EarthConnection

STEP UP YOUR SUSTAINABILITY QUOTIENT

(The material for this blog is taken from the following website:

https://zontausa.org/re-cycling-isnt-working-learn-the-7-rs/)

WE all know the common R’s of Sustainability: Reducing, Reusing, and Recycling. Today you can add another 4Rs – Recover, Repair, Refuse Regift.   Rethink your relationship with things and the Earth.

Reduce

• Reducing is about using, consuming, and sourcing less plastic.
• Reducing is, perhaps, the most important aspect to leading a zero-waste life and thankfully the solution is pretty simple.
• Simply decrease the frequency at which you consume plastic.

Examples of Reducing:

• Using less plastic bags – taking your own bags to the store would allow you to reduce the amount of plastic bags you need
• Using no plastic straws by choosing to bring a reusable alternative with you
• Driving your car less. Yep, you read correctly. Albeit a more niche suggestion, driving actually causes plastic from tires to grind against the road, releasing micro-plastics into the environment!

Reuse

• “To use again or more than once”
• Single-use plastics are some of the most harmful type of plastics to our environment.
• Examples of single-use plastics include, plastic straws/stirrers, plastic drinking bottles, bottle caps, plastic packaging and even chewing gum.
• Not only is using reusable alternatives simple and effective, but it is also likely to save you money in the long run!

Recycle

• We’ve all heard of recycling – it’s about turning the waste we produce into something else with value.
• Most countries have now developed impressive infrastructure, making it easier for households to recycle some of their waste.
• Many environmentally-focused companies are now even utilising recycled household waste to create items such as bags and clothing.
• It’s clear that we all need to recycle where we can although it seems that recycling plastic is harder than it may appear.
• Indeed, around 42% of packaging in most supermarkets cannot actually be recycled ‘easily’.
• The plastic recycling rate is falling in the United States but plastic waste generation is soaring.
• The US petrochemical and plastic industry has called for improved recycling, but faces pressure to stop its own production of plastic.

Refuse

• “To Indicate that you are not willing to accept something offered or requested”
• Linked to reducing, refusing is basically the art of saying ‘no’ to an offer of something you perceive you neither want or need.
• Refusal costs nothing and can have a huge impact on the world. Single-use products such as plastic bags, plastic straws and chewing gum should be refused wherever possible and reusable alternatives should be sourced if necessary in their place.
• The U.S. Is the World’s Number One Source of Plastic Waste
• Americans purchase about 50 billion water bottles per year, averaging about 13 bottles per month for every person in the U.S.!
• Americans throw away 100 billion bags annually– that’s the equivalent to dumping nearly 12 million barrels of crude oil! By switching to reusable shopping bags, we can eliminate that waste– which amounts to about 307 bags per person.[7]Americans alone use half a billion drinking straws every day.[8]
• Americans alone throw away around 25 billion Styrofoam coffee cups every year.

Repair

• “To restore (something damaged, faulty, or worn) to a good condition”
• Repairing items is a fantastic way to save money and keep plastic out of landfill sites.
• For example, you may own a chair that has a broken or split leg, instead of throwing it out could it be glued back together and used again?

Repurpose

• “Adapt for use in a different purpose”
• Perhaps one of the most difficult ‘R’s’ to incorporate into our lives, repurposing plastic is another fantastic way of minimising plastic waste. By repurposing, single-use items can be made into multi-use products.
• Examples of repurposing:
  • Cutting up plastic bottles and using them as vases or storage containers for refillable dried foods
  • Using plastic boxes to plant flowers or fruit/vegetables
  • Repurposing plastic containers into toys by sticking bottle caps to them for wheels of a car

Rethink

• “To consider doing something, especially a course of action in a different way.”
• If you want to make the biggest difference, however, maybe you could rethink the manner in which you shop.
• Indeed, thousands of refill shops are beginning to crop up around the world.
• Have a quick internet search to find your nearest place and head over with some empty jars!
• This way, you’re helping a local business AND doing your bit for the planet.

September 24, 2024

Every day there is news about the effects of climate change…severe droughts, flooding, fires, catastrophic storms, etc. Our planet is in serious trouble and the behavior of human beings is the primary cause. Pope Francis, in his encyclical Laudato Si’, challenges us to adopt a more Earth-friendly sustainable lifestyle. Moving towards a more plant-based diet is often cited as a crucial means of addressing climate change. But why? Below are some of the reasons a plant-based diet can both address climate change and provide multiple health benefits.

Animal agriculture is currently the single largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, making it one of the largest drivers of climate change. Key to this contribution is the release of methane gas from livestock production: Since 2007, the concentration of methane in the atmosphere has risen significantly, faster than any other greenhouse gas. According to National Geographic, “The 20-year global warming potential of methane is 84. That is, over a 20-year period it traps 84 times more heat per mass unit than CO2.” A leading cause of this increase in methane is the billions of livestock grazing in pastures and confined in feedlots around the world. Decreasing the consumption of meat, even by one or two days per week, can make a difference.

Livestock currently graze on more than one-third of Earth’s ice-free land surface which was once forest or grasslands that had captured and stored carbon dioxide. In the Amazon rainforest, clearing land for grazing cattle accounts for 70 percent of recent deforestation, with additional forest being cleared for growing soy to feed livestock. Restoring these lands to native ecosystems or forests has the potential to sequester quantities of carbon dioxide that could significantly offset decades of global fossil fuel emissions.

Animal agriculture is a major cause of water pollution, contaminating drinking water, causing toxic algae outbreaks in local waterways, and killing fish. Slaughterhouses that process and package poultry, beef, pork, and other meats dump millions of pounds of harmful substances directly into our nation’s rivers and streams.

Humans consume more animals today than ever before. Worldwide, some 80 billion animals are raised and slaughtered for food each year; in the United States about 10 billion are slaughtered, approximately 1 million per hour. According to one analysis of data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average U.S. citizen consumes about 21,000 land animals in his or her lifetime.

Most animals raised for human consumption in the United States are raised on factory farms where they are subjected to small spaces and horrendous conditions. The majority of these factory farms are currently exempt from federal animal welfare laws.

A plant-based diet also has personal health benefits. The overconsumption of meat in our diets increases the risk of obesity, diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular disease and other chronic diseases. As early as 2016 a University of Oxford study stated that “a global switch to diets that rely less on meat and more on fruit and vegetables could save up to 8 million lives by 2050, reduce greenhouse gas emissions by two-thirds, and lead to healthcare-related savings. It could also avoid climate-related damages of $1.5 trillion (US)”.

Small changes can make a huge difference. For instance, the World Resources Institute tells us that “Americans eat approximately 10 billion burgers each year. Replacing 30 percent of the beef in those burgers with mushrooms would:

• Reduce agricultural production-related greenhouse gas emissions by 10.5 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) per year, equivalent to taking 2.3 million cars (and their annual tailpipe emissions) off the road.
• Reduce irrigation water demand by 83 billion gallons per year, an amount equal to 2.6 million Americans’ annual home water use; and
• Reduce global agricultural land demand by more than 14,000 square miles, an area larger than the state of Maryland.”

Reflect on your daily diet and, if it is high in meat consumption, think about adding one or more meatless days to your week as your contribution to a healthier planet. Pope Francis reminds us that there is a connection between the abundance of food available in the developed countries and the hunger which plagues those in the less developed countries. He noted that “The future is not up somewhere in the clouds, but is rather built by promoting and accompanying processes of greater humanization. We can dream of a future without hunger, but this is only reasonable when we engage in tangible processes, vital relations, effective plans, and real commitments.” What commitment will you make today?

Resources:

• McGann, Mary, RSCJ in an article in America October 2022.
• Oxford University at https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2016-03-22-veggie-based-diets-could-save-8-million-lives-2050-and-cut-global-warming
• Planet Earth Weekly – https://planetearth5.com/2019/09/22/the-greenhouse-effect-the-dangers-of-methane/

World Resources Institute at https://twitter.com/WorldResources/status/1021787231672049664

Baku Azerbaijan
The Conference of the Parties (COP 29) is an annual gathering of world leaders to address climate
issues. In many ways this year’s event held in oil-rich Azerbaijan was disappointing. More than
1,000 oil lobbyists attended and often dominated the discussions. One outcome was that the
wealthy countries agreed to provide 300 billion dollars annually in funding for the less developed
countries to deal with the effects of climate change. Developing nations, however, had sought $1
trillion in assistance and called the agreement “insulting” and argued it did not give them the vital
resources they required to truly address the complexities of the climate crisis.

One positive highlight of the conference was The first-ever Faith Pavilion at a UN Climate Change
Conference hosted by the Muslim Council of Elders in collaboration with the COP28 Presidency,
the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and a diverse coalition of global partners
including the Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development, the Episcopal Diocese of California,
the International Partnership on Religion and Development (PaRD), the Peace Department, and
over 50 faith organizations. Pope Francis had planned to come to the Faith Pavilion for an inaugural
session but was unable to attend in person and gave a video address instead. For more information
on this initiative go to www.faithpavilion.com.