Green Options

Fellow sustainablogger Robin Shreeves recently wrote a great and helpful post — Your Trash Just Doesn’t Disappear, Stupid! (Or How To Make Sure Useful Things Stay Out of Landfills) — that touches on a bit of a phenomenon that piques my interest: mongoing, freeganism, dumpster diving.

The term “dumpster diving” probably conjures certain derogatory images: “bums,” lowlife dregs of society sifting through mostly rotten morsels of discarded food for sustenance.

Pushing aside such an unfortunate view of human beings living, hopefully only temporarily, in such unfortunate circumstances, let’s look at what dumpster diving has become: environmentally friendly, if not downright urban chic.

If you are joyfully anticipating the birth, adoption or fostering of a child, it is likely you are also considering furnishing a nursery or bedroom.

Often times being environmentally friendly is also the most cost effective option. Reuse is the ultimate in environmental stewardship. Take advantage of websites such as Freecycle, Craigslist and eBay to trade or purchase gently used items. Visit local resale shops and make friends of the sales people, ask them to call you when that needed item comes in. Frequent neighborhood garage and rummage sales. Get on an email list for local Moms Clubs and watch for their annual sales.

Eco Emporia is a new online shop based in the UK, that sells desirable objects made from discarded things. They have a range of eco-friendly gifts such as accessories created from felted sweaters, beautiful jewelery made from electronic components, bowls and necklaces made from chopsticks, plus wall art made from hand painted records. Everything is individually handmade by skilled craftspeople.

Founded by husband and wife team Anna and Peter Burns, Eco Emporia came to be after the couple was inspired by the craftspeople they met on numerous travels around the world. “Reusing and recycling is a way of life for many people around the world,” said Anna. “It’s about making the most of limited resources and income. As a result they create something new, useful and often ingenious. I remember being most impressed by the Uros people on Lake Titicaca in Peru. They created amazing boats by weaving lake reeds and kept them afloat using hundreds of recycled plastic drink bottles.”

Every time I buy a new gadget it’s like welcoming a new pet into the family. You go to the store, select the perfect little tyke, and rush home to introduce it to your existing collection. The best part? No jealousy among your older electronics: they’re made to play together.

But electronics rarely last as long as a real pet. As faithfully as it might serve you, within a few years it’s time to put that gadget out to pasture. This is your guide to the greenest pastures around.

A family in Australia has created their own tiny wetland as a part of a household grey water system.  It is a fairly large DIY project, but, as the article demonstrates, not an overwhelming project.  The writer even enlisted his young children to help in the construction.

Black water is toilet waste and other water that requires more substantial treatment.  Grey water is non-sewer waste water from washing clothes and showers and the like.  Although in most homes, both black water and grey water go into the sewer system and are handled in water treatment plants with the same processing, grey water really requires much less treatment. It is possible to find other uses for grey water, including using the water for toilet flushing or for irrigation.

How much good comes from one person’s hypervigilant paper recycling effort?

I’ve been asking myself variations of this question lately, mainly while at my day job as I see basically all colleagues around me tossing paper into the trash, rather than the recycle bin.

I know it’s tough to look in the mirror and think that you, just one individual on a planet of billions, can do much that makes a difference. So I’ve been pondering what the value is — or is not — to my vigilance in recycling.

Can I make a difference? Is my effort worth anything to the planet, especially in the face of so many non-believers who assume apathy is the only medicine?

I’ve looked for the numbers to apply some math-based logic to these questions.

We’ll probably never solve the mystery of the missing socks, but what we can do is keep the orphan ones out of the landfills. If you have a family of four or five and each person loses an average of two singles per year, then you’ll be dangling approximately 10 mismatched socks above your trashcan annually during your spring or fall cleaning. If the socks you are searching for belong to the little piggies on your precious baby’s feet, this number is probably even higher. Regardless of size, shape, or colour, here are a few uses for old socks:

Creating mix tapes was an essential part of growing up. Spending hours poring over music, getting the mix just right. Fast-forwarding and rewinding to ensure the perfect timing. Waiting patiently listening to the radio, to record that perfect song (a past time that today’s youth will never no the joys. But that’s a rant for anther time.) And all for that special someone.

And being on the receiving end of a treasured mix tape, you knew that your love would last forever. That is until he started to make a tape for that girl in second period math class.

Ah young, fickle love.

Taking cassettes to the next level, these crafters have taken old tapes and remade them, or remixed them, into some pretty nifty items:

• Over at Craftster, freepepper has created this wonderful wallet (pictured) out of a cassette tape. Instructables has a good tutorial on how to make one of your own.

Who doesn’t like a makeover?

Finding the perfect piece of furniture at a yard sale or thrift store can help you make over your house and furnishings, saving money and reducing waste at the same time. Often all that’s needed to renew something is a good cleaning and a new coat of paint, the only cost being your time.

But wait a minute, you say, paint is expensive.

It doesn’t have to be.

Gallons and gallons of latex and oil-based paints never get used, probably because we’ve been told to always get extra so we won’t run out in the middle and have to worry about matching the color (custom colors mostly). Many small jobs use less than a small can’s worth of paint, and yet we can only buy a full can, not just a tiny bit.

The next time you need paint or thinner, wood stain or oil finish, don’t buy new.

It seems like the price of everything is going up lately, and so is the cost of doing business. One of the best pieces of business advice I’ve heard so far is to keep your overhead costs as low as possible. This can be tricky for a green business, since we often spend a little bit more on sustainable and organic materials and office supplies. But with a little green thinking it’s possible to lower your costs while making eco-conscious decisions. Here’s where our old friends reduce, reuse, and recycle come in.

The key to lowering your overhead while greening your business is simplicity. Keep your operations as simple as possible, and cut out the fluff you don’t need. For some this may mean working from home rather than renting office space. For others it may mean scaling your business down and working smarter with what you already have. Every choice you make has the potential to save (or cost) you money, as well as help (or harm) the environment.

There are seven deadly sins. I can’t rattle them off to you but I’ll apologize in advance, because I’m fairly certain I’m guilty of some many most of them. With that being said I have two children and an obligation to turn them into stewards of the Earth. My children (like yours) are kind little people, but they have a propensity towards gluttony.

The common thread with families who conserve is that they’re part of a community and their children have a sense of obligation. Children are born narcissists and can evolve into selfish beings or amazing, giving and inspired members of our society.

How do we grow them up green?