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Keeping It Green

(There's no Planet B)

• Cambodia Rejecting Plastic Waste From the US and Canada

  Cambodia to Send Plastic Waste
  Back to the US and Canada

  July 18, 2017 (CNN.com)-Cambodia has become the latest Asian country to reject shipments of waste sent to its shores by Western companies for processing.

  Cambodian officials announced Wednesday that they were sending 1,600 tonnes of trash back to their source -- the United States and Canada.

  A total of 83 shipping containers of plastic waste were found on Tuesday at the major southwestern port of Sihanoukville, said Neth Pheaktra, Secretary of State and Spokesman to the Ministry of Environment.

  Click now for the whole story.

• Rethinking Recycling Why It's Probably Better
  for the Planet to
  Throw Plastic in the Trash

  July 15, 2019 Real Clear Science -Millions of Americans dutifully fill their recycling bins each week, motivated by the knowledge that they're doing something good for the environment. But little do they know, there's a recycling crisis unfolding.

  Starting as early as 2017, municipalities across the country, from Douglas County, Oregon to Nogales, Arizona to Broadway, Virginia, to Franklin, New Hampshire, began landfilling many recyclables or simply canceling their recycling programs altogether. The impetus for this disconcerting change? China.

  Are You Shocked? Click now for the story.

• How to Read Plastic Recycling Symbols Exactly How to Read
  Plastic Recycling Symbols

  Good Housekeeping. Mar. 18, 2019  -Sometimes it seems like everything in modern America is made of plastic. The versatile material is in our cars, toys, packaging, clothing, home goods, food utensils, and so much more — but it's also littering our streets, clogging our waterways, and choking marine life. In fact, one study says 32% of plastic packaging ends up in our oceans every year.

  Many plastics can be readily recycled, but according to National Geographic, 91% of plastic has never even been recycled. With all the different rules and symbols, it can be confusing for consumers to figure out exactly how to recycle it. For starters, every town and city has different recycling programs.

  Click now to read this important article.

• US Cities Burn Recyclables After China Bans Imports 'Moment of reckoning': US Cities Burn
  Recyclables After China Bans Imports

  The Guardian, Feb. 21, 2019 -Residents of cities like Chester, outside Philadelphia, fear a rise in pollution from incinerators after China’s recycling ban

  The conscientious citizens of Philadelphia continue to put their pizza boxes, plastic bottles, yoghurt containers and other items into recycling bins.

  But in the past three months, half of these recyclables have been loaded on to trucks, taken to a hulking incineration facility and burned, according to the city’s government.

• We Can Learn How to Stop Creating Unnecessary Trash 19 Ways to Stop
  Creating Unnecessary Trash

  Mother Nature Network, Dec. 31, 2018 - You dutifully set out a full recycling bin each week brimming with plastic, paper and metal. It's a good habit, but, unfortunately, recycling efforts aren't working as well as they should.

  In the last few decades, for instance, the number of plastic products has exploded, but only about 9% of them are actually recycled, according to National Geographic. Meaning most of your plastic beverage bottles, single-serve food containers, straws and cups end up in the landfill — and ultimately, the ocean — where they take centuries to biodegrade and harm wildlife.

• Second Use For Single-Use BottlesSustainable Multi-Use Fiber Made
  From Recycled Water Bottles

  Nov. 29, 2018 -Single-use water bottles have become a target for environmentalists concerned about the amount of petroleum required for each bottle and the massive amounts of waste generated from their short lives. But in recent years, companies have begun to use tossed-aside plastic in new and exciting ways.

  REPREVE, a sustainable fiber created from 100 percent food-quality and BPA-free post-consumer plastic, has opened up the door to give companies new options when sourcing eco-friendly materials.

  Click for details from
  inhabitat, including a slideshow.

• Useful Supplies From CO2 - How About That?New Devices Could Help Turn
  Atmospheric Co2 Into Useful Supplies

  Oct. 30, 2018 -New chemical-recycling devices might help combat climate change by making good use of heat-trapping gas produced by burning fossil fuels.

  These electrochemical cells convert CO into useful compounds much more efficiently than their predecessors, researchers report. If combined with existing technology that harvests carbon monoxide from carbon dioxide, the devices could help transform CO2 captured from pollution sources, like power plant flue gas stacks. That could reduce the warming effect of carbon emissions and produce chemical supplies for manufacturing and space travel.

  Click now to read the whole
  story from Science News.

• Houses From Salvaged MaterialsCheck Out These enchanting,
  Off-Grid Cabins Handcrafted
  from Salvaged Materials

  Oct. 12, 2018 -Ambitious tiny cabin crafter Jacob Witzling has taken inspiration from childhood fairytales to build some seriously dreamy woodland dwellings for himself and his friends. Using reclaimed wood and other materials scavenged from construction sites, Witzling has designed and handcrafted a series of gorgeous tiny cabins tucked deep into lush forestscapes. Inspired by a deep respect for nature, all of his amazing cabins run 100 percent off the grid with no running water.

  Click to read more from
  CleanTechnica, and view a slideshow.

• Bringing Awareness About RecyclingCan Self-Destructing Plastics
  Make Us More Aware of Recycling?

  Aug. 15, 2018 -Evian says it will produce all its plastic bottles from 100% recycled plastic by 2025. Starbucks made headlines this summer with its pledge to eliminate plastic straws by 2020. British supermarket Morrisons said it would bring back “traditional” brown paper bags for loose fruit and vegetables, which means that 150 million small plastic bags will be removed from circulation. But is any of this foot-stomping about plastics really enough? Isn’t it time for to ask the world’s scientists to research and develop polymers or plastics with built-in self-destruct mechanisms?

  Plastics are created from fossil fuels and petroleum and typically don’t biodegrade like materials made from other natural, Earth-based resources such as trees and plants. The heat and catalysts applied during the production process create carbon-based polypropylene chains that form virtually indestructible bonds, something Earth’s natural recycling process cannot break down.

  Click now to read the story from CleanTechnica.

• UK Mostly Waves “Bye-Bye” to Plastic BagsUK Bag Tariff Halves
  Plastic Bag Marine Litter,
  Reduces Sales of Plastic Bags by 86%

  Aug. 2 , 2018 -Following a 5p charge per bag, the sale of plastic bags in the U.K. has fallen by 86 percent, according to reports from the “big seven” supermarkets in the country. Scientists at the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (CEFAS) have also found that approximately 50 percent of plastic bag marine litter has been eliminated from the Earth’s waters since the tax was put into effect.

  Statistics on individual consumption show a decline from 140 bags per person to 19 as a result of the bag fees — a total elimination of 300 million bags. The 5p (roughly 0.07 USD) tariff introduced in 2015 seems to be working in the favor of marine ecosystems, which receive nearly all of the plastic waste after human handling.

  Click now to read more
  from Inhabitat, and view a slideshow.

• An Environmentally-Friendly Way to Produce PlasticsDemand For Biodegradable
  Plastics Expected To Surge

  July 31, 2018 -In the 1967 film, The Graduate, Mr. McGuire used one word to forecast market trends for an impressionable recent college graduate: “Plastics.” If the film were to be updated for 21st century audiences, it would need two words to describe the promising future: “Biodegradable Plastics.” Biodegradable plastics is a double-digit growth industry coming into its own from increased regulations and bans against plastic bags and other single-use plastic items. Concerns about plastic waste in the environment are contributing to demand for biodegradable plastics worldwide.

  Click now to read all
  about it from CleanTechnica.

• Don’t Just Toss It - “Park” It This Floating Park In Rotterdam
  Is Made From Recycled Plastic Waste

  July 11, 2018 -More than 1,000 square feet of plastic ultimately destined to pollute the ocean is getting a second lease on life in Rotterdam. On July 4, 2018, Recycled Island Foundation opened its prototype to the public: a floating park made entirely from recycled plastic waste and appropriately named the Recycled Park.

  Click now for the the story
  and slideshow from CleanTechnica.

• When It Comes to Recycling “when in doubt don’t” Are You a Wishful Recycler?

  June 26, 2018 -Many people aspire to do the right thing, but knowing what to recycle is not always easy. Putting items in the recycling bin with the hope that they will be recycled can do more harm than good and cause an entire load to be rejected.

  Here’s a list you need to know more about:
  Plastic wrap, bubble wrap, sandwich bags and freezer bags
  Paper towels, napkins and tissue
  Plastic bags and film plastics
  Styrofoam, flexible packaging such as pet food bags, chip bags and juice pouches

  Click now to learn more
  from Forsyth News.

• When China No Longer Accepts Our Recyclables? China’s New Recycling Policies
  May Spark an International Waste Crisis

  Jan. 20, 2018 -The current state of North American recycling results in much of our recyclables being shipped to China for processing.

  But a new policy being implemented by China is going to place much stricter controls on the types of recyclables they accept – and that could spark an international waste crisis.

  Click for more from The Greener Ideal,
  and watch the video to learn more about the
  problem, and how we can help.

• A Great New Way to Produce Packaging This Edible, Plastic-Free Packaging
  is Grown From Kombucha Starter

  June 26, 2018 - Polish design student Roza Janusz has created Scoby, an eco-friendly alternative to plastic packaging that is easily grown with the same methods used to make kombucha. Created from fermented bacteria and yeast, the organic membrane can be used to store a variety of lightweight foods like seeds, nuts, or even salads. The zero-waste food packaging is completely biodegradable and can also be eaten after use.

  Click now for more on this story
  from Inhabitat, including a slideshow.

• Don’t Toss That Food Waste - Wear It! The Agraloop Turns Food Waste
  into Sustainable Clothing Fibers

  June 18, 2018 - Don’t throw it out — throw it on. The Agraloop Bio-Refinery, a new technology developed by materials science company Circular Systems S.P.C., is capable of turning food waste such as banana peels, pineapple leaves and hemp stalks into natural fiber that can be woven into clothing. “We want to enable food crops to become our primary fibers,” Circular Systems CEO and co-founder Isaac Nichelson told Fast Company.

  The waste materials mentioned, plus sugar cane and flax stalk, could generate up to 250 million tons of fiber each year if processed through the Agraloop, meeting the global demand for fiber two and a half times over. Farmers are encouraged to acquire their own Agraloop systems, so that they may earn extra income from creating natural, sustainable fiber from materials they would otherwise compost.

  Click now to read more on this
  from Inhabitat, and view a slideshow.

• Don’t Just Recycle - TerraCycle Closed-Loop Solutions

  TERRACYCLE - TerraCycle's goal is to focus on hard-to-recycle materials, developing circular solutions for otherwise linear systems. Today they recycle millions of pounds of such material on a weekly basis, diverting it from our landfills and incinerators.

  When looking at a new waste stream we first focus on moving it from a linear disposal system to a circular one, and then over time to a platform that is as closed loop as technically possible.

• What We Can Recycle? 13 Household Items You Didn’t
  Know You Could Recycle
  This List Might Suprise You

  They include:
  1. Eyeglasses,
  2. Carpet,
  3. Christmas Lights,
  4. Tights & Stockings,
  5. Toothbrushes,
  6. Prosthetic Limbs,
  7. Pet Fur,
  8. Bras,
  9. Brita Water Products,
  10. Motor Oil.
  11. Tennis Balls,
  12. Keys,
  13. Toilets

  Click now for more
  from Direct Energy.

• More About Recyclable Items 13 Household Items You
  Didn’t Know You Could Recycle

  -The recycling basics are pretty easy: put paper, plastic, and glass in their appropriate containers so your local recycling center can process them correctly.

  But what do you with those odd (yet somehow everyday) household items filling up our drawers, closets, and garages? While we don’t want to throw them away in the trash, we’re not sure what to do with them. Thanks to this helpful little infographic, you can now take care of your toothbrushes, toilets, and tennis balls with ease!

  Click now for the Live Brighter blog.

• Recycling For Kids (1)Having Children Take
  Respnsibility for a Clean Planet

  Fun Presentation and Game about Recycling - Natural Resource Facts about Paper and Aluminum and How To Recycle for Kids - Green Living Strategies Presented by Children of the Earth United - Environmental Education for Kids of all Ages, Teachers and Families.

  Learn more about Creative
  Kids by clicking now.

• Recycling For Kids (2)Children Learning About Recycling
  and Having Fun at the Same Time

  Nico is on a quest to help save the planet! He’s passionate about sharing his knowledge of recycling with everyone, so join Nico on his journey to reduce, reuse and recycle with tips and fun activities. Once you have the practices down, you can share your recycling knowledge with your family and friends too!

  Learn more about Nico by clicking now.

• Check Out This Recycled "Green" HouseModern Recycled Container House in South
  Africa Operates 100% Off Grid

  Mar. 10, 2017- Sustainable design has taken longer to get off the ground in South Africa largely due to expensive construction methods.

  When Johannesburg-based Architecture For A Change (A4AC) took on the challenge of building a modern green home in the country, they aimed to make the house not only environmentally friendly but also affordable. They cut costs by using upcycled shipping containers and other repurposed materials to build Cliff House, a lifted flying container house with an economical, energy-efficient design.

• From Trash to Building Material What Is Poly Brick?

  It's a revolutionary building material made from 100% recycled Polyethylene Terephthalate Polymer. It is translucent, naturally insulated, and durable. The modular 3-D honeycomb self-interlocking structure makes it extremely strong without any chemical adhesives, while weights only 1/5 of the standard curtain wall systems.

• It’s Not Just Trash AnymoreOne Person’s Trash is
  Another's Renewable Energy

  The practical benefits of organic products don't necessarily end when it goes down the drain or into the trash. There is quite a bit of useful energy left in the items we discard.

• More About Plastic WastePollution
  (And What We Can Do About It)

  Plastic is literally at our fingertips all day long. Keyboards. framed computer monitor, mice. The amount of plastic we encounter daily doesn\’t end there. Chances are, you can relate. Plastic is an epidemic.

  But where does all this plastic go?

• Plastic Bottles Become Shoes and MoreTimberland Transforms Recycled Plastic
  Bottles Into Shoes and Bags

  Mar. 3, 2017- For its latest collection, Timberland is turning to the bottle—the plastic bottle, that is. The outdoor-wear maker has teamed up with Thread, a Pittsburgh, Penn.-based manufacturer of sustainable fabrics, to transform plastic bottles from the streets and canals of Haiti into a dapper collection of footwear, bags, and T-shirts.

• A State-by-State Guide to Landfill BansWhat’s Banned in Landfills:
  A State-by-State Guide

  Earth91/ Nov. 27, 2017 - In some cases, it’s not about whether you should recycle an item, but instead whether you must.

  That’s because in the U.S., there are no federal laws regarding recycling. There wasn’t even a law regarding waste generation until the Solid Waste Disposal Act in 1965, which eventually became the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) and set procedures for landfills and collection of household waste.

  This means any items banned from landfills are decided at the state (or, in some cases, city) level. Only one U.S. state, Montana, currently does not have any landfill bans.

• Beer Waste Into Clean Water+Microbes Turn Beer Waste
  Into Clean Water, Energy

  November 1, 2015 -Cambrian Innovation is extracting clean water and energy from waste streams at two California breweries with a secret set of microbes.

• An New Role for Discarded Plastics Netherlands: Plastic Roads to
  Be Made From Recycled Ocean Waste

  Sept 16, 2016 - After the floating farm, Rotterdam will be the first city in the world that plans to build roads using plastic waste rescued from the oceans. These are polymer blocks, reminiscent of Lego pieces with which we played as a kid, and presented as the ecological alternative to stop pouring concrete. t

• 3D Printing Our Way Out of WasteIs 3D Printing the
  Answer to Plastic Waste?

  January 29, 2015,  -You’ve probably heard a lot about 3D printing in the last few years. "Printing" is sort of a misnomer. Also referred to as "additive manufacturing," it’s the process of creating an object from a digital file by layering filaments to form the finished product. It’s been hyped as a revolution that will make conventional manufacturing obsolete, allowing people to create the products and tools they need in their own homes.

• Canon™ Cartridge Recycling Canon Environmental Technologies, Inc.

  In 1990, Canon introduced a cartridge recycling program for all-in-one laser beam printer toner cartridges through its Clean Earth Campaign Program. The goal of the program is to achieve zero landfill waste by reusing parts, recycling materials, and employing energy recovery. Canon’s all-in-one cartridges have components that can be recycled and reused by Canon.

• Electronics Recycling Recycling Electronic Waste
  Responsibly: Excuses Dwindle

  Maybe you replaced old electronics over the holidays or you’re just sweeping out the old and ushering in the New Year. Either way, you’ll need to do something with your old devices. For everyone’s sake, including Mother Nature’s, try to get rid of your old technology the right way.

  Click now to read how
  and watch the video.

• Light From Discarded Batteries Discarded Laptop Batteries Keep the Lights On

  Millions of discarded batteries have more than enough life to power home lighting for one year, researchers in India say.

  Many of the estimated 50 million lithium-ion laptop batteries discarded every year could provide electricity storage sufficient to light homes in poor countries, researchers at IBM say.

• The LandfillHarmonic There's No Such Thing As Waste

  Click now to watch this entertaining video and see what we mean.

• Self-Destructing Plastics & Recycling Awareness Self-Destructing Plastics and Recycling?

  CleanTecnica , Aug. 15, 2018  - Evian says it will produce all its plastic bottles from 100% recycled plastic by 2025. Starbucks made headlines this summer with its pledge to eliminate plastic straws by 2020. British supermarket Morrisons said it would bring back “traditional” brown paper bags for loose fruit and vegetables, which means that 150 million small plastic bags will be removed from circulation. But is any of this foot-stomping about plastics really enough? Isn’t it time for to ask the world’s scientists to research and develop polymers or plastics with built-in self-destruct mechanisms?

  Interested? Click now for whole story.

• The Last Straw Make the Last Straw You Got From
  a Restaurant Your Last One

  A disposable plastic straw is used on average for a whopping 20 minutes. It’s longer than the four-second lifespan of the plastic stirrer you may use to swizzle your coffee or tea, but 20 minutes is still just a tiny fraction of the several hundred years it could spend in a landfill.

  One straw may seem insignificant, but consider this: someone who uses one straw a day for the next decade will toss 3,650 pieces of plastic into the landfill—and there’s a chance that plastic may get lost along the way and end up in the ocean.

• Using Bugs to Clean Up Waste Dong Energy Funds
  First Power Plant Using
  Bugs to Clean Up Waste

  July 1, 2016- Dong Energy A/S’s REnescience plant in northern England will use enzyme technology to “wash”; organic matter from unsorted waste, creating a slurry that can be turned into a gas for use in power generation or motor fuels, said their VP of commercial bioenergy at Novozymes.

• CO2 As a Refrigerant A Good Use for CO2

  Volkswagen, Daimler, Audi, BMW and Porsche have announced plans to develop CO2 technology as a more climate-friendly refrigerant for air conditioning systems.

  VW says CO2 as a refrigerant — also known as R744 — has lower greenhouse gas effects than conventional refrigerants, with a GWP (Global Warming Potential) value of 1, or 99.3 percent below the European Union-specified GWP limit of 150.