Concord Monitor: Green Up Your Act
Filed under: Earth 911 - September 28, 2007
Your girlfriend’s driving a hybrid, your grandmother’s doing yoga and your neighbor keeps giving you sad looks when you bring those clinking bags of trash to the curb. You’re starting to think you’d like to join the Earth love-fest, but you’re not even sure what you’d bring in trade for those “Fair Trade” bags of coffee at the grocery store. Here are some ideas to start you down the road to ecological dexterity.
CHEAT SHEET:
Organic: According to the Organic Trade Association, the term organic describes a system of farming that “maintains and replenishes soil fertility” without using toxic pesticides and fertilizers, antibiotics, synthetic hormones, genetic engineering or other forbidden practices. Organic foods are also “minimally processed without artificial ingredients, preservatives, or irradiation to maintain the integrity of the food.”
Carbon neutral: An ideal state in which your habits net no damage to the climate. To achieve carbon neutrality, a person calculates his or her carbon emissions (there are numerous websites to help in this endeavor), then “offsets” them with practices like planting trees and donating to green organizations.
SRI: Socially Responsible Investing. Selecting financial investments based on social, environmental and/or ethical criteria.
Fair Trade: A movement that aims to ensure fair wages for small farmers (mainly coffee producers in developing countries) who, in turn, agree to grow their crops with respect to the environment.
Closing the Loop: According to the website earth911.org, this is “a term used to describe the last and most important step in the recycling process. It refers to the point when a consumer buys a recycled product after it has been put into a recycling program and reprocessed into a new item.”
Global Warming: The warming of the near surface temperature of the Earth due to increased emissions of greenhouse gases.
REQUIRED SKIMMING:
Conspicuous Consumption by Thorstein Veblen
Silent Spring, by Rachel Carson
Ecotopia: The Notebooks and Reports of William Weston, by Ernest Callenbach
Walden, by Henry David Thoreau
The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan
The Lorax, by Dr. Seuss
TO-DO LIST
Put a bin beside your desk for paper that’s printed on only one side. Reuse it for phone messages, memos and those origami masterpieces you make during company meetings.
Tune up the old bicycle and ride it to work once a week. Laugh at the poor shlubs heading to the gym at the end of the day.
Start a book or magazine exchange among co-workers, friends or whomever might enjoy your recycled issues of Ferrets Monthly.
Treat yourself to a hip cookbook such as Fresh Choices: Easy Recipes for Pure Food When You Can’t Buy 100% Organic, and throw an impressive dinner party.
Yeah, um, you gotta start recycling.
Do a home energy audit and make a game out of cutting back your consumption (think candlelight dinners).
Join a volunteer organization such as the Audubon Society or the Sierra Club, see if your town or church has an environmental committee you can serve on or just go pick up some stinkin’ litter.
ECO EATS
The organic food trend can be overwhelming - not to mention expensive. But you can navigate the “crunchy” section of the grocery store with confidence if you have a plan.
Buy only sale items, for instance, or look for items that serve double or triple duty, such as fair trade hot chocolate: it’s organic, helps poor farmers and tastes way better than the cheap stuff (even if it doesn’t have mini marshmallows).
If you need more guidance, check out consumerreport.org’s analysis of all things organic or hang out in the health-food aisle until a cute hippie comes along.
Try going meatless one or two days a week. Whip up a homey batch of baked beans or indulge in a gooey pb&j sandwich.
Think of food prep as a hobby instead of a chore. Block out a leisurely time slot for the Farmer’s Market, while away a Sunday afternoon pureeing and freezing squash and spend winter evenings plotting next year’s veggie garden.
LOOK THE PART:
Now that green has gone mainstream, you don’t have to wear dreadlocks and Birkenstocks to show your love for Mama Earth. Browse ecomall.com for everything from bamboo tank tops to hemp shoes or snag products like Burt’s Bees lotions and lip balms at your local drugstore. Better yet, hit the thrift shop for offbeat, recycled fashion.
Cloth shopping bags are all the rage, and they can (almost) make grocery shopping fun.
Try inventing your own body spritz by playing with various combinations of essential oils, available at natural food stores and some grocery and drug stores.
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