Category: environment

There are three R’s often mentioned in relation to sustainability: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

I would argue that the best of the three is Reuse.

Better than recycling a plastic grocery bag is using the same one over and over until it completely wears out.

We lived in the south of England from 1995-1998. I purchased the grocery bag shown during that time from a Co-op supermarket – and used it until a few months ago.

Sadly, it did finally wear out. The top completely tore off the bag.

So I decided to Recycle it.

If you use something way past its normal life, you are:

• buying fewer things;
• causing fewer things to be made from natural (or unnatural) resources;
• using less energy and producing less pollution by transporting fewer things to retail outlets;
• saving money you can give to your charity of choice; and
• causing less waste to enter landfills or be processed at recycling facilities.

What can you reuse today?

Something is wrong when it’s 105 degrees outside and you must bring a sweater to be comfortable at work.

My daughter and son-in-law live in Dallas. When I visit them during the warm times of year, it’s mandatory to bring a second layer to spend time in an office or restaurant.

It’s always too cold inside!

I did a little research and discovered that “each degree above 72 equates to about 3 percent savings on your total cooling costs” (source).

Think of the impact a large city could have if all thermostats were raised to 73 degrees from their current 65 or 70.

The South Platte River Railway runs close to our neighborhood in suburban Denver. Often, I see long strings of coal cars heading from Wyoming’s coal mines to Texas. During a recent drive to Dallas, I saw a very long line of coal cars heading southeast in the Texas panhandle.

Lower coal power consumption in southern states would result in tangible environmental gains through decreased coal mining activities and reduced diesel fuel burning and exhaust emissions from railways.

Let’s do it, Dallas! And Atlanta. And Houston. And Nashville. And (add your favorite southern city here).

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I generated the image of the cold lady using ChatGPT. And coal-fired energy may have been used in the generation of that image.

I love walking through fancy neighborhoods.

During those walks, I often think, what if that couple shared their oversized house with other people? Do two people really need seven bedrooms and nine bathrooms?

So I came up with a solution to a question that was not asked.

Large houses could be shared.

Dividing up a house into three separate dwellings would have so many benefits:

1. The most significant benefit could be increased mental health and social wellness. Three empty-nest couples who were good friends could band together to create one of these multiple-family homes. For their entire shared time in that building, they would have built-in friends for dinner parties, happy hours, morning coffee or just borrowing some Grey Poupon.
2. Shared dwellings have a smaller environmental footprint than single-family dwellings. For example, one driveway in snow country takes less energy to plow than three separate driveways.
3. Choosing such a dwelling would make a statement among your peers about the value you place on community and sharing.

Challenges:

1. Zoning for a multiple-family building in many fancy neighborhoods is not currently possible. That would require a major cultural shift. “Influencer marketing” could make this possible… a famous person who catches this vision could wield enough influence to change local laws.
2. Selling individual homes within a larger building could take longer than traditional single-family dwellings. This would also require a significant cultural shift.
3. Scheduling a party would necessitate communicating with your neighbors about when the hot tub and swimming pool would be booked. But there are apps for that.

Solutions:

1. After zoning is in place, an accomplished architect could design appropriate buildings that would ensure privacy for all occupants and good access for all to mountain or ocean views.
2. Existing buildings could be converted. Heavy sound insulation could be added between each home. Additional three-car garages could be added and creative driveway solutions to provide access to each. Below, I grabbed a big house floor plan (top) and created a three-family building (bottom). I did a quick mockup by adding two additional garages and divided the footprint into three homes. (It’s a crude mockup – obviously, the front porch would be converted to a closet. The rear porch would become a master bedroom, etc.) And each home would have its own kitchen, porch, bathrooms, laundry rooms, wine cellars, etc.

 

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I realize this is not a new idea. It’s happening in different ways all over the world. But I have not seen this in very many posh neighborhoods.

Global warming, whether you believe in it or not, is bad.

Or you can say we’re just in a big swing of climate change that will correct itself someday, somehow.

In either case, we can do a little bit here and there to make a difference about the increasing temperatures of our globe.

One small thing that wouldn’t be hard – turn off those lights in downtown offices.

A big plus to this happening is that the coal-fired power plants could run at less capacity at night.

It wouldn’t be that hard to accomplish…

All offices would have motion detector light switches that would turn the lights off between 7 pm and 5 am. If someone were actually working at night, they would just move and the lights would stay on for another hour.

The federal, state and local governments would pass this as a law, giving businesses a year’s advance notice.

Light switch creation and installation businesses would be funded by … well, I came up with the rest and will leave that idea up to you.

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The photo was shot by Jörg Angeli and is used under a Creative Commons license.

Every May across the USA, students exit their dorms and apartments and return to their ancestral parental homes.

They leave behind a ton of stuff.

My daughter moved out of her college dorm room for the last time in May. As we were hauling her stuff down to the car, she pointed out the “grab anything you want” pile.

One student had thrown out their Christmas coffee beans. The package was almost full.

Another left a perfectly good Apple USB-C charger.

I grabbed the beans because even though they were not fresh, they would supplement my coffee mixture for a good number of mornings. And I knew I could use the charger somewhere.

We also bolstered our snack stash for the journey home.

That was just the tip of the iceberg.

We didn’t need a couch, and none of the clothing fit my style.

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Multiply this by 5,300* and you can imagine the number of truckloads going to landfills – tons and tons of valuable stuff just wasted.

An environmentally-aware entrepreneur could prevent that waste by creating organizations to intercept discarded goods before they enter landfills.

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* That is the approximate number of colleges and universities across the USA.

I love to do what I can to help our planet.

Recently, I’ve been hit with ads for bamboo toilet paper and paper towels on Instagram.

Another set of ads features an environmental advance hitting the world of laundry soap. You can buy soap for washing clothes that comes in sheets. Buying those prevents manufacturing and disposing of those giant plastic containers the soap comes in and shipping 80% of the product’s water to your local emporium.

But there are two serious problems with these products:

1. Cost: they are way more expensive than most alternatives.
2. Shipping: it’s a big environmental cost to ship those things one-by-one (or even two-by-two) to your door.

We bought a “make your own shampoo” kit from a small company recently. It came in a nice cardboard package with no plastic. It consisted of a small bar of soap that we broke up, melted over the stove, added water and shook vigorously.

The shampoo is nice – very silky, and it makes our hair nice and clean.

But it was shipped to the US distributor from New Zealand!

So the two principles of bad cost and worse shipping definitely applied.

I know that early adopters must help fund cultural change. But count me out, in these cases. When they finally hit the supermarkets, I’ll be 100% on-board.

For now, at least, we are buying cardboard boxes of powder laundry soap – you know, the way it used to be sold.

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Footnotes:

1. I wrote these posts on bamboo toilet paper: one and two.
2. That lovely photo of a bamboo forest in Kyoto, Japan, is courtesy of Adam Dillon on Unsplash and is used with permission.

The world has thrown being environmentally aware out the window as we’ve faced the Covid-19 crisis.*

There’s disposable everything… gloves and sanitary wipes get thrown by the side of cars. To-go packaging from restaurants is almost always plastic. (And they usually also throw in a bunch of plastic cutlery.)

If the grocery stores in your neighborhood are like those near me, they won’t let you bring your own reusable bags into the store.

There is one thing you can do.

Keep groceries in your cart as you bring it to your car or bike. Then put your goodies in your reusable bags to carry home.

Simple. Easy.

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* Yes, I do know about the massive decrease in consumption of some consumer goods and lessened vehicle use, resulting in greatly reduced air pollution.

You can save the planet – one cup at a time.

Well, I am overstating the impact of switching to a ceramic or glass drinking vessel, but you can save a lot of waste by asking for a “drink it here” vessel when you visit Starbucks for a sit-down drink next time.

Here are a few advantages:

• You’ll prevent landfill accumulation.
• You’ll save on manufacturing and transport costs for the cups, straws and lids.
• You’ll enjoy the nicer feel of smooth ceramic or glass against your lips, compared to a thin plastic lid or a straw.
• You’ll make me happy.