Resolve to Use Less Plastic in 2009 – Here’s How

Could you live a life without plastic? Many have tried, and few have succeeded. Cutting plastic out of your life, as I’ve learned myself, is a nearly impossible task in the modern world. It’s everywhere. We previously examined all of the ways in which plastics are harmful to the environment and human health, and the reasons why people would want to cut back on their use of the material. Now, as 2009 begins in earnest, we want to help you all find ways to at least reduce the amount of plastic you consume, even if you can’t go without it entirely.

For those just beginning to sort out how much plastic they use and purchase on a daily basis, the process can be a bit overwhelming. Just ask Trine Tsouderos, a Chicago Tribune reporter who recently set out to break her family’s addiction to plastic for a single week. She found plastic at every turn, from the grocery store to Target, and especially among her children’s possessions. Sippy cups, pacifiers, clothes hangers, shampoo bottles, bags protecting loaves of bread – there seemed to be no escaping it.

Tsouderos dropped by Whole Foods to purchase some things she thought she’d need to avoid plastic for a week: stainless steel water bottles, an all-rubber pacifier, paper diapers, biodegradable dog poop bags, solid shampoo bars from LUSH and soap instead of baby wash. These things helped, but she found she needed to do much more, and it involved changing the way she thought about shopping.

Tsouderos began shopping at a local farmer’s market instead of going to the grocery store, where practically everything has plastic on at least one part of it. She found that even the supposedly green goods at Whole Foods had plastic packaging. She was also disappointed to see that the paper diapers leaked and that buying bread and bagels in paper bags meant driving all over town.

While Tsouderos’ experiment taught her that avoiding plastic altogether is entirely impractical, she also realized afterward that she was being more conscious about cutting back. She kept using the items she had purchased to help her avoid plastic whenever possible. And, that may be the key for all of us – making those key decisions that help us be more aware of how much plastic we use and where we can cut back.

Food is one area where we can all avoid a large amount of plastic by shopping at farmer’s markets, health food stores and butchers. You can put fresh produce directly into reusable bags, get your meat wrapped in paper and get staples like dried beans, nuts, pasta, spices, rice and other grains in the bulk section of your health food store (bring paper bags or your own containers). You’ll find that avoiding plastic at the grocery store can actually help your family become more healthy as it forces you to stick to mostly whole, unprocessed, healthy foods.

Buying items used is another great way that you can save money and reduce your plastic consumption at the same time. Need a camera? Check the pawn shop or consignment store. The same goes for plenty of other random household items. Rarely will secondhand stores sell items with any kind of plastic on them, though clothing does occasionally have those annoying plastic tag hooks.

In terms of specific tips, two places I regularly turn to are Fake Plastic Fish and PlasticLess.com.  Beth Terry from Fake Plastic Fish has been working to cut plastic out of her life since June of 2007, and she gives weekly tallies of her progress as well as details on how she’s accomplishing her goals. Here’s her list of 38 ways in which she has found she can avoid plastic, and there are many more ideas in the comments. Prescription bottles, toothpaste tubes, eyedrop bottles, caps from various glass containers and public transit tickets (which are inexplicably plastic instead of paper in the Bay Area) are among the items she found she simply couldn’t avoid.

PlasticLess.com is also jam-packed full of tips that you’d never think of on your own. It recounts the author’s successes in replacing plastic items in his life, from using an old-fashioned mortar and pestle to grind food to finding glass jars of shaving cream. It also bemoans pointless plastic crap like plastic fruit (really, why does it exist?) and those plastic testicles that some people hang on the rear bumper of their trucks. Recent tips include going barefoot when you can, renting movies online to avoid the DVD cases, using metal buckets for household chores and, somewhat comically, getting a vasectomy (since children are the ultimate target market for useless plastic junk).

Having kids doesn’t mean you have to resign yourself to a life of plastic crap, though. Marketers will try to convince you that you need all manner of gadgets and widgets in primary colors, but the fact is, mostly plastic-free care of your kids is doable and healthy. A concept called ‘Natural Family Living’ emphasizes toys made of wood and cloth, organic clothing and linens made of natural materials (all of which can be purchased secondhand to cut back on costs), and generally parenting without all the ‘stuff’ marketed to families. For more on natural family living, check out Mothering Magazine and the Nature Moms blog.

Though many people turn to ‘replacement disposables’ that are purportedly less harmful to the environment like biodegradable paper, cornstarch and sugarcane, the best line of action is to cut out such one-use items altogether. A cloth napkin, a set of reusable utensils and a reusable beverage container won’t take up that much room in your bag and they’ll save countless disposables from heading to a landfill (where, by the way, even biodegradable items often can’t break down due to a lack of oxygen).

Using less plastic on a daily basis isn’t easy. It’ll involve some sacrifice and creative thinking – but just imagine how good you’ll feel when you find that the amount of trash you’re putting by the curb each week is far smaller than usual. It’s truly worth it, for so many reasons!

Link [Chicago Tribune] + [PlasticLess] + [Fake Plastic Fish]

Florida College Student Invents Reusable Alternative to Styrofoam Take-Out Containers

Proving that simple solutions are often better than complicated high-tech ones, Eckerd College student Audrey Copeland has invented an alternative to Styrofoam take-out containers that you don’t even have to wash yourself. The EcoClamshell, made from a durable dishwasher-safe material, is available to students for a one-time fee of $5 and is designed to be brought back once you’re done with it. At least 200 students are currently using it.

From Bay News 9:

“Usually people bring them to their rooms,” Richards said. “Then afterwards they dump whatever the didn’t want and you can bring them back dirty, throw them in a bin. Then they rinse them out. It works great for me.”

Eckerd College has reduced the use of styrofoam by 25 percent a week.

“The same container circulates multiple times,” Copeland said. “Kinda like a plate.”

The student hopes to market the containers to cafeterias and restaurants with a regular customer base.

What a great way to encourage students to ditch the disposables. When you’re living on campus and depend on the dining hall for every meal – and trying to fit in lunch between a tight schedule of classes – you inevitably end up using lots of take-out containers, most of which aren’t biodegradable or reusable. The EcoClamshell offers a great way for college students to avoid introducing so many harmful materials into landfills – let’s hope it catches on nationwide!

Link [Bay News 9]