Plastic Free July 2014

This year I (and a more so reluctant husband) will be participating in plastic free July.  We first took part in 2012 and it was quite eye opening.  It really made us aware of the plastic that sneaks into your life when you are not looking.  Even though we are really aware of recycling, reusing and try to bring plastic into the house as little as possible the challenge made us really aware that we really need to try harder to find ways to reduce our plastic further. 

Here are the details of Plastic Free July.

The Challenge

The challenge is quite simple. Attempt to refuse single-use plastic during July.
"Single-use" includes plastic shopping bags, plastic cups, straws, plastic packaging...basically anything that's intended only to be used once and then discarded. If refusing ALL single-use plastic sounds too daunting this time, try the TOP 4 challenge (straws, plastic bags, plastic bottles &coffee cup lids).

The rules

1. Attempt to refuse single-use plastic during July.
2. Remember it's not going to be easy! It is a challenge, not a competition so don't worry about being perfect.
3. Collect any unavoidable single-use plastic you buy. Keep in a dilemma bag and share it with us at the end of the challenge.
4. It's up to you regarding how long you participate. You might decide to go plastic-free for a day, a week, a month or longer! However long you choose will still make a contribution.

Why you should participate

• Apart from the small amount of plastic which has been incinerated EVERY piece of plastic which was ever produced still exists on earth somewhere. In the first 10 years of this century MORE plastic was produced than the entire last century!
• Australians send 1 million tonnes of plastic waste to landfill each year. Do your part to make a change.
• Why use something for a few seconds that is going to spend the rest of your life trying to break down in landfill? We really need to change our habits.

I really encourage you to try this.  Even if you end up with a heap of plastic in your dilemma bag at the end of the month I guarantee you will learn a lot.

Check out the website for more details or to register.  I will keep you updated during the month and at the end of the month I will be posting photos of my dilemma bag.

So are you up for the challenge?

Recycling Soft Plastic

The other day I watched this documentary which is very American but it got me thinking about what happens to our plastic bags here.

I have been looking at our rubbish bin lately and thinking about how we can reduce what we throw out each week.  Not that we throw out a lot.  We usually have only 2 bags of rubbish in our bin each week but I think that we could be doing more.

One of the things that I have noticed often appears in our bin are different types of soft plastic.  Until just recently I was under the impression that these could not be recycled.
I was wrong!!

The following types of plastic can be recycled:
Plastic Shopping Bags
Pasta and Rice Bags
Lolly and Biscuit Packets
Fresh Fruit and Vegie Bags
Frozen Food Bags
Magazine and Newspaper Wrapping
Clean Plastic Wrap/Film
Old Green Bags
Bread Bags
Cereal Bags (personally I save these as they protect food from freezer burn and are great for keeping lettuce fresh)

Many Coles stores have a special bin where you can take all these types of plastics to be recycled.  To fine your nearest Coles store that offers this service click here.

And check out what they do with it:

Image from here where you can learn more about the company
 who make new products from our waste plastic.

I feel like I must have been living under a rock to have not know about this but I am so glad I do now.  We are about 45 km from our nearest drop off point but I will be making a point of taking our plastic when ever I go there.

Did you know this service existed?
Do you drop off your bags?

Below are some other links that relate to the subject that you might like to check out.

Recycling Near You
SITA's Recycling Tips
Clean Up Australia
Coles - Dealing with Waste
Planet Ark

Plastic Bag Obsession

Is it just me or are shops obsessed with trying to give customers plastic bags?

Hubby's pet hate is being offered a plastic bag for one or two items and he often comments that when he refuses a bag people look at him like he is a freak.  But what other people think does not stop us from refusing plastic bags.


The other day I was getting some groceries and the check out girl started packing them into plastic bags even though my green bags were sitting on top of my groceries.  Then when I pointed them out to her she asked me if I just wanted to take the ones she had already packed.  I told her that no I did not want them left in the plastic bags as we do not use plastic shopping bags.
She looked at me in a confused manner and asked "what never?"
I then simply said to her that I always carry green bags or cotton bags with me because I do not believe in using plastic bags.
She then said to me "oh yeah I keep green bags in my car boot, but I never remember to take them into the shops when I get my groceries so I end up with heaps of plastic bags from that.  I said to her that if I ever forget mine I just pack all my groceries back in the trolley and load them into bags when I get to the car.
Then she tells me she would be embarrassed to ask shop assistants to put things other than groceries in those bags.
I think she was pretty shocked when I replied saying "I think you should be more embarrassed accepting a plastic bag in this day and age when we know how much environmental damage they do and they are so easy to replace with re-usables".
She was not very talkative after that.
When I looked up the lady in the next checkout over, who was having her groceries packed into plastic bags, had obviously been listening because when she caught my eye she glanced down at all of her shopping packed in plastic bags and blushed badly then looked away.
There were other shoppers at the checkouts waiting so I have no doubt they all heard what I said as well and I am sure I gave them something to talk about.  And hopefully they do talk.

Perhaps this is a tactic we should use...

We are not 100% successful in keeping plastic bags out of our house and rubbish bags pose a big challenge but we really try and lately I have been looking at what to do with the ones we are left to deal with.

I know plastic bags are only a recent invention and humanity got by without them in the past so there is no doubt in my mind it can be done.

What tactics do you have for avoiding plastic bags?
Do you find that you are bombarded with plastic bags even when they are not really needed?

Plastic Bag Free March

In 2012 I participated in Plastic Free July which is a Western Australia initiative and it was quite an eye opener into how hard it is to avoid plastic and how deeply ingrained into our society it is.

This year in Queensland we have Plastic Bag Free March which I have signed up for.  The aim is to eliminate single use plastic bags by encouraging people to find alternatives.  Here are some of the reasons to get involved.

 Why get involved

• The National Litter Index (NLI) released in August 2013 found that Queensland is the worst performing mainland State.
• The Clean Up Australia Day 2012 Rubbish Report for Queensland showed that plastics make up 51% of the rubbish collected.
• Almost 20% of plastic packaging items picked up around Queensland since April 2013 has been plastic bags.
• The running tally of litter collected by Keep Queensland Beautiful shows that nearly 20% of plastic packaging items collected are single use plastic bags.
• Supermarkets account for 53% of plastic bag use; 47% come from other retail outlets.
• Every year, over six million tonnes of rubbish is dumped into the world’s oceans.  Plastic accounts for 80% of debris found in the world’s oceans. Of this, 10% is plastic bags.
• Plastic in the ocean kills over one million sea birds and 100,000 sea mammals annually.
• Ingested marine debris was responsible for killing about a third of turtles found dead in Moreton Bay.

If you want to be involved you can register here.  If you can't be involved please spread the word.

I will keep you updated with my progress, in the mean time check out this You Tube Clip

A Plastic Free Month -The Challange

Well I have no doubt this is going to be a challange.  I have signed up for Plastic Free July.
The challange is to attempt to buy no single use disposable plastic in July.

This is an initiative of Earth Carers a group in Western Australia.

The Rules

• Between 1 – 31 July, attempt to buy no plastic packaging that cannot be recycled.
• Remember its not going to be easy, but  its a challenge, not a competition so don't worry about being perfect.
• Collect any plastic packaging you do buy. Keep it in a ‘dilemma bag’ and share a photograph at the end of the challenge. 

For a while now I have been trying to cut back on the plastic entering our house that is not able to be recycled.  I have an arrangement with our butcher that I can take in my own containers and he will tare off their weight and fill them with what I need.
I have long given up plastic bags at the green grocer and instead use some old onion bags that I collected.  They weigh nothing and can be used over and over again.

I think that it is going to be a hard month and I am not optimistic about my "dilemma bag"  being empty at the end of the month.

I will be reporting back weekly about my efforts, struggles and the "dilemma bag".

If you have any suggestions about being plastic free please let me know.