This article in particular has to do with the cutting back
and eventually eliminating the one time use of plastic cutlery items such as
knives, forks, straws, spoons and many others. Chapter 4 & 5 of Savitz
speaks about how the reactions of businesses to certain sustainability changes,
the acceptance of it and how others may be against it. In this case the
European government does back the decision to eventually discontinuing the use
of these products overtime. It is important to have some type of plan in order
to completely make this happen and that they do have. They have a time-frame of
when a certain amount will not be in use starting by the year of 2021 and
hopefully ending in 2030 with a 30% recycle plastic usage. This ban has to be
approved by the legislature in the UK and hopefully the country will begin
their sustainability implementation within their economy. Please find link attached and feel free to
comment.
I am one that loves Walmart super center stores, however
living in Brooklyn, NY I don't have the access to these stores as other may
have outside of the city and in other states. There is a Walmart store located
borderline Queens NY and Long Island, which is close to me but it still is far
from the super center stores I've visited in places like the Poconos, North
Carolina, Virginia and my recent visit to San Diego, California. What I found
most interesting when I recently visited a Walmart Store in Chula Vista was
their bag strategy. I went into this Walmart to purchase a few items, nothing
out of the ordinary, but what took me by surprise was the cashier asking me if
I needed a bag while ringing up the multiple items that I was purchasing. I
first seemed a little offended by the question, thinking to myself "of
course I need a bag how else will I carry out these items". I kindly told
the cashier yes, I will need a bag which gave to me.
A day later I returned to another Walmart store with my
sister-in-law only buying 2 or 3 small items. When I was asked if I needed a
bag I simply responded no thank you being that I was capable of carrying these
smile items in my hand. I asked my sister-in- law about them asking if a bag
was needed for your items that you purchased and she informed me that usually
bring their own bags or reuse the store bags because they charge you $0.10 per
bag when you do need one. This is very useful for the environment by reducing
waste since plastic bag do no not biodegrade it causes less pollution within
the land and in the water. I think that in order to encourage more customers to
re-use their plastic bags or bring their own bags, Walmart along with many
other stores should give customers some type of bag credit every time they do
so. For example, when you purchase certain bottles, if you return them you get
a $0.05 refund so you can still benefit on your end overtime. My mother is one
that buys cases of water, she keeps all of her bottles to return to the store
and she often is able to buy at least another case of water with the money she
gets back. With that being said, individuals should be rewarded in some way
when doing such things as reusing bags so that they are encouraged to continue
doing it. I am curious to find out if this is currently being done in all
Walmart stores or just in certain areas.
I must say that I've really enjoyed this class and it has opened my so much as living in a sustainable world. There is so much to do but it is worth it in my opinion. I do think that this generation for the most part is very lazy and do not want to take the time and effort to obtain business sustainability. I've always told myself that there isn't anything worth having if it comes easy, you get better satisfaction knowing you worked hard to get what you've wanted or to get where you need to be. This is actually my second time taking this course and I've learned so much more this time around as I had more time than I had previously to complete this course. I won't say that I am going to 100% take sustainable actions in everything that I do, but I know I will absolutely take the time and the effort in doing so. I am also excited to continue sharing my knowledge with others in hopes that we can all eventually get together as nation in taking sustainability more serious than we do now. We have to understand that it isn't an individual situation but the economy as a whole. I am grateful for all that I have learn throughout this semester.
I went to friends baby shower over the weekend and one thing that automatically made me think about this class were the way they set up for their attendees beverages. I wanted to get something to drink and needed a cup, I saw a table with tiny glass jars and a straw already in each glass. I thought the glasses were keepsakes for the guests to take home and I found out that's exactly what they were. The glasses were to be used throughout the even for any beverages that people wanted, each glass had a tag, and the table had markers to write your name on the tag. We were responsible to keep your glass, use it all night and take it home with you as your keepsake, and the straws in each glass was a paper straw. I don't think I would have thought twice about this interesting decor, but after taking this course I believe this was an amazing sustainable move.
Attached is a copy of my carbon footprint in which my footprint is said to be 21.10 tons and is equivalent to 301 trees per year. 301 seems to be a lot to me, imagine how many people may have the same carbon footprint as I do that is very bad for our economy. My results tells me that I need to change my sustainability practices by adjusting my lifestyle.
After completing my sustainable action calculator on recycling via the YouSustain website on recycling my results seemed pretty interesting. It is said that I could possibly save up to 3597 lb of CO2 Carbon emissions. My impact of savings per year is said to be 1.23 tons while the average person is 0 tons and the average member is 4.23 tons. We are very strict about recycling in our household and so is the Department of Sanitation as they do come around and check your garbage giving out huge fines if something isn't in the correct place. We recently had to reeducate ourselves about where certain things should go. I've attached my results so that you can view them.
Just roughly going through one of my daily routines I can name a few of my sustainability practices some may be good practices and others may not be that great. So I'm going to first start with one on the most important things for me in the morning, which is coffee. I used to keep disposable 1 time use coffee cup at home to take along with me on the go, I now have a stainless steel on the go coffee cup which comes in very handy. Before I leave the house I am sure to turn off all the lights to save electricity. I also use energy saving bulbs throughout the house. Also, although I have cases of water at home, I do carry a water bottle with me to work everyday and refill from our water fountains throughout the day.
Shredder Bin at work
I must say that I do drive to work everyday which may not be that good of practice. Living in NYC and riding public transportation gives me anxiety, so I'd say that transportation is something I may need to work on. At work we have various recycling bins for employees. I am sure to dispose of any trash in its designated area to ensure that maintenance doesn't have a hard time when emptying my waste basket. I try not to use much paper as we are using an electronic medical records system, but if I do have to use paper I usually hold it until the end of the day and throw everything into our shredder bin. Our shredder bin gets emptied every Thursday and the paper is discarded in the appropriate manner.
This TED talk by Olivia Tyler was very informative although it was short. In The Triple Bottom Line book by Andrew Savitz, there is a chapter that discusses how difficult and complex the process of sustainability can be, and this video explains exactly that in reference to a simple cake. There are so many tiny steps and information that we should be paying attention to and questioning as well.
This video by Olivia Tyler gave a great insight on how deep and complex sustainability can be. As I've read in the TBL by Savitz sustainability is not easy and this shows just that. Olivia talked about something as simple as baking a cake, this is some that I do often and now I feel responsible and obligated to pay closer attention to the process when I am doing it. She speaks about what type of oils are used the cake, then you have to focus on the cream layers as well as the icing. We all often buy things on a daily basis and have no idea whether where things are made or where things grew. Its difficult to know the complete process of the supply change in products. Sustainability is a very intense process from the manufacturer down to the consumer purchase. I do believe that a lot of us are lazy, or have the lack of knowledge regarding sustainability. Olivia also mentioned consumers asking questions and basically doing our own investigations when purchasing things. The problem is, most of the time we are running into a store to pick up something and leave and never thing to even take 5 minutes to asks questions. Again, this can be a long and draining process, but we have to take into consideration why we are doing it.
Attached is a New York Times article in regards to a government investigation of Ford vehicles. their fuel efficiency and emissions testing. This article caught my attention as I recently had to get my car inspected in order to renew my registration. In NYS and many others, you must pass a state inspection to make sure that your vehicle is safe including emissions. The Clean Air Act started passed in 1990, required that states perform an emission test on vehicles in order to pass inspection. These in my opinion are early sign of sustainability, although I'm almost certain it started years prior.
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