Its hard not to think about every decision I make these days. It seems as though I’m now filtering all decisions through my waste and energy filter. I can’t stop thinking about how much I consume and how much of that is wasted. I eat too much. The food I eat travels too far. It has too much packaging on it that quickly ends up in the landfill because it wasn’t designed to be recycled. Much of what I cannot eat goes into the refrigerator or freezer where it is cooled with coal-fired electricity plants spewing CO2. In order to reduce the carbon released into the atmosphere, we are seriously considering nuclear again. Hmmm… let’s create some nuclear waste that has an enormous half life just so I can keep my leftover green onions cold while they rot away, forgotten in the crisper drawer. Why think about it? I can just throw them “away”.
I drive too much. If its too cold, I get in the car and drive to the supermarket. And if its raining, no way am I walking. I live 12 minutes (drive) from where I work. I daily get into my car (designed to carry a lot more cargo than just me) start up the engine and feed it gasoline until I arrive. At night, I repeat the process in reverse. Last Thursday I spontaneously decided to drive to Summit County to see a movie. I drove 1.5 hours to be entertained. Not a big deal, the exhaust just goes “away”.
I just read that the years and years of build up of sunscreen in our popular beaches is killing off coral reefs. Why am I not surprised? And we just thought that when we swam, the ocean washed our sunscreen “away”.
My favorite is my plastic grocery store bag. We purchase our groceries but need a way to transport them to our car and then from our car to our kitchen. Fortunately for us, we don’t need to plan ahead and bring a bag or two. Conveniently, the grocers provide us with free plastic bags that help us contain our prize sleeves of Oreos for that 45 second walk to our car (dang, why did we park SO far from the door?) Once home, that free plastic bag becomes useful once again for another ten seconds (fortunately the garage is MUCH closer to the kitchen). So the useful life of our free plastic bag is about 55 seconds. And then what happens to our plastic bag? And scientists estimate a bag will last 400 to 1000 years. (no one knows for sure as plastic bags have only been around since the thirties).
Heard of the Pacific Gyre? It is one of the world’s five major gyres or circular ocean currents. Unfortunately, the Pacific Gyre is becoming a toilet bowl for flushing “away” our plastics.
The circular rotation around it draws waste material in and has led to the accumulation of flotsam and other debris, so much so that the plastic debris gathers in concentrations of one million pieces of plastic per square mile in some areas. While historically this debris has biodegraded, the gyre is now accumulating vast quantities of plastic and marine debris. Rather than biodegrading, plastic photodegrades, disintegrating in the ocean into smaller and smaller pieces. These pieces, still polymers, eventually become individual molecules, which are still not easily digested.[1] Some plastics photodegrade into other pollutants. –Wikipedia
So, sure. You could argue that everything we do creates waste and problems. I think the main thing here is that we as humans actually THINK about our actions and the intentional or unintentional consequences of those actions. Before making a decision, we should really weigh out the benefits and costs (as much as we possibly can anyway) before choosing. This process helps us grow and progress. We can think our way out of habitual reaction and start to make decisions based on values rather than convenience now. Look around you, what you eat, wear, use, surround yourself with, and try to imagine the humble beginnings of each object, how it has been used since you’ve owned it and where it will go in the future. Where is your “away”?
