Take recycling another step further

“But I always recycle!” is the catchphrase of anyone caught out doing something less than good for our environment. Even my Federal MP bragged about his household recycling when I wrote to him about his party’s lack of support for climate change legislation. It’s not that I think recycling is bad, only that it’s just about the bare minimum you can do for your planet, and it doesn’t really impress me.

Most councils around Australia provide a kerbside recycling service, and it’s pretty easy to get into the habit of putting your paper, glass and plastics into a tub or bin. There’s really no excuse for not doing it (and if your council doesn’t do recycling, write to them and complain!).

However, most Go Greener readers are beyond that basic level of environmentalism. We know lots of different ways to conserve energy, save water and reduce waste. But there’s something extra we could all do to improve our recycling credibility.

When you’re shopping, buy recycled.

Although recycling services are getting more sophisticated all the time, recovering all sorts of useful materials, there’s not a lot of demand for things made from recycled materials. Only 36% of people in WA make an effort to buy recycled products, which I’m guessing would be similar around the country.

This makes it difficult for recyclers to make a profit (or even a living) and reduces jobs in that industry. Buy choosing recycled goods, you’re closing the loop of production, supporting a sustainable industry, and reducing your impact on the Earth.

There are so many things that you can get that have been made from reclaimed material. Sometimes you have to look in shops specifically for environmentally-friendly products, but you’d be surprised what you can find in your usual shopping centre too.

• Paper is the obvious starting point: there’s not a single type of paper product that doesn’t have a recycled alternative. I’ve talked about toilet paper before, but look into office copy paper, envelopes, magazines, paper towels, tissues, greeting cards, the lot. You can also get other office or school supplies involved. Or how about handbags made from old telephone books?
• Glass is usually recycled into new bottles and jars because it’s endlessly reusable – you just melt it and reshape it however you like. Check your usual products to see if they’re using recycled glass. But it can also be turned into beautiful jewellery, drinking glasses or put into kitchen counter-tops.
• Plastic is another one that’s easy to recycle and reuse for containers. It can go also into thongs, outdoor furniture, and wallets. It’s starting to be used for phones and even fleecy clothes!

But it’s not just for little things. Don’t forget the big stuff either: insulation, timber for your furniture and garden, and reclaimed building materials for your renovations.

Next time you’re buying something, check the labels of your options and see if you can choose one made from recycled materials. If you’re a business owner, you might like to check out the Buy Recycled Business Alliance, which can help you find places to buy recycled-content supplies and packaging.

Random Valley organic winery

Recently Dave and I took a trip out to one of our favourite wineries – Random Valley. Not only do they make delicious organic wines, they’ve also got a unique premises and vineyard that demonstrate their commitment to sustainability. We had a nice chat with the owners, Peter and Suzanne Little, about their setup.

Their cellar-door building is made of recycled materials, with several walls insulated using old wine bottles filled with water. They monitor the indoor temperatures and record them, with the information being sent to a research program with Curtin University and SEDO (WA’s Sustainable Energy Development Office). The building stays cool in summer and warm in winter, solely by clever design and construction. You can read a little more about bottle insulation at Treehugger. It’s the kind of thing that you could try for yourself, maybe giving it a test-run by building a shed or studio this way.

The Littles also use lots of reused materials in their vineyards – aluminum cans, milk cartons and newspapers all get a second life, as do fallen trees, plastic pipe offcuts and old fence posts.

What else do they do? Plenty!

• Their water run-off is put through nutrient ponds and reed beds to clean it up before it leaves the property.
• They’re starting an organic herd of cows
• Plenty of land is left in it’s natural state so that it’s a habitat for wildlife, and they’re hoping to create a corridor to the Blackwood River, if neighbouring properties do the same

It’s really inspiring to see people putting their sustainable ideas to the test, and living according to their principles. It encourages me to continue with the changes I’m making to my life. If you’re ever in the Margaret River region, I really recommend that you pop out to Karriedale and see what can be done to make a sustainable business. Oh, and try the award-winning wine too, it’s great!

Earth Day

Globe East, NASA's Visible Earth

Earth Day is celebrated on April 22nd every year. This year is it’s 39th anniversary, although it’s never taken much of a hold in Australia.

Unlike Earth Hour, it’s not a very focused campaign – people just do environmental stuff locally, with whatever theme they like. Because of this, it’s got quite a few detractors. They say that having one day a year to make your life more eco-friendly might have been a good idea back in the 70s, but these days we need to be going green every day. Grist Magazine has, for a bit of a joke, told everyone to Screw Earth Day.

And I see their point. We’re well past the stage of being able to just pop a bottle in the recycling bin and call it a day, we need to be making changes to our lifestyle. But what I like about Earth Day is all the articles that come out with great projects you can do to make your life greener. They’re a great resource, so I’ve collected some of my favourites below:

• Sustainable food ideas – if you’re a foodie, try one of these ideas from Mother Nature Network on Earth Day. My favourite is asking your coffee shop if they have organic or fair-trade coffee. If they don’t, ask them if they’ll consider it. It’s a small thing but could have a big impact if they make the switch.
• Green projects for you to build – Instructables rounds up their best eco-friendly projects for Earth Day. Find out how to build a solar thermal water heater for less than $5, or how to make your own bike trailer.
• Eco-crafts for the kids – Kaboose.com has some great craft projects you could do with your kids. I like the plastic-bottle terrarium and the milk-carton bird-feeder, and there’s some recommendations for books and movies as well.

If you try any of these, please leave a comment to let us know how it worked out!

What happens when the ice melts?

You might have already seen video of the 10,000-year-old Wilkins Ice Shelf collapsing in Antarctica the other week. Brian at Larvatus Prodeo has also collected some maps and graphics to put it into context. This particular collapse isn’t much in the grand scheme of things, but it’s part of a larger pattern. There have been many ice shelves disappearing lately – Wordie, Larsen B, Larsen A, Mueller and Jones have all gone in recent years.

What effect does all this ice running into the ocean have? If you remember a bit of high-school science, you probably already know that glaciers in the sea don’t increase sea-levels when they melt. It’s just like an ice-cube in a glass of water. But these ice-shelves are partly in the sea already, and partly on land. As they melt, they do increase sea levels. And that’s not good news for us.

I haven’t got any Antarctic melting to show you, but for comparison you should check out this dramatic video showing scientists taking ice-melt measurements in Greenland by hanging over a giant crevasse filled with rushing water.

The problem isn’t just sea-levels – it’s that the bright white ice also reflects a lot of sunlight back into space. If there’s less ice, more sunlight is absorbed by the oceans, which heats them up even more. It creates a runaway effect that’s difficult to stop.

We’ve probably already heated up the planet enough that we’re going to lose summer ice in the Arctic in the next 10 years, and will be living with 1-2 metres of sea-level rise within a few decades. It doesn’t sound like much, does it? You might have dived that kind of depth into a pool as a kid.

But it will have a huge effect on our ports and coastal towns. Something like 80% of the Australian population lives on the coast. At the very least, we’ll need to shift people from low-lying coastal areas inland a bit. And what happens if we don’t stop climate change?

If we continue with business as usual, we’ll be locked into much higher sea-levels. As the temperature increases, we could end up with over 50 meters of increase after a century or two. We won’t be around to see it, so here’s a graphic from the Climate Code Red website (Science A pdf, page 6, via) to illustrate the effect it’d have on Australia.

The good news is that this is preventable. By becoming energy efficient, reducing our reliance on coal, and even scrubbing some CO2 out of the atmosphere, we can stop this from happening. We just need to get started…

Fresh green links

A few bits and pieces for the weekend:

Urban design makes it difficult for kids to be ride or walk to school – a lack of safe crossings and the distance from schools are some of the causes behind the drop in the number of kids who ride or walk to school. It was 35% in 1985, down to 26% now and falling. We need to look at things like this if we’re going to a) reduce reliance on cars and b) improve the health of kids in the community.

Victoria is selling off native forests for just $2.50 a tonne – that’s right, for the price of a Mars bar, you could get a tonne of Australia’s native hardwood forests. But you’ll have to get in line, most of it goes to low-grade pulp-mills to make paper. Plantation timbers sell for about $38/tonne, so they’re being undercut by the State government. I don’t understand why – if the state is desperate for money, why sell so cheap? And if not, then why not just leave the forests alone?

An all-electric car has been approved for Australian roads – it’s a plug-in from Mitsubishi called the iMiEV. It’s got a 160km range on a 7-hour charge, so would make a good car for going to and from work for a lot of people. Top speed is 130km.