From TreeHugger:
Mr. Lloyd Alter was staying at the Sheraton Hotel while attending a conference, and he “get(s) up early to put together the TreeHugger newsletter and needs (his) coffee,” and in general he would “try to avoid disposable cups”.
As you’ve probably noticed of late, lot’s of creative people are turning unwanted stuff into home pieces that scream WOW.
Perhaps you’d get more excited by IKEA’s latest catalogue, but the point is that we need to change the way we think about “discard” and “unwanted”, and get rid of disposable everything.
From Wall Street Journal: Are your Nikes greener than your Adidas? There will soon be an answer to this question, if the manufacturers have their way.
A group of roughly 100 well-known apparel brands and retailers have developed a software tool to help them measure the environmental impact of their apparel and footwear, from raw material to garbage dump.
Cool! Congratulations!
Unfortunately, there appears to be some problems. According to the article, people who support the ban in theory is questioning the practicality.
“At the Cheese Shop, a sandwich place, employees are questioning the ban, asking why the ban extends to water, and not soda or juice. Further, tourists often walk in looking for bottled water, especially when the weather’s warm. One employee went further to assert that efforts should be directed towards better bottle recycling processes instead of banning bottled water.”
Couple of points that came to mind:
Here is a list of wasteful things that you can easily replace in your home from Planet Green:
Seeing as how here in Singapore we’ve decided to deal with our waste by building an island, suffice to say we might have a waste management issue here on our hands more pressing than most other countries.
The plastic used in your printer’s toner or cartridge is expected to last about 1,000 years and over 1 billion are discarded annually. Can’t find a re-manufacturer that saves the plastic and preserves your warranty? Bring your toners and cartridges to us we send it for re-manufacturing and if you let us know what model you want we can supply you with re-manufactured cartridges.
