Conservation and the environment

[iAmBaronVonTito]

I also have tried to stop using paper towels for cleaning and I use cut up t-shirts instead. They make perfect rags. (Socks are good if you need something absorbent.)

why not use an actual rag?

They go for like 2 cents at Pep Boys.

Yeah but that produces more waste. If I use something I already have then I'm not producing more stuff, right? (What is up with you guys and the rags? Didn't you ever use old t-shirts or sheets to clean stuff up?)

I also wash out ziploc bags sometimes and re-use them. I tried to stop using them but they're actually a good way to preserve food (aka not waste food) so instead I try to reuse them at least twice if I can.

as long as i didnt store meat (once upon a time) in the ziploc i attempt to use it more than once also.



also, what about the energy/waste used when the batteries from the hybrids need to be dumped of properly- i would think thats just as harmful, yeah?

[Martin]

I try to do my share of good things - walk, don't drive, take the train, buy local produce, etc - but I bet I'm still a bad guy if only for the fact that I don't share my apartment (electricity, heat, water) with anyone. That sucks for me and the environment.

[dania]

You're not alone crimestick, I also live alone.  Oh wait, you ARE alone.  We're both alone hahaha

Here's more stuff:
*Torn-open envelopes I use for jotting down information.  Usually they go in a drawer next to my computer.   

*Wine-corks I've been saving for unknown reasons.  Any idears?  Magnets? 

*I saved a whole bunch of lightbulbs and San Pelligrino bottlecaps last year and made chrismas ornaments. 

*Spent pens, lighters?  The only idea I have for these is to make some kind of eccentric windchime that makes a plasticky clicking sound instead of a dinging sound.  Who knows it might look neat...

[iAmBaronVonTito]

You're not alone crimestick, I also live alone.  Oh wait, you ARE alone.  We're both alone hahaha

Here's more stuff:
*Torn-open envelopes I use for jotting down information.  Usually they go in a drawer next to my computer.   

*Wine-corks I've been saving for unknown reasons.  Any idears?  Magnets? 

*I saved a whole bunch of lightbulbs and San Pelligrino bottlecaps last year and made chrismas ornaments. 

*Spent pens, lighters?  The only idea I have for these is to make some kind of eccentric windchime that makes a plasticky clicking sound instead of a dinging sound.  Who knows it might look neat...

i subscribe to READYMADE magazine (www.readymademag.com) and they tend to have TONS of stuff on how to reuse/recycle things like wine corks, old pens (someone made forks out of old pens), its pretty cool.

[Sarah]

Christ, I have plastic bags that are literally decades old.  Who knows what toxins they're releasing into my food.  I don't care.

I wasn't going to post about this, but what the hell:  A while ago, I watched one of those dumb reality show/documentary things BBC America likes so much that involved a bunch of people living in a dump and surviving off what they could find there.  Most of the show was pretty dopey, but one thing did strike home for me:  When the so-called carbon footprint of each participant was calculated, the difference between the most virtuous of the group, a young student madly committed to causes environmental and dedicated to self-denial and another young fellow who couldn't care less about the world around him was very, very small.  The reason?  Neither of them drove, and that alone made both of them madly less intrusive on the world than anyone else in the group. 

Then there was another revelation:  Apparently, for us to prevent the world from ending each of our carbon footprints should not exceed 2,000 metric tons, whereas even the holy, self-abnegating student's was 2,500--to which another 5,000 tons was automatically added because of all the services supplied in an industrialized nation.  So no matter how good any in this case British individual is, there's no hope in hell.

Now, obviously, one piece of BBC fluff does not count as incontrovertible evidence, but there's a lot of other doomsaying out there that claims much the same, so, when you come down to it, anything we do is just ever-so-slightly delaying the inevitable.  That said, of course we should all do as much as we can.

When you come down to it, the Church of Euthanasia is on the right track.

[yesno]

I'm on the go here, and i certainly don't want to start a vegetarian holy war outside of fotchan, but cutting back on meat consumption-- as effective/less effective as not driving?

[iAmBaronVonTito]

I'm on the go here, and i certainly don't want to start a vegetarian holy war outside of Chinatown, but cutting back on meat consumption-- as effective/less effective as not driving?

i halfway agree with you, yesno.  i think how we consume meat is whats killing us.  if we could change how we treat cattle, transporting it, etc.  i think it would make a difference.

i wish i had the luxury to buy more groceries on a local farmers level.

[Emily]

i help the environment by using Blackle instead of Google.
http://www.blackle.com/

[A.M. Thomas]

I live in a cave.

[yesno]

that blackle thing is undermined by the fact that it takes more energy to display black than white on LCD screens, which only show black by blocking a continuous backlight.

[yesno]

I need to eat fewer gorillas; the carbon footprint of shipping them all the way to the US  must be staggering

[erika]

I'm on the go here, and i certainly don't want to start a vegetarian holy war outside of Chinatown, but cutting back on meat consumption-- as effective/less effective as not driving?

Eating local does the trick too. It's not just about meat. If you're eating bell peppers that have been flown in from Mexico, you're doing more damage to the environment (jet fuel, packaging costs, etc.) than eating a pig that was slaughtered at a farm less than 100 miles from where you live.

[Sarah]

I just found out that the farm from which I buy my meat--about thirty miles away (it's delivered to me a few times a year when someone is coming into town anyway)--sells raw milk for $5.00/gallon (not much more than regular store-bought nowadays, and way cheaper than the organic stuff I buy).  I'm going to try to get this regularly.  Some of you, at least, will be jealous of me.

[erika]

I'm jealous. I can't find cheap meat. I've been eating a lot of beans lately.

*toot*

[yesno]

Re: local foods

True, but the biggest carbon cost with food still usually comes from ppl driving to the supermarket--going too far out of your way, by car, to buy local food might defeat the point (although long term maybe you're helping grow the market).

Also, it's not so much food miles as method of shipment. Planes are a nightmare, but trains are very fuel efficient. Also food shipped by truck may or may not be carbon friendly.