By conserving natural resources, we can cut down the amount of pollution in the environment. Since recycling turns waste materials into useful products, this reduces landfill waste and keeps pollutants out of our water.
You probably already sort your trash into recyclable items and comply with Santa Monica’s newly enacted organic recycling laws. While that’s a good start, there is much more that we can do in our city.
With that in mind, we will look at sustainability from two different angles: recycling by using alternative materials and by reducing consumption. Think of these two ideas as advanced tips to reduce ecological waste.
Use Alternative Materials: Recycle With Bamboo
Bamboo is a plant with long, straight, and densely packed fibers. It is sustainable, durable, renewable, easy to clean, and biodegradable. What’s more, it can grow up to 40 feet in three months and be harvested every 3 to 5 years.
Bamboo Paper vs. Regular Paper
Bamboo is an alternative to wood. It has the same feel and look as traditional paper, but it’s more sustainable because it uses less water to make. Try a bamboo toilet paper subscription to make sure you always have this eco-friendly option available.
Bamboo Fabric vs. Regular Fabric
Cotton is often marketed as a green fabric. That’s a distortion of the facts. While cotton itself may be natural, it is sprayed with harsh chemicals and grown with toxic fertilizers.
According to many studies, bamboo is better at absorbing harmful chemicals and preventing cancer than other plants used for fabrics, including cotton.
Since bamboo cotton has antibacterial properties, it even makes healthier face cleansing products like reusable cotton rounds.
Reduce Consumption: Use Less Paper, Plastic, and Cans
1. We Can Cut Back on Paper
We’re getting closer to modernizing the world’s paper usage with digital printing and online services. Using less paper reduces deforestation and CO2 emissions.
Printing digitally instead of traditionally causes less pollution and waste, since there are no chemical deposits from the ink or other materials that would otherwise pollute the environment.
2. We Can Reduce Our Plastic Use
Since plastic use has increased considerably since the 1950s and continues to increase at an alarming rate, we may have more plastic in our oceans than fish by 2050.
We can make positive environmental changes if we recycled single-use bottles and carried reusable bags. For example, plastic can be ground and reshaped into fabrics. We can also bring our own cloth shopping bags to the supermarket instead of accepting plastic ones.
3. We Can Use Fewer Metal Cans, Too
People are trying to cut back on the use of metal cans to combat the negative effects of recycling.
Some alternatives to aluminum cans are containers made of more biodegradable materials. For instance, Ennstal Milch makes a unique container, they call “Cartocan,” which is made of eight layers of cardboard.
Why Recycling Is Essential
There are two reasons why recycling matters now more than ever.
Recycling Reduces the Rate of Environmental Degradation
It’s encouraging to learn that there is a strong push for teaching environmentalism in schools. It’s also encouraging that the federal, state, and local governments have made some efforts to address environmental pollution. Unfortunately, it’s still not enough. We also have to do our part by recycling paper, plastic, cans, and bottles. This proactive behavior has many advantages. It is not just helpful for the environment, but also effective for saving money and space in landfills.
The Situation Is Getting More Dire
In 2021 the entire world saw the effects of global warming. Rising sea levels flooded coastal areas and damaged property and infrastructure, increasing public health risks. Droughts caused crop failures and food shortages. There was constant coverage of severe weather events like hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods in the U.S. and around the world. We need to do everything we can to save the environment.
