Reduce Your Garbage 10%
Every man, woman and child in the US produces 3-5 pounds of garbage a day. How horrific is that? Every 10 pounds of garbage that goes to the landfill costs 100 pounds of carbon emissions.
What can you do?
Recycle. Broome County, NY has a list of all the items you can recycle both to the curb, and taking up to the landfill or participating store directly. By recycling alone, you can reduce your garbage by 50%.
Reduce – buy in bulk, don’t buy anything individually wrapped – you can do that. Buy items with the least amount of packaging. Reduce what you do use – napkins, paper towels, snacks, bottled water, etc.
Reuse - did you know the average time a plastic grocery bag is used is all of 12 minutes? Plastic in the form of grocery bags, water bottles and packaging is 20% of what enters our landfills. If you have to use plastic products, reuse them as often as you can before throwing them away.
Here is a list of links for reusing just about everything...
Compost – over half of the food you throw away can be composted in your back yard, or your neighbor’s, if you don’t want to. It’s incredibly simple. Just go to Compost Info for 7 different methods.
Recycling Events. Organize weekly recycling events at your church. The following are mere suggestions, but are easily formed.
Week 1 will be Old Cell Phones and Ink Cartridge Week. Locally there are many organizations taking both as part of their fundraising efforts. If you need help locating one, your church may know of one, or call your local council of churches.
Week 2 will be Sneaker Week. Bring all old sneakers/athletic shoes, plus a $1 donation for shipping. These will be sent to Nike for their program to make the shoes into athletic mats/playgrounds. Ship to the Nike Reuse a Shoe program – http://www.nikereuseashoe.com/ has details of where to ship or drop the shoes off.
Week 3 will be Small Appliance Week. Only the following appliance can be collected during this week. Computers, monitors, printers, laptops, keyboards, radios, stereos, modems, televisions, VCRs and fax machines. Church members will take these items up to the landfill for proper disposal.
Week 4 will be Batteries, Oil, Antifreeze and Fluorescent Bulbs Week. Please have all of these in non-leaking containers. All will be taken to the appropriate drop-off locations for proper disposal. You can find drop-off locations for all of these at the link at the top of the page.
You may also participate individually by going to the recycling website for dates and additional items to drop off at the landfill or participating businesses.
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What can you do?
Recycle. Broome County, NY has a list of all the items you can recycle both to the curb, and taking up to the landfill or participating store directly. By recycling alone, you can reduce your garbage by 50%.
Reduce – buy in bulk, don’t buy anything individually wrapped – you can do that. Buy items with the least amount of packaging. Reduce what you do use – napkins, paper towels, snacks, bottled water, etc.
Reuse - did you know the average time a plastic grocery bag is used is all of 12 minutes? Plastic in the form of grocery bags, water bottles and packaging is 20% of what enters our landfills. If you have to use plastic products, reuse them as often as you can before throwing them away.
Here is a list of links for reusing just about everything...
Compost – over half of the food you throw away can be composted in your back yard, or your neighbor’s, if you don’t want to. It’s incredibly simple. Just go to Compost Info for 7 different methods.
Recycling Events. Organize weekly recycling events at your church. The following are mere suggestions, but are easily formed.
Week 1 will be Old Cell Phones and Ink Cartridge Week. Locally there are many organizations taking both as part of their fundraising efforts. If you need help locating one, your church may know of one, or call your local council of churches.
Week 2 will be Sneaker Week. Bring all old sneakers/athletic shoes, plus a $1 donation for shipping. These will be sent to Nike for their program to make the shoes into athletic mats/playgrounds. Ship to the Nike Reuse a Shoe program – http://www.nikereuseashoe.com/ has details of where to ship or drop the shoes off.
Week 3 will be Small Appliance Week. Only the following appliance can be collected during this week. Computers, monitors, printers, laptops, keyboards, radios, stereos, modems, televisions, VCRs and fax machines. Church members will take these items up to the landfill for proper disposal.
Week 4 will be Batteries, Oil, Antifreeze and Fluorescent Bulbs Week. Please have all of these in non-leaking containers. All will be taken to the appropriate drop-off locations for proper disposal. You can find drop-off locations for all of these at the link at the top of the page.
You may also participate individually by going to the recycling website for dates and additional items to drop off at the landfill or participating businesses.
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Labels: Carbon Fast, Carbon Reduction, Garbage Reduction, Lent
posted by Leslie | 9:51 PM
1 Comments:
Since our garbage is a direct byproduct of our consumerism, I thought it appropriate to put this comment here.
National Geographic's "greendex" is out. Per the Grist -
There’s more to the report than these few categories—you can read all 296 pages of it here [PDF]—but if you want the short version, here it is: developing nations like India and Brazil have the highest (read: greenest) Greendex numbers, while Canadians and Americans round out the bottom ... overall and in pretty much every category (way to be consistent!).
(her is: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/greendex/assets/GS_NGS_Full_Report_May09.pdf)
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