A woman in India holding up a vermi compost she made with the help of earthworms. (Photo: Find Your Feet/Flickr/CC-BY)

Are you one of the many people who are already recycling? Did you know you can do even more by saving certain parts of your garbage that create compost? It is a great way to help keep the landfills from filling up so quickly. In some cities you can save all your food items, such as eggs, vegetables and even coffee grounds, throw them into a bin and the city will haul them off with your other recyclables like plastics, glass and aluminum. Check into your local waste management company to find out if they take compost for recycling.

Landfills and compost — a growing problem

Since landfills are a major source of methane emissions, which is a potent greenhouse gas, anything we can do to lessen the size of landfills will help prevent any more of this relatively potent chemical. In less developed countries, where bad credit loans are not an option, there are many families that make their living off of dump sites. They go in and remove all the items that can be recycled, which has helped keep the size of the landfills down considerably.

Landfill management

When it was decided that a big corporation needed to go in and manage the landfill, and the families were no longer allowed to work there, the landfill grew at a much faster rate. Handing the landfill management over to big businesses not only removed a way to earn a living for many families, but it has also increased the size of the landfill dramatically. Sadly, many of these families in need have no access to quick funding, like an unsecured loan or an installment loan, for instance.

Waste management

Cities have started selling decomposed compost to consumers. And in some cities residents can save money on their trash pickup bill if they do more recycling. You can also find local residents who have a garden and a compost pile of their own. You can donate your compost and maybe, in return, you just might find yourself the recipient of some of their yummy garden treats next summer.

Environmentalism... a little change makes a big difference. CC by chrissatchwell/Flickr

Just about everyone has heard at least part of the environmentalism message. With so many options, though, it can feel easier to just not make a choice and do nothing. If you really want to be “environmentally friendly” the first thing to do is stop beating yourself up. Choose one thing and make small changes.

Issues with environmentalism

Since the 1970s and 1980s environmentalism movement has been growing. Many people started caring about the planet. “Save the planet” started to be stressed more. Earth Day was founded as many protested by chaining themselves to trees and asking for more recycling. Somewhere in the last four decades, though, the message has gone from “reduce, reuse, recycle” to a laundry list nobody can keep track of.

It won’t help to have everything changed

The biggest problem with trying to “be environmentally friendly” is how overwhelming the change can be. It seems like there is too much to do with sorting garbage, using bags over again, driving less, using cloth diapers, stopping smog and millions of other things. It is easier to do nothing at all than try to do everything. It seems like everything has to be done at once. This causes people to think it is easier to just quit.

Start a little at a time

It is easier to not do anything when there is so much to do. It’s hard to remember that the smallest thing can be huge sometimes. Don’t do it all at once. Just do one small thing. It only takes two weeks to get a habit developed, but you should probably only try one new thing per month, or even every other month. Just start with one thing. Do the easiest change first. Here is one easy example. A reusable coffee mug in the morning would be a positive change. Take public transportation to work one day a week. Shop differently. Don’t get regular fruit, try organic. It is hard to make the large and expensive changes. You can start to live better with small changes. That is what it is all about. You will become the change easily if you just make a few changes a year.

Is recycling even cost-effective?

It’s cost-effective to recycle some material, but other materials can actually cost too much to be worth it. It takes so many resources to sort, clean and reprocess items that not all recycling is profitable.

Fresh material, on the other hand, can be a lot cheaper, but at what ultimate price? It just makes sense to reuse the millions of pounds of old scrap, glass, textiles, electronics, paper and plastics that are available. State budgets these days are in need of a bailout or at least a major payday installment loan.

Salvaging other recyclables

Many know the benefits of scrapping their old materials, but many just have no time or desire to do such things. You can actually create a pretty good income just by scrapping alone. I have a friend who swears that he brings in at least $200 or more a day.

What materials make money?

The best materials to gain a good income from are iron, stainless steel, aluminum, copper, wire, catalytic converters and car batteries. If you have a truck or trailer, the possibilities are endless. There are hundreds of dollars just sitting out in the elements, in a field or an alley, just waiting to be recycled.

Precious metals right under your nose

You can even get gold – yeah, gold! – out of your old computers. The reason people will buy catalytic converters for $100-plus is because they’re made with platinum. Dealers who buy these auto parts will send a shipment in to a refinery and make about $1,600 from one converter. Amazing, right!? If anything, this information will make you think again before you throw away potential value.

The Story of Stuff book even talks about books! Image from Flickr.

When The Story of Stuff video was released in 2007, it quickly went viral. The video asks us to re-think the “materials economy” – where people purchase stuff, sometimes using cheap payday loans, use it, and then dispose of it. Over 10 million views later, Annie Leonard has released a 300-page book that goes much more in depth than The Story of Stuff’s original 20-minute video.

The Story of Stuff, the original

The original 20-minute video The Story of Stuff features single mom Annie Leonard talking about the realities of how stuff is made, purchased, and disposed of, including it’s environmental impact.

The Story of Stuff becomes a book

While at first it may seem counter-intuitive that The Story of Stuff Project would grow into a book – another piece of “stuff” – author Annie Leonard outlines the multiple reasons for writing the book on her website. A book is able to provide so much more information about her 10 years of research into The Story of Stuff (including sneaking into illegal factories). The Story of Stuff book also answers hundreds of the questions people asked her when they first saw her Story of Stuff video – like how do they get involved and where do they get more information.

The Story of Stuff book bridges divides

Just as importantly as sharing even more information about The Story of Stuff, a book is able to go places and make an impact in ways an online video never could. Only a small minority of people have internet access fast and consistent enough to do things like watch videos – and a book can go anywhere.

The Story of Stuff book is hopeful

Watching The Story of Stuff can seem kind of depressing. Not only are we using up the world’s resources, but we are doing it so quickly that faxless payday loans get used to feed the obsession. Amazingly, in the book even more so than the video, The Story of Stuff becomes a hopeful tale. Yes, it covers in detail what is going wrong, but it also covers in even more detail the hopeful signs. The Story of Stuff distills down to the fact that yes, things are bad – but we can get involved and we can make a difference.

The Story of Stuff book is even fairly stuff-free

If, after watching The Story of Stuff, you feel guilty about wanting to buy, rent, or read the book, you won’t need to. The Story of Stuff book is printed on 100% Post-Consumer Waste paper, uses soy inks, solvent-free glues, and even used electronic editing. Even better than that, an MP3 CD of the book is set to be released soon, so you can listen to the book instead. Yes, the book does contribute a bit to the Stuff on your bookshelf, but it does so in the way that will help The Story of Stuff become a much more positive story.

Fast cash is hard to come by, and people looking to go green may think they won’t be able to save themselves and the environment simultaneously. The environment is a top concern these days with the focus on global warming and recycling. Many consumers are laboring under the daunting task of installing solar panels on their roofs, building green homes from the ground up, and buying hybrid vehicles. Experts are saying that it isn’t that big a task and consumers are thinking too big when it comes to the environment.

Change is in the small things

Michael Silvers, of GoGreen.com, said, “Going green doesn’t have to mean changing the whole house from the top down. By far it’s the little things consumers do in mass numbers that are going to change the world.” Silvers is referring to focusing on homes and making small consistent changes. Here are some of the changes he suggests.

• Light bulbs. Compact fluorescent bulbs are one of the simplest ways to cut back on energy. It will cost more up-front to make the purchase, but over time it will save. Using a 15-watt compact fluorescent bulk instead of a standard 60-watt light bulb can save $30 over a bulb’s lifetime. Considering most consumers have numerous bulbs in their home, it can add up to substantial savings and cut back on energy costs.

• Insulation. Another simple way to go green is to close up energy drains in a house, and insulation is the primary way to do it. Whether that’s using weather stripping, caulking or insulation in an attic, any way consumers can cut back on loses of cold air in the summer or hot air in winter, they can save energy. It also will reduce monthly energy costs. The local government normally offers some low or no-cost programs that help consumers insulate their homes. A representative will come out and give tips on where the energy leaks are and how to seal them up. The savings can be put into an emergency money fund for fast cash needs.

• Appliances. There is a double advantage here. First of all, the government is offering a tax deduction on Energy-star rated appliances of up to $1,500. Second, buying efficient appliances can save energy and money. Recent studies showed that the top-notch Energy-star rated appliances saved consumers 10 to 50% monthly in bills. Over the course of a machine’s lifespan, that adds up to a considerable amount of savings.

• Water. Low-flow models of shower heads, faucets and toilets can all add up to savings. Just like appliances have their Energy-star rating, plumbing products have a WaterSense label that assures they are efficient models. Plumbing and hardware stores can lead consumers to the most efficient products, and manufacturers are continuously expanding the choices now that going green is a priority.

Going green doesn’t have to break the bank

Many consumers think that going green will never produce fast cash due to the large investment in change. Experts are saying that this isn’t true because it’s the small changes that make the biggest difference. Consumers looking to go green should take the everyday things in their lives and revamp them by upgrading the Energy-star rated and WaterSense labeled items. They can also close up energy drains and look at lighting and plumbing for added savings. As Silvers added, “You don’t have to invest hundreds-of-thousands of dollars in a home to go green. You’d be surprised how small changes can bring change much quicker.”

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It's a start! This photo from December shows Andrea and Pete's first load of cans for their project. Image from Flickr.

Andrea and Pete, a Washington State couple, made a goal to pay for their wedding by recycling cans — far cry from the usual route of borrowing money to pay for a wedding. The couple started the Wedding Cans project less than two months ago, and they’ve already made it to 82 percent of their 400,000-can goal.

They were stunned when they realized that they just might meet their goal. Now, Andrea and Pete are considering another possibility: they could surpass their goal. They plan to continue collecting cans to recycle until their ceremony in July, and last week on Wedding Cans, Adrea wrote: “we are looking into possibly donating cans and/or the proceeds from cans collected after we reach our goal to charity.”

Wedding Cans media blitz

Today, Andrea and Pete did a string of interviews, coordinated by Alcoa Inc. aluminum company and broadcast via satellite, to spread their message about recycling. They also officially announced that, should they exceed their goal, they will donate 60 percent of any additional proceeds to Doctors Without Borders for Haitian disaster relief and to recycling programs. The other 40 percent will go toward their honeymoon fund.

Though  Andrea and Pete started Wedding Cans because they  needed a way to pay for their wedding, the ceremony may not be the end of their environmental crusade. “We are just incredibly happy that we have been able to encourage so many others to recycle – and we won’t let it end with our wedding,” wrote Andrea. Check out today’s Wedding Cans interview schedule on the web site.

The wedding plan for Wedding Cans

Though the Wedding Cans has been a huge project and a lot of work, Pete and Andrea’s wedding will be quite a different story. Their goal of 400,000 cans will raise just enough money to pay for renting the location for their wedding and reception — a castle in Idaho — and paying for other bare-minimum necessities.

The couple plans to have a potluck reception, Andrea’s mother is making the cake, they’ll be making their own decorations and a friend will donate home-brewed beer.

Andrea and Pete's back porch. Image from Flickr.

Do you remember those Pete and Andrea characters I wrote about a couple of weeks ago? They started the Wedding Cans project to raise money for their wedding. Their goal was to recycle 400,000 aluminum cans to pay for their wedding. That gigantic mountain of cans — about five tons — will net them the modest sum of about $3,800 to pay for their DIY, potluck-style wedding.

When I first started writing about the Wedding Cans project, the couple was at about 4 percent of their goal. However, after Andrea sent out press releases to local news and the Associated Press picked up the story, Wedding Cans went national — then international. And soon they’ll be making a big announcement about what they’re going to do if they end up with extra cash.

The big one

Shortly after radio stations as far away as South Africa started covering the Peter Geyer and Andrea Parrish Wedding Cans story, their project caught its big break. Alcoa, the third-largest aluminum manufacturer in the world, donated 150,000 cans. That, together with all of the other donations that poured in from around the world, catapulted Wedding Cans to where it is now, just two weeks later: 77 percent of goal.

When Pete and Andrea began the Wedding Cans project, they wondered if seven months would be enough time to reach their goal. However, only six weeks after starting the project, Pete and Andrea are realizing that there’s a good possibility they could actually exceed their goal.

Extra cans, extra wedding! Right?

If I were in Pete and Andrea’s position, I’d keep the extra money and upgrade my wedding. Considering that they are pinching pennies big time, including having the guests bring food and serving home-brewed beer, they could easily justify spending the extra cash on the wedding. I think most people would agree with me.

However, it has always been apparent that Pete and Andrea are not like most people. Andrea informed me today that they have a plan for the extra funds, and, of course, it is not what you’d assume. So, take note: Alcoa is sending a satellite team to their home Jan. 28, and Pete and Andrea will be doing interviews with media outlets all over the country to update everyone on their progress and make the big announcement. If you can’t find the story in your area Jan. 28, check back here and I’ll have an update for you. If you recycle cans in your area, you can donate the cash by depositing it in their PayPal account.

Andrea Parrish and Peter Geyer. Image from Flickr.

With the amount of cash people spend on weddings nowadays (average in U.S. is $28,000), it’s practically impossible to pull it off without involving a personal loan, either on the part of the parents or the couple. It’s no wonder some people would rather just elope. But couples are coming up with creative ways to pay for all of the food, drink and attire that are mandatory for celebrating a romantic union in style.

When I first heard about the couple in Spokane, Wash., who are planning to pay for their wedding by recycling aluminum, I thought “What a cool idea!” However, I had my doubts about whether they could pull it off. Oh, me of little faith.

Aluminum explosion

The story of the crazy couple trying to collect 400,000 aluminum cans to raise just $3,800 (obviously, they want a small wedding) first was featured on Offbeat Bride, a popular web site that features not-so-traditional weddings. Fast-forward to just one week later, and the story is featured in the Spokane newspaper, and according to the couple’s web site, weddingcans.com, after it ran on a Spokane TV news station, the Associated Press got ahold of it.

The video of the couple “with a can-do attitude” ran in states all the way across the country, including Maryland and New Jersey. And now they’ve made international news; The Globe and Mail in Canada picked up the video. But here’s the kicker, folks: the YouTube video. Think of how many unsuspecting videos have gone viral. And remember that guy who started with a paper clip and ended up with a house? Once you factor in harnessing the power of the Internet, paying for a wedding with aluminum cans doesn’t sound crazy at all. It sounds downright doable.

In fact, considering that right now their story has made it to the front page of Yahoo.com, it sounds downright done.

Want to help their cause?

The couple says it will come to you to pick up cans — if you live nearby. However, people in New Jersey and Maryland can help, too. Wedding Cans, the web site, says:

Not in the area? Please consider collecting the cans in your office, classroom, or kitchen. Find a local recycling center, and turn them in. Take the cash, take yourself out for a coffee or draft beer, and perhaps kick a bit of what’s left over our way.

After  you collect money for your cans, go to weddingcans.com and scroll down to the bottom, there’s a shiny, golden “donate” button. Click on that, and it’ll let you deposit money in their PayPal account. I like the way they put it on their web site: “Saving the environment and throwing a killer party… what could be better?”

Don't let all of your wrapping paper end up at the dump. Image from Flickr.

Christmas is a time of joy, when we get to see loved ones we haven’t seen for a while. Christmas in many families is filled with history and tradition. Christmas has a lot of pros, but it also has more than a few cons.

One of the biggest problems with Christmas is waste. Once you add up the wrapping paper, boxes, toy packaging and full-sized trees, you’re looking at some significant landfill contributions. But fear not, there are ways to have a traditional Christmas and still respect our planet.

Oh, Christmas Tree

For a reasons I don’t understand, a lot of people are dead set against getting a fake Christmas tree. While this is the most environmentally responsible method, some people simply can’t be swayed, even though it saves money, like getting the best personal loan rates, and it saves waste.

There are ways to keep your real tree from ending up in a landfill. Many people have big bonfires with their Christmas trees or burn them in their fireplaces at home. Try to figure out a way to get your tree to people who can use it to help heat their homes or use the materials to create something else. For instance, you might be able to get your tree to a plant that could use it to make …

Wrapping paper

Many people aren’t sure whether wrapping paper is recyclable, but guess what! It most certainly is. A lot of cities with pick-up programs accept wrapping paper in the recycling bins. The same thing goes for cardboard boxes.

A lot of toy packaging can’t be recycled, but much of it can. It may seem like a huge hassle, but look around at all the houses around you. Now think of what it would look like if you all piled up the waste that resulted from your Christmas presents. Do the right thing and make sure you recycle everything possible so that there will be many joyous Christmases on this Earth to come.

Traveling through an ocean garbage dump the size of Texas (Photo: seacat.wordpress.com)

In the Pixar film “Wall-E,” pollution has run rampant, to the point where the Earth is uninhabitable. Much of this pollution comes straight from the waste inherent in our high-speed consumer culture of convenience. As a result of their sloth, humankind have been forced to evacuate the planet and live a complacent life among the stars.

And what should we learn?

The movie is meant to draw our attention to the responsibility we have to maintain our world for future generations. There will come a time when we must take to the stars and look for new places to continue the spreading of our race. I’m not saying it will be exactly like “Wall-E,” “Dune” or any other science fiction stories we’re familiar with, but astronomic events will eventually rob Earth of its ability to sustain life. There are numerous astronomers and scientists who believe this, so I’m not a lone voice in the wilderness here. I’d bet short term loans and payday loans with no faxing on it, if I were a betting man…

But let’s not rush to muck things up!

That’s exactly what the Great Pacific Garbage Patch represents: our lack of care, moving us ever closer to the day when life will be choked away by all the garbage. I include apocalypse/”Rapture”-type cults among this garbage… it’s just garbage that chokes out the intellect instead of birds, plants, fish and asthmatics.

Paul Rogers reports for MercuryNews.com that scientists are doing all they can to learn more about “one of the most glaring examples of waste and environmental pollution on Earth,” the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. For those of you who don’t know what this is, it’s a place 1,000 miles west of California and north of Hawaii where all the trash from our sewers and storm drains flows. It’s “a massive vortex of floating plastic trash estimated by some researchers to be twice the size of Texas,” says Rogers.

It’s everywhere

Mary Crowley, co-founder of the nonprofit expedition Project Kaisei, believes that it’s high time something be done about this serious threat to life in the Pacific Ocean.

“More and more now, you see signs of marine debris and plastic everyplace. You can be at very remote beaches, and you’ll see plastic bottles, barrels, toys and a lot of plastic fishing nets,” she said.

I say more effort should be made to clean up such waste and recycle it, whenever possible. If you want to start such an effort in your community, take that first step. It may take a little bit of money to get it off the ground (biodegradable advertising signs, a Web site, etc), and if you need a cash boost to get that going, payday loans with no faxing and short term loans are available right here.

Find a new use for plastic – fast!

It’s unclear exactly when the Great Pacific Garbage Patch began to form or what its exact boundaries are, but it is know that the plastic that forms the bulk of it will not decompose in the traditional sense. Exposure to sunlight will eventually break it down into small pieces, but that could simply make it more difficult to clean up. Truly, many scientists believe that cleaning up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch will be impossible. The last hope may be that it can be converted into some sort of fuel.

Studying the harm done

Crowley and other researchers like Miriam Goldstein aim to study the size of the garbage patch and how it affects ocean wildlife.

“We are going to try to target the highest-plastic areas we see to begin to understand the scope of the problem,” said Goldstein. “The team of graduate students will be studying everything from phytoplankton to zooplankton to small midwater fish.”

The danger of confetti

That’s what the plastic essentially breaks down into. According to Rogers, there are billions of pieces of tiny plastic floating just below the surface of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Not only are the smaller pieces much harder to collect, but they’re much more likely to be consumed by wildlife like sea birds and fish. The plastic then fills their stomachs without providing nutrients. This often leads to death of the animal. Furthermore, plastic pieces can absorb toxic chemicals, which migrate up the food chain and eventually make it to humans.

And more frightening bits

Plastic fishing line, some of them from drift nets that are several tons in weight, entangle thousands of sea turtles, whales and marine mammals each year. In addition to this, plastic junk carried by the currents of the North Pacific Gyre include cigarette lighters, floats, toothbrushes, bottle caps and more. Some of the junk is decades old.

To put the amount of waste in perspective, scientists point out that for every pound of plankton in the center Pacific Ocean, there are as many as six pounds of marine litter as seen in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. That’s about 46,000 pieces of plastic litter for each square mile of the oceans, according to a 2006 United Nations study.

What can we do?

Full cleanup may be impossible, so in the time we have left on Earth before space travel makes a mass exodus possible, we must be responsible. Try to recycle your plastic waste, or only use products that break down in the environment. Dispose of waste properly, too – don’t just chuck it down the drain or into the ocean. Also, whenever the opportunity comes about to help fund scientific studies and projects designed to help combat such problems, donate if you can.

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