Day 39 of our Green Year: Recycling

Now I know what you guys are thinking. Craig, recycling? Come on that is an easy one. You are right, it is an easy one. Everyone knows they should recycle, but for whatever reason, a lot of people do not recycle. While the percentage of recycled material used by the United States rose dramatically between the 1980s and 1990s, it has not climbed over the past few years. This means that people have more or less 'reached their peak' with recycling, and that peak is far from perfect. Recycling has actually fallen in several cities in the United States, including Seattle, where recycling was once king. Recycling rates in the United States are also their lowest in over ten years, and Americans are throwing away more beverage cans and bottles than ever before. In fact, in 1995, 37 percent of Americans recycled, while in 2002 it was only 21 percent.

That is why for our 39th Day of the Green Year, we are committing to recycling everything that we can. You can see from the picture that we already recycle cardboard, bottles, cans, milk jugs and papers, but we are going to start going a step further. A lot of what we do here in the Baird household is centered on taking what can be recycled and reusing it for another purpose in the house before we recycle it back into the manufacturing line, but we are going to go a step further, and if it can be recycled, we will. No more throwing out items. We aim to be no-impact with our garbage now. I would also like to point out that in that photo you see plastic bags, those are from before we turned Green, and we are slowly getting rid of them through recycling.

The point of this blog is to show people that we are recycling everything we can, and you should to. Far too many people only recycle pop cans and newspapers, when there is so much more that can be done. That is what this Green Year is about, teaching others how to go greener than the norm.

Here is a list of the many things that can be recycled:

File Folders, envelopes, paper, paper clips, staples, newspapers, flyers, magazines, catalogs, text books, coffee trays, phone books, beverage cans, food cans, glass jars, glass bottles, plastic bottles, plastic containers, ink cartridges and electronics.

Here are some 'fun' facts about recycling in the United States.

• Recycling aluminum saves 95 percent energy than making it from scratch. You can power a TV for three hours by recycling one aluminum can (in terms of energy saved).
• Enough aluminum is thrown away to rebuild the commercial air fleet of the United States, four times over, every single year.
• Recycling one glass container saves enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for four hours.
• Recycled glass generates 20 percent less air pollution and 50 percent less water pollution than making it from scratch.
• One ton of glass made from 50 percent recycled materials saves 250 pounds of mining waste.
• You can reuse glass an endless amount of times, yet 41 billion glass containers are made each year.
• It takes 60 percent less energy to recycle paper than make it from scratch, while generating 95 less air pollution.
• For every one ton of paper recycled, 17 trees and 7,000 gallons of water is saved.
• Every year enough paper is thrown away to build a 12 foot wall from New York to California.
• If Americans recycled every plastic bottle they used, it would keep two billion tons of plastic out of the landfills.
• Americans use enough plastic wrap to wrap all of Texas, every single year.
• If you incinerate 10,000 tons of waste, you create one job, putting 10,000 tons of waste in the landfill creates six jobs, but recycling 10,000 tons of waste creates 36 jobs.

Did I miss anything that can be recycled? Let me know. Don't forget, send us your photos of you doing green things as outlined in Our Green Year and we will post it on our website.

Day 38 of our Green Year: Going Green With Newspapers

I am a big fan of reading the newspaper. I love to learn the news of the day, find out about upcoming events and more. Not a week goes by that I don't pick the paper up a few times. Now, each time I do this I am creating paper waste, because I use the paper for only a few minutes to an hour, it seems like a big waste.
Naturally, you can take your paper to be recycled, which is a great thing, but why not reuse the paper to reduce your purchase and use of other items. There is no better way to be green than by taking items you already have and using them to prevent you from buying more items.

So, Layla and I have decided that not only will we recycle our papers, but we will also use them in other ways to go green.

1. We have already talked about how you can use newspaper in compost, as long as it is not color pages. However, why not use the newspapers as a great way to block weeds? There have been several people who have laid down newspaper in their backyard, after digging out a bit of space, then putting dirt and compost over top of the papers. This helped prevent weeds from growing, and allowed beautiful flowers that were planted on top of the newspapers to bloom nicely.
2. If you have kids, nothing works better for them to scribble on than paper.
3. You can line cabinet bottoms with newspaper instead of buying cabinet paper.
4. We have already shown how you can clean windows with newspaper, but did you know that using newspaper to clean windows prevents streaks on the window?
5. You can also use newspaper in a seed starter pot? It is truly amazing how this can be put together and it eliminates the need for you to buy pots for the seeds. Here is a great tutorial: http://www.geocities.com/newspaperpots/
6. It can be used as wrapping paper, instead of wrapping paper from the stores.

The great thing is that after you use it for scribbling, cleaning or whatever, you can still go and recycle it, so you have reused it for something else, and then recycled it. Win-Win!
Do you have any ideas for what you could use newspaper for? Let us know!

Remember, if you have pictures of yourself or your family doing green things we have mentioned in our blog, be sure to let us know by sending us a picture. We will put it up in the blog to show the world the steps you are taking in your own green year. E-mail pictures to crwbaird@gmail.com