02.14.10
Posted in Chemicals, Environment, Glad Ware Company, Green Companies, Green Household Products, Green Living, Recycling, Technology, pollution at 4:59 am by Administrator
The last blog post examined some ways that chemicals and particularly those in plastics harm animal life, both on land and in the sea. This post will examine how certain chemicals harm humans. During my reading on this subject in the last week or so, one thing became very clear to me. Human and animal health is directly linked to the health of the environment. That seems like such an obvious statement, but oftentimes humans would like to think of environmental problems as just nature or animal problems. But when chemicals are involved, what affects animals also many times directly or indirectly affects the health of humans as well.
I read several articles on the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” which went into more detail about how the effects of tons of garbage in the Pacific Ocean is poisoning or killing the wildlife. The really sad thing is that there seems to be no quick feasible way to clean it up because it involves several countries, is very far from land and just gets complicated. This will take a lot of concentrated effort on everyone’s part including governments, advocacy groups, scientists and engineers to name a few, not to mention the money involved. But the chemicals leaking into the ocean from this garbage eventually makes its way into some of the fish/seafood we eat which makes its way into our bodies. Some pregnant women have been warned in the past not to eat certain fish because of the levels of certain chemicals. The ole food chain quandary sometimes gets really complicated. You’ll find several articles on this subject on http://www.treehugger.com and http://planetgreen.discovey.com. One program in particular that is taking a proactive stance in research and is taking positive actions to help clean up and prevent future ocean littering is Project Kaisei. Read about their good work at http://www.projectKaisei.org. Their work gives me hope that there is a solution. They are researching how to use this garbage to recycle into fuel of some kind. Through them we all can help with the research and clean up by helping fund the effort.
The websites noted above present much information about the chemicals that make their way into our bodies, not just through the ocean garbage dump but in our own homes, in every day living. Over this last decade, discussions, research and concerns have continued to rise about the harmful affects of certain plastics, or the chemical compounds making up certain plastics. These are the ones we are in contact with the most and which this blog will concentrate.
Questions began to arise about the chemical compounds of some plastics back in the 1980’s and continued into the new decade and century. Finally, recently after many studies, disagreements between agencies, researchers, scientists, industry personnel, advocacy groups, and others that had invested interest on one side or the other, the FDA made an announcement which denounced their previous finding earlier in the decade about bisphenol A (BPA). The FDA agency does now find ‘reason for concern’ about bisphenol A. However, the FDA took no further action. The statement itself was good and encouraging that more research will take place. But even so, bisphenol A or BPA is still in hundreds of products we use in everyday life.
That’s not to say that all plastics are harmful. Some plastics are safe and certainly useful. From my reading, one type of plastic used in many products proves to be non toxic in our daily use of it. It is named polypropylene. It is one of the few plastics that have no harmful occupational or health hazards during the manufacturing process as well (which is rare). Since the packaging of plastic products are not required to name the type of chemical compounds used in the product, how can we know what products we buy are made of this safe plastic? You will not know in the store. But you can either take down the phone number or website and contact the company and ask. Or you can buy the product and call before you unwrap or use the product to find out what it is made of, which is what I did last week. My bowls and tops had gotten so misplaced, borrowed or whatever that I needed to replace them so that I could send my husband to work with lunch that had a sealed top and could be warmed in the microwave. Having read that heating plastics is suspected to be one of the ways that BPA is leaked into our food and bodies, I called before I used. I purchased Glad Ware Containers with their “most interlocking lids ever.” The package said they were microwave, dishwasher and freezer safe. When I called, the Glad representative stated the lids were made from polypropylene and the containers were made from Terephthalate which is another plastic compound that meets the FDA regulations for food containers and storage. (Regulations. U.S. FDA (1998) approved the use of PET as components of polyethylene phthalate polymers intended for use in contact with food in accordance with the conditions prescribed in 21 CFR part 177.1630.) Glad has on its website a declaration of safety and non use of BPA in their products including sandwich bags, plastic wraps, trash bags as well as the food containers.
After reading some of the literature regarding concerns about the leakage of potentially harmful plastic compounds the most widely known one, bisphenol A, there is still reason for everyone to be concerned until it is proven without a doubt non-harmful to animals and humans.
BPA is used in all kinds of everyday products including CD’s, baby bottles, sippy cups, lining in cans containing canned foods, water bottles, medical supplies, literally thousands of products we use everyday. Researchers at the CDC found that BPA was found in 93% of urine samples taken in a study of over 2500 participants. The levels varied somewhat with men showing 2.6 micrograms per liter, women with 2.9 and children between ages six to eleven showing a measurement of 4.5. The debate is ongoing that BPA does or does not accumulate in our bodies. The people that think BPA is not harmful say that the chemical leaves the body through the urine, therefore it doesn’t cause problems. The questions remain: does all the BPA leave the body or does it accumulate somewhere in the body? If so where and what are the lingering affects? Researchers have stated that BPA in low amounts have been harmful to lab animals and assume the same is so with humans.
Other researchers have found through tests with animals that BPA is suspicious or related to heart disease, complications in breast and prostrate cancer treatments, fertility problems and others. The FDA seems to be specifically concerned about how BPA affects infants and young children. Canada has taken the step to ban and remove BPA from baby bottles. Many manufacturers and retailers in the USA have voluntarily taken products off the shelves that contain BPA.
So while the jury is still out and the research still underway on BPA and other harmful plastic compounds, what do we do in every day life to care for our children and ourselves? Below is a list that can get us thinking and started. I will be doing these from now own, wish I’d known about such things when my children were young.
1. When in doubt, don’t use it. If you have a non plastic alternative, use it.
2. Contact the company and get their take on their products, then check the reputation of the company regarding violations of regulations, etc. The internet is a wonderful tool for this.
3. Use as little plastic as possible. Prevention on the front end is always better. Even if it is safe regarding human use, the disposal and recycling efforts of some plastics are not finely tuned. Much ends up in landfills (some say up to 22% or more of landfills are plastics) for millions of years to come – or in our oceans to cause havoc on the wildlife there and eventually making it back to our dinner table. Tons of other plastics just get thrown on roadways, parks, etc. where it stays forever until a good hearted human comes along and cleans it up. At least if it is an aluminum drink can littered in the park, it can be retrieved and easily recycled.
4. Advocate for better labeling of non-food products so we know what we are buying before we buy it.
5. Be on the safe side and buy glass baby bottles. Triple check the type of plastics in your childrens toys, especially teethers, rattles, etc. that will for sure go into their little mouths. Some harmful plastic are even in some childrens books that are bound in plastic. If you don’t know or can’t find out about safety, don’t buy it.
6. Aside from helping yourself and your family, get more involved. Some suggestions:
a. Celebrate Earth Day April 22.
b. Celebrate World Environmental Day June 5,
c. Celebrate World Ocean Day June 8.
d. Adopt a Mile clean up on a road near you.
e. Adopt a Stream, Creek, Lake, River, Bay, Ocean – any body of water will most likely have a clean up program. If not, get your community involved and start one.
d. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and Reclaim energy.
e. Save energy and water.
f. Live as green as you can, garden, alternative energy, hybrid vehicles, etc.
g. Give, aside from giving of yourself, give money to valuable and needed earth friendly causes.
h. Teach your children and grandchildren the importance of taking care of the earth. Teach them about animals, nature and recycling to start.
i. Pick at least one of these to do, preferably more.
j. Inform others of risks and needs regarding our earth.
k. Enjoy Your Earth!
Permalink
10.27.09
Posted in Green Companies, Green Household Products, Green Living, Proctor and Gamble, Recycling at 7:41 pm by Administrator
Since my last post, I continued to take inventory of the products I use in my home and have been researching the companies that produce them. My goal is to see if these companies take into consideration sustainability and earth friendly products.
Most of what I use for house cleaning products, as I noted in the last post, were products made by S.C. Johnson Company. The research I did on them ‘passed’ my test of appropriate product research and development and their concern about decreasing their carbon footprint.
Most of the other products I use are produced by Proctor and Gamble Company. These products include: Tide (or Cheer or Gain) and Bounce for laundry; Cascade and Dawn for dish washing. For hygiene products almost all of them were produced by Proctor and Gamble. These include: Scope, Crest, Oral-B, Old Spice products, Secret, Head and Shoulders, Pepto-Bismol and Vicks products, Ivory and Zest soaps, Olay and Cover Girl products, Febreze and Charmin.
What it pretty much boils down to is that for my household, these two companies produce the majority of the products we use. So it has become more important to me that I know these two companies in particular care about the world.
As with S.C. Johnson company, during my research on Proctor and Gamble, I found some very interesting results. First of all, they have a Sustainability Strategy that contains five areas. These include: Products, Operations, Social Responsibility, Employees, and Stakeholders. Their web site has details about each area. I was impressed that not only have the products and operations areas made good progress, but their Social Responsibility area goes far beyond what I ever expected.
The company gears the Social Responsibility part of their strategy toward helping children in need of the basics like clean water, immunizations, health care, etc. These children are in countries that are in dire need of such help. In the last five years, the company has helped 87,000 children. Given that the welfare of children is high on my list, this one area really impressed me. Needless, to say they ‘passed’ my test as well.
Another fact that I didn’t know and probably most ordinary people in the U.S.A. didn’t either, is that Proctor and Gamble was added to the list of the Top 100 Global Sustainable Corporations in 2009. We’re talking global businesses! That’s a great honor. Please go and read more about Proctor and Gamble for yourself at http://www.pg.com.
As for me, I have started reducing, reusing, recycling, and researching companies where I buy my products. I am satisfied with both companies where most of my household and hygiene products are researched and produced. I was pleasantly satisfied that they are already into sustainability with products I use and that I do not need to change any products at this point.
I suppose now I maintain where I am with my recycling effort, but not consider it completed. There are two things I know I need to continue monitoring. One is the temptation to return to old life patterns. (Honestly, it is easier just to throw it in the trash.) The second thing is to research new companies when I consider a new product purchase.
But for S.C. Johnson and Proctor and Gamble, I say, “Keep up the good work for the green earth!” Also, thank you for your efforts in making our earth a better place to live.
Permalink
10.25.09
Posted in Green Companies, Green Household Products, Green Living, Recycling, S.C.Johnson at 4:57 am by Administrator
I have been taking inventory of the products that I use most often in my home. The reason is that I wanted to find the ones that are earth friendly and to determine the ones that are not. I want to support the companies of the products that are into sustainability.
Some of the products I use regularly include Scrubbing Bubbles, Oust, Shout, Windex, Off, Pledge, Raid and Drano. For wrapping foods I use Ziploc bags and Saran Wrap. As it turns out all these products are made by S. C. Johnson. I researched the S.C. Johnson Company to find out if they were into sustainability. I am glad to say that S.C. Johnson is big time into green living and research continues on their products to improve them to be as sustainable as possible.
Their website www.scjohnson.com covers everything from CEO reports, to reports on chemicals in products, to what we can do in our homes to help be more green thinking and living. I especially liked this part of their website. The suggestions given on the site of things we can do at home included ideas for every room in the house. Some are common and well known like turn the water off while brushing your teeth. But did you know that when the stove top burner pans become caked with burned on grease or other food over time that they absorb more energy and therefore costs more to use? Did you know that when we use a six inch pan on an eight inch stove top burner, we waste over 40% of the energy produced by the burner? We need to match the pan we use to the burner size so as not to waste the energy. There are many other helpful ideas on the “Doing Your Part,” in the ‘Around the Home’ section of the website. It is worth reading for the living green cause, and it also may just save on utility bills.
I encourage you to take a good look at the S.C. Johnson website. There is loads more information on products and even coupons. I was really impressed that the company that produces so many of the items I use every day has been into sustainability for years, longer than I have. The Company has received two Presidential Recognition Awards for their “greenlist” process and their overall efforts towards sustainability.
Thanks S.C. Johnson for the great work and concern for our good Earth.
Permalink
10.13.09
Posted in Green Living, Recycling at 6:00 am by Administrator
What a learning experience I have got myself into! I still have a long way to go but I do feel that in just a couple weeks I have moved from a non-recycler to a recycler. I am no longer part of the two thirds of Americans that do not recycle. I continue reusing the items I have a second use for, take unneeded items to the thrift store and I recycle the things I can. I did follow up on the last blog post and went the next day searching for places to drop off items to recycle. I have also joined a nearby (sixty miles) Freecycle group that swaps or gives away items that are still useful.
What I found was that I can recycle batteries and certain metals in a town about twenty miles from where we live. I can drop off paper, magazines, cardboard, plastic bottles (numbers one and two), cans, and plastic bags in another city sixty miles away. Then there is another city about fifty miles away where I can drop off glass, phone books, cell phones, ink & toner cartridges, other e-waste including computers, monitors, printers, peripherals and other plug-in electronics. But I cannot drop off all these recyclables in one city. Well, so much for it being easy for someone in a rural area. Or in this case, for those in these cities with items that cannot be recycled due to no vendor.
Another downside that I ran into is that the vendor who was at one time taking plastics (numbers three through seven) is no longer doing that for the SE, USA. This leaves these types of plastics with no place to go but the landfill. These plastics include containers like yogurt cups, cottage cheese containers and many more plastic items. That is a bummer big time. Right now these plastics make up most of the trash in my trash can.
However, there is a good side to this story. I set up several containers after I found out what I could recycle and where to take it. I have one container for all types of paper, being careful to shred any personal information. Another container is for all types of cans, after rinsing them out. Beside it is the plastic container which includes not just grocery bags, but bread and roll bags, plastic wrapping from other food items, soda and milk bottles, without the tops and rinsed out, and even some medicine bottles are the right numbers (one or two). I was amazed at the number of different plastic items that ended up in the recycle bin. I also have a container for cardboard and bottles.
Some may think that it is just too much trouble with the miles to travel, keeping up with what city takes what, rinsing out the cans so no food traces remain, looking for the numbers on the plastics, removing tops off the bottles, etc. But the main stumbling block to overcome in the beginning is the attitude and deciding that recycling is a good and even necessary habit to develop. Eventually I expect it to become a lifestyle. The attitude I had at the beginning of all this had to do with acknowledging that each person (me and you) leaves a carbon footprint every day we live. My footprint will grow bigger and multiply if I do not teach my children and grandchildren that they also are leaving a print and need to do something about it. I cannot just tell them, I have to be an example. We adults have to be as responsible as we can be.
I can already tell it is something that is staying more on my mind as I cook or unwrap something. I don’t just turn to the trash can, but stop and think where does this go? As I run across different plastic containers, it’s becoming like a game to determine what number is assigned to the container and if I can recycle it or not. I feel a sense of, “Yes!”, when I’m able to throw it in the recycle bin and a sense of “dog gone it”, when I lose and have to throw it in the trash. There is a satisfying feeling to it, even though at times it does take more energy to recycle than to just throw something in the trash can.
Did you hear the report on Public Radio a few days ago that the atmosphere is 10% better off today than it has been in forty or so years? Given the economy with factory and plant closings, fewer cars on the roads, etc., there is less pollution going up that creates havoc in the atmosphere. It’s sad that it takes a major recession/depression to bring about a 10% improvement.
We as a nation can do better. We as individuals can do better. If you haven’t joined in the recycling effort, go ahead and take that first recycling footstep rather than leave that big dark carbon footprint.
My next step besides maintaining the recycling effort is to look at more of the companies I do business with. Who are they and what are they doing for the environment? I’m also allowing the idea to run around in my mind about writing the powers that be about what can be done for the rural recycler around our nation’s countryside? While I combine trips to these three cities and drop off my recyclables while I’m there for other reasons, it would be great if the rural recycler had more options. It doesn’t hurt to ask!
In the mean time, I’ll follow the advice of Mother Teresa, “Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.” Each house doing their own recycling effort, parents teaching their children or in some cases children are teaching their parents, each household recycling on their own. I can’t fathom how much positive change this would make in our economy and environment. From money saved by companies producing products and passing the savings on to the customer; to creating new and clean energy resources and many other advantages most Americans cannot imagine. Recycling changes our individual lifestyle and thereby changes our nation’s lifestyle big time.
SO, COME JOIN ME. IT’S OUR ONLY EARTH!
Permalink
09.24.09
Posted in Green Living, Recycling at 4:17 am by Administrator
September 24, 2009
As I was reading up on the subject of recycling, I found an article “The Compelling Facts About Plastics 2007” which was a report about the efforts going on in Europe regarding recycling plastics. The report covered 27 member states of the European Plastic Converters group plus Norway and Switzerland (EU27+NO/CH). This report had some amazing facts about their progress with recycling garbage, to the point that in some areas they are nearing complete diversion from landfill use. They “now recover more than 80% of their waste” through recycling into products or using for energy. The article goes on to say, specifically with plastics that 50% of all plastics across these European states are recycled in some way, 20.4% recycled into products and 29.2% used as energy recovery. In comparison, the latest U.S. figures (2008 State of Garbage in America report) showed that only 31% of the total waste headed toward landfills is getting recycled. Only 14% is used as energy recovery and 55% continues to the landfill. If this European group can recycle more than 80% of their total waste, we can do better than 45%. It was noted in the above article that the need for recycled plastics is growing in demand. Greater demand means industry and jobs. Germany has made a passenger ferry from plastics and glue. Imagine what other recycled products, large and small can come from the plastics or other material we now dump in landfills if we put our best effort into it. Not to mention the progress in the energy industry if we recycled any other possible resource into energy.
The EU27+NO/CH group has and continues to define ways for Europe to make full use of their resources (including garbage or solid waste as a resource). This group has developed a process with a hierarchy regarding the way they think and go about recycling. “The hierarchy for improving resource efficiency is (in descending priority order): Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Recover Energy, Disposal.” This sentence really broadened my concept of the recycling process. The much more inclusive and appropriate term is “improving resource efficiency”. I am afraid many Americans share my microscopic definition of recycling, which in the hierarchy above is really just the reusing step. Notice there is one step before reuse and that is reduce. Americans don’t like that word either. We are so spoiled with our big houses, big cars and having more of everything. The third step “recycle” which is actually using plastics and other garbage to make needed products that are in high demand. The next step is just as important, “recover energy”, meaning using non product recyclable garbage to make energy of some type. The last step is in the right place in the hierarchy, “disposal”. I think many people in our country think disposal first and that’s it. Some of us, including me, may reuse some things, thinking we are actually recycling. The fourth step, recover energy, while some of it goes on in our country, most of us don’t have a clue what it means much less who does it, how or where. So we have a long way to go before such becomes household conversation. The topic can get very technical and in depth as we in America make our attempts at defining and proceeding with “improving resource efficiency”.
Perhaps we can borrow some ideas from the Europeans about resource efficiency, as it seems they have been doing it for years. Necessity is the mother of invention, as the saying goes. The Europeans have experienced the necessity. Maybe, with new industries like Terracycle and companies like Kraft and others jumping in, that it is a sign Americans are beginning to see the necessity for change as well. We’ve talked about it for years but have done little compared to what is needed. There are two good reasons to move forward quickly, the most important being the well being of our environment and planet. Secondly, the Europeans have proven not only can resource efficiency be done, but it can be done with costs efficiency as well.
So Kudos to Wheat Thins, Kraft Foods, Terracycle and others joining the mission. I now am compelled to join the “resource efficiency” mission by looking for a place to take recyclable items today! My grandsons will go with me. They need to learn as well how to really recycle, not just reuse and dump. Will you join me?
Permalink
