Every little bit helps

[Tinkerbell]

Unlike Richard Branson I can't donate billions of £s towards research into new renewable energy technologies, but I do try to do my bit including composting kitchen waste, declining plastic bags when shopping, selecting fruit and veg unwrapped at the supermarket in addition to separating the papers, bottles and tins for refuse collections.

What do you do?

Tinkerbell

[honeybee]

Originally Posted by Tinkerbell

Unlike Richard Branson I can't donate billions of £s towards research into new renewable energy technologies, but I do try to do my bit including composting kitchen waste, declining plastic bags when shopping, selecting fruit and veg unwrapped at the supermarket in addition to separating the papers, bottles and tins for refuse collections.

What do you do?

Tinkerbell

Yep I do the same. Try not to use too many nasty chemicals including washing stuff and toiletries (I'm not as brave as my hippy friend though who just uses water to wash). Try to make garden wildlife friendly. Buy local/organic where poss. Kerbside recycling here is fairly good but could be better. Have to take most plastics to the special collection place. Was pretty horrified when I went to east-riding of yorks this summer to find the council offered no kerbside recycling, not good when you see how much you throw away and think it could be in the ground for hundreds+ years to come. Also shocked to hear a report about how much landfill space is taken up by clothing (11% I think)which could have been sent to charity shops/recycled. When it breaks down it produces methane etc. Also a lot of new clothing is made by very un-green methods using nasty dyes etc.
Personally think recycling should be law and people shouldn't be so lazy.

[nightshade]

We recycle almost everything, the council is very green, it even takes my noncompostable
waste shreds it and sells it back to me after composting.
The only thing that annoys me is that the waste amenity setup requires me to pre sort my waste then when I arrive something has moved and I have to go around twice(this calls for a letter)

[Earth Hart]

Originally Posted by honeybee

Personally think recycling should be law and people shouldn't be so lazy.

Couldn't agree more, the sooner the better. I share a wheely bin with a lady who has a drink problem, I'm always taking out her bottles & cans and her paper & card . Ive had words but she said she didn't care, apart form having her commited, what else can you do? I've asked for my own bin but that seems wrong somehow.

[Paul mabbott]

Agree with all that. On the topic of clothing, any decent charity shop wouldn't accept clothes that I give up on *but* I always buy natural fibres and these are compostable (eventually). It's the synthetics which are the problem so if you get clothes only of natural materials you will not only cut down on landfill but reduce dependence on oil and seriously nasty chemical processes.
Paul
(wardrobe by OXFAM)

Originally Posted by honeybee

......... Also shocked to hear a report about how much landfill space is taken up by clothing (11% I think)which could have been sent to charity shops/recycled. When it breaks down it produces methane etc. Also a lot of new clothing is made by very un-green methods using nasty dyes etc.
Personally think recycling should be law and people shouldn't be so lazy.

[honeybee]

Originally Posted by Earth Hart

Couldn't agree more, the sooner the better. I share a wheely bin with a lady who has a drink problem, I'm always taking out her bottles & cans and her paper & card . Ive had words but she said she didn't care, apart form having her commited, what else can you do? I've asked for my own bin but that seems wrong somehow.

On national news a while ago a woman was taken to court by council (can't recall where) for misusing her recycling bin, putting allsorts in. Maybe she'll care if she gets some nasty warning letters.

[Paul mabbott]

Do I know her? Some time ago I saw an old dear who lived in my street who was walking down the High Road popping thngs into the street bins. Poor thing, I thought, perhaps the Council haven't given her a wheelie bin ... but I had a look and she was disposing of empty gin bottles ....
Like other people here, our family recycles as much as possible and, at the end of the week, we have a bag (plastic!) full of plastic wrapping. This is what goes to the landfill as well as producing so much pollution in its manufacture .... but it seems unavoidable.

Originally Posted by Earth Hart

............... a lady who has a drink problem, I'm always taking out her bottles & cans and her paper & card . Ive had words but she said she didn't care, apart form having her commited, what else can you do? I've asked for my own bin but that seems wrong somehow.

[honeybee]

yeah and the supermarkets are only just cutting down on excess packaging...the manufacturers should be made to too. Surely in the end it would save them all money. Behind the scenes at smelly asda where I work they have 2 big compressor things, one for plastic, one for cardboard that gets recycled. However I deal with the grocery waste and what gets chucked is disgusting. They're only just seperating chemicals and batteries etc whereas before it just went to landfill. By their own standards they should've done this a year ago. Ashamed to work for them but needs must, maybe when global warming really hits it'll be warm enough to go and live in a tent in a field, if it's not underwater.

[eeyore]

Apart from recycling its amazing what you can reuse given the drive - When I was skint during foot and mouth i kept body and soul together by (among other things) buying old wardrobes from junk shops , steaming the veneer off , using the timber to make coffee tables then using the recovered veneers to make marquettry tops.

I am also notorious for salvaging stuff out of skips, i once got a solid mahogany counter top 3metres long by 1 metre wide and 2 inches thick out of a skip when a local bank was being refitted , that made 2 coffee tables and four bowls

Even the humble pallet often has hard wood blocks seperating the slats ( a lot are made in seria leone), I'd prise them appart and turn to blocks into mini vases that i used to sell for about a tenner each

[Paul mabbott]

Not just ASDA - I go to big S & big T because their stores are nearest (a long walk to Waitrose which seems a lot better). What has long irritated me is that they waffle on about recycling plastic bags &c when (a) they could just stop handing them out (as now happens in the big French supermarkets) and (b) they could give us all the cardboard boxes which they just scrunch up. It's far easier to transport things in boxes than bags (and store them when you get home) - basically, they would be making two contributions to the environment in one move. Or couldn't the customers adjust?

Originally Posted by honeybee

Behind the scenes at smelly asda where I work they have 2 big compressor things, one for plastic, one for cardboard that gets recycled. However I deal with the grocery waste and what gets chucked is disgusting. They're only just seperating chemicals and batteries etc whereas before it just went to landfill.

[JT71]

Well I'm trying to do my bit....

1. recycle glass and tins. cruch pop/beer cans first. I store them in a box that was designed to hold sunlounger cushions but it serves well as a recyling box.

2. I have a composter and compost kitchen waste and garden waste.

3. changed where possible to Ecover products.

4. Just had a new more efficent boiler.

5. bought an A rated for energy dishwasher and wash only when it's full. I think this would have slight advantages over washing up by hand after each meal.

6. Catch the rain water from the garage. When our loft conversions finished I'm going to try to collect some of the water from the house too.

I'm not an eco-warrior by any means, but I'm doing something...I'm sure we could all do more.

I'm a bit annoyed with Coventry City Council. I got my composter through Warwickshire council as my mum lives there, and it was cheap, like £15. So about a year later Coventry send us wheelie bins that we can put compostable waste in...so no use to me really....then about 2 months after that offer composters at £15. Now why not offer the choice of a wheelie bin for green waste or a composter????????? It stands ot reason that most stuff that can go in the wheelie bin can go in a composter. Are the people in charge complete idiots? I would have declined the green wheelie bin and they would save money. Also a lot mor epeople might have opted for composters...therefore less wheelie bins collected = less pollution from the refuse truck.

[Paul mabbott]

I suppose that it's just an "easiest is cheapest is best ... ". The council sends out bins to everyone, probably easier to do that than to ask they also, probably, (more reasonably) take the view that you might compost but the next resident in your house may not (this is similar to the insistence that we *must* have a garage even though we don't put a car in it .... the next people might ...
Have you tried taking the extra bin back?

Originally Posted by JT71

I'm a bit annoyed with Coventry City Council. I got my composter through Warwickshire council as my mum lives there, and it was cheap, like £15. So about a year later Coventry send us wheelie bins that we can put compostable waste in...so no use to me really....then about 2 months after that offer composters at £15. Now why not offer the choice of a wheelie bin for green waste or a composter????????? It stands ot reason that most stuff that can go in the wheelie bin can go in a composter. Are the people in charge complete idiots? I would have declined the green wheelie bin and they would save money. Also a lot mor epeople might have opted for composters...therefore less wheelie bins collected = less pollution from the refuse truck.

[glsammy]

We recycle as much as we can. When we go shopping we always take our old bags, we've got some now that are more than a year old! What's depressing is we never see anyone else doing this.
Our Council supply us with one recyclable bin, in which we're supposed to put all of our paper, cardboard, plastics etc, but they insist we mustn't sort it, just tip it all together, which to me seems crazy. So we shred all our paper, and then have to tip it loose over the plastics, metal and cardboard! They then have to sort that lot out.

[Owl-Light]

Originally Posted by Tinkerbell

Unlike Richard Branson I can't donate billions of £s towards research into new renewable energy technologies, but I do try to do my bit including composting kitchen waste, declining plastic bags when shopping, selecting fruit and veg unwrapped at the supermarket in addition to separating the papers, bottles and tins for refuse collections.

What do you do?

Tinkerbell

Yep same here too exactly. We use completely biodegradable bags for kitchen waste (available from the WWF online shop) and Jute carrier bags for getting the shopping home. Energy saving lightbulbs etc...

My partner has a Smart fortwo which although petrol driven it is one of the most environmentally friendly petrol driven vehicles on the market. Its all the two of us need.

The latest Smart ev is fully electric, with no petrol engine component at all, its also the first commercially available vehicle that claims to be 100 per cent carbon neutral. That will be our next upgrade. Like a Tardis they're surprisingly spacious on the inside. We can get all our weekly shopping in there easily or the two of us and all five cat carriers if need be.

We buy local produce wherever possible and eco friendly, cruelty free products like Ecover etc. Our electricity is in the process of being switched to Ecotricity at the moment. It only takes five minutes on line to make the switch and at no extra cost which is cool.

We're always on the look out for ways to simplify our choices or make them greener but don't make a big issue out of it. Nothing worse than those that constantly preach at you about it. The funny thing though is its not a chore, its actually good fun and often pleasantly surprising when you find options that turn out to be a whole lot nicer that the standard version in themselves.

I'd love Solar Panels on the house but just cant afford the initial outlay at present.

[littleT]

Originally Posted by glsammy

We recycle as much as we can. When we go shopping we always take our old bags, we've got some now that are more than a year old! What's depressing is we never see anyone else doing this.
Our Council supply us with one recyclable bin, in which we're supposed to put all of our paper, cardboard, plastics etc, but they insist we mustn't sort it, just tip it all together, which to me seems crazy. So we shred all our paper, and then have to tip it loose over the plastics, metal and cardboard! They then have to sort that lot out.

We are supplied each year with a Small Blue Hard plastic bag, for us to recycle our papers.
I don't buy papers and pay little attention to the free ones that get shoved through our door. The paper that gets recycled here is what drawings the kids have done and all that unwanted junkmail that we're not allowed to put in the bag for some reason - waste that needen't be waste!!

Our council run recycling is a blue box, 60x40x40 and we're supposed to fit all our plastic bottles(no lids or other plastic-bottles only) Glass bottles and jars, Tins and cans. This comes once every two weeks. I don't use the box because it's not big enough. And the hubby insists that I take all recycleable things to the charity collection points as he doesn't see why the council should gain all the profit and praise from our recycling efforts.
Even our card board gets recycled.
The domestic waste gets checked before landfill here so any recycleable goods are detected and the plastic bags removed, so generally the council are doing the job for the lazy louts and a couple of jobs have been created.

The bin chipping hasn't come into play yet but how is it going to effect the recycling thing really.

I have two large freezer bags that I use over and over for shopping, any super market plastic bags are used as bins. (which the concil takes care of.)

Our garden waste so far hasn't been waste as it's re-used else where in the garden. i.e. the mud being dug from the front (to create our drive) is being taken to the back to fill holes and relevel the lawn area before turfing/seeding commences. The part of dry stone wall that we removed went to a neighbour who is using the bits to build a wall of his own. Some bits went in brown bin for council collection but we certainly don't need it to be so large!!

I'm still new to most stuff so I have to admit that I could probably do more, but as you said - Every little bit helps.
You've got to start somewhere, i suppose.