 15 songs per disk, that would add up to over 2,600 CDs. Lastly, some environmentalists will also appreciate iPod features like the downloadable Animal Ingredients List A-Z, a "portable, quick reference for vegans on-the-go." Features like these can make being green a little easier.

Lastly, there’s the question of the energy used by the servers that hold music for people to buy online. They’re left running 24/7 to allow people to buy music at any time of the day or night. Rather than arguing that this energy use is less environmentally taxing than the energy used in manufacturing CDs, let’s do one better and take action on the issue. According to the Climate Counts consumer scorecard, Apple isn’t doing much to address climate change. This could swiftly be rectified if, say, ten percent of Apple iTunes users contacted the company asking it to run its iTunes servers on clean energy. Change has to start somewhere, and this is a good opportunity.

For those of us who are less digitally wired, there’s still the good old radio. A long product lifespan, low energy usage, and dozens of music radio stations give the radio impressive eco credentials. If considering the ins and outs of CDs vs. downloads makes your head spin, relax. We’re here to enjoy being green. Just turn the radio on and let the music flow. Also, it’s worth checking out online radio. One site I highly recommend for discovering new artists is Musicovery.

If you’re using electrical devices for music, don’t forget to turn them off and unplug them when they’re not in use to save energy. For an extra eco touch, you can get a solar charger for your iPod or computer. You can also choose to power your music (and your home) with renewable energy from your local utilities company or an energy offset provider.

So turn up the volume and get your groove on. Dance like nobody’s watching and let the green times roll.

References and Resources:

Apple iTunes Store Environmental Impact | Torants

iPoison + iWaste | Greenpeace

Apple and the Environment | Apple

Compact Disc | Wikipedia

Compact Disc Manufacturing | Wikipedia

Can I Buy Green Power In My State? | US Department of Energy

Photo Source:

Streetart in Lisbon,Portugal | Flickr

The Canadian navy has traditionally had a good relationship with the garbage on board its ships: the cold Arctic temperatures have kept the mess frozen, allowing refuse and olfactory senses to live harmoniously.

Then came global warming. The increased temperatures have caused quite the stink on Canadian naval ships, so much so that the navy is relaxing regulations and allowing ships to dump the garbage and even raw sewage at sea. A portion of an internal navy memo was reprinted by The Canadian Press:

The changes ‘help alleviate our COs (commanding officers’) concerns (with regard to) accumulated food remnants stored in garbage bags on decks during ever-increasing global warming summers…These food remnants may decay or putrefy and generate an occupational health and safety issue on board ships (that) our COs can ill afford while striving to enforce Canadian sovereignty in our internal Arctic waters."

The orders – part of the more relaxed provisions in the Arctic Water Pollution Prevention Act – allow for dumping if there are "operational" or safety reasons, or if capacity is exceeded.

These provisions, and the increased number of ships being sent north on sovereignty patrols, have many people arguing that taking the smelly garbage to a port for unloading is the worth the inconvenience, especially when the alternative is dumping it at sea.

However, navy officials say dumping would be worst-case-scenario, and that navy ships are still much more restrictive in their environmental stewardship than the law requires them to be.

The Canadian Press