For a Sustainable Lifestyle
10 eco-friendly habits we should keep after the COVID-19 crisis
Photo by Erik Mclean
The coronavirus pandemic has forced us to change many habits in our daily lives. Some of them, such as the use of plastic gloves, bags or disposable wipes and masks can definitely not become the new norm. Yet some others are worth keeping for the sake of our health and the environment after the coronavirus crisis.
A better diet for us and our planet
It’s safe to say that our food consumption has been one of the habits most impacted by the lockdown. Restaurants and bars had to close their dining rooms and quickly pivot to home delivery and curbside pick-up. Pasta, bread, flour, and meat have been difficult to find at grocery stores after everyone stocked up on food and beverages. As a result, most people have found themselves cooking more than usual, as shown by the surge in cooking and recipes websites traffic.[1]
1. Grocery shopping efficiency
With fewer trips to the grocery store to limit our exposure to the virus, we’ve had to get more organized and rethink the way we make our grocery shopping list, plan our meals for the week, and store fresh food.
Because of that, we now spend less time wandering supermarket aisles, which means less temptations, and we’ve mostly been focusing on purchasing necessities.
The extension of home deliveries and curbside pick-up have become very convenient and felt safer especially for people at risk. Here in Charlotte, NC, Farm Fresh Carolinas does a great job bringing fresh local and organic produce directly to homes and offices. I have personally reduced drastically my plastic waste and number of trips to the grocery stores as Farm Fresh Carolinas uses reusable insulated bags and accepts my reusable produce bags to pack and deliver delicious fruits and veggies.
Another great resource for the Charlotte area readers is Lake View Farms, they are your good old milkman guys, who deliver hormone free, antibiotic free, free range dairy in glass bottles that are sanitized and reused for other home deliveries.
Local producers are feeding their community and deserve all of our support. On top of supporting a small business, local products are full of flavor and nutrients as they don't travel long distances to reach our kitchen, while their carbon footprint is significantly reduced too.
The support to local farmers and shops has provided a sense of community. During the pandemic, there has been a shift to communities that has helped local businesses carry out initiatives and give back to the world. Locally, The Loyalist Market, a restaurant downtown Matthews, NC coordinated with other businesses, the distribution of a free sandwich to any child eligible for free lunches in the North Carolina school system, feeding up to 700 children a day!
2. Homemade baking and cooking
Your social media feed has likely been filled with mouthwatering images of sourdough breads. During the lockdown, people have rediscovered the joy of cooking and baking. Google even shows recipe trends by state: pound cake in North and South Carolina, crepes in Utah, pancakes in Vermont, egg salad in Colorado. The most-searched recipe in America during the confinement was the banana bread.
Home-cooked meals help to save money and have a positive impact on your health by reducing "chronic diet-related illnesses, like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hypertension, and obesity".[2]
3. Grow your food
Home gardening bloomed around the world with quarantine. U.S. seed company W. Atlee Burpee & Co sold more seed in March 2020 than any time in its 144-year history[3]. There are different reasons for this sudden enthusiasm: some are concerned over food security and try to be more self-sufficient, while others are looking for a soothing activity (though the two aren’t mutually exclusive).
Growing plants boasts many benefits. It lowers stress and improves overall mood, releasing dopamine and serotonin in our bodies and is a great way to get moving.
If you would like to grow your own food or have already started your small corner of paradise in the Charlotte, NC area and think you could use some advice, Erin at the Patio Farmer is your go-to person.
4. Compost
What's better than feeding your garden soil with your food scraps?
About 30% of our kitchen trash can is made up of food scraps. Once discharged in the landfill, this organic material gets trapped with the rest of our solid waste and lacks the oxygen it needs to decompose. It produces methane, a greenhouse gas that’s 28 times more potent than carbon dioxide and is the main cause of global warming.
There are many ways you can deal with food scraps. If you live in an apartment, the Bokashi or the worm bin are great composting systems for small spaces. And if you don’t want to start your own compost, see if one of your neighbors (or perhaps a farmer) has one and would be interested in your food waste. If you live in Charlotte, NC, check out Crown Town Compost Services! Enter the code "EKOLOGICALL" when you sign-up for their composting services and get one month free ($20-$30 value).
A caring lifestyle
1. Exercise
Because most gyms and parks are closed, streets have been filled with people of all ages in pursuit of some exercise and fresh air. Cities like New York, Seattle, Oakland or Charlotte even opened vast stretches of their streets to walkers, joggers, bicyclists and others seeking outdoor space. We all know that exercise has many benefits on our physical and mental health. If you have started exercising during the confinement or just kept practicing an activity, continue as it is a great way to support your immune system and mental health.
2. Slow down
Lockdown also rhymes with slow down. We’ve suddenly had more time to enjoy the simple things, like having a nice chat with a neighbor, watching the plants bloom, and calling friends and relatives.
The quarantine pushed some of us to reflect on our lives that can feel like a hamster wheel sometimes: run from one place to another, jump from a meeting to the next, attend as many events as our agenda can fit, wait for the weekend, rest and repeat.
A lot of people question the desire to go back to this “normal”. Maybe we don’t need to put so much pressure on ourselves, maybe we don’t need to fill every moment with a commitment.
Of course, for some other less privileged people, the lockdown did not mean more time to reflect on life but instead meant more work and more stress.
Nevertheless, we all need to take time to slow down from time to time and think about what makes us feel good instead of rushing through life with closed eyes.
3. Care for others
The Covid-19 crisis was another demonstration on how everything in our world is interconnected. In response, we have shown that we can come together as a worldwide community to protect people at higher risks, including our elderly and all of the front-liners, and look out for each other. Donors have shown an incredible generosity during these unprecedented times. More than $1bn-worth of charity was given by individual Americans at the beginning of May, 2020.[4]
In the South Charlotte area, our community has raised, between mid-March and beginning of June 2020, over $60,000 to help our neighbors in need, feeding 65 families that couldn’t count on the school cafeteria to provide free meals to their children anymore.
This is a sign of hope that shows the world’s capacity to make a difference.
Hopefully, these changes have contributed to nurture our mental health and urged us to reconsider our true priorities.
Conscious consumerism
1. Homemade - DIY
The lockdown, not only, encouraged us to cook more but also to try to make our own cleaning wipes, hand sanitizer as well as sew our own masks. Many people realized it’s easier and cheaper to DIY instead of buying.
2. Rethink our purchases
Staying home has also allowed us to reflect on our consumption habits and reconsider where we want to spend our money. Many of us have been supporting local retailers, avoiding purchasing items that are manufactured at the other end of the world.
Also not succumbing to the temptation to buy gadgets or clothes probably helped many to realize that their consumer behavior is about instant gratification, not lasting happiness. Happiness is not for sale, it’s hidden in simple things.
People had also more time at home to sort out their belongings and sell online those they don’t use anymore. The second hand clothing market now represents $32 Billion which pushed Walmart to partner with ThredUp “a resale marketplace for used fashion items ... to sell through its online platform”. The fashion industry is the third most polluting industry in the world, so that's good news for our planet.
Making our products, buying second hand and purchasing less, reduce our impact on the planet by limiting the amount of natural resources extracted for Earth, the energy necessary to produce and transport those items and eventually the demand on companies to produce always more and cheaper. The cherry on the top: your wallet thanks you!
3. Work from home
Up to half of American workers are currently working from home versus 15% pre-Covid-19.[5]
Beyond the multiple positive effects that working from home has: no commute, increased productivity, more flexibility, drop of CO2 emissions, less gas... It also has several positive outcomes on goods consumption. We use less paper, energy, coffee cups’ lids, beverage bottles, utensils, food packaging, plastic bags and apparel!
Work from home has eliminated business travel almost overnight and the need to commute for most of us. Transportation accounts for 28% of all greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., and light-duty vehicles are responsible for 59% percent of the transportation sector's emissions, way ahead of aircraft (9%), work commute plays its part in it. Remote work reduces greenhouse gas emissions, fossil fuel consumption and improves air and water quality.
The benefits for the workers, the companies and the environment will likely change the way we work and travel for business post Covid-19.
***
Nobody wants to see people lose their lives, their loved ones, or their livelihoods. But crises bring changes, and not all of those changes are bad. Times like these give us the opportunity to take care of our physical and mental health, improve our quality of life, and protect our planet. It’s important to seize this opportunity and develop new ways of thinking, new behavior, and new habits. If you are thinking about becoming a more conscious consumer and lower your waste at home, sign up for a free zero-waste online class.
The changes we’ve had to make come with many positive outcomes:
- Reducing food waste
- A healthier lifestyle
- Saving money
- Spend time on what makes us happy
- Decluttering our lives from the unnecessary
- Reducing pollution
It’s worth keeping those habits, don't you think? What habits from the confinement will you keep?
As I write this blog post, numbers of cases are still increasing in North Carolina and other states in the USA. Please wear a mask, stay six feet away from each other and be safe.
[2]https://time.com/5827315/coronavirus-diet/
[4]https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/05/06/how-generous-are-americas-rich
[5] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/09/magazine/remote-work-covid.html
Earth Month Celebration - 30 Eco-Tips
What's wrong with my sponge?
Did you know that the little rectangle you use to clean the kitchen and the bathroom is hiding some dirty secrets form you? No? I did not either!
Let me share with you what I have discovered about our sponges:
1. It smells! Why? Because about 10 million bacteria are having a fest in every square inch of your kitchen sponge, it's more than in your toilet. Gross!
2. It pollutes! Sponges are made out of plastic meaning it releases micro-plastics in our water drains. Once thrown away they stay forever in the landfills.
3. It's a recurrent waste! You keep buying new ones
4. It's impregnated with chemicals such as Triclosan, registered as an antibacterial, anti-fungal and pesticide!
So ditch the sponge and switch to a wooden brush, a hand brush, a vegetable cellulose sponge, a hemp or a coconut scourer, a loofah or make a tawashi with your old socks!
How to make a Tawashi Sponge?
A Tawashi sponge is an eco-friendly dish sponge coming from Japan which is made out of old socks.
Materials needed:
- 2 or 3 old (usually orphan) socks, ideally 100% cotton to avoid microfiber pollution
- a wooden board
- 20 flat head nails
- a hammer
- a pair of scissors
- a ruler
- a pencil
- a protractor or a try square (optional)
Instructions:
1: Draw a 5.6 inches square on your wooden board
2: Mark dots along the square, 1.2 inches between the corner and your first nail and then one dot every 0.8 inches. Once the 20 dots are marked, firmly plant your nails
3: Cut 10 strips of 1.2 inches wide into your socks
4: Attach the first 5 strips to the nail, stretch them one by one from one side to the other (see image)
5: Weave your 5 other strips, place the first one at the top and pass it on top of the other vertical strip, then under, then on top, under, on top until you hook it to the opposite side... Then take the 2 second strip, do the same, except you start by passing it under first, then on top, under and on top and so on.
6: Once the weaving is complete, close your sponge by unhooking 2 rings from their nail in a corner, pass one ring through the next ring. The second ring becomes the “first ring”. Continue this step all around your square. The last ring is used as a hook.
Et Voila!
Click here for video instructions from the Permacrafters.
So are you ready to ditch the plastic sponge and try a sustainable alternative instead?
10 easy ways to save water
In the midst of a world health crisis, water is playing a crucial role helping us stay clean and healthy. Still today in 2020, 785 million people – 1 in 9 – lack access to safe water and 2.2 billion people – 1 in 3 – lack access to a toilet. The situation will likely worsen as population and the demand for water grow, and as the effects of climate change intensify. (United Nations, 2018)
Here are 10 easy ways to conserve our precious resource in our home:
1. TURN OFF THE TAP while washing your hands, brushing your teeth, shaving and scrubbing yourself under the shower. Did you know that turning off the faucet while you brush your teeth can save up to 200 gallons of water a week for a family of 4?
2. SHORTER SHOWERS: an average shower uses about 5 gallons of water per minute. Installing a low flow shower head and cutting your shower time to 5 minutes can reduce your water usage and CO2 emissions by 70-80% per year. My personal tip is to play your favorite song, when it's over, it's time to get out of the shower. Another tip is to keep a bucket in the shower and use the collected water for the house plants or hand wash delicate clothes.
3. TOILETS: “If it’s yellow, let it mellow!” is an easy way to save water. Also if you don't already have a small toilet tank installed, you can place a bottle in the tank so less water is needed to fill it and therefore less water is being flushed. This tip can save up to 10 gallons of water per day. I still cannot wrap my head around the fact that we flush drinkable water down to our toilets while some people in the world don't have access to clean water. My dream is to have a composting toilet one day.
4. APPLIANCES: As said in my previous blog post, only do full loads of laundry and dishes and save up to 20 gallons of water per wash. If you need to hand wash dirty dishes, here is how my grandma used to do it: plug the sink or fill up a small tub, wash the dishes then rinse them with a trickle of water. Depending on the size of your sink / tub, you’ll only use a total of about 2 gallons of water compared to 2 or more gallons per minute if you let water run through the faucet.
Photo by Nadine Primeau on Unsplash
5. FOOD: it takes a lot of water to grow, process and transport food, the worst is meat with 2,000 gallons of water needed to produce one pound of beef for instance. With the agriculture industry being responsible for approximately 80% of the water used in the U.S. reducing our meat consumption, eating more vegetables, avoiding processed food and fighting food waste are the most impactful choices you can make in terms of water conservation.
6. VEGETABLES: wash your fruits and vegetables in a bowl instead of running water then reuse the water for your plants or garden.
7. COOKING WATER: Water and feed with nutrients at the same time your plants with the water used to rinse, boil, steam vegetables, eggs, pasta. This leftover water can also be used for your homemade stock.
8. CLOTHING: Another area where we usually don't realize the amount of water required is the manufacturing of clothes. It takes 720 gallons of water to produce one single cotton tee-shirt. So before buying new clothes, consider buying second hand.
9. GARBAGE DISPOSAL uses important amount of water and energy to run so adopting a zero waste lifestyle helps reducing the trash produced. Consider starting a compost with your organic scraps.
10. LEAKS: they represent 12% of water use in a typical American home so check your pipes and toilets.
What about you? How do you make sure not to waste water and reduce your consumption?
Switch to a Zero Waste Laundry Routine
Source: Photo by Dan Gold on Unsplash
Depending on how you do it and how often, laundry can be an excellent source for reducing your household waste.
Because washing and drying your clothes saps up so much energy, doing a load of laundry every two days generates around 970 pounds of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent) per year. That’s about the same as taking a round-trip flight from San Francisco to L.A.—15-mile car rides to and from the airport included.
Beyond adding a significant amount to your carbon footprint, laundry can hurt the earth in other ways. The average American household does around 300 laundry loads annually, which consumes as much as 6,000 gallons of water each year. In addition, many of the name-brand detergents, fabric softeners, and fragrant laundry products we use contain toxic chemicals that harm wildlife and contaminate our waterways.
Then, of course, there’s the issue of the massive amounts of plastic waste created from jugs of laundry detergent.
With 1,100 loads of laundry initiated each second in the U.S., it’s time to take action. You can help protect our planet by switching to a zero waste, non-toxic laundry routine with these four practical tips.
1. Wash less often
The most effective way to minimize laundry waste is also the most straightforward: do less laundry. No one wants to wear smelly clothes, but you may find you toss clothing items into the laundry that could be worn again. If you can wash and dry your clothes less frequently, you can save energy, water, time and keep your clothes longer.
To reduce your number of weekly loads, follow these tips:
- Practice the “sniff test”. If it doesn’t smell, you probably can wear it again!
- Wash jeans sparingly
- Try spot cleaning clothes between washes
- Keep garments fresh by spraying them with vinegar and water before hanging them up and/or hang your clothing in the open air.
- Maintain clean towels and prevent mildew smells by always allowing towels to dry completely after us.
2. Maximize washer efficiency
When you do run a wash, make sure you have a full load to ensure your machine is working at its optimal efficiency. Many washing machines consume the same amount of water regardless of the size of your load.
Don't hesitate to pre-treat stains with a stain removal stick: simply wet the fabric and rub the soap stick onto the stained area, then wash as usual.
Wash your clothes in cold water. A staggering 90 percent of the energy used by a washer goes towards heating water, and you can cut energy consumption and save around $60 per year by sticking to a cold cycle. As an added bonus, washing your clothes less frequently helps prevent fading, shrinking, and microfiber shedding.
3. Air Dry
When it comes to energy wasted when doing laundry, the dryer is one of the greatest offenders. Drying your clothes in a machine accounts for nearly three-quarters of laundry’s carbon footprint. You can work towards zero waste laundry and save a ton of energy by opting to hang your clothes out to dry on a clothesline. Not only will you take advantage of free solar energy, but you’ll also help your garments and linens last longer. In addition to drying clothes, the sun’s U.V. rays can actually whiten and disinfect clothes, and even help remove stubborn stains.
4. Use eco-friendly laundry detergent
Many store-bought detergents contain toxic chemicals and fragrances that can be detrimental to your clothing, skin, and the planet. In addition, with only 9% of plastic is recycled in the U.S, the plastic jugs of liquid laundry detergent will probably go pollute our oceans and crowd our landfills.
Skip the commercial liquid laundry detergent and go for a greener, non-toxic laundry powder. Steer clear from liquid detergents, which include preservatives and sometimes trace amounts of formaldehyde—a known carcinogen and skin irritant.
Powder detergent, on the other hand, is much more shelf-stable and does not require the use of preservatives. In addition, powder is more powerful than liquid and is typically packaged in cardboard boxes or steel canisters, which are lighter to ship and easy to reuse, refill, and recycle. You can take a step towards adopting a greener laundry routine with the people- and planet-friendly laundry powder from Meliora.
When it comes to saving the planet, even small changes can make an impact. By adopting a zero waste laundry routine, you’ll minimize your carbon footprint and water consumption while cutting costs, saving time, and helping your clothes last longer.
Which strategies will you implement first to incorporate a zero waste laundry routine into your life?
Sources:
- https://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/2010/nov/25/carbon-footprint-load-laundry
- https://books.google.com/books?id=olm9BwAAQBAJ&pg=PA86&lpg=PA86&dq=440kg+of+CO2e&source=bl&ots=8Z4QY05fY1&sig=ACfU3U1WsU9hGrkicg-v0AUWJRZ-fU0Heg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjxnZjHlIToAhUIVc0KHWInA-AQ6AEwDXoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=440kg%20of%20CO2e&f=false
- https://www.onegreenplanet.org/environment/waste-free-laundry/
- https://www.consumerreports.org/laundry/energy-saving-laundry-tips/
- https://www.thespruce.com/save-water-in-the-laundry-room-2146003
DIY Hand Sanitizer
Instructions
- 1/2 cup of aloe vera gel
- 1/4 cup of witch hazel, rubbing alcohol (> 60%, the highest % the better) or vodka for a stronger gel (optional)
- 1 Tbsp of jojoba oil (sweet almond, flax oils work too)
- 10 drops of Tea Tree essential oil (natural antimicrobial, antifungal, and disinfectant)
- 10 drops of Lavender essential oil (Peppermint is a great antibacterial oil if your prefer its smell)
Your natural, non-toxic hand sanitizer gel is ready!
Zero Waste Classroom Valentines
What does Valentine's Day look like when you try to lower waste, especially with school-age kids? Well, it is a dilemma, your kid wants candies, which means wrappers, which means trash...
