adminYou might not think about how often you use plastic but it really is all around us in every aspect of your day-to-day routine. We’ve put together some of the most important steps to removing plastic from your life which will help out our planet in the long run.
- Use the micro-bead app
If you haven’t already heard, there is a new app you can download to your phone that will scan your personal care products for microbeads. All you have to do is point and shoot at the barcode of the product and the app will give you an answer based on colour coding.
Red: This product contains microbeads.
Orange: This product still contains microbeads, but the manufacturer has indicated it will replace in a given timeframe or adapt the product accordingly.
Green: This product is free from plastic microbeads.
Pretty neat huh?
- Give up chewing gum
Did you know your chewing gum was made of plastic? You should probably go spit that out before reading further. Back in the day gum was made from chicle, which is the sap from trees found in rain forests. Now one of the main ingredients is ‘gum base’ which is just a nice way of saying plastic and rubber.
- Always watch for these ingredients
On the topic of ingredients, here are a few to look out for in the products you purchase:
- PET (polyethylene terephthalate)
- HDPE (high-density polyethylene)
- PVC (polyvinyl chloride)
- LDPE (low-density polyethylene)
- PP (polypropylene)
- PS (polystyrene)
- Get rid of plastic bags
Did you know about 1 million plastic bags are used every minute? One of those bags will take about 1,000 years to degrade. That is a lot of plastic just lingering about our planet. Bring reusable (non-plastic) bags with you to the grocery store to carry your groceries home. Try to avoid putting your fruit and vegetables in plastic bags as well.
- Skip bottled water
Bottled water produces about 1.5 million tons of plastic waste per year. It also requires 47 million gallons of oil to produce those bottles. We like to preach this one. You don’t need to be purchasing bottled water anymore! And while you’re at it make sure you’re using reusable cups for your coffee as well! You’ll be saving roughly 500 disposable cups from hitting our landfills each year. Get out your thermos’s and reusable bottles and start saving your planet today.
– K
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