Day 31 Reflections

And that's a wrap - plastic free of course!

On the first of July we set out what Plastic Free July means to us:

It means making deliberate choices to buy and consume less plastic. Our goal is not to become a strict Plastic Free Household, but a household that produces as little waste as possible based on: Refusing, Reducing, Reusing and as a last choice, recycling. When we need to replace a product we want to make sure that we choose an appropriate no, or low plastic replacement. This goes for everything from toilet paper, to oats, toothbrushes and oils for cooking. We want to make sure we are not contributing to our planet drowning in plastic any more than is necessary.
At the end of July we have noticeably less waste in our rubbish bin and our recycling bin, and holiday aside we've also spent less money.

A reminder of some of the basics we were already doing (and have continued to do):

• Using our recycling bin and collecting and recycle our 'soft plastics' at the local Coles supermarket
• Carrying our own water bottles
• Generally choosing to make time to have tea or coffee at the cafe, but we have a selection of keep cups.
• Taking our own cloth bags to the grocery store, along with a collection of homemade mesh bags for produce.

 
A few things we’ve added to this list:

• “Taking three” picking up and removing three pieces of plastic from the beach or our local waterways whenever we visit.
• A renewed focus on home grown produce - we're gearing up for spring.

What we plan to add:

• A commitment that each time we travel we will make one more change to reduce our plastic consumption while away from home.
• Baking more of our own bread.
• Taking our own containers to the Deli and butcher.
• Exploring options for plastic free personal care products – as we need to replace them.

The Big Four

Inspired by the Slow Your Home podcast we did a series of four blogs on 'The Big four'. Four single use plastics that we challenged all our friends, family and readers to stop using altogether, with some easy swaps and changes of habit.

The Big four single use plastics are:

• plastic water bottles
• drinking straws
• takeaway coffee cups
• plastic shopping bags

We feel that eliminating these four single use plastic items is easy, and will have a really big impact. There really is no need to use any of these items - there are so many alternatives.

How did we go?
This month while at home and on holiday we’ve taken some time out on our weekends and checked out some great coffee shops. It’s been much more enjoyable than rushing away with a take out, and we plan to continue with this, buying less coffee but sitting down to enjoy our coffee or tea. We’re also proud that we’ve not bought any straws or plastic water bottles.
The only “fail” for us was one plastic shopping bag, on a late night pharmacy for our daughter. We are not being hard on ourselves for plastic free July not being front of mind on this occasion.

Check out Slow Your Home - Plastic: Say No to the Big 4.

Most unexpected discovery

The discovery that the majority of teabags are actually only 70-80% biodegradable because they contain polypropylene. Ouch, that was a shock. Thankfully we made a shift to loose leaf tea years ago and haven't looked back.

One for the ladies

We were really surprised that our most read post was ‘One of the ladies’ all about cloth pads. Here’s the link in case you missed it!

Here’s a summary of some of the suggestions and ideas we’ve shared this month:

Food and the Kitchen

• Try Beeswax cloths, they have significantly reduced the amount of Gladwrap used.
• Bulk buy dry goods with other families - we've done this once and will defiantly keep doing this. It's not that difficult with a couple of families to have sufficient quantities to set up a wholesale account with traders like Honest to Goodness.
• Meal planning – get organised and reap the rewards, we buy more food in bulk (less packaging) and we have little to no food waste. Remember the average Australian Household throws away about $40 worth of feed a week – this should be motivation enough!
• We keep our compost bin on the kitchen bench top. This means it is the most accessible bin (so there's no temptation to just use the rubbish bin, which requires effort) and it gets emptied more frequently than when it lived in a cupboard under the sink.
• Eat more seasonal vegetables. They are usually fresher and better quality, cheaper, and over the course of the year you'll eat a greater variety of foods.
• In terms of planting for food start small. Add in more plants when you're ready and when you've masted what you're already growing. If you've got space think about some fruit trees. Citrus trees are pretty easy to grow well in and around Melbourne.
• If there's a community garden nearby seriously think about joining for the support and knowledge that comes with joining a group a larger group of gardeners.

The Bathroom and laundry
Revisit the hierarchy of refuse, reduce, reuse, recycle:

• Refuse: do you really need every single one of your cleaning and personal care products? Could you buy one produce to replace two or three different products?
• Reduce: could you buy in bulk - and reduce the packaging, or change brands to a similar produce with less packing. Alternatively could you use less of a particular product?
• Reuse: reuse some of the containers - if you choose to make your own
• Recycle: Put a recycling bin in your bathroom and laundry, seriously this simple action has made a big difference in our house. There was a real temptation to place empty containers in the rubbish bin that sits in the bathroom - rather than walk to the kitchen recycling bin! 

Gadgets and phones

• Investigate whether a broken electronic gadget can be repaired, before you replace it or upgrade - you might be surprised. If you're in Perth or Melbourne we highly recommend Haiou for the service and speed or repairs.
• If you must upgrade please, please please recycle your mobile phone. Check Mobile Muster in Australia, it's the only industry-led mobile recycling program in the world.

Travel

• Say no - if you don't need that toiletries bag, don't take it. If you have room pack your own comfy socks and a small light weight blanket or scarf (as both these items tend to be wrapped in single use plastic).
• If you really want to make sure your waste is recycled, especially on the return trip you could take your waste off the plane and deposit it in recycling bins at the airport, or take it home to compost.
• Please use airline and airport social media to support the good things you see and tell them how you feel about the increasing amount of waste.

Toys, and gifts

• To try and limit the amount of plastic toys we have always tried to emphasise that we love and would value gifts of books and clothes.
• Practical suggestions for plastic free toys and children’s gifts: think about wooden and fabric toys or consumables, like soft toys or blankets, wooden tea sets, dress ups, wax crayons, pencils and interesting paper.
• If you do want to give a physical gift, buy a book, give a plant, or something homemade - this could include baking a cake, muffins, biscuits or something yummy.
• Donate to a charity.
• Reuse gift bags and wrapping paper or wrap in fabric.

(Modern) cloth nappies

• Find a family who uses MCNs and talk to them before you decide one way or the other - we are always happy to chat about MCNs and dispel a few myths.
• Check if you Council, or anyone local has a cloth nappy library - there is a bewildering number of types and brands of cloth nappies these days.
• Consider starting small, give it a go. There are lots of great trial packs (for example three nappies) to see if you like them. Even part time cloth nappies will reduce your amount of waste, and save you money.
• Consider buying MCNs second hand - there are some great forums for this and there can be some real bargains to be had.

More research required!

Bioplastics
We plan to do some more reading and research in to ‘bioplastics’ so watch this space for an update. We’re intrigued by the idea of bioplastics but worried that they may actually do more harm than good. We will continue to focus on reducing or reliance on plastic rather than switching to bioplastics as an alternative.

Airline waste, maybe, just maybe it’s not so much about the unwillingness of the Airlines?
One of the things that really stood out on the flight home was the volume of waste generated from one Jetstar flight. This is something we want to find out more about – and find ways to change attitudes and policy reduce waste and at the very least find ways to support more waste being diverted to recycling.
The amount of airline waste ending up in landfill each year may not be so much about the unwillingness of individual airlines. It may have more to do with:

• Quarantine regulations (for example in Australia international aircraft rubbish is classified as quarantine waste and must be disposed of accordingly);
• a lack of end of trip recycling facilities. For airlines to develop a comprehensive recycling programme they require (standard) reprocessing facilities at every airport they use. It's not feasible or practical for items from a previous flight to be transported back to a central processing facility.

That said some airlines do better than others! So call out the airlines that are doing well and those that have room for improvement!

Personal Care Products

Now it gets hard

Somehow in our house plastic free July has focused on the kitchen. Moving into the bathroom and laundry it suddenly became quite hard, and to be honest a little bit daunting to contemplate 'plastic free'.

We tend to buy a lot of our bathroom and laundry products in bulk so this July we haven't had to confront replacing any consumables in either of these rooms. But what happens when we run out of laundry soap? Shampoo and toothpaste? Not to mention dental floss, make-up and deodorant. We did a quick audit and almost all of our cleaning, laundry and hygiene products come in plastic containers. A notable exception is our laundry powder. It comes in a recycled cardboard box, with no other packaging and no plastic scoop in each box. We also use facecloths, and we've ditched disposable make-up wipes and cotton balls, in favour of reusable fabric options.

We know that if you look online you can easily find recipes for several products that can be made at home and replace the one you buy. But we're yet to test them and to be honest not sure if we have the inclination for many of them. Also while we are fans of myplasticfreelife.com there are some quite pedantic blogs when in comes to personal care for example "Searching for a Plastic-Free, Zero-Waste Dental Floss".  We're just not ready for this level of thought and dedication (yet).

Some of our family's suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Revisit the hierarchy of refuse, reduce, reuse, recycle.
• Refuse: do you really need every single one of your cleaning and personal care products? Could you buy one produce to replace two or three different products? 
• Reduce: could you buy in bulk - and reduce the packaging, or change brands to a similar produce with less packing. Alternatively could you use less of a particular product?
• Reuse: reuse some of the containers - if you choose to make your own
• Recycle: Put a recycling bin in your bathroom and laundry, seriously this simple action has made a big difference in our house. There was a real temptation to place empty containers in the rubbish bin that sits in the bathroom - rather than walk to the kitchen recycling bin!

Question

Are you ready to challenge the plastic containers and packaging in your bathroom and laundry?

A gift

There are so many ways to give, without giving plastic

Tonight we'd like to share some thoughts and ideas about giving. In recent years we've tried to move away from giving 'stuff' to giving or contributing to shared experiences. A meal, Moonlight Cinema tickets, a day out in the Yarra Valley or at the Peninsula Hot Springs. Sometimes we've bought gift cards, donated money to a particular cause, or bought subscriptions (such as magazines).

Our favourite gift is our annual pass for Melbourne Zoos from 'Grandma and Pa'. This gift has brought all of us so much joy and wonderful memories of exploring the zoos. Each time we visit we seem to comment on how much we love our annual pass and the people who bought it for us.

Some suggestions and ideas we'd love to gift to you:

• If you do want to give a physical gift, try a homemade one, this could include baking a cake, muffins, biscuits or something yummy.
• Donate to a charity.
• Give a book.
• While eco-friendly, non-toxic good quality toys can cost more than cheap plastic toys, kids (and our planet) are worth the extra time and investment. If you have any doubts about this read of Slow Death by Rubber Duck.
• Give life – give a plant! 
• Reuse gift bags and wrapping paper or wrap in fabric. Check out the Rogue Ginger for some great ideas on how to wrap presents (plastic free of course!)

Question

What's been the best experience you've been gifted?

One for the ladies

It's that time of the month

A word of warning about this blog. If you are male, or female and really grossed out by the whole idea of cloth pads then don't feel compelled to keep reading.

It's fair to say that some of the more common adjectives associated with cloth pads include: gross... disgusting... and unhygienic.

Some my favourite alternative words are: zero waste - completely plastic free (yippee!), low cost, toxic free, sustainable and healthier.

Environmental benefits

There have been some attempts to calculate how much landfill ladies generate during a lifetime of disposable pad/tampon use none of which seem particularly scientific or useful. So here's the deal - over 4 million Australian women aged between 15 and 55 will purchased menstrual products (tampons, sanitary pads, panty liners) in July. Each of which is also wrapped in plastic, and each pack of 10 or 12 in wrapped in even more plastic. However you calculate it this is a lot of plastic and a lot of waste.

Disposable pads/tampons and pads are estimated to take hundreds of years to decompose. Cloth pads have a lifespan of two to three years, or longer. Mine are five years old and starting to show signs of wear. Better yet the cotton fabric will only take about a year to decompose when they are no longer fit for use.

Source: 1 Million Women

Better for our bodies?

Disposable pads (and tampons) are made primarily of bleached wood pulp or viscose rayon. What makes them so effective is super-absorbent gels and leak-proof plastic backings. I'm no health expert but personally I don't believe that placing all of this next to my skin one week in four can be healthy in the long term. I know that my periods have been less painful, lighter and shorter in the years since making the switch to cloth pads. I'll leave this for each woman to make her own call on this one.

Cost savings

In the last 12 months I have spent maybe $20 at most on disposable products (which I've used when travelling, or playing sport). The best estimates I could find are that over five years the cost of using washable pads is around 25% of the cost of using disposable pads. Personally I think it's less than that. Either way it's significantly cheaper.

Some  suggestions and ideas I'd love to share:

• While you can make your own (lots of patterns out there on the internet try:
• http://www.reusableincontinencepads.com.au
• https://www.hannahpad.com.au
• http://www.moonpads.com.au

Modern cloth nappies

5,500 that’s the number of nappies a parent will typically change from birth to toilet training.

There's a choice, disposable nappies, or Cloth Nappies. This blog is all about Modern Cloth Nappies (MCNs). They are super cute and look like a slightly bulkier version of a disposable with the difference being you throw them in the washing machine instead of the rubbish bin.

There is no folding and no soaking. The nappy is often one piece, or two pieces that easily snap together. Seriously your washing machine does the hard work and there is no soaking or bleaching required. Choices of fabrics have improved a lot in recent decades since the age of the terry towling flats. MCNs perform as well, if not better than a disposable nappy.

Here's why we used cloth nappies.

Over 2 billion disposable nappies go into landfill sites in Australia each year. Or put another way every child wearing disposable nappies will contribute 1-2 tonnes of nappy waste to landfill. That’s nappies, nappy bags, packaging, wipes - and a whole lot of poo! Every single discarded nappy is still out there, rotting in a municipal landfill.

MCNs are either adjustable and can be used from birth to toilet training or they are ‘sized’ for example newborn through to toddler size. Depending on the brand and type of nappy liners either snap into the shell or are placed into a pocket that opens at the back of the nappy. This means you can customise the absorbency of the nappy as needed.

What about laundry I hear you ask?

Well it’s as simple as dry pailing the nappies, until you have a large enough pile to wash. We rinsed our nappies and then placed them in with our normal laundry.

The financial benefits

Back to the 5,500 nappy changes. The total cost of disposables and wipes over the 5,500 nappies over two and half years estimated to be somewhere around AUD $3,000 (give or take preferred brands and age of toilet training). Here’s an rough average or typical spend on MCN’s:

• Nappies - $400 (around 15 to 20 new nappies)
• Cloth wipes $30 (most parents using cloth nappies choose not to use disposable wipes)
• Dedicated night nappies $90 (optional)

To which you can add an estimated upper limit of $200 laundry over the life of the nappies (assumed to be two and half years).

TOTAL COST  around $630

While our primary motivation for using cloth nappies was environment we know that we have benefited financially from using cloth nappies most of the time. We weren't fanatical about cloth nappies, and we've certainly valued the convenience of disposable nappies at various points in time - especially when travelling.

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• If you want to reduce the amount of nappy waste and help look after the planet MCNs are the way to go. They are easy to use - super cute, and very easy on the wallet. What’s not to like?!
• Find a family who uses MCNs and talk to them before you decide one way or the other - we are always happy to chat about MCNs and dispel a few myths.
• Check if you Council, or anyone local has a cloth nappy library - there is a bewildering number of types and brands of cloth nappies these days.
• Consider starting small, give it a go. There are lots of great trial packs (for example three nappies) to see if you like them. Even part time cloth nappies will reduce your amount of waste, and save you money.
• Consider buying MCNs second hand - there are some great forums for this and there can be some real bargains to be had.

Questions

If cloth nappies were ok on your bottom (and your parents, and you grandparents before them) what's so wrong about them now? MCNs and modern washing machines make this a much easier choice than ever before!

Not quite plastic?

Bioplastics

So while on holidays (we promise this is the last time we will mention our recent trip to Cairns) we tried a 'Flying Fox' icey-pole. Now the fine print in the photo below might be hard to read but apparently the packaging is not plastic. It's "wrapped in a cellulose film made from wood pulp which degrades into a non-toxic biomass".

We're confused

According to the Biodegradable Products Institute a biodegradable material is: "where under the right conditions the microbes in the environment can break down the material and use it as a food source". Which means that bioplastics may or may not be biodegradable, and the conditions under which bioplastics may biodegrade vary widely.

Unfortunately biobased and biodegradability are not the same. Just because a material is based on an “renewable resource” does not mean that it is “biodegradable” and / or  “compostable”. This type of bioplastic (where the carbon is derived from renewable feedstocks) can be made from corn, sugar cane, wheat fibre or in the case of our icy-pole 'wood pulp'.

While some biobased products can biodegrade in municipal or commercial composting facilities, home composting, and aquatic environments, others will only biodegrade in very specific environments, and others will not biodegrade at all.

Pro's

• A smaller energy footprint and a less polluted ecosystem
• They can be made from a wide variety of renewable resources

Con's

• Firstly, and currently the BIGGEST challenge - it can be very difficult to figure out which bioplastics are biodegradable and/or compostable. This means that many bioplastics do not get discarded correctly and because so many municipalities don’t even have the facilities to sort, compost, or recycle bioplastics everything ends up in a landfill anyway (where the bioplastic may or may not degrade).
• Because not all bioplastics actually degrade (in a meaningful time span) some will remain intact for decades (especially if they are not discarded properly).
• There is a need to develop composting programs and infrastructure, and to manage concerns about the contamination of recycling systems.
• In landfill sites some new bioplastics can degrade without oxygen, where they release methane.
• The methods used to grow the renewable feedstock may have a large ecological footprint - and can displace food crops.

Back to the Icey-pole

We did a little more research and the packaging on our icey-pole was fully biodegradable, so feel free to use the home compost heap for this one!

Questions

Are you confused too?

Are the cons worth it? Or should we refocus the effort on using less plastic, rather than the same amount (or more) plastic but 'guilt free' because it is somehow natural and we think it will degrade so therefore is not contributing to yet more plastic waste?

Day 23 Travel (part 2)

And we're home... 

All good things out come to an end. Today we flew home from Cairns.


One of the things that really stood out on the flight home was the volume of waste generated from one Jetstar flight. When the flight attendants collected the rubbish it looked like all the empty cans, cups, and plastic bottles ended up in the same rubbish bag. One small glimmer of hope was we think they may have been separating out newspapers and magazines on top hopefully for recycling.

According to the International Air Transport Association airline passengers generated 5.2m tonnes of waste in 2016. Most of this went straight to landfill or was incinerated. Disturbingly this figure is projected to double in the next 15 years (for the purpose of clarification this figure does include toilet waste).

Maybe it's not so much about the unwillingness of the Airlines? 

So here's what we've discovered. The amount of airline waste ending up in landfill each year may not be so much about the unwillingness of individual airlines. It may have more to do with:

• Quarantine regulations (for example in Australia international aircraft rubbish is classified as quarantine waste and must be disposed of accordingly)
• A lack of end of trip recycling facilities. For airlines to develop a comprehensive recycling programme they require (standard) reprocessing facilities at every airport they use. It's not feasible or practical for items from a previous flight to be transported back to a central processing facility.

That said some airlines do better than others here's a couple of positive examples:

• BA separate and recycle aluminium cans, but only on flights into London airports.
• United Airlines use compostable paper cups, and they collect and donate unused toiletry kits to homeless shelters.
• Qantas now recycle 12 tonnes of rubbish from domestic flights each month (we saw no evidence of this on Jetstar).

Close to home

Let us begin this section by stating up from that we have no particular affiliation or love of any one airline. However one of the more interesting Closed Loop case studies relates to its work with Qantas.

In 2010 Qantas worked with Closed Loop to examine the sustainability of products on 
its international flights. In August that year they completed a waste audit of international flights landing in Sydney. Here an overview of what they found:

• In the cabin: mostly water bottles and plastic wrap were left in seatback pockets and half of the amenity kits weren't used. By weight 59 percent of this waste could be recycled
• Waste from the meal carts: mostly food, unopened drinks and aluminium trays. By weight 23 percent of this waste could be recycled.

Immediate changes included how amenity kits were handed out, and removing aluminium trays for meals. In 2013/14 Qantas reduced waste sent to landfill by 20 percent (based on 2009/10 figures). These days Qantas cabin crew ask customers to help separate aluminium cans, plastic bottles, and newspapers for the cabin rubbish collection service, and each aircraft galley has dedicated recycling bins.

Some of our family's suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Say no - if you don't need that toiletries bag, don't take it. If you have room pack your own comfy socks and a small light weight blanket or scarf (as both these items tend to be wrapped in single use plastic).
• If you really want to make sure your waste is recycled, especially on the return trip you could take your waste off the plane and deposit it in recycling bins at the airport, or take it home to compost.
• Please use airline and airport social media to support the good things you see and tell them how you feel about the increasing amount of waste.

Questions

Do you really think it is asking too much of passengers to help with some really basic sorting of recyclables? (e.g. Aluminium cans, plastic bottles and newspapers)

What great examples of airline (or airport) recycling or waste reduction have you seen?

Day 22 travel

A tropical paradise

So we've been a little quiet the past few days - with good reason we've been enjoying a family holiday in Cairns. We're celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary and have had a wonderful mini break in Far North Queensland.

What we've also discovered is that it's a little harder to stay true to Plastic Free July when in the air and away from home. 

Some reflections

Some things have been pretty straight forward: we've carried our drink bottles (so no single use plastic bottles); we travelled with a few cloth bags for groceries; our own fork and spoon (wrapped in a serviette); and we decided on no take out coffee - we're on holidays plenty of time to dine in. We also have a couple of great wet bags left over from cloth nappies which we brought for wet bathers and rashies.

The not so straight forward: food waste and food wrapped in plastic - on the plane, and while out and about. Also being away from home and buying things like dips (that we would normally make from scratch and store in glass) and certain produce like strawberries which of course come in a plastic tray. Last night we had fish and chips on the esplanade - reusable plates, but sauces in disposable cups, and all of the desserts were wrapped in plastic cling film or in single use plastic tubs (for the fruit salad).

So we compromised. 

We've had a wonderful time away, and we've decided that each time we travel we will commit to one more change to reduce our plastic consumption!

Here's another couple of blogs with a similar theme:

• http://treadingmyownpath.com/2014/08/15/how-to-fly-plastic-free-as-much-as-possible/
• https://myplasticfreelife.com/2011/02/plastic-free-travel-bring-your-own-and-be-prepared/

'The Big four' Part 4

Take Away Coffee Cups (and no they can't be recycled)

As part of Plastic Free July we made a commitment not to use take away coffee cups even again. Big call, but with some reusable 'keep cups' and a couple of habit changes (actually remembering to take them with us) very easy.

Disposable take away coffee cups. They look like they are made of paper, but are actually lined with plastics that do not break down and are damaging to the environment.

Australians use around 1 billion disposable coffee cups every year - amounting to some 60 tons of plastic waste per annum. So it's no wonder that take away coffee cups are the second-largest contributor to litter waste after plastic bottles (our final piece of plastic in this four part series). With these figures in mind take away coffee cups deserve to be identified as one of the 'Big Four'.

Slow down, sit down and enjoy a moment with your coffee, or buy a keep cup it's that simple

Once again there are some very simple solutions to never needing another single use (plastic lined) take away coffee cup.

Number One: Slow down. If you 'need' a coffee what about taking five minutes from your day to sit down and enjoy it (from a reusable mug). Perhaps a radical idea in our fast paced lives, but try it for a change, you might find your savour the taste and enjoy your coffee just that little bit more.

Number Two: buy a reusable travel mug (with a decent lid) and carry it with you. To this we would also add work out which cafes offer a discount when you bring your own mug, if you drink a lot of coffee the savings could add up over a year - and they will defiantly pay for your travel mug. In 2015 recent research revealed that by the time you use your keep cup 15 times you've broken even from an environmental perspective.

That's it, super easy!

Some of our family's suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Once again we suggest check out Slow Your Home - Plastic: Say No to the Big 4, and http://www.noplasticbags.org.au/alternatives/
• Slow down, enjoy a coffee sitting down once in a while.
• Buy a travel mug! We love our Keep cups.

Questions

Do you really enjoy that coffee that you drink while on the go? 

'The Big four' Part 3

Plastic Drink Bottles - the single use throw away kind

When it comes to single use throw away plastics nothing gets more flack than the plastic water bottle. Criticised for the contents on the inside (which are basically tap water), and for its plastic packaging.

Despite the fact that plastic drink bottles can be recycled, the majority are not, and each of these will take over 500 years to decompose. If that doesn't bother you what about the cost. A bottle of water costs around $2.50 AUD versus only a few cents per litre for tap water.

This is another 'Big four' item that we haven't bought in a really long time, and are committed to not buying again. It's not hard to carry a reusable drink bottle.

Some of our family's suggestions:

• Take your own reusable drink bottle with you when you leave the house for work or play.
• Try switching to glass bottles. They are much easier to clean and have no effect on the taste or smell of your drink.

'The Big Four' Part 2

Straws

The second single use plastic that we challenge all our friends, family and readers to stop using altogether, with some easy swaps and changes of habit is... the humble straw.

This one is an easy one for us, as we can't actually remember the last time we used a straw. This probably has a lot to do with other life choices that mean we don't drink soft drink, juices (even fresh squeezed) or milk shakes. Since starting plastic free July we've been fascinated with how many times we see people using plastic straws.

Top ten 

Plastic straws make the top ten list of items picked up on beach clean ups. We wonder if this is in part because they are small, and maybe each straw on its own is not viewed as significant? What ever the reason straws rarely make it into recycling bins.

The image below sums up the scale of the problem. Avid scuba diver Kasey Turner was snorkeling after work recently at a popular dive site in Manly. She found 319 straws on a single 20-minute snorkel. Twenty-four hours later Kasey went back and found 294 in the exact same place.

See: https://www.nourishedlife.com.au/article/893141/why-plastic-straws-are-so-bad.html

Some of our family's suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• For those who use straws regularly please take a few minutes to watch some very compelling videos at One Less Straw 
• If you must, buy a set of washable reusable straws and carry them with you (Try Biome, or flora&fauna) 

Question

Do you really need a straw with that?

Day 15 half way through July

Some reflections

At the start of the month thought that we were doing a reasonably good job of reducing our consumption of plastic. Two weeks in and we have realised there are a lot of additional small changes we can and will make to continue to reduce our impact on the plant. Out goal was not to be a strict 'plastic free' household but to produce less waste and focus on the hierarchy of refusing, reducing, reusing and as a last choice recycling.

Here's some of what we've noticed so far:

• People are actually reading our blog and Facebook posts - thank you!!
• We have less waste in our rubbish bin and our recycling bin (which we will put out next week for the first time in four weeks).
• We've saved money - we've kept a strict grocery list, not been tempted by take away coffee when we've forgotten our reusable cup and have had very few lunches out (although when we have gone out for lunch we've selected restaurants over the food court or fast food which is a little more expensive but much more enjoyable).
• We've learnt a lot, from waste education in Victoria to sustainable alternatives, and there's always more to learn.
• We've not used any of 'The Big Four' single use plastic items - yay us! This is something we aim to sustain long term.
• Replacing items over the coming months as they run out (such as personal care items / cosmetics etc) is definitely going to be a challenge.

Day 14 'The Big Four' Part 1

Plastic Bags

Inspired by the inspirational podcast Slow Your Home we have decided to do a series of four blogs on 'The Big four'. Four single use plastics that we challenge all our friends, family and readers to stop using altogether, with some easy swaps and changes of habit.

The Big four single use plastics are:

plastic shopping bags

drinking straws

takeaway coffee cups

plastic water bottles

While our goals for Plastic Free July do not include becoming a strict Plastic Free Household, we feel that eliminating these four single use plastic items is easy, and will have a really big impact. There really is no need to use any of these items - there are so many alternatives.

We have been working towards reducing our reliance on plastic bags for quite some time. But they still manage to find their way into our house and typically end up lining our rubbish bin.  Plastic Free July has been great motivation for us to really focus on setting up a range of habits and practices to ensure that we don't contribute to demand for these items ever again.

Save the turtles, say NO to plastic bags

Australians use around 4 billion plastic bags each year. Over three quarters of them are sent to landfill after a single use. A huge waste of resources, and a massive environmental problem. Too many plastic bags end up as litter on our beaches. Recent University of Queensland research found that 30 percent of turtle deaths in Moreton Bay are caused by the ingestion of plastic debris.

It's so easy to pack a reusable bag (or two)!

The easiest, and best thing we can all do is use re-usable bags (or a backpack) to carry shopping. That's it.

Keep them in the car, or taken them with you when you might be going shopping. There are some great lightweight fabric pocket fold up bags that easily fit in even the smallest pocket or handbag. Buy supermarket green bags if you must, but there are lots of awesome shopping bags out there, and you can always get creative and make your own.

Our eclectic collection of cloth grocery bags

Newsflash

So as of today Australia's two major grocery stores have announced that they are (finally) going to phase out single use plastic bags.

See:

• http://www.news.com.au/finance/business/retail/woolworths-ditches-plastic-bags/news-story/9333ba06907457105729b98ecc276469
• http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-07-14/woolworths-to-phase-out-plastic-bags-around-the-country/8709336
• http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2017/07/13/woolworths-to-ban-single-use-plastic-bags-from-next-year_a_23029296/

Some of our family's suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Check out Slow Your Home - Plastic: Say No to the Big 4, and http://www.noplasticbags.org.au/alternatives/
• The rubbish bin dilemma - we still don't have perfect answer but we are now trying a few approaches. This includes putting dry/clean items straight into our unlined kitchen bin, and putting wet items into discarded soft plastic wrappings, or cardboard boxes/ a sheet of newspaper.

Questions

Do you really need all those plastic bags?

Day 13 'Resource Recovery'

Confession, this is actually day 13 and day 12, because Mum was out last night and the State of Origin was on. Commiserations to all the Blues fans out there. 

Now the content of this post is probably quite technical and dry, but try and stay with us to the end because we think it's actually quite a critical part of 'plastic free'.

The Metropolitan Waste and Resource Recovery Implementation Plan

The what?

This little document (all 162 pages of it...) "ensures our [Melbourne's] waste and resource recovery system is integrated and provides an essential community service."

Still no clearer? This Plan tells us how Melbourne's waste will be managed over a 10 year period. It has four strategic objectives:

• Reduce waste sent to landfill
• Increase organic waste recovered
• Deliver community, environmental & economic benefits
• Plan for Melbourne’s growing population

All of this sounds fine enough until one of us ('Mum') actually started reading the document (I want to point out that I did have cause to read plan in the course of my work. My focus was on the land use buffers around current and future land fill sites).

What is incredible is while this plan is part of Victoria’s waste and resource recovery infrastructure planning framework (as set out in the Environmental Protection Act 1970) it has absolutely NO focus on reducing waste - only how the waste is 'recovered' or managed once created. Which is staggering given there are 21 landfills in Melbourne, and 10 of these will close in the next 10 years; and over the lifetime of the plan the amount of waste produced each year is expected to increase by 63 percent (based on current population projections).

Surely there needs to be an emphasis on or at least a relationship with reducing the amount of waste, whether that be 'recycling' 'organics' or 'waste'. So I turned to the Victorian Waste Education Strategy where I had a little more luck. This Strategy contains six 'strategic directions'

1. Increase the Victorian community and business perception of waste management as an essential service 
2. Increase community awareness of waste and support and encourage waste avoidance
3. Improve resource recovery and reduce contamination
4. Reduce litter and illegal dumping
5. Support waste and resource recovery education for schools
6. Strengthen Victoria’s waste and resource recovery education capabilities

Here's some of what I found out about the two actions under direction two (Increase community awareness of waste and support and encourage waste avoidance).

Action 1: Food waste avoidance

1.1 Provide information and guidance on minimising food waste to the community
1.2 Support the community to minimise food waste to landfill
1.3 Pilot food waste avoidance programs with the commercial and industrial sector in targeted local government areas.

Some facts to add to your knowledge about food waste: "Food waste makes up a significant component of the average household’s landfill bin in Victoria – about 40% of what is thrown out by weight. Victorians estimate that they waste around $40 a week on unused food and drink, equivalent to $2,000 a year. Across Victoria, this adds up to about $4 billion a year. Not only is this a loss of money to householders, it is a waste of the resources used to grow, process, package and transport food from markets to our homes."

Action 2: Waste avoidance and minimisation for business
2.1 Identify target business sectors
2.2 Partner with key organisations
2.3 Develop guidance material to support
2.4 Support SMEs who want to transition to waste avoidance and waste minimisation efficiencies

But at the end of all this reading we are really disappointed about the lack of action to reduce the amount of waste being produced in the first instance. The Waste Education Strategy really appears to lack any real teeth to effect change. There are so many 'weasel' words, encourage, support (those who want to), partner with. Very disappointing.

Our suggestions for an addition to Plastic Free July:

• Get involved! If there's an opportunity to contribute to  a strategy or a plan about waste - take the time to contribute and make your opinion known. The more diverse input to these plans and strategies the better. Make sure the relevant politician know your view on waste - specifically plastic and the need to reduce the amount of plastic, especially throw away single use items.
• There's a need to keep Government (in this case more specifically Sustainability Victoria) accountable for all of the actions in the Victorian Waste Education Policy. We plan to write (e-mail) the relevant Minister expressing our disappointment with the policy, and request a progress updates to understand what's actually being achieved.

Questions

What are you going to do to reduce your food waste? Surely that $40 is better of in your wallet, than being tossed away.

Day 11 Grow your own!

Get out in the garden

On the weekend we wrote about eating more seasonal produce. One easy way to do this, and learn what's in season is to grow your own. Even if all you can manage is a few fresh herbs on a windowsill to add to your cooking, it will all help reduce the amount of plastic you need to use. Those who have visited us will know that we have a small garden, but have managed to grow a reasonable amount of produce, with plans to grow more.

Here's a selection of some photos from this week in our garden:

Our rhubarb took a couple of years to get going but now we have lots of it  and regularly enjoy stewed rhubarb.

Broad beans - growing well this year.

Mixed plantings of beetroot, rocket and parsley at the back.

Black Kale, this is the first year we've grown them from seed.

This is our main vegetable patch (mid-winter) it's not wide, but with a 28metre driveway it's a surprising amount of space.

We have a lemon and a lime tree, both are starting to produce  a good amount of fruit.

It might look like a bunch of twigs, but this is one of our six apple trees that line our driveway.

Some of our family's suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Start small, add in more plants when you're ready and when you've masted what you're already growing.
• If you've got space think about some fruit trees. Citrus trees are pretty easy to grow well in and around Melbourne.
• If there's a community garden nearby seriously think about joining for the support and knowledge that comes with joining a group a larger group of gardeners.

Questions

What's the best thing about home grown produce?

Day 10 More Plastic than Fish in the Ocean

The ocean is filled with about 165 million tons of plastic

"If we keep doing what we are doing now, scientists estimate that by 2050 there is going to be more plastic than fish in the world's oceans"

Today, like most work days I cycled to work along Dandenong Creek. Most days I am struck by how fortunate I am to have such a lovely commute to work. Tonight I was listening to the Magpies warble and the Frogs croak, watching the sun set as I chased the last half hour of day light on my ride home. Then it stuck me just how much plastic had been washed in the Creek after the storm earlier in the day. How in all the years I have been cycling along the creek I've never stopped to think about just how much plastic is being washed into the creek on its way into Port Phillip Bay.

So today I decided to add another element to our family's plastic free July challenge - to pick up and remove plastic from our local creeks, it might only be a couple of pieces (quite literally a drop in the ocean) but it will help and if it inspires others to do the same then it will make a difference.

My suggestions for an addition to Plastic Free July:

• This month please take three pieces of rubbish with you when you leave the beach, waterway or…anywhere. Visit: http://www.take3.org

Questions

How many times this month have you simply walked past plastic discarded in water - be it creek or ocean?
Could you make a difference, and inspire someone else to do the same?

Day 8 (and 9)Tin cans (lined with plastic)

The Tomato dilemma

This weekend we did a lot of cooking, and we used a couple of tins of Australian grown tomatoes. Before we started our plastic free July challenge we knew that tin cans are usually (but not always) coated (with an epoxy resin) to prevent them from reacting with the food and oxidising. Therefore they are not technically plastic free. In an effort to move towards plastic free we could:

• stop, or reduce the amount of cooking we do with tinned tomatoes;
• use fresh tomatoes, which we do when they are in season and cheaper, and will continue to do; or
• switch to glass bottles of passata for cooking, but, and it's a big but all of the passata sold in our local grocery stores is made from imported tomatoes.

Plastic free July for us means making deliberate choices to buy and consume less plastic. Our goal was never to become a strict plastic free household, but a household that produces as little waste as possible based on: Refusing, Reducing, Reusing and as a last choice, recycling.

So, in our efforts to support local produce over imported we are going to stick with our tins of tomatoes and take some comfort that we are reducing the amount we consume (by choosing more seasonal vegetables when fresh tomatoes are less abundant) and reusing the cans before we recycle them.

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Up cycle! We've had so much fun with our planter pots, and most have lasted a couple of seasons. They are a great way to grow lettuce and rocket slug free before the soil warms up.
• Eat more seasonal vegetables. They are usually fresher and better quality, cheaper, and over the course of the year you'll eat a greater variety of foods. Try the Sustainable Table seasonal produce table.

Questions

How far are you prepared to go to be 'plastic free'?

Day 7 Uh oh a broken mobile phone

Never fear it can be repaired!

Today was not a good day. It started with a broken mobile phone. Now we could tell you an interesting and elaborate story about how it broke, or just tell you that we have a tiled floor and a toddler. The phone did not survive the fall.

We checked browsed online and figured we could buy a new phone. The phone is over two years old so definitely time for an upgrade, right?

Well today we tried something different. We figured we would investigate whether it could be repaired, along with an iPad (left in the bottom draw because it wouldn't turn on) and another mobile phone (which we replaced earlier this year with a brand new one on the day it broke).

Good news!

The broken mobile was repaired in less than an hour (along with the other mobile and the iPad) and we now have VIP membership to the repair store - not that we want a reason to visit again anytime soon!

While we definitely have more technological gadgets than one small family needs we feel a little better about have extended the life of couple of phones and an iPad.

It's estimated there is over 23 million unwanted mobiles in homes around Australia. A staggering five million of these are broken or unusable. Over 95 percent of the materials our mobile phones, batteries and chargers can be recovered and recycled and kept out of landfill.

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Investigate whether a broken electronic gadget can be repaired, before you replace it or upgrade - you might be surprised.
• If you're in Perth or Melbourne we highly recommend Haiou for the service and speed or repairs.
• If you must upgrade please recycle your mobile phone. Check Mobile Muster in Australia. The program is voluntarily funded and managed by mobile handset manufacturers, service providers, network carriers and distributors. It's the only industry-led mobile recycling program in the world. Since the program started in 1998 over 1,244 tonnes of mobile phone components have been collected and recycled.
  

Question

Do we really need all of our electronic gadgets?

Day 6 A good cup of tea

There's nothing better than a good brew...

Our family loves a good brew. According to Wikipedia after water, tea is the most widely consumed drink in the world, so we must be on to something good! Dad is Scottish and we all know how much his proud nation stands by the idea that all of the world's problems can be solved over a good cup of tea.

Would you like some plastic with that?

We've recently discovered that the majority of teabags are actually only 70-80% biodegradable because they contain polypropylene, Ouch, that was a shock. Luckily we made a shift to loose leaf tea years ago and haven't looked back.

But.... according the to the UK Tea Council (we love the idea that such an institute exists!) 96 percent of the 165,000,000 cups of tea drunk every day in the UK are made with tea bags. We can only guess that the figure is likely to be similar in Australia. We also know that it is getting increasingly difficult to source loose leaf tea in grocery stores.

Our lovely red tea pot!

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Have a read of Treading my own Path: The Scandalous Plastic in Tea Bags – Who Knew? and  The Guardian article 'Most UK teabags not fully biodegradeable, research reveals'
• Did you know that it is five times more efficient to only boil the amount of water you need, as opposed to boiling a full kettle each time you make a cup of tea.
• We love Madura Australian tea, check out: https://www.maduratea.com.au

Questions

Did you realise that tea bags are not compostable, and contain plastic?

Day 5 Children's Toys

It's play time!

Tonight as we packed away the toys (again) we reflected on how many of Miss A's toys are actually plastic. Before she was born we spoke a lot about trying limit the amount of plastic toys. With one exception (discussed below) we have not purchased any plastic toys. However there is an inevitability with small children that friends and family will give toys and gifts, and the vast majority are made of plastic. While we have spoken to some like minded friends and family about our preferences we have never refused gifts or tried in any way to impose rules on how these important people can share and show their love.

Pre-loved

For a recent Birthday Miss A received a plastic toy cash register. The beautiful thing about this gift is that it is pre-loved by three cousins who each took great delight in showing her how to use it and playing 'shop' with her. They each recalled the endless fun they had playing 'shops'. We also appreciate that it is sturdy and well made. The solar powered battery that powers the calculator still works and we are confident that other kids will get enjoyment from it.

Let's build!

Our wonderful 'Retro' Duplo

So the one exception is Lego (or more precisely Duplo). Our whole family loves playing with Duplo. In addition to what Miss A has received as gifts we have invested in quite a lot of Duplo, which we have purchased second hand. We were actually surprised at how well Duplo holds its value.

We bought 12kg of Duplo (yes that is a lot of Duplo) and most it is over 20 years old, demonstrating just how durable the worlds number 1 toy is. We are a huge fan of play with 'loose parts' that can be shaped and created into so many different things depending on our daughters imagination.

Yes it's plastic, but we're ok with that. The majority of it was pre-loved by another family and it's been used over and over again. We also know that at some point will be placed in storage for another generation to use all over again.

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• We talk a lot about 'pre-loved' rather than second hand, or hand me downs.
• To try and limit the amount of plastic toys we have always tried to emphasise that we love and would value gifts of books and clothes.
• Some particle suggestions, think about wooden and fabric toys or consumables, like soft toys or blankets, wooden tea sets, dress ups, wax crayons, pencils and interesting paper. 
• If you can, and are comfortable talk to grandparents and immediate family during pregnancy about what you would like (emphasis on suggestions and ideas of what you would like - not a list of 'please don't buy'). Following conversations with our families during pregnancy we were fortunate that both sets of Grandparents contributed towards a buggy and her car seat when she was born - in lieu of lots of toys.

Question

What is your families favourite pre-loved toy?

Day 4 Wrapped in plastic

A trip to the Deli

Today we needed to top up on some fresh produce and pantry items. This included a trip to the deli to buy bacon (as mentioned in Day 1 we are not vegetarians). While we don't eat a lot of processed meat it does feature in our meal planning.

So we figure that a single sheet of plastic is an improvement on bacon wrapped completely in plastic - taken out of the fridge at the grocery store. But it is still plastic. So our next challenge is to take our own container to the deli and remove the need for any plastic.

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Slow living (now there's a whole other blog) involves not always making convenience the number one priority in life.
• Check http://slowyourhome.com/the-slow-home-podcast/ Especially 'Talk to your butcher' http://slowyourhome.com/172/

Questions

Have you taken your own container to the deli or the butcher? What was there reaction?

Lunch Time Day 3

Who's hungry for some lunch?

Today we would like to share our lunches with you. 

Firstly - the fun lunchtime experience. Dad and Miss A went out for Sushi. Miss A loves her food and trying new flavours, today was no exception, she tried pickled octopus and seaweed. Luckily the food was served on reusable plates (and single use bamboo chopsticks). They also avoided the little single use soy sauce plastic fish - with soy in glass jars on the tables.

We put a lot of Miss A's love of food adventures down to our approach to introducing solid foods which was 'baby led weaning'. Which is really just a fancy term for letting her feed herself from around 6 months. We just gave her family food, basically whatever we were eating (we made a couple of adjustments, the main one being omitting salt from cooking and seasoning our own food before eating). She's always sat at the table with us for meals and eaten a selection of what we've served up - no mush, no cooking extra or special meals, and most importantly a lot less waste and packaging! We're often amazed at the amount of packaging surrounding small food portions for babies and children.

Mum's lunch was far less exciting and was unfortunately eaten at her desk in between a busy schedule. But there was no single use plastic. I took in a salad made the night before, a tin of tuna, home made savoury crackers and a banana, along with my napkin (which I brought home to wash). We're definitely not ready to give up on tinned tuna quite yet as a quick and easy source of protein for lunch.

A suggestion and resource we'd love to share:

• Baby led weaning. We found this website a useful starting reference: http://www.babyledweaning.com

Day 2 A trip to Ikea

Failure and success

So today was another technical fail on the plastic free front... We went to Ikea this morning and managed to only buy a couple of extra items not on our list. We bought a new suitcase, unfortunately we couldn't repair our last one after it was chewed by the conveyor belt at Melbourne Airport on our way home from Perth last year. We also bought a shopping trolley for the markets as trying to juggle multiple cloth bags and backpacks with a toddler has't been working. Unfortunately both of these came wrapped in... you guessed it - plastic. Which we will take up to Coles to be recycled. Generally we are pretty impressed with Ikea's commitment to reduce packaging waste, and there was very little packaging on the other bits and pieces we bought today.

On a much more positive note we baked a couple of loaves of bread today, with no plastic in sight!

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Yesterday we mentioned meal planning. We are pretty good at meal planning and have noticed that since we have started to be more organised with planning for meals we buy more food in bulk (less packaging) and we have little to no food waste.
• We keep our compost bin on the kitchen bench top. This means it is the most accessible bin (so there's no temptation to just use the rubbish bin, which requires effort) and it gets emptied more frequently than when it lived in a cupboard under the sink.

Question

How do you manage rubbish bins without a plastic bag to line the bin?

We welcome all thoughts and suggestions!

Plastic Free July a new beginning. Day 1

Plastic Free July

Like many of our friends we have accepted the challenge of A Plastic Free July. We're concerned about our impact on the environment and want to take make some additional changes to reduce our reliance on plastic. So here goes...

The Brown Family

Firstly a little bit about our family. We are the Brown family (Mum, Dad and a toddler). We live the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. While the focus of this blog is our efforts to achieve a plastic free July this challenge is part of a much bigger effort to reduce our impact on the planet, and generally consume less resources. We live in a smallish two bedroom house, with double glazing, solar power, and extra water tanks. Outside of the house we grow some of our own produce, and we mostly bike or take public transport to work - but we do own a car.

Back to the plastics....

Entering this challenge we think we do a reasonably good job at reducing our consumption of plastic goods - especially single use plastics. Here's some of the basics we've been doing for a long time:

• Use our recycling bin - easy tick, if you're not already doing this then we can't imagine that you would be reading this blog!
• Carry our own water bottles
• Generally we choose to make time to have tea or coffee at the cafe, but we have a selection of keep cups for when coffee on the go is the only thing that is going to get the morning started in a hurry
• Take our own cloth bags to the grocery store, along with a collection of home made mesh bags for when we buy fruit and vegetables
• Collect and recycle our 'soft plastics' at the local Coles supermarket

What does A Plastic Free July mean to us?

It means making deliberate choices to buy and consume less plastic. Our goal is not to become a strict Plastic Free Household, but a household that produces as little waste as possible based on: Refusing, Reducing, Reusing and as a last choice, recycling. When we need to replace a product we want to make sure that we choose an appropriate no, or low plastic replacement. This goes for everything from toilet paper, to oats, toothbrushes and oils for cooking. We want to make sure we are not contributing to our planet drowning in plastic anymore than is necessary.

Day 1 Failure: The Saturday morning grocery run

Before we tell you about our experience on the Saturday morning grocery run we want to make two things clear - we are not vegetarians (we bulk order our meat, so don't purchase it weekly) and we are very organised with meal planning, hence the very small weekly shop.

So far all good, sauerkraut (in glass jars) and fresh produce. The only minor inconvenience was visiting a second green grocer this week to purchase a whole pumpkin, not wrapped in plastic. 

Plastic Fail: We need to find somewhere to buy nuts and seeds in bulk at comparable prices, and then there is the dairy...

Some of our families suggestions and ideas we'd love to share:

• Recently we invested in some Beeswax wraps for food - and significantly reduced the amount of Gladwrap used. Try Bee Wrappy, alternatively there are lots of Etsy stores that sell them.
• Bulk buy dry goods with other families - we've done this once and will defiantly keep doing this. It's not that difficult with a couple of families to have sufficient quantities to set up a wholesale account with Honest to Goodness. We ordered Oats (25kg), Rye and Spelt flours and some other specialty baking products.
• Toilet paper - can't go past 'Who Gives a Crap' No plastic in sight, forest friendly and funds toilets for those most in need. 

Questions

Dairy products, we have two questions:

1. How and where can we get reasonably priced basic cheddar cheese that is not in plastic - we go through about 1kg a week
2. Plastic milk bottles - is milk in glass really a better outcome for the environment? We ask this based on some assumptions around the transport costs associated with the packaging (glass being heavier than plastic) and the extra transportation of the bottles to be cleaned, and returned to the dairy. Also we've heard that the glass milk bottles are packed in plastic to reduce breakages during transport, and a large amount of water is used to clean the bottles.

We welcome all thoughts and suggestions!