Tamara Harbar
Going Green

Sometimes our messes can inspire us. When Daniel Burd opened a closet door and a pile of plastic bags fell on his head, this Waterloo high school student was inspired to figure out exactly which bacteria eat plastic.

His science fair project identified two strains of plastic-pulverizing microbes and won the 2008 Canada-Wide Science Fair.

We all have similar messes piling up at home and at work, things we can’t recycle but can’t bear to throw out, either. The most common question I hear from Going Green readers is what to do with non-recyclables like cereal box liners, dry cleaning bags and polystyrene, the Number 6 plastic known as Styrofoam. I even got a call about a dead owl once.

Some Going Green readers don’t want to throw non-recyclables out to not rot in the landfill. Rotting is the perfect waste management system. Natural materials like food scraps, cotton and wood eventually break down, nourishing the earth in the process.

But covered landfills discourage or slow down natural rotting processes so garbage never really goes away. Many non-recyclables are non-rottables anyway. Plastic bags can take up to a thousand years to break down. Polystyrene never breaks down.

Non-recyclables can inspire us to think outside the blue box. For starters, imagine having no, or almost no, non-recyclables to get rid of in the first place.

If I don’t bring polystyrene home, I don’t have to send it to the landfill (or stockpile it in my basement until Stratford’s blue box program accepts it for recycling – I keep hoping)!

I bring my own reusable containers for take-out meals and drinks, or I get take-out from restaurants that provide recyclable or compostable containers. That’s only a partial solution, because so many other products come packaged in polystyrene. But even this step has led to huge reductions.

Reusing non-recyclables can be another partial solution. Dry cleaning bags are handy as dust protectors for clothes we don’t wear often. But there’s only so many dry cleaning bags anyone needs. And unless a permanent reuse for them is found, eventually they’ll still end up in the landfill, where they still won’t decompose for hundreds of years.

So to prevent non-recyclable messes from toppling on your head when you open closet doors, or from being buried in a landfill where they’ll outlive your great-great-great-great-great grandchildren, here are a few ways to avoid these offenders.

 Cereal box liners
• Buy your favourite breakfast cereals, whether corn flakes, rice krispies, or granola, from bulk food stores.
• Store them in reusable containers.
• Save and reuse the plastic produce bags for your next bulk purchases.

Dry cleaning bags
Ask your dry cleaner these questions.
• Can the dry cleaner reuse or recycle returned bags?
• Can the dry cleaner leave your clothes unbagged?
• Or consider buying (or making) a cotton dry cleaning bag, like the ones available from www.reuseniks.com.

Polystyrene
According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, polystyrene is a hazardous waste and a human carcinogen.
• Avoid food packaged in polystyrene.
• Bring your own reusable containers for take-out meals and drinks.
• Ask restaurants and grocery stores to replace polystyrene food containers with recyclable cardboard or compostable cornstarch alternatives.
• Remember consumers have clout: write to manufacturers asking them to replace polystyrene with eco-friendly and people-friendly products.