Valentine’s Day Goes Green

I’ll say it straight out: Valentine’s Day is not my favorite holiday. To start with, I hate the color pink. I attribute this to both a tomboy past and the way it reminds me of raw flesh. Secondly, I don’t like heart shapes. For Valentine’s Day I once sent my boyfriend a sketch I had made of an anatomically correct heart, complete with aorta, chambers, and blood vessels galore. It was large. Colored. Surprisingly, he still wanted to marry me. Finally, I am so not a romantic. I don’t do forever. I don’t think giving someone the sexual organs of a plant (i.e. flowers) is particularly sweet. I roll my eyes at romantic cliches. Yup. That kind of girl.

That said, if you do care about Valentine’s Day, there are definitely things you can do to keep it from being a total failure in terms of eco-friendliness. As low impact as writing off Valentine’s Day altogether? Well, no. But not everyone can be a misanthropic Valentine’s Day hater. Here are some ideas for showing your love for your friends and the planet on the 14th.

1. Cards. I remember the huge bag of Valentine’s Day cards I would get every year in elementary school. Some were cute and came in tiny envelopes with pink hearts. Others were ugly and had Batman or Transformers on them. Regardless, they all got tossed within a week. If you have to do cards, you could go for recycled cards or make your own out of scrap paper and materials you already have at home. If you don’t have the time or money, simply swap out some of your paper cards for e-cards. Better yet, why not call the people you love, especially if you haven’t spoken recently?

2. Chocolate.  Does anyone actually think that Russell Stover counts as chocolate? Instead of buying highly processed and heavily packaged chocolate, why not go for delicious locally made chocolates? (Hint: filled chocolates really aren’t supposed to last longer than 2 weeks. If it expires in a year, don’t buy it.) My two local favorites are Dolce Bella (best raspberry truffles ever, made from raspberries she grows herself) and Saratoga Chocolates (ooh! melty-smooth!), but I bet there’s a good chocolatier near you. If not, how about organic or fair trade chocolate? Organic is kinder to the planet and our bodies, and fair trade is kinder to the people who make cacao beans possible.

3. Flowers. See any roses growing near you? No? That’s because roses are dormant in February, so all the bunches of long stem roses you see are either hot-house grown, or (more likely) imported. Imported flowers have often been drenched in pesticides and have certainly had larger carbon footprints than locally grown flowers. If you can’t find local flowers or just can’t give up the roses, consider choosing organic or fair trade blooms — at least to protect your lover and 3rd world workers from up to 1,000 times the pesticides found in conventional produce. I’ve also made my own bouquets out of origami irises, which aren’t difficult to fold.

4. Just say no to stuff. Nothing expresses your love like mass-produced commercial goods…right? It’s actually pretty easy to show the people you love how much you care without buying things. Offer a massage, make a dish or dessert they love, hang up your towel without being nagged. (And do it way more than once a year.) Buying is the easy way out. We’ve all been raised to be consumers, but being green is about getting away from stuff and getting back to the things that matter most: friendships, compassion, experiences.

Did I miss any tips? Leave a comment!

Green One-Upmanship

Conservationism has now become a point of contention in our society between couples, parents and kids, and individuals. In a way, that’s a good thing: enough people care deeply enough to make environmentalism an issue. Of course, being green[er] can also make us self-righteous, intolerant, and ultimately unhelpful in furthering the green cause. Most of us recognize that we need to be doing something, but few of us agree on what, and how far is far enough.

As far as I’m concerned, if you’re concerned about the environment and are actively doing something to mitigate the situation — whether by donating money to World Wildlife, replacing bottled water with a reusable, participating in Meatless Monday, or doing something more drastic like getting rid of the car, installing solar panels, or going vegan — you’re part of the solution. Congratulations!

Is there more you could (and perhaps should) be doing? Of course there is. And some people will already be practicing greener water usage, transportation, eating habits, etc. But again, it’s relative. If you start replacing some of your industrially farmed meat with grass-fed or organic, that’s good. If you cut down on meat, that’s better. If you go completely vegetarian, that’s even better. But that’s still not as green as the vegan who grows and buys food exclusively locally and hoofs it home.

Fortunately, there’s room for compromise in a greener lifestyle — which is good, because no one can be perfectly green in every way. Take my friend Erin, for example. By most standards, she’s a lot greener than I am. We’re both vegetarian, but she buys more local and organic food and grows some of her own. I try not to drive unless I have to; she doesn’t own a car. We both donate to Nature Conservancy; she volunteers her time planting trees. But Erin flies four times as much as I do and plans to have two kids, where I’m a homebody and look forward to being an evolutionary dead end. It probably evens out, but even if it doesn’t, who cares? We both lead relatively green lifestyles that our consciences can stomach. There is no point to beating ourselves up (or having other people do it) over the fact that we could always be greener. We do both keep trying.

Here’s my bottom line: make as many green changes as you are willing and happy to make. And keep looking for new changes you’re willing to make.  The world would be a lot less of a mess if everyone who had the luxury of doing so actually did.  I’m all for encouraging and educating people on the many ways we could reduce our impact, but there’s no point in a greener-than-thou attitude.  The people who really deserve our censure are the ones who don’t believe climate change has anything to do with human behavior.

Why a Kindle isn’t on my holiday wishlist

My idea of a good Saturday used to involve going to the library in the morning, getting a stack of books, and spending the rest of the day in my sunny room devouring one after another. Even though I no longer have the leisure to do that every Saturday, I’m still definitely a book junkie.

So, here’s my next question: can you be green and a booklover at the same time? (Books are basically dead trees.) Amazon’s answer is, yes, of course you can. Go on, buy a Kindle and go digital. (Alternately, you could plant a tree for every book you read.)

Amazon is probably right. Even figuring in the carbon footprint of a Kindle over its lifetime, including manufacturing, transporting, energy consumption, and finally recycling, I’m sure it comes out to less than what my personal library has incurred. But I still have trouble stomaching the idea of curling up with…an electronic device. Of having no visible books in a room. Of not being able to flip through and touch actual pages, admire unique fonts, shelve them in my idiosyncratic filing system.

Part of me is glad that Kindle may mean that fewer trees are cut down to produce Danielle Steeles, Tom Clancys, Sidney Sheldons, and all the other mass market crap I don’t read and would never buy in the first place. (Sorry.)

However, there is something special about a physical book. Part of it is tactile: the texture of the cover, the smell of newly printed pages, the slight signs of wear left by your own hands and repeated readings. I treat my books nicely, but many of my favorites still carry the marks of my affection: a tiny splash of tea, a smudge of chocolate, a few strands of cat hair poking out at one end.  My own books are as familiar and comfortable as a favorite pair of slippers, and their history is at least partially my history.  

I know nostalgia alone isn’t a good enough reason to keep killing trees. But I reserve the right to be un-green in at least a few areas of my life. Having a car is one of them. Not switching to solar power or digital books are two others. You eat meat; I’ll read paper books. We’ll both pretend we can’t do without.

Vegan Sunday

OK, so it doesn’t have the alliteration of Meatless Monday, the environmental movement that operates on the principle that industrialized animal agriculture is one of the biggest sources of carbon and pollution. Cutting meat out even once a week (Monday, for example) makes a major difference. It’s been estimated that going meatless even once a week lightens your footprint more than eating entirely locally.

I’ve been vegetarian for a few years now, so every day is meatless Monday (or Tuesday, or whatever), but I sometimes feel like I’m keeping the letter but not the spirit of Meatless Monday. Dairy and egg products, while perhaps less ethically problematic for me, are almost as bad for the environment as meat. I don’t eat either in huge quantities (yay for being mildly lactose intolerant!), but I do tend to have maybe 1-2 servings a day. A splash of milk in my tea, yogurt, scrambled eggs, the odd baked good. You get the idea. 

So, in a fit of environmental zealotry, I declared Sunday my vegan day of the week. Instead of my usual yogurt and black tea, I started my day with green tea, a bowl of Life cereal, almond milk, and a slightly overripe pear. Things went well until about lunch time, when I bought fresh francesi rolls at the farmer’s market and then recalled that I had a wedge of triple creme brie waiting patiently in the fridge. 

Brie….brie….brie….

All afternoon I fantasized about making a brie bowl, brushing one of my rolls with olive oil and garlic and big chunks of creamy brie, toasting until the cheese melted into gooey gobs and the bread toasted up crisp and brown on the outside. I was borderline obsessed. I don’t actually eat brie that often. It’s certainly not a daily staple. But somehow, knowing that I couldn’t have any made me crave it madly. I contemplated cheating on my one day veganism. I even briefly considered staying up until it was technically Monday. I resisted and went to bed unsatisfied.

I suddenly feel a little more sympathy for omnivores who can’t face the thought of giving up meat for even one day. I’m sure I have days in which I am almost or entirely vegan without thinking about it, but the actual prohibition of all milk and egg products was…well, harder than expected. I’ll try again this Sunday, this time planning my meals in advance.

Things I learned from Vegan Sunday:

• Asian food lends itself much more readily to vegan fare. For dinner I had colorful stir-fried veggies with dark mushroom soy sauce. I could also have had noodles, curry, or fried rice. Since there’s no dairy culture in East Asia, most Asian dishes that are already vegetarian are also already vegan.
• I need to duct tape the cheese/butter compartment shut. Dangerous.
• Planning out my meals in advance could make a big difference in how deprived I feel. If I filled the day with vegan meals I loved, I probably wouldn’t think twice about dairy products. It’s worth the experiment.
• I should just buy fewer dairy products. Easier, more effective, and better for the environment.

But tonight? I am so making that brie bowl.

Why You Can’t Buy Yourself Green

As the holidays draw nearer, I expect that we will be barraged by lists of green holiday presents: presents that are recyclable or recycled, that reduce water or energy use, that are made from organic fabrics and fairly traded.

Speaking for myself, I love browsing the Rainforest Site shop. I think it has a genuinely quirky and cool collection of (somewhat) green items whose proceeds go to save the rainforest. I drool over the tree-motif, fairly traded fabric shopping bags (see right). I linger over the Roman glass jewelry. I consider doing all my holiday shopping there, irrespective of the interests and tastes of the poor folks on my gift list.

Surprisingly, the site’s association with saving rainforests tempts me to spend and buy more than I would otherwise do. The guilt I’ve come to associate with shopping vanishes because it suddenly has a good cause. It’s also harder for me to keep in mind the William Morris quote I shop by: “Have nothing in your home that you do not either know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” (This is the perfect compromise mentality for fellow materialists/aesthetes who can’t quite give up consumerism.)

But shopping is pretty much never a green activity, even if it’s for a good cause, even if you’re buying green goods, even if you only buy things you consider beautiful.

Anything you purchase has a certain cost in energy, carbon, resources, and labor. If you can get away without buying something new, it’s almost always going to be the greener move. It’s true that you can make better or greener purchasing decisions, and that those organic sheets or recycled plastic bags are a better choice than their non-green counterpart. But you’ll still be using resources and energy that you could preserve by simply reusing what you already have. (Seriously, does any of us need more fabric shopping bags?)

Today I saw a device that you can hook up to your car that will measure how much gas you’re wasting and how to reduce usage, and I wondered: is the total amount of gas being saved equivalent to the resources and pollution generated by developing, producing, and distributing this totally unnecessary gadget? Is there such a thing as a truly green gadget?

Being truly green probably isn’t very good for the economy in the short run, but our current consumer based economy isn’t sustainable in the long run, so we might as well nix the idea that we can buy ourselves to eco-friendly sainthood. Ideally, buying green would mean not only buying greener goods, but buying fewer of them and using them more wisely.  Consider it your holiday present to the Earth.

Oh, and as for presents? Why not contribute to someone’s solar power system fund?

Solar Goes Presidential

Renewable energy superhighways aren’t here yet. But they just might be in our future.

The renewable energy sector got a boost last Tuesday, October 27, when President Obama toured the new DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center in Arcadia, Florida as it came online. The new 25 MW solar plant is the largest so far in the US and is expected to be able to supply clean solar energy for about 3,000 houses.

President Obama praised the ambitious new solar plant and offered his vision of America’s energy future: one in which a new interstate energy grid provides reliable, clean power to America. Rebutting arguments that clean, renewable energy would come at the cost of jobs and the economy, the president suggested that building a unified, updated grid system would in fact create jobs, lower energy costs for Americans, and reduce our environmental impact. An interstate ’superhighway’ system for energy would also mean that renewable power produced in one region could be distributed to meet energy needs outside the region or state (e.g. wind power produced in a rural area could be transmitted to an urban one).

Being able to distribute renewable energy without running into the bureaucratic rules of different energy companies (the US grid – the world’s most complex machine?) would make it a more feasible solution for curbing America’s CO2 emissions caused by traditional energy generation. President Obama compared his proposed energy superhighway to Eisenhower’s interstate highway system that made travel safer, more reliable, and more efficient.  Will energy superhighways do the same thing for renewable energy? We don’t know.

But wouldn’t it be awesome if we could find out, sooner rather than later?

10 Super Easy Ways to Be Green[er]

I watched An Inconvenient Truth for the first time last night. When it came out a few years ago, I wasn’t as much of an environmentalist as I am  now. Since then, and especially since joining Twitter, I have been bombarded with daily updates about How We Are All Screwed Why We Need to Act Now. The film didn’t really tell me anything I didn’t already know. At the same time, it was a sobering reminder of just how much work it will take to clean up our act and preserve not only us but also the species we share the Earth with.

If An Inconvenient Truth has a flaw, it is surely that it doesn’t directly empower people to act. Al Gore talks a lot about the need to lower our gigantic CO2 output, but doesn’t 1) make the problem seem small enough that an individual’s actions can positively affect it; or 2) give individuals ideas on how to combat their own lifestyles.

Now, I realize that that wasn’t the point of the film, which was to serve as a wake up call, but perhaps it would have been a good aspect to address. Individuals have to believe that they can make a difference in the problem before they’ll act. Therein lies the problem: our actions, individually, are pretty minute and difficult to measure. However, en masse, they can make a tremendous difference. (Or at least I kept telling myself, as I cut short my morning shower on a chilly autumn morning.) At the same time, most people don’t want to change any really fundamental aspects of the comfortable lives they lead.

So I offer this list as a compromise. They are all extremely easy and practical to do, and require singularly little effort. They might even save you money. They won’t make as significant an impact as, say, going vegetarian or giving up your car, but they’re a minimal-effort way to start making a difference

1. Quit the plastic water bottle habit once and for all. Plastic, for all intents and purposes, does not biodegrade. According to The World Without Us, every bit of plastic we’ve produced in the past 50 years, with the exception of the small percentage that has been incinerated, is still around in one form or another (much of it in the ocean). We simply don’t know enough right now about the longterm effects of plastic on the environment. Switch to a stainless steel or aluminum water bottle instead, which can be used for years and fully recycled at the end of it.
2. For the same reason, go for a reusable shopping bag instead of taking plastic ones at the store. You probably have a couple already stashed in your closet that were given to you free by various companies. Use them!
3. Swap paper napkins with cloth ones. There’s no need for virgin forest to end up as a disposable napkin. (Much less as toilet paper. Rather than use cloth for that function, however, you can opt for recycled toilet paper.)
4. Shop less. Every item you buy has a carbon footprint and uses resources. Unless you truly need it or truly love it, consider using what you already have or doing without. Consumerism is a big part of our use of land and resources and, inevitably, of pollution and waste.
5. Take shorter showers. The world is likely to face severe fresh water shortages within the next fity years. Your water footprint is no less important than your carbon footprint to sustainability.
6. Go meatless for one day a week. Industrial agriculture is a major cause of carbon emissions, to say nothing of obesity. Do yourself and the planet a favor by cutting it out once a week. If everyone were vegetarian one day a week, we could prevent 1.2 million tons of CO2, 3 million tons of soil erosion, and 4.5 tons of animal waste. It would also be equivalent to taking half of all American cars off the road.
7. Walk one of your errands each week. Even a Prius can’t compete with the near-zero carbon footprint of walking. Do yourself a favor, too!
8. Join Freecycle, a group committed to keeping things out of the landfill. You can keep your unwanted items out of the landfill and get ones you do need.
9. Turn off the lights when you’re not using them. (Better yet, unplug appliances or turn them off from the strip.) Unless you’ve gone solar, your electricity is still largely generated by coal burning and non-renewable energy sources.
10. Reuse before you recycle. This may come as a surprise: recycling isn’t actually that green. It still takes up energy and resources. Reduce waste by buying less and avoiding packaging and creatively reusing things you already have before you recycle.

The rules are overall pretty simple. Choose reusable products over single or limited use products. Shop smarter (and less). And think before you consume resources. Don’t let anyone persuade you that you can buy yourself green — while you can and should replace necessary products with greener equivalents, buying new products, even if organic, sustainably produced, and recyclable, is never going to be as green as reusing what you already have.

Thoughts on the Sigg Recall

A favorite of the green movement, Sigg bottles are reusable aluminum water bottles with snazzy designs that are marketed in three ways:

 Reducing single-use plastic water bottle/cup waste (my Sigg has served me for over a year so far and eliminated my 1 plastic water bottle a week habit).

Reducing exposure to toxins present in plastic water bottles (reusable and otherwise) such as BPA, an endocrine disruptor leached from some plastics (#7 and #3).

Reducing the unpleasant plasticky or metallic taste associated with other resuable bottles.

Recently the news leaked that older Siggs, with their coppery baked-on liner, contain trace amounts of non-leaching BPA. Greenies shrieked in horror and dismay and rushed to Whole Foods to exchange their older Siggs for free shiny new non-BPA replacements.

Hang on a sec. Shiny. New. Green? Those words don’t belong in the same line.

As I understand it, the core value of the green movement is to reduce, reuse, and recycle. I can imagine that you’d be upset if you bought a Sigg primarily because you were looking for a non-BPA bottle. But if you bought yours, as I did, on the grounds that you wanted to stop being a part of the casual waste of resources, I think you’re being a little hypocritical in relinquishing your non-leaching bottle so readily. Even though Siggs are completely recyclable, recycling should be the last step. Reusing and reducing always come first.

There are plenty of good reasons to replace your Sigg. Siggs dent quite readily and a severe dent can actually mess up the inside liner and make them unsafe to drink from. If you’ve had and used your Sigg for over a year, and it no longer closes well or has other functionality issues, you might be justified in replacing it.

However, to replace your Sigg just because it has trace amounts of non-leaching BPA seems silly to me. You’re exposed to a lot more BPA in canned food. You are probably exposed to more endocrine-disrupting toxins just stepping outside for a walk. Heck, you probably apply them personally to your skin, hair, or teeth every day. On the day in which we have reduced our daily exposure to toxins to basically nil, then you’re entitled to be upset about being subjected to trace amounts of non-leaching BPA. Don’t hold your breath.

My Sigg is red, with a design of a gnarled tree and a bird taking flight. It has two substantial dents from when my car door closed on it.  (Yes, I know…I have a car…) Despite the aesthetic imperfection, it works perfectly.  Water from it tastes like water, not like plastic, not like metal. It goes everywhere with me. 

Replace it with a free one? No way. You can take my Sigg with its non-leaching-trace-amounts-of-BPA-liner out of my cold, dead hands.

Greenest Hair Removal

You no longer have to be a granola-crunching hippie to be concerned about the environment and the damage being done to it by the mounds of disposable plastic razors, packaging, and toxic chemicals associated with removing hair. But if you’re not enough of a hippie to leave the hair where it is, you have several reasonably green options for smoothing your body. Here are four methods that are effective, safe, and best of all, environmentally conscious.

Sugaring is an ancient Arabic form of hair removal that uses a simple paste of sugar, lemon juice, and water that has been heated into a honey-like consistency and smoothed on to the skin. Strips of cotton are then placed over the mixture and pulled off. Some techniques even bypass the cotton strips. Sugaring is less irritating to the skin than waxing, contains no dangerous chemicals, and produces little waste (the cotton strips can be washed and reused). It is said to be less painful than waxing and is good for larger areas such as legs, underarms, and the bikini area. Click here for a recipe and a demo.

Threading is an Eastern technique that also goes back centuries. A twisted piece of cotton thread is manipulated to pull hairs out singly or in a straight line. It takes some practice to get the technique down, but requires nothing beyond a piece of string and is especially effective in shaping the brows. Experienced threaders work very quickly and professional threading actually costs less than waxing. Click here for a detailed explanation and demo of threading.

Plucking. Notice a pattern? The most eco-friendly methods of hair removal are also the oldest and the simplest. If you already pluck, good for you! Plucking is the greenest of the traditional hair removal methods. All you need is a pair of tweezers and some time. Best for brows and other small areas — most women don’t have the time to pluck their legs!

Shaving with a non-disposable razor. Razors just aren’t that eco-friendly, but the ones with replaceable blades are much more so than disposable plastic razors. If you can’t take the pain of sugaring or threading, a well-made razor is your friend. Just be sure to take good care of the blade to extend its lifetime and pair it with an eco-friendly shaving cream.

Eco Fashion Made Easy

Let’s say you’re a treehugger in disguise – you wouldn’t be caught dead in Birkenstocks and tie dye, but you genuinely care about the environment and want to be a part of the solution. Is being a green fashionista a complete oxymoron?

 Not at all, as long as you’re willing to change the way you shop.

• Rule #1: shop less. You may not want to hear this, but consumerism is not and will never be as eco-friendly as using what you already have. Be creative with your stuff!
• Rule #2: shop smarter. Make sure that what you do buy is more eco-friendly, and in keeping with rule number one, choose timeless, versatile pieces that will outlast this season’s trends. Eco-friendly clothing is meant to be worn many times, and has the durable construction and quality materials to last you for years, unlike last year’s Old Navy jeans.

Green clothing does tend to cost more. Producing clothing responsibly is just more expensive than its pesticide-and-sweatshop alternative. But you’ll get guiltless glamour and fund sustainable practices with your dollars. And if you abide by rule #1 (shop less!) you may not actually end up spending more by going green.

 That said, getting started in green fashion can be tricky. Many unethical companies present their goods as eco-friendly when they’re merely greenwashed. Here’s a beginner’s guide to the three major categories of true green fashion: organic, sustainable, and vintage.

 Organic

Clothing that is labeled organic is made from all natural materials such as cotton, hemp, wool, and silk that were not radiated, genetically modified, or treated with pesticides and insecticides. In order to earn this label, the clothing must also be processed, cleaned, dyed, and finished in as environmentally conscious a way as possible.

Why it makes a difference: Organic clothing that has been grown and produced according to these principles has a significantly lower ecological impact than conventional clothing. For example, cotton is highly susceptible to disease and infestation, so conventionally grown cotton leaches large amounts of pesticides and insecticides into the soil and water, which are deadly to local ecosystems and harmful to human workers and even wearers.

Unfortunately, the organic clothing industry is far from standardized. A USDA or OTA (Organic Trade Association) certification is your best guarantee that something is genuinely and comprehensively organic. Many other certification organizations exist, but as a rule of thumb, if it’s suspiciously inexpensive, it probably isn’t low impact.

 Sustainable

‘Sustainable’ is an even less regulated term than ‘organic’ and can mean any of several things. Sustainable clothing tends to focus either on the reuse or recycle of materials or on the long term renewability of the crop and production process. Recycled clothing uses the fabric of old clothing to create new pieces. Renewable crops include bamboo and hemp, which grow quickly and well without pesticides.

When accompanied by a Food Alliance certification, something labeled as sustainable has been produced under fair working conditions, without hormones or GM crops, with fewer pesticides, and with special attention towards protecting soil, water, and local ecosystems for the long term. Fair trade products have more of a socially conscious bent but are often also environmentally friendly.

Why it makes a difference: Forward-thinking sustainable clothing is produced at a lower ecological and social impact and keeps a much-needed eye out for the 7^th generation. Look for a Food Alliance or Fair Trade certification.

Vintage

Ah, what a lovely euphemism for used clothing. Used clothing skips the extra step involved in recycled clothing and is your one truly budget-friendly eco alternative. No matter how greenly sourced, new clothing has more of an environmental impact than used. Luckily, vintage clothing is always fashionable, especially dressed up or combined in interesting ways, and there’s no shortage of styles to choose from. Dig through thrift store racks for real bargains, or go to a ‘vintage’ boutique for cleaner, pre-sorted, and more expensive used clothing.

Why it makes a difference: Buying vintage clothing consumes no new resources and keeps clothing out of landfills.

 Read on for more detail about greening your wardrobe:

How Organic Clothing Works

“Certified Organic Clothing” What does it mean?

How Green is my Bamboo Shirt?

A Quick Look at Organic vs. Sustainable