Green Options

Turning trash into treasure is at the heart of Crafting a Green World. A green crafter sees beauty in scrap heaps, recycle bins, and objects on the side of the road. Julie talked just yesterday about making sure you know exactly what you’re working with before you start your project. Even after you’re sure you aren’t about to take a blowtorch to a rare piece of vintage vinyl or antique Colonial silver, sometimes you still need a little inspiration. Here’s a little art assemblage eye candy to get you going!

A couple of weeks ago, I ran the book fair at my boys’ school. This is the fifth year I’ve been in charge of the fair, and the fifth year that I’ve brought home the plastic table cloths that are part of the fair kit I’m sent. They are in perfectly good condition, and I bring them home to use to cover table tops when the kids paint and find lots of other uses for them.

I’ve been seeing a lot of clever uses around the internet for used plastic lately, particularly plastic bottles. Have you seen any of these?

The Recycled Plastic Boat. David de Rothschild is trying to promote the importance of recycling. He’s constructing a 60 foot catamaran and planning to sail it across the Pacific in April. The aim of The Plastiki is to

captivate, inspire and activate tomorrow’s environmental thinkers and doers to take positive action for our Planet and to be smart with waste, ultimately we hope to inspire people to rethink waste as a valuable resource. One person’s waste could be another person’s treasure.

The Plastic Bottle Greenhouse. A public school group from Australia, ECO (Environmental Care Organisation) built an entire greenhouse out of 1,652 plastic bottles. A steel frame supports the structure and the bottles are threaded on pvc pipes. The greenhouse will help to enhance the school’s environmental education program.

The school won the Make a Difference competition run by radio station C91.3, which supported the project.

We’ve written here before about how to get composting and about how organic matter in landfills produces methane, a greenhouse gas that’s stronger than CO2. The average person in the U.S. drinks around 3 cups of coffee per day. Americans consume over 2.4 billion pounds of coffee per year. That leaves a lot of spent grounds that could be headed right for the trash bin.

Java City is doing its bit to make a difference with its Joe-to-Grow program. Folks can pick up spent coffee grounds to use as fertilizer for acid-loving plants. On top of recommending that you sprinkle them on your garden, the Java City folks say that used grounds make a great repellent for ants, slugs and snails. They also recommend drying out the grounds and then sticking them in the fridge or closet to absorb odors, just like baking soda!

So what are some other uses for spent coffee grounds?

Emily Siwek from Sample Scrap is an interior designer who started reclaiming fabric when she realized that so many quality materials go to waste!

[Reclaimed Upholstery Fabric from Sample Scrap]

A certified LEED-AP, she was taken aback by the waste associated with the design world. So many pieces of quality scraps head straight to the bin once their life as a sample is over. Emily wanted to change that, so she launched Sample Scrap on Etsy in June of 2008.

I’m all about a bargain. With a large family, we really focus on getting the longest life possible out of items and sourcing new to us items whenever possible.

So, I’ve become a HUGE fan of:

Freecycle. Seriously, folks. You sign up, get email updates with freebies being given away in your area and you offer up the extras in your closets. I gave away a sewing machine that was in need of TLC and an old wooden play structure. I’ve found clothes for the kids and baby equipment. The only money involved is the cost of driving to pick the items up. Awesome.

Craigslist. While this isn’t a great place to find freebies (though they do have a free section), it is a wonderful resource for new to you furniture, auto needs, tools, and kids items. I’ve sold bags of clothes for $20 a pop and purchased a couch for $150. Yay.

Please forgive my rudeness. If I heard my children speak to someone that way, there’d be some serious lecturing going on. But you’ll understand when I relay the conversation I heard between two young moms the other day at a restaurant.

Mom #1 “My garage was so jam packed with boxes of things. I didn’t even know what was in half of them. I finally go so tired of it all I just took them all out to the curb.”

Mom #2 “Isn’t it such a great feeling when the trash men just make it all disappear?”

Mom#1 “Yes, ‘poof’ and it’s all gone.”

To which I wanted to scream over to their table “Your trash just doesn’t disappear, stupid!” But I didn’t because I was raised better than that. And my son was with me. And I’m fairly gutless in situations like that. But I was screaming it in my head.

What an absolute waste. What still perfectly useful items were in those boxes that the trash men hauled away to be burried in a landfill. There’s no way of knowing, but I do know this one thing. There were many ways she could have easily found new homes for the still useful things in those boxes.

As I see it, when you’ve got something that is still useful but you aren’t using it anymore, there are three responsible ways to get rid of it. None of them involve putting it out at the curb for the fairy trash men to waive their wands and make it disappear.

[image by IamSAM]

The average American replaces an old cell phone with a new one about every year and a half. With around 256 million cell phone users in the U.S., that’s a lot of electronic waste. Because we replace them so often, cell phones are major contributors to the “wireless waste” in this country.

Cell phones contain a number of toxins that build up in the environment over time, like arsenic, antimony, beryllium, cadmium, copper, lead, nickel and zinc. These chemicals are linked to all sorts of nasty health problems, such as neurological disorders and cancer. That’s the bad news. The good news is, there are lots of free, easy ways to safely dispose of your old cell phone and keep it out of the landfill. Rather than pitching your old phone in the trash, check out a few ways you can use your old phone to do good or even score some cash!

I know I do A LOT of product reviews. I confess, I love to shop and consider myself to be a somewhat of a self anointed maven. I love trying new things out and writing about it.

Perfect for blogging but not so great for the environment. So I have come to a decision to instead of throwing things out; I will reuse them in hopes that my family will make less impact than the Earth. I wish I could say that I live off the grid and grow my own vegetables and all that; maybe one day I will get there. For now we rent, we use electricity from coal generated power company (When asked about alternative resources, the sales associate had no answer for me). We do things for the Environment, but I feel not enough. Well here’s a way you can do something for the environment free… it doesn’t cost nada, zip, nothing. Reuse what you have and use until it’s standing on its last leg. Take for example the Ikea desk that my significant other had since his single days. I hate that desk. I hate its MDF cheapness and how it’s coming apart since the move. It’s really standing on its last leg. I want to throw it away (or donate to Salvation Army) and get a brand new desk. I saw one on Pottery Barn catalog that’s SO me. However, I decided to put some pretty wall paper over the ikea one and call it a day. It’s a waste to throw it out and anytime, you purchase something new. More renewable resources are needed to build another one. Just remember that.

I am getting quite creative with uses of things. Another example are the tab curtains we had that are SO outdated and didn’t fit the windows to our new place. As someone who puts considerable value in aesthetics and design; the curtains were blight to my stylish sensibilities. However, with a curtain rod and modern textile, I repurposed the curtains to be a shade for the window. I didn’t have to go out and buy a new curtain or shade. I just used the one I have to create something that worked for the new place. It saved the curtains to going to the landfill (or the Salvation Army, my solution for unwanted things) and I saved money in the process.

Conducting a waste audit is an excellent way for students and adults alike to realize how much “trash” is thrown away each day. My students and I, with the guidance and equipment of the lovely Katy Mike Smaistrla, Education Coordinator at the Earthways Center in St Louis, did a weeklong analysis of what is thrown away at our school, and the results provided awesome learning opportunities and project potential.