Most recyclable plastics are categorized and labeled according to the kind of plastic they contain. The labels run from 1 to 7 and can typically be found within the chasing-arrow recycling triangle on the bottom of a given piece of recyclable plastic. The Greenpeace report, conducted from October 2019 to January 2020, claims that only plastics labeled #1 or #2 can be legitimately labeled “recyclable” in the United States today.

Let’s break down these two categories. Plastics labeled #1 contain Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET). Common products include water bottles, soda bottles, and peanut butter jars. Plastics labeled #2 contain High-Density Polyethylene (HDPE). Common products include milk jugs, five-gallon buckets, shampoo bottles, and laundry detergent containers. These plastics are recycled into new plastic bottles or containers or are converted into textiles or insulation. 

The United States used to ship plastics labeled #3 through #7 to China to be processed and recycled. In March 2018, the Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection raised its standards for the quality of recycled materials that China would purchase, reducing permissible contamination levels from 3% to 0.5%. Since then recycling plants in the United States have struggled to process these plastics on their own.

Plastics labeled #3 through #7 are “hard plastics” and are considered to have “negligible-to-negative value.” This means that they have a low reprocessing capacity and are, therefore, unlikely to be recycled into new products. Recycling plants pay to have these plastics picked up and processed elsewhere, which usually means incineration or a trip to the landfill.

Greenpeace has asked companies that produce products with plastic labels #3 through #7 to remove recyclable language from their labels. It has also promised to file a Federal Trade Commission complaint against them for mislabeling if these companies don’t comply. Some of these companies include Target, Walmart, Procter & Gamble, and SC Johnson.

Common products that carry labels #3 through #7 break down as follows:

Plastic #3: vinyl; tubing and pipe; siding; auto product bottles

Plastic #4: laundry baskets; bread bags; squeeze bottles; plastic film

Plastic #5: yogurt containers; amber-colored pill bottles; coffee cup lids; straws; kitty litter buckets; plastic cutlery

Plastic #6: styrofoam cups; solo cups; egg cartons; to-go containers; plastic cutlery

Plastic #7: toys; sippy cups; CDs and DVDs; lenses

For more information on how to decode recycling symbols, click here.

What can you do?

Here are ten action items you can take:

1. Check purchases closely: Try to buy only plastics with #1 or #2 labels.
2. Take stock of how much plastic in your house is or is not likely to be recycled after you sort it into the recycling bin.
3. Bring your own grocery bag, or choose paper bags over plastic.
4. Choose meat products wrapped in paper by your grocery store butcher over meat products packaged in plastic.
5. Clean your refrigerator storage bins so you can avoid plastic produce bags at the grocery store and store produce neatly at home.
6. Choose items in aluminum or glass packaging over plastic packaging: Both aluminum and glass are commonly recycled by waste programs throughout the country.
7. Pass on plastic silverware, straws, trays, and coffee cup lids.
8. Opt for glass tupperware over plastic baggies.
9. Educate residents about which plastics are actually recyclable in the United States.
10. Encourage residents to download the Remyndr app to receive notifications and updates regarding the recycling pickup schedule in their neighborhoods.

For more information on how China’s recycling decision has impacted recycling in Massachusetts, read our article from March 2019.

Sources:

“Circular Claims Fall Flat: Comprehensive U.S. Survey of Plastics Recyclability,” Greenpeace, Inc., 2020.

Dimugno, Laura, “Recycling symbols decoded,” Mother Nature Network, March 4, 2013.

Vartan, Starre, “Most plastics in our recycling bins aren’t getting recycled, new report finds,” Mother Nature Network, February 24, 2020.

In the wake of China’s 2017 ban on the import of mixed paper and mixed plastic, Waste Management and other large waste haulers looked to poor countries as an export alternative. Over the last two years it became clear that the receiving countries could not process the volume of trash exported by the United States. Waste mismanagement led to environmental and social harm. 

Waste Management now sells 77% of its recyclable materials to domestic markets. In an August press release, WM said, “The company is working to help establish responsible domestic markets for recycling and beneficial use of these materials.” The company has further stated that “where there is no market, we are disposing of this material responsibly.”

This seems to be the start of a growing global trend, as Australia’s Prime Minister has said the country should be responsible for its own waste and as the Dutch State Secretary has called for plastic waste exports to stop. 

What do you think about the ban of plastic waste exports? Let us know in the comments!

Sources:

“The Largest Trash Collectors in the U.S. Have Stopped Shipping Waste to Poor Countries,” Good News Network, Oct. 21, 2019.

“U.S. Waste & Recycling Companies Positions on Plastic Waste Exports,” The Last Beach Cleanup, accessed Oct. 22, 2019.

Wheeler, Perry, “Waste Management, Casella announce halt to plastic waste exports to countries with poor waste management,” Green Peace, Oct. 16, 2019.

Doran, Matthew and Macmillan, Jade, “Ban on recyclable waste exports looms as political leaders commit to a phase out,” Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Aug. 9, 2019.

“Plastic waste export should be stopped,” Weekly News Review, June 17, 2019.

Gretchen Carey, president of MassRecycle, tells WBUR, “In the Greater Boston area, 80 to 90 percent of our material had gone to China.” Since the new standard took effect, prices for recycled materials have plummeted. For example, the price of mixed paper has fallen from $75 per ton to less than $5. This shift impacts how MassRecycle conducts business, which affects local municipalities.

WBUR notes that local municipal budgets have been thrown out of order, “Massachusetts cities and towns, which are required to recycle household materials, are now scrambling to pay for something that used to turn a profit.” The cost of increased recycling and processing is substantial. According to Gunther Wellenstein, recycling coordinator for Lowell, the city’s new contract for recycling and processing may cost nearly $500,000 per year.

Coordinators like Wellenstein cover these costs by finding money elsewhere in the budget. Wellenstein says, “Half a million can come out of public safety, public education, economic development.” While some may see this as a waste of municipal funds or as unfair to other public service programs, Wellenstein adds, “You have to pay for the increase in trash.”

Single-stream recycling is another factor that has made China’s new policy so disruptive. Single-stream recycling is the system familiar to most people, in which all recyclable materials are deposited into the same bin and collected for processing. Massachusetts has eight Municipal Recovery Facilities (MRF) that process recycled materials.

According to WBUR, nearly 25 percent of waste collected by the Charlestown MRF cannot be recycled because of contamination or because the material is nonrecyclable. The remaining 75 percent is distributed into a waste stream and sorted into mixed paper, plastics, glass, and metals. Massachusetts’ MRFs are designed to reduce contamination to 3 percent, but they now must work to meet the new 0.5 percent standard.

When China first declined to purchase U.S. recycled materials due to contamination, commodity dealers shipped to new markets in Thailand, in India, and in Vietnam. However, these countries now also refuse to purchase recycled materials from the U.S. This means that much of the waste we recycle ends up in landfills.

Each year Massachusetts produces upward of 5.5 million tons of solid waste, 25 to 35 percent of which is recycled. The rest is deposited across 12 landfills in the state. As those sites reach capacity, up to one-third of the waste tonnage is shipped to Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York for processing and disposal.

Two relatively easy ways for communities to help the problem are to be mindful of what gets recycled and to make sure that materials are indeed recyclable. Wash plastic containers, such as yogurt cups and peanut butter jars. Pizza boxes with grease stains are okay. Bowling balls and other Marie Kondoed household items are not.

On a macro-level, new markets need to be created for recycled materials. Massachusetts has started to offer “grants to cities and local companies so they can buy grinders to turn … recycled glass into an aggregate to use for building sidewalks and roads and filling potholes.” Although no one solution can address every aspect of the problem that the recycling industry faces, smaller cumulative steps go a long way to help.

What other solutions have your community or municipality considered or implemented to help solve the recycling problem? Leave a comment to let us know!

Source:

Gellerman, Bruce, “How a New Policy in China Has Led to a Recycling Crisis in Mass.,” WBUR, accessed March 20, 2019.

This month The Ocean Cleanup launched a 2,000-foot boom designed to gather plastic debris and clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

According to The New York Times, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch floats between California and Hawaii and is comprised of 1.8 trillion pieces of trash, with at least 87,000 tons of plastic. Gross. The Ocean Cleanup will endeavor to clean up half of the garbage patch in five years.

To learn about how the boom technology works, read our article about plastic waste and The Ocean Cleanup here.

According to Forbes, the patch measures 617,763.45 square miles in size. For reference, Alaska is 663,267.26 square miles in size. That’s our biggest state. That’s big enough to be seen clearly by satellites from space.

The boom has been towed to a site for a two-week test period, after which it will be towed to the garbage patch 1,400 off the mainland. Boyan Slat, 24, founder of The Ocean Cleanup, said that the boom will arrive by mid-October.

While cost efficiency, performance, and impact on marine life remain open questions, the fact that such an ambitious waste management endeavor has been undertaken deserves to be celebrated. In a world that’s only begun to see the devastating effects of climate change, the least we can do is take out the trash.

Source:

Caron C (2018) Giant Trap Is Deployed to Catch Trash Littering the Pacific Ocean. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/09/science/ocean-cleanup-great-pacific-garbage-patch.html

Nace T (2018) The World’s Largest Ocean Cleanup Has Officially Begun. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2018/09/10/the-worlds-largest-ocean-cleanup-has-officially-begun/

Dr. Sarah-Jeanne Royer published a new study, which finds that “the most commonly used plastics produce two greenhouse gases, methane and ethylene, when exposed to ambient solar radiation.” In other words, as plastic waste decomposes, exposure to the sun causes the plastic to emit gases that contribute to the greenhouse effect.

In July 2017, we wrote about a a study on the production, the use, and the fate of all plastics. Since 1950, 8.3 billion metric tons of “virgin plastic” has been produced, 75.9% of which has become plastic waste. Seventy-nine percent of this plastic waste has been relegated to landfills or the natural environment.

According to BBC News, “Dr. Royer found that the most widely-used plastic, the stuff used to make shopping bags, is the one that produces the greatest amount of these warming gases.”

Initially, Dr. Royer intended to measure the methane gas emission of biological samples from the ocean. In the course of her study, she discovered that the plastic bottles that held the samples produced greater methane emissions than the samples themselves.

The parameters of Dr. Royer’s study are as follows:

“After selecting the plastic category emitting the greatest amount of hydrocarbon gases, we tested the effect of a change in density and morphology (i.e., pellets, flakes, powder) on hydrocarbon gas emissions. Environmental factors, including solar radiation, UVB (ultraviolet B; 280–320 nm) and solar radiation exposure history were varied as part of this study. These tests were executed in parallel with two long-term experiments assessing the effect of aging for 212 days using virgin pellets and for 152 days using marine plastic from the ocean. Finally, to determine the impact of medium on plastic degradation and gas emissions, we tested the production of gases from plastic incubated in either air or in water.”

Dr. Royer’s study finds that the methane gas emitted by virgin pellets after 212 days is 176 times stronger than the methane emitted at the start of the experiment. This emission rate doubles that of emissions from the ocean over the same length of time.

As BBC News reports, the primary focus on the relationship between plastics and climate change has been on the fossil fuels used to produce plastics. Dr. Royer’s study is the first to quantify the emission of warming gases other than CO2 from plastic waste.

While the level of emissions is relatively small at present, it is expected to increase as plastic waste from the past 70 years continues to break down and as new plastics are produced.

Luckily, it’s not all bad news. Last week The New York Times reported that scientists are developing plastics that self-destruct on command. How does it work?

To create plastic, molecules are formed into long chains, called polymers. Historically, stable polymers have been used because they do not break down easily. Now scientists want to create plastic with unstable polymers. When these polymers encounter a trigger, such as light or acid, their long molecular chains will “unzip” and return to their original, small molecular state.

Marc Hillmyer, head of the Center for Sustainable Polymers at the University of Minnesota, notes that the challenge is to create plastic polymers that are stable when in use and that are unstable when they are no longer needed.

To learn more about plastic waste or to get involved, visit plasticpollutioncoalition.org.

Sources:

McGrath M (2018) Plastic pollution: How one woman found a new source of warming gases hidden in waste.
BBC News: Science & Environment. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-45043989

Roland G, Jambeck J, Lavender Law K (2017) Production, use, and fate of all plastics ever made. Science Advances.
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1700782. http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/7/e1700782.full

Royer S-J, Ferrón S, Wilson ST, Karl DM (2018) Production of methane and ethylene from plastic in the environment.
PLoS ONE 13(8): e0200574. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0200574

Lim X (2018) Designing the Death of Plastic. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/06/science/plastics-polymers-pollution.html

A new year can open the door to a new you. Part of that new you often involves a fresh, new wardrobe. But what can you do with the clothes you never wear? The ones taking up space. Glad you asked.

PURGE

Decluttering goes a long way in the effort to be a better version of ourselves. To that end, have each member of the family go through his or her closet, cubbies, or dresser to sort out the clothes that are no longer worn – the sweaters you never liked, the blouses that got stained, the pants that must have shrunk in the wash. You can scale the purge to your own personal preference: if you haven’t worn the clothes in a year; if you haven’t worn the clothes in six months; if you haven’t worn the clothes in six weeks. Gather all the clothes together and pile them in trash bags or fold them in an old laundry basket.

Note: Keep anything sentimental.

DONATE

All of our local communities sponsor clothing drives from time to time. The key is to find one that accepts the kind of clothes you have to give: kids clothes, old clothes, sports gear, etc. If you don’t find a local clothing drive, give to your local homeless or veterans shelters. Call beforehand to make sure they accept donations, but definitely give it a chance. It always a touching experience to help people back on their feet. However, if neither of those options pan out, you can always donate to your local thrift stores – your Salvation Army, your Goodwill, your Big Brother, Big Sister. They’ll even give you a receipt that you can claim on your taxes.

Note: Most places won’t take used underwear. Those are better kept as rags, pet toys, or compost.

The clothes don’t make the person; the person makes the clothes. And donating your old clothes is always in style.

BURIAL

Pumpkin burial is one of the more seasonal ideas we’ve encountered, specifically because of its connection to Dia de los Muertos.

Celebrated October 31 – November 2, Dia de los Muertos originated in Meso-America and was tied to the harvest season. Indigenous celebrants would dedicate a portion of their bounty to their ancestors, who were believed to return during this time to commune with the living (Gabriela Martinez, Los Angeles Times).

Bury your carved pumpkins in the backyard. You can create a makeshift Dia de los Muertos altar by decorating the burial site with candles, sugar skulls, and photos of your departed ancestors. The buried pumpkins will decompose and enrich the soil naturally and it’s a fun way for children to learn about the spirited Latin holiday.

COMPOST

It’s easy to add those pumpkins to the compost pile. After you or the kids crush the carved pumpkins, throw the broken pieces onto the heap and cover them with leaves.

WARNING: Be sure to remove any candles prior to the pumpkin demolition, and avoid mixing pumpkins that have been painted or treated with chemicals in with the compost heap.

Massachusetts residents, if you are without a compost pile but still want to compost your pumpkins, you may deposit them at the compost site in Avon, MA.

ANIMALS

In a similar vein, you can feed your carved pumpkins to the animals in the wild. Slice your pumpkins into bite-sized pieces before they begin to rot. Then deposit those pieces in an area of your yard accessible to wildlife. If you prefer not to have critters crawling around your property, you can always feed pumpkin to your pet cat or dog.

Pumpkin has a high fiber and water content, which means it’s healthy for your pet’s digestive tract. Again, make sure that the rot has not yet set in with the pumpkin you plan to feed your pet. It’s a good idea to wash the pumpkin once you chop it into chunks so that you can get rid of any bacteria that may have cultivated while the pumpkin was on the porch.

DECORATIONS

As we wrote in our blog post When Orange & Black Meets Green & Blue, you can transform newly carved pumpkins into flower vases. For this fun DIY project, all you need to do is coat the interior of the pumpkin with PVC glue, let it dry, and add water. Hint: This works better with pumpkins that have been cut and gutted than with pumpkins that have been surgically enhanced into jack-o-lanterns.

If carving and flowers aren’t in your candy bag, you can still upcycle your uncarved pumpkins and paint them for the upcoming holidays. Break out the paint, glitter, and glue and see what you can do! If you’re in need of ideas, you can find an endless variety of ways to paint your pumpkins on Pinterest. Simply search for “painted pumpkins” and scroll for an idea that inspires you!

For more environmentally-savvy ideas this Halloween, read our post on How to Create an Eek-O-Friendly Halloween.

Have a happy, fun, and safe Halloween!

On July 19th, Science Advances published a study entitled “Plastics: Production, use, and fate of all plastics ever made.” Authored by Roland Geyer, Jenna R. Jambeck and Kara Lavender Law, the study combines global data on the life cycles of polymer resins, synthetic fibers, and additives into a comprehensive material flow model to provide “the first global analysis of all mass-produced plastics ever manufactured,” (Geyer, Jambeck, Law).

Plastics 101

Large-scale plastic production and use began in the mid-20th century. Today, plastics’ largest market is the packaging industry. While none of the commonly used plastics are biodegradable, the only way to permanently eliminate plastic waste is by destructive thermal treatment, such as combustion or pyrolysis. Unfortunately, plastic waste is not confined to landfills and recycling centers. Plastic debris has been found in all major ocean basins. In 2010 alone, an estimated 4-12 million metric tons of plastic waste generated on land entered the marine environment. According to Geyer, Jambeck, and Law’s research, plastic waste is so prevalent in the natural environment that it’s been suggested as a geological indicator of the Anthropocene era (Geyer, Jambeck, Law).

Hard Numbers

Let’s unwrap the numbers. Since 1950, 8.3 billion metric tons of “virgin plastics” have been produced. As of 2015, 6.3 billion metric tons of that total have become plastic waste. That’s 75.9% of all plastic ever produced. Now, of that 6.3 billion metric tons of plastic waste, 567 million metric tons (9%) have been recycled, 756 million metric tons (12%) have been incinerated, and 4.98 billion metric tons (79% of plastic waste; 60% of plastic total) have been relegated to landfills or the natural environment (Geyer, Jambeck, Law).

Here’s where we and perhaps some of you begin to hyperventilate. That’s okay—just don’t do it into a plastic bag. Those are hard numbers. And we at Remyndr are the last ones who want to admit that recycling won’t save the world.

Fear not! There’s hope yet!

The Ocean Cleanup

Engineers, entrepreneurs, and scientists are working to develop technologies that reduce plastic waste. One of our favorite foundations working toward this end is The Ocean Cleanup. Founded in 2013 by 18-year-old Boyan Slat, The Ocean Cleanup has developed a technology system  that leverages natural ocean currents to remove plastic waste from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is the largest of five floating garbage patches around the world. The Ocean Cleanup’s passive technology is estimated to clean up 50% of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch within five years (The Ocean Cleanup).

How the Technology Works

The Ocean Cleanup’s technology system has four parts:

First, a recyclable floater made of high density polythylene floats on the ocean surface. The floater extends from a half mile to a mile in length and is deployed in strategic locations determined by The Ocean Cleanup’s algorithms.

Second, the floater attaches to a solid, fiber-reinforced thermoplastic polyurethane screen that catches sub-surface waste and allow fish to pass underneath with the current. Scale model testing shows that the screen can catch anything from one-centimeter plastic particles to discarded items several meters in size.

Third, the screen is anchored by a large sea anchor suspended at 600 meters below the ocean surface. Since water moves more slowly at greater depths, the anchor will make the system move more slowly than plastic waste, thereby capturing the debris.

Fourth, a support vessel empties the cleanup systems once they become full. With a system of belts and pumps, a ship will remove the plastic waste and ship it back to land to be processed, recycled, and resold (The Ocean Cleanup).

Read more about how The Ocean Cleanup’s technology works.

The Ocean Cleanup funded their pilot project, which will be deployed later this year. Their next step will be to develop refined iterations of their technology designs based on a series of tests. By mid-2018, The Ocean Cleanup will roll out its first operational cleanup system (The Ocean Cleanup).

What You Can Do

Be Mindful of Plastic

The easiest thing you can do to help is to become mindful of your plastic consumption. If you have a bag with you at the store, maybe tell the clerk that you don’t need another bag. If you like drinking cold water at home, maybe use a Britta filter instead of using plastic water bottles. If you love peppermint mocha frappuccinos all year round, who can blame you? But be mindful of recycling the cups in the appropriate bin. Sometimes it can feel like a hassle to separate your recycling by materials, but that has a deciding impact on whether your recycling ends up as waste or actually gets recycled. If you want a reminder of which items go where and when they get collected in your neighborhood, download the Remyndr app.

Get Involved in Your Communities

Local community groups are a great way to connect and get involved. Montclair, Cedar Grove, Nutley, Verona, Avon, Marshfield, and North Attleboro all have active Facebook Groups. Members discuss local ongoings in their neighborhoods, share advice on how to conserve energy and become more green, and sell or swap furniture, appliances, and hand-me-down toys. It’s always better to give away or sell an item before you throw it in the trash. In addition to the Remyndr Facebook Page, check out some of our favorite neighborhood Facebook Groups: 

Waste Not Montclair (NJ)

Share Montclair

North Attleboro Recommends

Nutley Moms

Buy Sell Swap Cedar Grove, NJ

Everything Avon Mass Group

Marshfield MA Forum

Sustainable Verona

Verona / Caldwell NJ Buy Sell & Trade

Donate to The Ocean Cleanup

If you’re looking for ways to get involved with clean energy, The Ocean Cleanup now allows companies and individuals to fund their own ocean cleanup systems. With a tax-deductible donation, you can literally be part of the largest ocean cleanup in history. To learn more or make a donation, visit The Ocean Cleanup.

That’s a snapshot of what’s happening in the world of plastic waste and clean energy solutions. To stay up to date with these issues and your local neighborhood recycling schedules, visit the Remyndr Facebook Page and download the Remyndr app.

The Paris Agreement. You’ve heard it mentioned in casual conversation and political debates. But what is it exactly? What does it entail? With so much going on in our lives, our towns, and our country, it’s small wonder that many of us don’t know.

We’re here to give you a primer on the Paris Agreement to you in three easy pieces. Next time you catch someone with a confused look on their face, you’ll be able to fill them in with the facts.

197 Parties Involved

The Rio Earth Summit (1992) negotiated an international environmental treaty called the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Since 1995, members of the UNFCCC have met annually at the Conference of Parties (COP) to assess global progress on climate change.

The 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference took place in Paris from 30 November to 12 December. It marked the 21st session of the COP (COP 21), at which time the UNFCCC was comprised of 197 Parties.

The Paris Agreement is an outcome of COP 21. It is an international treaty among the 197 Parties of the UNFCCC. It entered into force on November 4, 2016. As of this writing, 145 of the 197 Parties involved have ratified the Paris Agreement. Track which Parties have ratified the Paris Agreement.

Common Framework for All Nations

The Paris Agreement established a common framework by which all Parties respond to climate change. Prior to the agreement, developed and developing nations’ commitments were sharply differentiated. Under the new agreement, all Parties are committed a unified approach to climate change through “nationally determined contributions” (NDCs). This approach includes provisions to hold Parties accountable, such as regular reporting on emissions and implementation efforts and an international review of those efforts every five years. Moreover, the agreement has led  “186 countries responsible for over 90 percent of the world’s climate pollution to announce specific national reduction plans for climate action after 2020” and will mobilize investments to help developing countries build “low-carbon, climate resilient economies” (UNFCCC, NRDC).

2 Degrees Celsius

The main goal of the Paris Agreement is to prevent the average rise of the global temperature by 2 degrees Celsius and to pursue measures that will limit the average temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius over the next century. The global temperature’s rise is measured against pre-industrial levels. If the global temperature rises above 2 degrees Celsius, the consequences include rising sea levels, flooding, severe storms, forest fires, drought, and species extinction (UNFCCC, Business Insider).

There you have it, a three-piece primer to the Paris Agreement. For more information on what’s in the Paris Agreement, read it here, or read an outcome summary here. To learn about The Global Carbon Budget, visit the World Resources Institute website here. Next time you hear someone talking about the Paris Agreement at a barbecue, don’t be afraid to share your insights!

Happy Earth Day!

As we said in our Earth Day post last year, Mother Earth is at the heart of who we are and what we do at Remyndr. And over the course of this past year, the issue of climate change has increasingly come to the fore in public discourse. But how does climate change affect our daily lives? Better yet, how do our daily lives affect climate change? What’s our Ecological Footprint?

At Remyndr, often we talk about how to reduce your ecological footprint by recycling more, buying less plastic, and downloading our free app. Today we want to take a more granular look at your unique ecological footprint based on your lifestyle. After all, how do you decide what specific steps to take to reduce your footprint if you’re not clear on how your lifestyle impacts the environment?

Download the Remyndr app for free.

That’s where the Ecological Footprint Quiz comes in handy. It’s free, it’s fun, it takes five minutes. The EFQ is a carbon calculator that measures “how much biologically productive land and sea is used by a given population or activity and compares this to how much land and sea is available” (earthday.org).

Take our Ecological Footprint Quiz!

Simply take the quiz, get your results, and “explore scenarios” that could help you minimize your footprint. You don’t need to take gigantic steps in order to make a huge impact. Say you eat meat at one less meal per day. Over the next year, you can reduce your total animal consumption by a third or half! Huge return on investment for one small step! Besides, we can all use a salad, right?

We hope you enjoy Earth Day 2017! Follow us on Facebook to keep up to date our weekly posts!

Don’t miss out on updates in your neighborhood! Download the free Remyndr app.