You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘Waste management’ tag.
If you’re a frequent visitor to this site, you know that plastic bags are the bane of our collective existence. And you know you should bring your own shopping bags to the grocery store. But what about those little plastic bags in the produce department? Refuse/Re-use. You can buy reusable produce bags online at places like reusablebags.com or you can even learn to make your own at motherearthnews.com.
Superuse is an online community of designers, architects and others who’re interested in inventive ways of recycling, from bottle-cap festooned guitars to tables made of discarded cassette tapes. At Superuse, everything old is new again.
We’re all about saving water by using less, but you might also think about saving more. HarvestH2o.com is dedicated to the advancement of sustainable water management practices – including “rainwater harvesting.” Depending on where you live, it might be hard to harvest enough rainwater to truly live “off the grid,” but chances are you can at least save a little on your utility bills.
Green Field is all about the paper- tree free paper. While they offer a range of handmade papers and machine made hemp paper, they are best known for their Seed Embedded Wedding Invites. The beautiful paper is embedded with wildflower seeds so you can plant it instead of recycling. (Also check out their 100% Junk Mail® papers – made from their own junk mai!)
If you’ve ever wondered how much water you actually use when you hose down your deck or driveway, the Save A Drop hose nozzle may just shock you into becoming more of a conservationist.
Trash for Teaching is a non-profit organization that collects (clean and safe) cast-off materials from manufacturing processes (that would otherwise become trash) and repurposes them as educational resources. This innovative program helps bridge the gap between the excess of waste created in manufacturing processes and the lack of materials in public education. Crafty!
This Friday’s Focus is Recycling. It begins with a demonstration of wearable art created from plastic bags:
So not true, Mr. Gallagher. Reverse vending machines automate beverage container recycling by “re-consuming” cans and bottles and refunding the deposit to the consumer – instantly. They’ve been around for years overseas… let’s hope we start seeing more of them pop up in the U.S.
Ma Yanjun, a farmer living in the Chinese village of Oigiao in Shaanxi Province, is the creator of a solar-powered water heater made out of 66 beer bottles. The bottles are connected to each other so that water –heated by the sun – flows through them. “I invented this for my mother,” explains Ma. “I wanted her to shower comfortably.” More than ten families in Oigiao have installed versions of Ma’s device.
HAT TIP: weirdasianews.com
When and if you’re confronted with the question, “paper or plastic,” the best choice is neither. Which is to say, BYOB – bring your own reusable bag. According to MSNBC.com, manufacturing all the bags Americans use each year takes 14 million trees (for paper) and 12 million barrels of oil (for plastic). Making paper bags creates 70 percent more air pollution than plastic, but plastic bags create four times the solid waste. And they can last up to a thousand years. The most compelling reason to reject plastic bags can be seen in our next post.
Preserve® plastic products are made from benign #5 polypropylene plastic that is collected from reputable sources and transformed into new products. Among their many innovate and eco-friendly products is the “mail back” toothbrush, which comes in packaging that doubles as a return envelope – so you can send it back for recycling!
W+W. Concepto: Roca Innovation Lab | Diseño: Gabriele & Oscar Buratti, originally uploaded by Sociedad Estatal ddi
Stylishly combining a washbasin and WC into single piece, the new Roca “water-reuse” technology reuses water from the washbasin to fill the toilet cistern. Now that’s a way to eliminate waste! For more information, visit roca.com.es.
Red Bull energy drink is encouraging the recycling of their cans… into artwork. The Red Bull Art of Can competition and exhibition has been going on for years now. Some of the entrants are beautiful, some whimsical, even bizarre… and always interesting. Got an idea? Get it together now – entries close May 15th].
Iceberg leftovers, Alaska Icecubes, originally uploaded by moonjazzDue to an initiative passed by Alaska’s citizens, cruise ships in Alaska must meet water effluent standards equal to high-level municipal waste water treatment. Cruise ships must also meet opacity standards at the top of their smoke stacks. And once the ships enter Alaskan waters, an ocean ranger travels onboard to ensure compliance with regulations and correct operation of its wastewater treatment system.
Nowhere else in the world do cruise ships come under this level of scrutiny. Not surprisingly, these regulations aren’t terribly popular with cruise operators. Why would they? After all, the companies are accustomed to operating in third world countries with powerless populations and lax environmental oversight. They are used to doing what they want.
Not in Alaska. In a state with 6640 miles of coastline, ocean health is paramount to the longevity of fishing and tourism industries. Careful regulation is the only sure way to preserve natural resources. Alaskans know this better than most. If any good may have come from the disastrous wake of the Exxon Valdez, it may be the public’s fierce defense of natural beauty when threatened by corporate greed.
One for the innovative use of trash files: UK artist Nick Gentry is creating one-of-a-kind portraits using recycling floppy disks. According to Nick, his work “represents the increasing pace of the modern life cycle, where objects are created, used and disposed of quicker than ever. To challenge this notion, as these personal artifacts of life are cast aside, the obsolete are now given new life and a renewed purpose by using them as a medium for art.” Mr. Gentry’s website is just a click away: www.nickgentry.co.uk.
Taking place in New York at the end of the month, the Greener Gadgets Conference tackles all of the issues surrounding energy efficiency and sustainable design, from innovative advances in packaging and product manufacturing to end-of-life recycling solutions. Save the date: February 25th.
Electronic waste, or e-waste, refers to the mountains of broken or obsolete computers, printers, televisions, stereos, and telephones that have entered the world’s waste stream over the past couple of decades. In fact, Greenpeace International estimates that up to 50 million tons of e-waste is generated globally each year. Bringing the e-recycling message to the streets, Best Buy gets kudos for a very clever billboard.
HAT TIP: scoutingny.com.
Depave – a project of Portland Oregon’s non-profit City Repair – is an organization dedicated to inspiring and promoting “the removal of unnecessary concrete and asphalt from urban areas.”
Their objectives are to:
• Provide information, inspiration, and technical assistance to those wishing to remove concrete and asphalt
• Educate the public about the benefits of pavement removal
• Advocate to minimize and/or reduce the amount of impervious pavement in public construction and repair projects.
• Promote responsible and creative reuse and recycling of concrete and asphalt
• Provide an opportunity for greater connection with the natural world
For more information, visit http://depave.org/.
Schmidt Beer Wedding Cans, originally uploaded by broox
Andrea Parrish and Peter Geyer of Spokane, Washington, are a young couple whose idea of marriage is downright trashy. The enterprising and eco-conscious duo are determined to pay for their wedding by recycling 400,000 aluminum cans. The wedding date is July 31st and they’ve amassed over 25,000 aluminum cans so far. Details at weddingcans.com.
Last week Greenpeace issued its 14th quarterly “Guide to Greener Electronics,” which rates hardware makers on chemical waste, e-waste, and recycling efforts. This quarter the guide also assesses each company’s public efforts on environmental issues – revealing companies that actively lobby for industry-wide laws that would prevent use of environmentally damaging materials. Download the PDF here.
Adam Gardner of the band, Guster, speaks about what he and the band are doing to do their part to help the environment, and about REVERB, the company he created to help other musicians go green.
Looking for a way to be eco-friendly even after you leave this world? Resomation is a water/alkali-based alternative to cremation that uses less energy than traditional cremation and produces significantly less CO2, while eliminating mercury emission into the atmosphere. So when you go, go green.
For details, visit resomation.com.
originally uploaded by estherase
If you despise one-use plastic bags as much as we do, here’s some news that’s totally, like, nano-tubular. A chemist has created an “upcycling” method of turning the disposable bags into carbon nanotubes. Nanotubes technology is pretty new, but Stanford University researchers recently coated copier paper in ink made of carbon nanotubes and silver nanowires to create bendable, highly conductive storage devices. Nanotubes could also become self-repair tools for electronic circuits in our smart phones and laptops. Here’s the scoop.
The following is from Adbusters: “An ecological footprint is the amount of productive land area required to sustain one human being. Globally, there are about 1.9 hectares of productive area per person, but the average ecological footprint is already 2.3 hectares. So we would need 1.5 Earths to live sustainably.
The largest footprint belongs to citizens of the US, at 9.57 hectares. Five Earths would be needed if everyone in the world consumed at that rate.”
You can calculate your own personal ecological footprint here: footprintnetwork.org.
Newsstand copies of the November issue of Creative Review are wrapped in a revolutionary new bag that dissolves in hot water.
CR is the first magazine to use “Harmless Dissolve,” a new packaging material created by British firm, Cyberpac.
Pennsylvania’s Woodloch Pines Resort was honored by the Global Renewable Energy Expo Networking Summit April 16, 2009 for demonstrating ingenuity, creativity and perseverance in the pursuit of pioneering green goals. Their “Green Team” meets regularly to implement eco-friendly solutions for the resort. Here is just some of what they offer:
• Environmental programs for class trips, corporate groups & scouting programs.
• Use of bio-degradable disposable plates, flatware, cups and to-go containers.
• Energy-Saver faucets and shower heads as well as faucets with infrared sensors to limit water waste.
• Energy saving compact fluorescent lighting
• Tree replacement program through their landscaping department.
• Use of recycled paper whenever possible for promotional materials.
• Recycling of economy-sized cans and packaging in their kitchens.
• Installation of an energy management system, which controls the air conditioning/heating and lighting of public areas through the use of infrared sensors.
• Co-mingled recycling bins throughout the grounds of the resort for guest and employee use.
• Bat Boxes throughout the resort – a natural way to control insects
photo: Vince Alongi
If you were walking down the street and you saw a plastic bag lightly tumbling in the breeze, would you stop to pick it up?
photo: Bobbytee.
If you’d been with us aboard the Baylis, you would without question.
Welcome to the Derick M Baylis, a 65-foot auxiliary-powered sailing research vessel, a Prius at sea.
Chartered by Sealife Conservation, its mission is to inspire conservation of the Oceans by fostering awareness of the marine environment through research and education. On board, a mixture of open minds: a fifth grader and an ocean activist, college students and college grads, dads and daughters. The most obvious commonality is the desire to experience and learn.
Would you step out of your way to pick up that Styrofoam cup in the park?
A day aboard the Baylis would provide you with more than one reason to do it.
The Baylis has just left its slip and nets are manned on both the port and starboard sides. A candy wrapper is the first catch of the day, small, but certainly there’s not a thought of throwing it back. A simple standard has been set: if you see it, call it out, and it will get hauled in. During the trip to the sea, other debris is collected. The experience is underscored by living sea lions basking on a buoy, pelicans flying overhead, and twenty or so dolphin close enough that you can
hear them breathing and slapping the water. A drifting patch of kelp is hoisted on board and the passengers comb through the leaves looking for life’s beginning stages taking refuge in the safe haven. Tiny crabs and other little creatures are placed in beakers so they can be studied.
A torrent of plastic and other trash is impacting their lives, so while the ocean is where most of earth’s life begins, it seems to be our least-respected resource.
If you were strolling on the beach, would you salvage that plastic cup half buried in the sand?
photo: Alan.Slmak
If you knew the crew of the Baylis, absolutely, you would.
The Billabong seaplane rendezvous with the Baylis off the SoCal coast.
On board are three incredible, big-wave riders. Mike Parsons, Grant “Twiggy” Baker and Greg Long don’t look like the hell men they really are as they board the sailboat from a dinghy, calm and clearly intrigued. Each of them has surfed the largest waves in the world with that same studied character.
They understand the ocean and it’s contents. Around the globe, they have seen pristine beaches turn into dumps and witnessed a bounty of plastic bags and bottles mixed with syringes. They watch as the Baylis nets its own collection of discarded objects, using GPS to note the location.
Would you stop a boat to pick up a floating water bottle?
At this point you know the answer is yes. A manned net on the starboard side misses a plastic bottle and suddenly the boat is turning around to gather it – a 65-foot boat on a turnabout for a single water bottle. There are no complaints, only interest in the brand and where it is from. The 180-degree turn for the bobbing plastic makes a point – for if we can stop trash like this from ever leaving the land, it will never find its way to the ocean’s garbage dumps.
That plastic bag, tumbling in the breeze?
Are you going to pick it up?
There was a point in my life when I would have answered, “no.” Or perhaps I wouldn’t have answered the question at all. Today I find myself stuffing plastic bags in my wetsuit sleeve while surfing. There are funny looks from the others in the line -up until I explain that, to a turtle, a plastic bag looks just like a jellyfish. Suddenly, they understand.
Back aboard the Baylis: A chunk of Styrofoam is netted (the little foam balls that break-off are easily mistaken for food by fish and sea birds). A silver Mylar happy birthday balloon is scooped off the surface to a chorus of hilarious, helium-inspired cheers. Things change. I’ve changed. Anything is possible.
Aloha,
Steve Lawrence, greenlandoceanblue
**All unattributed photos by Steve & Madison
Get into the spirit of the holidays and the spirits of sustainability with 360 Vodka. Billed as the “world’s first eco-friendly vodka,” it’s filtered five times and produced at a facility that takes great strides to make the production process as eco-friendly as possible. Packaging is created from 100% recycled content, bottles are created from 85% recycled glass, and the 360 factory even has an on-site recycling center.
Food waste is one of the main sources of greenhouse gases, particularly methane, which is more dangerous to the environment and traps more heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. Canadian author, chef, and food blogger, Dana McCauley, points out that one-quarter to one-third of the food we waste is unopened or whole or untouched and suggests that we too often buy more than we need. In an attempt to be “a better earthling,” she now separates loaves of sliced bread and freezes what she won’t be using within a day or two. “By doing this I should be able to divide my sliced bread expenditures by at least half, saving about $75 a year…I’ve sent the $75 I plan to save to the World Food Programme’s Silent Tsunami Fund which hopes to ‘reach the millions of people who, six months ago, were not even considered ‘hungry’ but, today, are fast becoming the new face of hunger.’
More Dana McCauley at danamccauley.wordpress.com.
A company called, Evocative Design, has developed a substitute for Styrofoam. Their packaging material (called, Greensulate) is made from seed husks and the roots of a mushroom called mycelium. It’s durable and biodegradable. For more information, visit .core77.com/blog.
Instead of tossing out cell phones and other electronic devices, artist Boo Chapple suggest that we should eat them. In a pamphlet titled, Consumables, she says that “if electronic devices were edible, we could save on petrochemicals and solve the global food crisis in one simple move. In place of e-waste, there would now be e-food. There would be no more photo essay exposés of towns in China piled with PCB’s, dusted in plastic and beset with birth defects. There would be no more African famines.”
Hat Tip: fastcompany.com/blog
All images are from Consumables, a project by artist Boo Chapple, with photography by Bo Wong.
We’ve been featuring a lot of high-concept, renewable building ideas lately but the idea of repurposing materials for building is hardly a new one. In fact, one of the most interesting examples of resourceful construction has been around for over a century. Given the lack of lumber in Death Valley, a Rhyolite, Nevada resident named Tom Kelly used over 40,000 bottles to construct his home in 1906. It still stands today – a monument to environmental ingenuity. Learn about other bottle houses at agilitynut.com.
Newsflash: 60% of American hotels are trashy. A recent study shows the average hotel guest throws away about two pounds of garbage every day and only about 40% of hotels offer a recycling program of any kind. Fortunately, more and more hotel and resort operators are getting the wake-up call. Details at travel.nytimes.com.
If you’re not familiar with the concept of upcycling, it basically means repurposing something into something else rather than disposing of it. We’ve heard of lots of great upcycling ideas for trash – fashion, household goods, art – but we haven’t come across ideas for an actual trash container – until now. Some very clever city-dwellers have repurposed dumpsters into gardens, skate ramps, and even swimming pools.
Hat Tip: dornob.com and weburbanist.com
Fashions may fade, but plastics last forever. Fortunately, the designers at Bagir are picking up disposable plastic bottles (soooo last season) and transforming them into some of today’s hottest fashions.
For everything from washable clothing made from 55% recycled PET bottles to the transparent suit that turned a few heads at last month’s New York Fashion Week, click on over to bagir.com.
These shoes were made out of recycled plastic bags by Childean design student Camila Labra. The bags were fused together and the result is a material that is flexible, light, and non-toxic. They can be bought for about $45 USD. For more information, visit botasdacca.blogspot.com and if necessary, bring a translator.
Very impressive indeed. Loll Designs have figured out a way to take used plastic milk jugs and transform them into some of the most imaginative and stylish outdoor furniture we’ve ever seen.
What did you think we were talking about? Check ‘em out here.
The Polymer Energy company has been working hard for years and claims to have struck oil in a most unexpected place – your local landfill. Using a process called “catalytic pyrolysis,” the company claims to have developed a viable way to turn plastic waste (including disposable shopping bags and household cleaner containers) into crude oil. Finally – a domestic energy source we can all get behind. Learn more here.
In the not-too-distant future, “vertical farms, many stories high, will be situated in the heart of the world’s urban centers. If successfully implemented, they offer the promise of urban renewal, sustainable production of a safe and varied food supply (year-round crop production), and the eventual repair of ecosystems that have been sacrificed for horizontal farming.”
Some of the advantages of vertical farming:
* Year-round crop production
* 1 indoor acre is equivalent to 4-6 outdoor acres or more, depending upon the crop (e.g., strawberries: 1 indoor acre = 30 outdoor acres)
* No weather-related crop failures due to droughts, floods, pests
* All VF food is grown organically: no herbicides, pesticides, or fertilizers
* VF virtually eliminates agricultural runoff by recycling black water
* VF returns farmland to nature, restoring ecosystem functions and services
Hat Tip & More Info: verticalfarm.com/
An organization called, Matter of Trust, is collaborating with thousands of hair salons around the globe who donate hair clippings for use in soaking up oil spills. The effort was inspired by hair stylist Phil McCrory who began testing the oil-absorbing potential of hair after noticing the oil-soaked fur on Alaskan otters after the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989. For details, click www.matteroftrust.org.
Using soft rubber from recycled flip flops, Karin Wittmann Wilsmann’s MISS RIO OTTOMAN was a finalist in the 2003/2004 Ecodesign Award competition for environmentally responsible products.
Hat Tip: www.dwr.com
Plastic film is a thin gauge packaging medium used as a bag or a wrap.
Every year we make enough plastic film to shrink-wrap the state of Texas.
More than 60 percent of plastic film uses low-density polyethylene.
Polyethylene is 100 years old this year.
That’s way beyond retirement age, right?
Hat Tip: http://www.greenfeet.net.
In anticipation of World Environment Day 2005, a rockstar team of San Francisco architects, artists, contractors, city officials, and engineers was challenged to construct a house using only scrap and salvaged materials.
You’re looking at the result.
Hat Tip: www.scraphouse.org
Photo taken from the ORV Alguita
The following is an edited blog post from the Oceanographic Research Vessel Alguita. It’s followed by Steve Lawrence’s account of our journey to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. FROM THE ALGUITA: …after one attempt that caused the seaplane to bounce three times across the water before it found air and speed to climb back up, they aborted the mission. The pilot came over the radio saying they were unable to land due to the confused nature of seas producing large swells with only five knot winds. The captain said he understood and saw the rough ride they had with the attempt to land. And the pilot came back, “You should have seen what it looked like from here. It could have ended badly.” But all was not lost. The captain asked if the pilot he would check for any debris sightings. After making several laps around the area, the pilot came back on the radio to report they saw not one but two huge wind-rows of plastic debris. He started rattling off things they could recognize from above including a coat hanger. On his last lap around, the pilot preformed an air drop. The packaged contained something the captain had asked him to bring for a badly needed part for a generator. Thank you.
FROM GREENLANDOCEANBLUE CO-FOUNDER STEVE LAWRENCE:
17 September 2009
It is 5:30 am in Honolulu on this mid-September morning, the sky is dark and it is nearly soundless. Early, no doubt, but the energy brewing among those gathered is not generated from the airport hanger’s coffee pot. Indeed, the buzz this morning is all about the Patch.
We have come to the Kamaka Air Hanger with a singular itinerary – an historic, 600 mile flight into a southern portion of the North Pacific gyre, or as headlines across the world have broadcast it – The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. There we are to rendezvous with Captain Charles Moore of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation – the man who actually discovered the patch a decade ago. This is an unprecedented journey, and we are fortunate to have secured the Billabong Clipper – a Grumman Albatross – the only plane capable of the four hour journey, the ocean landing and the return to Hawaii.
There are nine passengers in all, including a pair of students (one journalist, one biologist), an activist, an eco website editor, a mayor’s consultant, and myself, a filmmaker. We are greeted by Jacob Asher from NOAA, who confirms the importance of the journey and instructs us on how to observe and log debris sightings along the way. Mr. Asher has done his fair share of debris overflights around the Hawaiian Islands in the past few years. “Mark the latitude and longitude with accuracy down to the minute in the first column” he explains while indicating a grid which specifies commonly sighted items ranging from ghost nets to general debris such as plastic bags.
After a safety briefing, the props kick over and we are soon airborne, banking northward as the morning sun pulls itself from the vast Pacific and a morning blessing appears in the form of a rainbow. Mobile phones are soon rendered useless, due not only to lack of service, but the deafening roar of the engines that hoist the 30,000 ton craft.
We fly at a relatively low 1000 feet, which offers a much more intimate perspective that the typical 40,000 feet of a commercial aircraft. In fact, even before the island behind us has faded from sight, we spot our first debris – a loose buoy, now just another piece floating garbage being slowly pulled out to sea by the centrifugal swirl of the gyre.
As we all settle in, Hayden Smith is already at work. Mr. Smith, the activist, intently watches the surface below, pen and pad at the ready, tearing himself away from the window only to confirm coordinates with the cockpit. As a Harbour Master (that’s Harbour with a “u”) in Auckland, New Zealand, he knows the business of marine debris better than most. At the age of thirty one, he is a veteran environmental protector. With the support of the government his efforts have been concentrated on Waitemata Harbour for the past seven years. He hopes his meeting with Capt. Moore will help him better understand the Algalita’s research, and how he might apply the knowledge to his work back home.
The farther we travel, the greater the frequency of debris spotting. Log sheet notations range from ghost nets to bags and bottles – visible even from this height.
Tellingly, the most abundant animal life spotted from the plane are the many birds that skim the ocean surface. Three hundred miles from the closest land mass, the birds scan the waters and dive in for lunch. Unfortunately, what appears to be ocean life is often degraded plastic lurking just below the surface. Hundreds of thousands of these birds die every year from mistakenly ingesting these toxic remnants.
Three hours into the flight and the debris sightings soon develop a kind of rhythmic cadence. Surface debris flies by like confetti on the surface below, styrofoam cups, basketballs, bags, pure trash scattered in the texture of the sea. As the plane descends closer to the surface, the debris stream is a constant… 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4… 4/4 time beats of trash with scattered accents along the way. A sad song indeed.
In the vast blue sea, we spot the Algalita research vessel. Circling the craft, the pilots search for a window to safely land.
We are told to fasten seatbelts, yet in our attempt to land we are nothing more than a skipping stone. What looked land-able from a higher altitude is in fact a small but lumpy mix of swells. We pull up and the pilots take a wide lap riding a wind line. This line we are flying along is an ocean convergence zone — an area of converging forces. In this case, the forces in opposition are strong ocean currents. Along this definition in the sea, from horizon to horizon, is a line of trash. We stare in awe at what looks like the high tide line on the world’s most polluted beach. It is composed of a variety of plastics and debris, everything from broken coolers to milk crates.
Unfortunately, no camera can fully capture the sickening sight, especially traveling at our air speed. Every photograph is a blur. Yet one thing is perfectly clear, man’s impact on the once pristine Pacific.
Most remarkably, what we see is only the tip of the iceberg. This is only the surface debris. Just below the surface, the synthetics are mistaken for plankton and other edibles. It is no wonder wild life and sea life feed on it. Unlike the animals that live in and around landfills, these creatures have not been conditioned over time to recognize hazardous foodstuff. Since these species have existed, the food chain could be “trusted.” That is no longer the case.
The equation becomes frighteningly obvious. Small fish eat the plastic, medium sized fish eat the small fish, large fish eat medium-sized… and who eats the large fish? We do.
As we ponder the implications, the plane makes another pass at landing alongside Moore …. to no avail. The sea is simply too rough. The plane begins a gradual ascent and the realization hits us all. The disappointment is most evident on Hayden Smith’s face. He fights the urge to appeal the pilot’s decision. It was a long trip to be denied the destination… traveling all this way and just getting the post card. But, as Smith realizes, our safety is the primary concern… and we have in fact seen what we came to see. In this case the pictures do not tell 1000 words, but what we have seen is indelible.
As I settle back into my seat, frustration soon gives way to a renewed sense of purpose. People will argue that the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is an urban myth, they will dispute its size and density…. but there are eleven more of us who now know the truth. The Patch is real. We may not be able to fathom how it all got here… or how we might begin to clean it up… but we can and must take immediate steps to stop it from growing any larger.
On Board the Billabong Clipper
Pilots Mike Castillo, Lynn Hunt
Team Joel Clausen, Colby Munson, Keith Rollman, Hayden Smith, Ericka Staples
Camera Hugh Gentry, Bill Paris
GLOBe Steve Lawrence
With support from Billabong, Tenth Millennium
TerraCycle was the brainchild of Tom Szaky when he was a student at Princeton University in 2001. The company has grown from being a purveyor of worm poop fertilizer to a developer of products created from up-cycled waste. For more details, visit terracycle.
Steve Lawrence reports that, despite ocean conditions that made an at-sea landing and takeoff unsafe, our journey to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (9/18/09) was a great success. We’ll have a detailed post from Steve on Monday. For now, he reports that when the Billabong seaplane “strafed” 5-8 mile stretches of the southern tip of the Garbage Patch from an altitude of 30 to 50 feet, he and his colleagues witnessed an endless stream of debris that ranged from plastic bottles and plastic bags to basketballs and milk crates.
To all those who’ve been following this story: thanks very much for your patience and support. See you Monday when we’ll also have an opportunity to salute everyone on the plane as well as those whose energy, ideas, and all-important funding made the trip possible.
Hat Tip: Steve Munson – a larger-than-life environmentalist/entrepreneur whose personal energy is sufficient to light a fair-sized city.
Hat Tip: Hayden Smith who captains the Waitemata Harbour Clean Up Trusts vessel, MV Phil Warren, and helps remove rubbish from the Auckland, New Zealand harbour every day.
Brooks Running Shoes Print Ad, originally uploaded by Zooppa US
Brooks has taken an innovative step to improve the life-cycle efficiency of its running shoes with its biodegradable BioMoGo cushioning material. BioMoGo is a cushioning material for the midsoles of running shoes, and Brooks promises it provides even better performance than traditional EVA foam – with an important twist: BioMoGo is biodegradable. The material is manufactured with a non-toxic additive that remains inert during normal use (so your shoes won’t fall apart on your feet), but the additive drastically accelerates degradation when buried in a landfill.
Hat Tip (we lifted your words verbatim): metaefficient
Plastic Pacific: greenlandoceanblue’s Excellent Journey, 9/15/09
On Tuesday, September 15th, film director and greenlandoceanblue co-founder, Steve Lawrence will fly from Hawaii via seaplane, the Billabong Clipper, with a group of planet-caring souls to an area of the Pacific known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Once there, the group will experience the environment first hand as they join the ocean research vessel Alguita, captained by Charles Moore – the man who discovered this once Texas-sized soup of plastic a decade ago.
Lawrence, who directed Disney’s recent X Games 3D, will produce a diary of the journey on film which greenlandoceanblue hopes can become the centerpiece of a global lesson plan to help educate students and the media about the growing problem of plastic waste worldwide.
On their flight to the Garbage Patch, the group will also be assigned the task of noting ocean debris with GPS units and the data they collect will be used to help NOAA scientists involved in at-sea detection and removal of large amounts of debris.
Credits: For more information about greenlandoceanblue, please visit www.greenlandoceanblue.com and for information about Capt. Charles Moore and Algalita Marine Research Foundation, visit, www.algalita.org.
Thank you, Billabong (www.billabong.com)
Photo Hat Tip: Splash & Play Seaplane available for purchase here.
At Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport, a device called the Eco-box is being used to capture human breath exhaled by travelers and convert it into fuel for the airport’s diesel vehicles and heating system. If the project is successful, the airport plans to expand the carbon recycling system to collect 289,000 gallons of fuel. But why waste our breath. Read more here.
Hat Tip: livescience.com.
Several times a month, Food Forward – an all-volunteer, grassroots group of Angelenos – convenes at a private property (by invitation) and glean the excess fruit on its trees, donating 100% to local food pantries. For more information – or to join them – visit foodforward.org. You can also read more about the Food Forward movement here.
Hat Tip: Kiko and latimes.com.
A group of Italian researchers are testing a robot that can collect trash on demand. The robot is called, DustCart, and he/she has been zipping through the streets of the city of Peccioli in the Tuscany region of Italy. The WALL-E clone not only collects trash but also gathers data regarding atmospheric pollutants such as nitrogen oxide and sulfur oxide. Hat Tip: inhabitat.com.
Sewer pipes have been recycled for use as hotel rooms at the Das Park Hotel in Ottensheim, Austria. Hat Tip: Superuse.org*
* Superuse.org is an online community of designers, architects and everybody else who is interested in inventive ways of recycling. The site allows you to post items at various scales within the reuse-topic. All examples of small commodities, furniture, interiors, buildings and reuse on urban scale are welcomed.
Lightweight, checkout-style plastic bags are now banned in South Australia. We Americans use 100 billion plastic checkout bags per year(producing them takes 12 million barrels of oil).
Verterra dinnerware is made from fallen leaves and water. Compostable, non-toxic, and biodegradable. Something to think about for family reunion barbecues and backyard weddings.
Hat Tip: verterra.com
The world’s first Plastic Bag Free Day will be on the 12th September 2009. Leave plastic bags at the checkout, help to make your town Plastic Bag Free or join in the celebrations at town’s that have already stopped using plastic bags. You could also write to shops and supermarkets asking them to support the day. For more information, visit adoptabeach.org.uk.
bacon cheeseburger, originally uploaded by TW5011.
The Haute Trash Fashion troupe is a group of progressive fashion designers who have put on over 100 shows all over the Western U.S. Their fashions are made from a variety of salvaged materials, from construction fencing to inner tubes and plastic containers.
Robin Worley (aka Rayona Visqueen), an original member of Haute Trash, explains that their fashion shows help break down “the boundaries of stereotypical beauty and fashion by celebrating bodies of all sizes, shapes and ages through humor and satire. We might change the way you see the world. “
Hat Tip: re-store.org
Washup has created a device that integrates a washing machine with a toilet. The hybrid takes wasted water from the washing cycle and reuses it for flushing. Plus, it’s a space saver. Hat tip: tuvie.com.
Above: a Reusuable Fresh Snack Pack from freshsnackpack.com. BPA free, PVC free, lead free, kid-tested, mom-invented. We haven’t tried one but that doesn’t mean you can’t.
Studio Gorm’s Flow and the Kitchen of terrestrial Mechanics is a living kitchen where nature and technology are integrated in a symbiotic relationship. The water from the dish rack drips on the herbs and edible plants, which are grown in the planter boxes places below the rack. The counter top features a built in waste bowl, which can be utilized to dump the scraps while preparing the food. Once the bowl is full, it needs only to be tipped to transfer the waste into the worm bin composter, which lies beneath the counter top. As the waste is lowered into the composter, the worms convert it into nutrient rich fertilizer, which can be put back into the plants.
Hat Tip: Peligro Pictures and Fast Company
In 1963, Heineken created a beer bottle that doubled as a building brick. The monks at Thailand’s Wat Pa Maha Chedi Kaew Buddhist temple had the identical insight when they built the structure from a million recycled beer bottles. Free building material, less litter – lifts the spirit, doesn’t it? More about the Heineken bottle here.
Flow is a 2008 documentary film directed by Irena Salina. It examines the global water crisis and presents a case against the growing privatization of the world’s dwindling fresh water supply.
Throwplace.com® – the internet’s landfill alternative – is a web site where global users can list goods they wish to give away. Charities, businesses or individuals registered with the site are able to search it and make requests for items of interest.
Shuhei Ogawara, a resident of Koriyama, Japan, built his 13 foot-long canoe out of thousands of used, disposable chopsticks recovered from the city hall cafeteria. The chopsticks were collected over a 2-year span and Ogawara spent over 3 months gluing 7,282 of them into strips to form the canoe shell.
Namaste: pinktentacle.com.
Increasingly, plastic water bottles are being targeted as a major source of pollution. In response, cities around the world are promoting tap water (Venice, Italy, is branding it “Acqua Veritas” and cites a reduction of plastic trash by 27 tons a year.
Hoping to combat negative perceptions about plastics and single-use disposal litter, The Society of the Plastics Industry (SPI) is about to launch a social media-based Internet campaign targeting the millennial generation.
Complete story: huffingtonpost.com
Keep California Beautiful has launched this public service announcement to encourage people not to trash the beach. Okay?
Client: Keep California Beautiful
Agency: BBDO West Prod Company: Tool of North Am
Namaste: Peligro Films
Green roofs keep roofs cooler and can therefore reduce air conditioning costs. They also reduce storm water runoff. Having even a couple inches of soil helps to greatly extend the life of the roof, and a longer lifespan means less material ends up in landfills. If you’d like to know more, visit ecogeek.org.
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- Toronto Makes Green Roofs the Law, Approves Controversial Bike Lanes (treehugger.com)
- Seattle’s Largest Green Roof Over 1.4 Acres! (groovygreen.com)
- Green Roofs: Style + Sustainable = 17 Sweet Designs (neatorama.com)
No Impact Man’s #One Recommended Eco-Lifestyle Change: Stop eating beef. Worldwide, beef production contributes more substantially to climate change than the entire transportation sector. Plus, a diet with no or less beef is better for you anyway.
You can read No Impact Man’s entire Top Ten Recommended Eco-Lifestyle Changes list at noimpactman.typepad.com.
Hat Tip: Mike Wagner
LunchBots are a healthy alternative to plastic containers for packing lunch to go. Made from the highest quality 18/8 stainless steel, LunchBots do not leach chemicals like plastic does. Eco-friendly and reusable means saving money and the environment. Visit the lunchbot website for more information.
Namaste: Peligro Films
