So … What’s Wrong with Plastic?

First it’s important to understand that not all plastics are created equal.  Some plastics contain harmful chemicals that can leach out into our bodies, with a host of negative side effects.  Understanding which plastics are safe, and for what uses, is no small feat.

Here’s a little rhyme I heard to keep in mind when shopping.  5 and 4, 1 and 2 – all the rest are bad for you.  So check for the number inside the little recycling triangle on the bottom of your stuff and avoid the 3’s, 6’s and 7’s.   Just to be on the safe side, you’ll likely want to go easy on the 1’s as well.

What’s the problem?  Well, plastics contain a whole host of toxic substances that are put in there to make them strong, clear and flexible.  From phthalates, to BisPhenol A, to antimony, these chemicals are accumulating in the environment and in our bodies, causing reproductive challenges and cancers to name but a few issues.  And no one knows for sure how much is okay, which makes it very difficult to regulate and protect the public.

One of the best guides that I’ve seen to plastics is on the healthy child website http://healthychild.org/5steps/5_steps_5/?gclid=CIjg5df6s5wCFSMSagodPRuwnQ

This guide walks you through each of the various types, gives you some examples, and tells you about the challenges.

So what can you do with your lunches?

1. Avoid plastic – there are other options available, including stainless steel and glass.  Where its feasible, consider switching out.

2. Use only the “safe ones”.  Since an all stainless steel lunch can weigh several pounds, it may not be a great choice for the little ones, but particularly for your food containers, choose the safe options only.

3. Never, never, EVER heat food in plastics.  Heating increases the rate of leaching, and puts it directly into your body.

4. Be extra careful with babies.  Glass bottles are not much more expensive, and are a much safer option.

5. Limit use of cling wraps and baggies – these plastics can be less stable, not to mention less environmentally friendly.

It sounds daunting, but a little knowledge can help you significantly reduce your exposure to harmful chemicals in plastic.

THE CAMP BUZZ IS ON- HOW TO DEAL WITH BUGS THIS SUMMER

Presumably, you’re sending your kids to camp because you want to give them the opportunity to reconnect with nature.  It makes sense then,to pack them away with stuff that protects the nature they’re going to visit.

So where do you start?  Well the first thing that comes to many peoples’minds when they think of camp is the bugs.  So let’s start by addressing them.  There are a few simple tips to minimize bites of all kinds, before we get to creams and potions.

1) Choose light-coloured clothing –  Not only are these much cooler in the sun, but mosquitoes are attracted to dark colours, and much less likely to bite you in lightly coloured clothing.

2) Go for coverage – A light, long-sleeved shirt is not much hotter than a t-shirt, and can drastically reduce the number of bites that kids get.  Light, long pants can offer the same kind of protection, and there’s even the kind that convert to shorts if you’re out of the woods and get too hot.  Socks are important too.  Don’t choose the low kind that leave your ankles bare.  Bites on the joints can be some of the itchiest and most annoying for the kids, so we want to avoid them as much as possible. And finally, a hat is a great way to keep the bugs from burrowing in the kids’ hair and feasting.

3)  Don’t wear anything “stinky” – Send the kids with unscented shampoos, creams and sunscreens, and try to wash their clothes in unscented detergents before they leave.  All of these things attract bugs in droves.

If you still want some kind of a bug repellent, I’d suggest using something without harmful chemicals in it.  This protects both your childrens’ health, and the plants and animals that they’re going to visit.  DEET, while quite effective as a repellent, is a toxic chemical, and should be used sparingly if at all.   The challenge is that there are so many “natural” solutions out there that really don’t work, so are hardly worth the expense and effort.  Repellents containing either eucalyptus and citronella, or both seem to be the most promising.

How about the sun? Again the first strategy is to avoid it first.  Hats and long sleeved clothing are a great start. They even have clothing that contains a high spf, so that you can avoid putting on sunscreen underneath them.  .

Smart camps will schedule activities that keep the kids out of the sun during the 11am -1pm time frame when the suns rays are most harmful.

Just like bug sprays, sunscreens have come under a great deal of scrutiny in the past few years for their chemical content, and the jury is still out on many of the specific ingredients.  We’ll stick to a few guidelines here:

1) You’ll want to avoid parabens, as you would in other skincare

products.

2) Choose something “natural’, without a huge list of chemicals in it.

3) Avoid “nanotechnology”.  We’ll address this later in a separate blog, but essentially it means that the particles are so small that they can be absorbed right into your bloodstream – not a good thing.  Avoid products that say things like “micronized”. (more…)

“Biodegradable” has long been a staple of the green movement.  We know
to look for it on product labels because it’s good,  both in the
packaging and the product, but do we really understand what it means?

For the most part, no.  Unfortunately, it is one of the most commonly
abused greenwash terms, likely because there is no standardized
definition. Generally it means that the product will break down quickly
in nature to naturally occurring components with the help of the
existing bacteria.  But how quick is quickly?

Eco-Logo, the most prevalent environmental certification in Canada
requires that products or packaging be “readily biodegradable”.  They
specify a test for all products that measures how quickly a product
breaks down.  In general they are looking for at least 60-70% breakdown
within 14 days.

This test is going to screen out a lot of products.  Take plastic bags
for example.  Technically they do biodegrade - they break down in nature
– it just takes an estimated 1000 years to do it (we don’t know for sure
since plastic bags have only been around for 50 years…).  I don’t know
about you – but that’s not my idea of biodegradable.

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Candles have become a staple of the décor of many homes over the lastdecade.  While going green has come to the forefront of things like cleaning and personal care products, you may not have even consideredgoing green with your candles.  You should.  The story isn’t pretty.

Conventional candles aren’t green, and they definitely aren’t healthy.  The United States Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) found that approximately 40% of candles have lead wires in the wicks which ensure that the wick stands up tall.  Unfortunately, lead wicks also mean that the air quality in your house is severely compromised – as much as five times the amount deemed hazardous for children.  Lead poisoning has some serious side effects including hormone disruption and cognitive dysfunction to name a few.

Candles are also typically made of paraffin – most people don’t realize that paraffin is actually a petroleum product.  Burning candles indoors creates some of the same pollutants that come from your tailpipe.  If you see soot build-up around the jar, or on the ceiling above the candle, it’s a good indication of what might also be happening to your lungs.

There is a better way. Candles made from Beeswax burn much cleaner and are therefore better for the planet and for your health.  100% vegetable-based candles are also non-toxic and a good option.  Lead-free is an absolute necessity, so make sure that the wicks are made from cotton and labelled lead-free. Lastly – avoid synthetic scents, they may smell great but most are carcinogenic. Don’t buy candles from the dollar store.  Many will fail all of these tests.

You don’t need to give up candles to be green, but you may want to choose to be more strategic in the candles that you choose.  In candles, you pay for what you get – truly green candles that won’t compromise your health are more expensive to manufacture, and hence more expensive to buy.  We think it’s worth it.

Cottaging is one of the great pleasures in life, but as more and more of us head north to enjoy the great outdoors, the stress on the lakes can be more than they can bear. Here are a just a few tips on how you can minimize the impact of your cottage on the lake that you love.

1) Always choose biodegradable – Although there are no universal standards around what biodegradable means, in a nutshell it says that a product will break down into substances that are naturally occurring in a short period of time once it is used. For things like soaps, shampoos and cleaners that you’ll be using up at the cottage, this is critically important. Conventional products can literally take years to break down, which is very harmful to everything in the lake.

2) Think of your septic system – Bacteria are necessary for the effective functioning of your septic – they do the majority of the work breaking down your waste. You can imagine the problems created when you put things like antibacterial soap or toxic chemicals into your septic system which kill off all of the good bacteria. Choosing green products make a big difference when your wastewater goes directly into the environment.

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This year has been a challenging year to champion the need to take action on Climate Change.  It’s not that people don’t believe that it’s happening – Canada is currently out suntanning during our warmest, driest winter on record.  It’s that many people feel that if this is climate change – then they’re all for it.

Not everyone shares our enthusiasm…  If you headed to Florida, or even Cuba this spring break, you likely saw some uncharacteristically (and unwelcome) cold weather this year.  Herein lies the challenge of climate change – it makes for very unpredictable temperatures and weather patterns – and one heck of a time vacation planning.

So how do you pick a vacation destination?  If you’re green-minded, adding planet- friendly as a criterion can make this difficult job even more challenging.

So what actually constitutes an eco-friendly vacation?

1. Close to home – one of the biggest impacts of a vacation can be the air travel, so consider a “staycation” instead – where you explore options that are little more local.  Everyone has a place close by that they’ve always wanted to check out and just haven’t had time – even a moderate drive is much less harmful to the planet.
2. Consider a “Green Hotel” – the hotel industry has been quite slow to join the environmental movement, but through associations like Green Hotels you can choose accommodations that keep the planet in mind.
3. What about an Eco-Tour?  The EcoTour Directory considers an Eco-Tour to be “a trip that causes minimal impact to the environment and local people. The site is usually culturally and biologically diverse and attracts tourists who have a common interest in nature, wildlife and culture.”  But buyer beware. Many so-called eco-tours specialize in exploiting the very resources they are intended to protect.  Do your research carefully, and get good references.
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Actually no… most of them aren’t.  Cut flowers that you purchase in the majority of flower shops may be beautiful, but they come at a high price, both environmentally and socially.

Most of the flowers in these shops come from far away – so start with a
good dose of greenhouse gases from the transportation to get them here.
While growing, they are sprayed with a cocktail of pesticides –
sometimes as many as 100 times what they would spray on foods at the
same farm.  These pesticides have very negative impacts to the local
environment, not to mention the local people employed on the farm to
pick them and ship them here – people who don’t have options to demand
better.

So what should you look for?

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‘Tis the season when we look back on the year and make some commitments on going forward.  This year, why not include a little greening into your resolutions.  If you’re looking for suggestions, here are a few to get you started:

1) Ditch the plastic waterbottles.  If you are going to do just one thing to improve your ecological footprint, your best bang for your buck is to kick the bottled water habit.  Not only are you paying a ridiculous mark up on water, but you’re contributing billions of bottles to the planet, and all the associated greenhouse gases that come with them. Stainless steel waterbottles are reasonably priced and easy to find, and tap water is cheaper.  Save some money and the planet!

2) Go litterless at lunch.  Whether for you or the kids, its really no extra work to pack a few reusable containers instead of using plastic wrap or baggies.  One day, not a big day – 320 work days in a year – well that’s a lot of baggies in the landfill.  Consider a lunch kit – it makes packing kids lunches much easier.

3) Go green when you clean.  Our health tends to be the focus of most of our new year’s resolutions, so this is a good time to remember how closely the environment is tied to our health.  When we choosegreen cleaners for example, its not only better for the planet to choose a green cleaner, it’s also much healthier for you and your family.  Same goes for personal care products – the very same things that make a shampoo green make it easier on the body.

4) Drive lightly on the planet - We’ll explore how to save money on gas later - but you can get started simply by going lighter on the gas pedal.  Every 10 kilometres over the speed limit that you drive, costs you 10% more fuel to drive the same distance.  The two minutes that you save by speeding cost the planet and your pocketbook more than you think.

** Add your resolutions below – and check out the resolutions from my fellow Green Cricketers.

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You’ve been asking for ways to get the kids involved in your quest for green, and we’re happy to provide some suggestions. A great way to start - if they haven’t seen the Earth Rangers, check them out at www.earthrangers.org and invite your school to book their free show.

Earth Rangers is an environmental education organization based in the Greater Toronto Area. They go into schools and offer a live show with a strong environmental message in a fun way, along with some amazing wildlife that the students can see in action. There are separate shows for primary, junior and intermediate students that inspire them to take action to protect the planet.

Their kids’ website, www.earthrangers.com provides a follow up to the school show. I has a bunch of great eco-tips for kids, along with fun games to play (my daughter likes Funky Skunky best – and I have to say that I see where she’s coming from). The games also have a great message woven into them, like recycling, composting, or energy efficiency.

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