It’s an interesting look at the systems that make up the human body, how they interact with one another and how those systems can be disrupted by outside forces. In the case of our bodies, those outside forces are the foods we eat, water we drink, chemicals we’re exposed to, etc. It got me to thinking about how much our systems are like our planet’s systems.
Earlier this year (2009), construction began on the first renewable energy wind farm in Arizona. The project is owned and maintained by Iberdrola Renewables and went online earlier this month (Aug. 2009). The electricity produced by the first phase of the wind project will serve 15,000 homes. 100% of the 63MW of electricity produced by the 30 wind turbines will be purchased by Salt River Project (SRP).
There seems to be an emerging debate over which is a better environmental solution for plastics; is it better to make your product out of recycled content or out of biodegradable material. It seems reminiscent of the old “Paper or Plastic” debate.
Promoters of recycled content site the benefit of using second life petroleum, saved energy costs and increased support of recycling programs. They also claim that biodegradability does not add any value as all plastics should be recycled and made into new products.
On the other side, there are the debaters of biodegradable packaging, who look at the 70% or more of the plastic products that are not recycled and instead are discarded into a landfill. They claim to be using a realistic approach by looking at the reality of our current society and the customary disposal of products. They claim environmental benefit by reduced landfill space and clean energy production.
So what is one to do when determining an environmental packaging solution? Do you protect the earth by reducing our waste footprint with biodegradable packaging, or do you protect the earth by reducing the carbon and petroleum footprint through using recycled content?
In the ENSO world, we say “Why choose when you can have both!” ENSO bottles can be made out of recycled content and have the benefit of biodegradability. So in a sense, you can have your cake and eat it too!
by
Teresa Clark
ENSO Bottles, LLC
866-936-3676
Web: www.ensobottles.com
Have you ever wondered what exactly happens to your garbage after you get rid of it?
In Seattle this month a group of MIT researchers will be attaching electronic tracking tags on about 3,000 pieces of trash. They want to find out and get people thinking about what they throw away and where it ends up.
WHERE TO START:
New Jersey rockers BON JOVI are getting set to release their 11th studio record, The Circle, on November 10TH. To help build up the hype, the band has gone eco-friendly with a new line of Green merchandise.
The new line of t-shirts, called the Bon Jovi Green Line, offers affordable shirts made of either organic cotton or a type of polyester made from recycled Mountain Dew bottles. The shirts, priced at $30 US come in two flavors: an Eco-Friendly Organic T-Shirt or an Eco-Friendly Recycled T-Shirt.
The organic shirt is made of 100% Organic Combed Ring Spun Cotton and is rated 4.5oz Certified Organic Cotton, while the recycled shirt offers something a bit more exciting. The light green Eco-Friendly Recycled T-Shirt is made of 65% Recycled Polyester from PET bottles / 35% Recycled Cotton. One recycled t-shirt is made from approximately 8.5 recycled bottles and will dry in half the time of a normal shirt. The band asks buyers to hang dry the shirt if possible, because it’s better for the environment. The shirt gets its green color from the Mountain Dew bottles.
Americans throw away 2 million plastic bottles every 10 minutes and 1 million recycled plastic bottles saves 3.8 barrels of oil and eliminates 180 metric tons of CO2. 10% of all US oil is used to make plastics.
Going green has become an important priority for schools all over the country. While teachers and administrators are doing plenty to instill green values into school curricula and infrastructure, the best place to teach kids what to do at school, is…well at home!
Consider these tips for helping kids to take a few steps forward when it comes to going green as the new school year starts:
Ride the bus to school
Even if you do not usually take the school bus, consider taking a public bus to school. It is one of the most eco-friendly options for getting to and from school. According to Terra Wellington, author of the book “A Mom’s Guide to Growing Your Family Green, Saving the Earth begins at Home,” one school bus takes 36 cars off the road reducing fuel usage and emissions. The daily fuel cost to transport a child to school is $3.68 for a private vehicle but only $.73 if that child rides a school bus.
Pack a low waste lunch
You can save money and reduce waste by packing your child’s lunch in reusable bags and containers. For a “no waste” lunch, plan such that the only compostible items are left over, such as fruit peels.
Take an ENSO bottle to school
While it’s easy to send your kids to school with bottled water, bear in mind that most plastic water bottles do not biodegrade and simply pollute our environment and plug up our landfills. However, ENSO bottles change all that and are designed to break down in aerobic (compost) and anaerobic (landfill) environments, plus ENSO bottles are recyclable! Best of all, ENSO bottles can be used for “Show and Tell” to amaze the teacher and impress the friends by talking about its many eco-friendly properties.
By Scot R
ENSO Bottles, LLC
866-936-3676
Web: www.ensobottles.com
This is a question that I’ve been mulling over for the past couple of weeks. Recently I’ve been reading books and articles that suggest that recycling is more of a business than an environmental solution. The articles claim that the majority of the recycling industry is not based on “helping the environment” but is about picking the easiest and largest money making bottles – #1 PET and #2 HDPE beverage bottles.
In 2007, due to the Ethanol mandate there was a 400% price increase on corn food products in the world. As a results countries began growing crops by clearing out rainforests. Clear cutting and burning rain forests to make land available for new crops created more greenhouse gases than the total exhaust from EVERY vehicle in the WORLD. When we fill up our vehicles with Ethanol or use corn based plastics (such as PLA) we are contributing to the burning rainforests.
Reusing sounds like the answer to reducing pollution and the amount of trash we put into our landfills but it isn’t working. Manufacturers have built in product obsolescence for more than fifty years with the idea of the more we use the more jobs we’ll have. Recycling plays an important role in reducing waste; however, here in the U.S. recycling is failing miserably. Consumes are confused and believe that anything they put into a recycle bin should be recycled. It might be a good thought but recyclers are only removing the items that have market value…the rest goes into the landfill. Keep in mind that even if you reuse something or recycle something sooner or later it will end up as trash. Our landfills in this country are mostly the “Dry Tomb” type of landfill. Dry tomb landfills are nothing more than large pits that have been lined with a protective bottom and as each layer of garbage is bulldozed level it is compacted and covered with a thin layer of dirt. Biodegradation does take place with a dry tomb landfill but at a slow pace. The idea behind the dry tomb is to hide garbage from our sight and smell.