My Ecological Footprint Update

Well, as the weeks have progressed, I have decided I need to throw out one of my goals. That goal that I am having a problem doing with is remembering to use the recyclable bags when I go to the grocery store. We have three bags at the house but are left on the pantry doorknob when I walk out of the house to go get groceries. I feel that if I can reduce the amount of plastic bags that I use at the grocery store and carry more in the plastic bags then that will be a step to using less plastic bags. We then reuse the plastic bags at the house multiple times and stock them in a drawer rather than throwing them all away, which would be bad for the environment. I thought it was a good goal to use at the beginning of the year and I attempted it by having reusable bags, however the goal went down the drain when I kept forgetting to walk into the store with the bags.

Kodak Reveals New Evnironmental Logo

Kodak has released its new logo that will be attached to all of its new products to signify the envornmental benefits of the various products. The logo is a yellow and green leaf with the slogan being "Kodak Cares". Along with the launch of the logo, Kodak has also launched an environmental website to promote corporate sustainability and the various initiatives to support the environment.

Along with implementing the new logo, Kodak PrinterEnviro Services has qualified to carry the leaf as they are enforcing recycling and providing reusable options for the customers to control their ecological footprint.

At first I was a little skeptical about this however, since they are providing options for customers to control their footprint is going to be beneficial. I do not think just implementing a logo is doing enough, however actually seeing results is what matters to taking initiaitves to becoming more sustainable.

To view the entire article visit: http://www.environmentalleader.com/2010/05/18/kodak-unveils-new-environmental-logo-sustainability-website/

Ford Drives Green with Sustainability Printing

Ford has currently been making an effort to reduce their use of paper by 6,000 tons in the past year! Now that is a lot of paper - it is equivalent to a loaded freight train with two locomotives and 100 cars. With their practice to reduce the amount of paper there have been a few initiaties that have benefitied from this transformation:

• More than 12,000 trees are preserved


• 5.2 million gallons of waste water flow is now saved.


• 600,000 pounds of solif waste is not generated


• More than 1.1 million pounds of greenhouses gases prevented


• More than 8.6 billion BTUs of energy is not consumed

Now, those number are astounishing to me! Implementing the new paper trategy required changing peoples perceptions regarding the use of printers, however there has been full support among Ford managers as well as their suppliers to help create a better world, by reducing the use of paper.

Beginning this year Ford, Lincoln and Mercury owners manuals will be printed in the US on paper containing at least 10 percent recycled fiber and certificed by the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council). They are estimating that 2.2 million owners manuals wil be printed this way! I think that this is a fantastic step to becoming more sustainable. It all starts with small changes and slowly but surely they will help reduce the environmental impacts around the world. Every attepmt counts!

To review the full article:http://paddocktalk.com/news/html/story-135508.html

P&G launches Supplier Sustainability Scorecard

Proctor & Gamble has gotten onboard with assessing their suppliers environmental footprint through the use of a scorecard. They will be evaluating and measuring energy use, water use, wast disposal and greenhouse gas emmissions on a year-to-year basis, states the article released on May 12, 2010.

The scorecard will be available to the public and open for use to any organization to evaluate the envionmental performance of the key suppliers. P&G are in hopes that they can encourage environmental improvement across a span of 75,000 businesses and $42 billion in spending.

The company says that in 2010 it is going to be transitioing from its current internal system of auditing to use thrid-party auditors and will subscribe to SEDEX database where the results can be shared.

Personally, I think that it is great for large companies to attempt to get on board with regulating their efforts to reduce environmental impacts. The only problem I have with this is whether or not the suppliers will actually follow through with their scorecards. Companies can talk the talk, but can they walk the walk is a major aspect of implementing the scorecards.

To read the full article visit:
http://www.environmentalleader.com/2010/05/12/pg-launches-supplier-sustainability-scorecard/

Re-evaluation

Well I think it is about that time now that I re-evaluate my attempts to reduce my ecological footprint. I have been doing pretty well in the areas of unplugging appliances, and minimizing the amount of electrical equipments that all of my roommates and I use. The most difficult goal I am still having trouble meeting is reducing the number of laundry loads per week. I have however attempted to do wash in cold water. It is pretty interesting, because now these are becoming more of a habit, rather than having to make little "sticky notes" as a reminder.

Through all of this, I think I have another goal to reduce my footprint. It is one that sort of ties in with the reduction of using electrical appliances, but I noticed that almost all of my roommates, including myself sleeps with a mini fan on at night. Some use it to drown out potential noise and some use it to make their rooms cooler. I think I might try to talk to them to see if now that the weather is nice, if we can open windows at night instead of having 5 mini fans running 7 - 8 hours on average, 7 days a week. It might be difficult, but what I have learned in taking this sustainability class is that people need to be educated first and from there, making changes really is not that difficult. I think I am going to try to give my input to my roommates and hopefully help make a difference.

Another goal I think that would be easily achievable is to switch to green energy on my Puget Sound Energy bill. I think that adding $10 more dollars to our monthly bill would not be too bad, considering dividing that by 5 would not be too difficult for us college girls.

So overall, so far so good. I think I am on the road to sustainability, and I just need to take my goals one at a time and make it become a daily habit rather than being forced to do something I have never done before.

TIGI Catwalk Curls Rock Amplifier

For some of you that know me, I have naturally curly hair. If the hair has no product in it, well then it looks like I have come out of the 80's. Now, don't get me wrong, I like the 80's era, however the frizzy hair is not really in "style" anymore. In class, we were to pick a product that we use frequently and go to the Environmental Working Group online and check the toxicity of our particular product. I chose the TIGI Catwalk Curls Rock Amplifier, because I tend to use this product more often than not. I was a little worried about this product being high in toxicity because of the smell and the texture of it. Well, come to find out, it ranks a 5 out of 10 which means that it is moderately hazardous. This was much better than what I was originally afraid of.

There were two ingredients that were the most toxic which was the fragrance and the Methylchloroisothianzolinone. Some researchers say that this ingredient causes cancer, and some say that they have no evidence that it does in fact cause cancer. This ingredient/chemical can burn skin when it is in its pure form, and since it is not in pure form and there is minimal amounts of it in the product, I am not too worried about it burning my skin.

I am going to continue to use the product, because it gives me the results I want. It has been very hard to find a product that actually works and will continue to give me results. I think that if it were higher on the hazardous scale, I would chose a different product that is safer. Until then, I am going to continue to use this product, however I will continue to use it in very small amounts.

Here you can find the results from the EWG website: http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/product/128682/TIGI_Catwalk_Curls_Rock_Amplifier/

Ecological Footprint Reduction Update

Well so far in my attempt to reduce my ecological footprint, I have done pretty well, however I still have definite room for improvement. I have been turning off all the lights and turning off power strips at night as well as unplugging things in my room when they are not in use. I have also unplugged all of the appliances in the kitchen when we are not using any of the appliances. The laundry issue has been a work in progress. Living with 4 others girls, it has been hard to minimize the amount of loads we have been doing, however I have switched to washing my clothes on cold rather than on hot. I think we still need to come up with a number of loads per week to do rather than each person doing small loads every week. Another area I also have not been doing very well on is using the reusable grocery bags. I think I need to just leave them in my car rather than on the kitchen table, because clearly that is doing me no good. I also have yet to purchase fruits and vegtables from the local farmer down the street, so hopefully soon I will walk down there and buy them! I am going to make more of an effort these next couple weeks to really focus on completing my tasks and continue to reduce my footprint!