Green Parent Chicago

The single use plastic bottle culture

I dream I’m the guy who’ll cause a massive reduction in consumer purchase and use of single use plastic bottles (all because of this post, so please share).  I am a visual artist, and whether you’re a grade school student, high school student, college student, casual reader, ardent reader, working professional, budding or entrenched activist — no matter who you are, I’d like you to look at the following visual documentary.

Single use plastic bottles represent an unsustainable and ecologically unpardonable practice.  What are “single use plastic bottles?”  And why are they so hideous?

Single use plastic bottles originate from crude oil (petroleum).  It’s typical to envision crude oil coming from Middle Eastern kingdoms.  But crude oil is also drilled and spilled in Africa, in places such as the Nigerian delta region; it’s drilled and spilled from ocean floors; now there’s the archaic scramble to surface mine all the Canadian oil sands.  Anyway, single use plastic bottles (and all other plastics) come from oil.

After extraction of the crude oil, carbon burning trucks or direct pipelines transport the crude oil to shipping ports.  It’s a fact that now half of the world’s oil takes transoceanic journeys to reach oil hungry nations.  More carbon is burned so the ports can have electricity.  More carbon is burned to get the port workers to their jobs.  More carbon is burned as oil tankers make their two week trips across oceans. 

Once the oil tankers reach port, more carbon is burned to unload their oil and then transport the crude to the oil refineries.  Energy intensive processes such has high temperature heating refines the crude oil.  The crude is converted into hundreds of new petrochemical compositions (such as auto fuel).  Chemical additives are mixed with certain new compositions to make polymers, which are turned into dried pellets.

More carbon is burned to ship the polymer pellets (which originated from crude oil) to water bottling plants, or soda bottling plants, or juice bottling plants, which operate on carbon-based and nuclear energy resources.  The polymer pellets are turned into polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic bottles.  Bottles are filled with consumable liquid.  And more carbon is burned to ship the filled bottles to retail stores.

The retail stores operate on carbon-based and nuclear energy resources.  Employees drive to work in carbon-burning vehicles.  Consumers mainly drive to retail stores in carbon-burning vehicle to purchase consumable liquids packaged in single use plastic bottles, either individually or by the case.  They then drive away in their carbon-burning vehicles.

And then, after 12-16 ounces of consumable liquid is poured into the body, the plastic bottle is mainly thrown in the trash, where it will ultimately be buried in a landfill, or it is despicably tossed away as ground litter, where it can eventually enter the watershed and add to the growing collection of oceanic plastic pollution.

This is a mindless cultural activity.  It wasn’t in place when I was a kid; it is a recent phenomena.

I do not participate in the single use plastic bottle culture.  I haven’t purchased or drank from a single use plastic bottle in two years.  You’ve just seen how much energy is burned and how much pollution is created so one can drink liquid from a single use plastic bottle.  It’s ridiculous.  Recycling single use plastic bottles only continues the energy intensive cycle.  The solution is to completely quit all participation in this practice.  Quitting is easier than you think.  Here’s how I did it…

My wife and I each own two stainless steel water bottles, and so does our five year old daughter.  They are washed after each use.  We maintain 10 one gallon plastic water jugs.  We keep them out of sunlight to avoid chemical leaching.  We determined that they stay bacteria free since there is no direct plastic-to-mouth contact.  We refill them at the grocery store water refill station approximately 8—10 times each before recycling them.  We have a water pitcher with a replaceable filter (we have a taste issue with our tap water, but I drink tap water elsewhere).  The pitcher fills our coffee maker and supplements our daily water consumption.  We do cook with tap water. 

August Chicago Kidical Mass "Garden Ride"

This month saw the August edition of a Chicago Kidical Mass ride take off. This month’s ride was a “Garden Ride”.  We rode our way around the greater Logan Square neighborhood and made stops at two community gardens to meet the gardeners, wander through the greenery, sample kale and other fresh garden goodies, and enjoy the flowers and the beautiful day.

As always, we all met up in Palmer Square, and kicked things off by riding two loops around the square.

I"m getting ready to ride around Palmer Square (photo courtesy of Chicago Kidical Mass)

Then we  headed off towards our first stop, the Whipple-Dickens Community Garden.

The garden was lovely – all sorts of vegetables, herbs, flowers, you-name-it, was growing in this neighborhood plot.   It was fun to just walk around and discover all that was growing.

Eventually we loaded everyone back up on the bikes.

You can bring your friends along on a Kidical Mass ride

And we headed off to our next stop the Altgeld – Sawyer Corner Farm.

Wandering through Altgeld-Sawyer Corner Farm

As always with a Kidical Mass ride, there were a wide variety of kids bikes, cargo bikes, bike trailers, trail-a-bikes, and so forth for folks to ride around the city sans car with their kids.

Box bikes, bucket bikes, baskets and baby seats

And some folks wanted to take our Yuba Mundo out for some test rides. We happily obliged.

Eventually we tore ourselves away from the farm and rode off to our final stop, Unity Park.

Once at the park we parked our bikes again and set the kids free to run, scream, climb, play, and have a good time.  The adults managed to have some fun too.

A big kid in a bucket bike

 

Our family pile O' bikes

The Chicago Kidical Mass group rides the second Saturday of the month for most of the year. You can find us here on Facebook  or on our group page on the chainlink.   Come out and ride with us!

-Samantha
This article originally appeared on Samantha's family biking blog Ding Ding Let's Ride where she writes about everyday biking in the city, family biking, and adaptive biking for special needs children.

Little Locavores: Drink, Eat at Corks and Crayons and Support Purple Asparagus!

Imagine a class full of children swearing that they hate vegetables. Not hard to envision, right? Come back in an hour and watch them swarm the teacher’s desk for any leftovers from their veggie tasting. Believe that? I’ve witnessed this transformation on hundreds of occasions while teaching in the Chicago Public Schools for the non-profit that I founded and run, Purple Asparagus.

Purple Asparagus educates children, families and the community about eating that’s good for the body and the planet. Every year, we present Delicious Nutritious Adventures, our cornerstone education program, to thousands of parents and children throughout Chicago at schools, community centers, and farmers' markets. Delicious Nutritious Adventures invites families to explore the foods we eat in an entirely different way. We teach about the farmers who grow the food, the places it comes from, what’s good about food grown close to the earth, and how to prepare healthy, delicious recipes. Combining nutrition education, food literacy, cooking, and fun, our highly popular hands on classes celebrate farm fresh fruits and vegetables.

Obesity is a national crisis, one that’s hit Chicago particularly hard. Overweight and obese children are at greater risk for diabetes, hypertension, increased risk of heart disease, and poor self-esteem. The issue is particularly prevalent in the underserved communities where good food is in short supply. Purple Asparagus is working to combat this issue in these communities by taking a new approach to healthy eating.

While teaching kids about healthy choices is a priority to Purple Asparagus, we’re sneaky about that message. Everything about our classes (even our name) is fun. Kids are more willing to try “healthy” foods when they’re not presented as such. A first grade boy will surely turn up his nose at a chickpea when told that it’s high in fiber and protein. Explain instead that its Italian name comes from its resemblance to a wart on a famous Roman’s face and he’ll climb all over his classmate’s to try it. Describe mint as a gum plant and a child’s resistance to the green leaves will melt. We explore food in a way that’s interesting and fun that makes kids happy to try new foods.

In the 2010-11 school year, we provided 250 hours of free educational programming to schools, community centers, farmer's markets, and health fairs in Chicago serving roughly 2,500 students in over 30 Chicago neighborhoods on a shoestring budget with an all volunteer staff. We also served as a lead partner with Healthy Schools Campaign on the largest coordinated response to Michelle Obama's call to chefs, Chefs Move to Schools. Through this program, we trained over 175 chefs who visited close to 200 schools reaching 8,000 children.

All this is great, you say, but how can I help? It couldn’t be a better week to ask this question. Purple Asparagus’ annual fundraiser, Corks & Crayons Benefit at Uncommon Ground, 1401 W Devon Ave, Chicago, on Sunday, August 28, 2011 from 3-7 p.m. The family-friendly event that brings foodies old and young together to celebrate the joys of family meals and healthy eating all for a good cause. The event will include a mini farmers’ market sponsored by Harvest Moon Organics farm, live music from Old Town School musicians, the Kohl Foundation Storybook Bus as well as Truck Farm Chicago, a traveling mini-farm exhibit connecting kids to food and health.

If you cannot attend, please consider bidding on our online auction. We have some terrific auction items to buy now as well as some new items coming on in the next few days - even for out of towners!

-Melissa Graham is a former attorney and chef and owner of Monogramme Events & Catering, a boutique catering company specializing in seasonal and sustainable cuisine. She's also president and founder of Purple Asparagus, a non-profit dedicated to bringing families back to the table by promoting and enjoying all the things associated with good eating. When she’s not in the kitchen or the classroom, you can often find Melissa shopping at the Green City Market where she serves as the membership chair.

-photo credit, Artisan Events

The Green Stork Recommends: There’s Something In the Water

After reading about all the contaminants – including cadmium, lead, mercury, nickel, titanium and chlorine (not to mention pharmaceuticals, PCB’s and rocket fuel!)  that were in the water – all American city water – I nagged my husband into putting a whole house water filter on our water system before my first son was born. Honestly, it was the best gift he ever gave me.

I am frequently asked by women what they should register for. And my first recommendation is always a whole house water filter. Your child bathes and drinks this stuff daily – and it just isn’t clean or pure enough for your babies highly absorbent skin and vulnerable developing system. He needs clean water more than cute onesies, stuffed rabbits and silver rattles. I know that water filters aren’t adorable, photogenic or engravable – but the benefits to your child’s immediate and long term health are inestimable. THIS is one of the top ten best gifts you’ll ever give your child. All for the price of one really nice handbag. Not including installation.

Why am I mentioning this again now? Earlier this month, the Chicago Tribune featured an article on lead in Chicago drinking water …

High lead levels were found in drinking water in seven of 38 Chicago homes tested by federal regulators this spring, according to records obtained by the Tribune.

 Why should you care?

Experts say there is no safe level of exposure to lead, which has been known to cause diminished IQs in children, even at low levels, and heart attacks and strokes in adults.

 This is bad stuff, ya’ll. And very easily kept from your child’s system.

If you are preggos you honestly want to think about registering for a whole house water system.  Our water isn’t safe enough for you or anyone you really love (maybe for a despised boss – but that’s it). At first, other moms will roll their eyes and think that you’re a right nutter – but ask them to Google “water quality” and let’s see who is rolling their eyes then.

Note: Champagne has none of these contaminants.

Cheers!

-"The Green Stork" Claire Douglass is a first time Chicago mom, concerned with ever increasing data connecting childhood health issues from asthma to autism to exposure to common household toxins, chemicals and air quality – seeks to detoxify her nest, and create as green a nursery and playroom as possible.Without driving herself, or her husband, crazy. The former is going far better than the latter.

EarthTalk: Our Destructive Consumer Culture

Dear EarthTalk: I don’t hear much about the environmental impacts of our consumer culture any more, but it seems to me that our “buy, buy, buy” mentality is a major contributor to our overuse of energy and resources. Are any organizations addressing this issue today? – M. Oakes, Miami, FL

There is no doubt true that our overly consumerist culture is contributing to our addiction to oil and other natural resources and the pollution of the planet and its atmosphere.

Unfortunately the tendency to acquire and even horde valuable goods may be coded into our DNA. Researchers contend that humans are subconsciously driven by an impulse for survival, domination and expansion which finds expression in the idea that economic growth will solve all individual and worldly ills. Advertising plays on those impulses, turning material items into objects of great desire imparting intelligence, status and success.

William Rees of the University of British Columbia reports that human society is in a “global overshoot,” consuming 30 percent more material than is sustainable from the world’s resources. He adds that 85 countries are exceeding their domestic “bio-capacities” and compensate for their lack of local material by depleting the stocks of other countries.

Of course, every one of us can do our part by limiting our purchases to only what we need and to make responsible choices when we do buy something. But those who might need a little inspiration to get started should look to the Adbusters Media Foundation, a self-described “global network of artists, activists, writers, pranksters, students, educators and entrepreneurs who want to advance the new social activist movement of the information age.”

Among the foundation’s most successful campaigns is Buy Nothing Day, an international day of protest typically “celebrated” the Friday after Thanksgiving in North America (so-called Black Friday, one of the year’s busiest shopping days) and the following Saturday in some 60 other countries. The idea is that for one day a year we commit to not purchase anything, and to help spread the anti-consumerist message to anyone who will listen, with the hope of inspiring people to consume less and generate less waste the other 364 days of the year. The first Buy Nothing Day took place in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1992 with a few dozen participants, but today hundreds of thousands of people all over the world take part.

In recent years some anti-consumerists have added Buy Nothing Christmas to their agendas as well. Some ideas for how to leverage Buy Nothing Christmas sentiment without looking too much like Scrooge include giving friends and family “gift exemption” cards and asking shoppers in line at a big box store, “What would Jesus buy?”

Beyond Buy Nothing Day and Buy Nothing Christmas, the Adbusters Media Foundation stokes the fire of anti-consumerism throughout the year via its bi-monthly publication, Adbusters, an ad-free magazine with an international circulation topping 120,000. Do yourself a favor and subscribe...and cancel all those catalogs stuffing up your mailbox in the meantime.

CONTACTS: Adbusters, www.adbusters.org; Buy Nothing Day, www.adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd.

EarthTalk® is written and edited by Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss and is a registered trademark of E - The Environmental Magazine (www.emagazine.com). Send questions to: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Subscribe: www.emagazine.com/subscribe. Free Trial Issue: www.emagazine.com/trial.

Local Resident, Stephanie Dunn, in Hunger Strike for Clean Power Ordinance | P.E.R.R.O.

Chicago, IL — Local Chicago resident, Stephanie Dunn, started a hunger strike on August 1st in downtown Chicago to call on the Mayor and City Council of Chicago to pass the Chicago Clean Power Ordinance.

Show your support for Stephanie by joining and visiting with her in Daley Plaza, in downtown Chicago, and to contact the Mayor of Chicago or the non-sponsoring Aldermen by calling 311. You can contact Stephanie at (312) 768-9949.

Stephanie will be holding her hunger strike until the end of Friday August 5.

via pilsenperro.org