Usually my zero waste diaries are about zero waste in the home, but I wanted to feature an exciting zero waste news story coming out of Texas, of all places. It got a surprising amount of publicity and I was very encouraged.
Bulk-only grocery store in TX
In.gredients plans to become the country's very first "package-free, zero waste grocery store." GOOD describes the store in this fitting and awesome way: "It's as if the specialty bulk food section rebelled and took over the rest of a traditional grocery store."
Here are some more numbers for you: about 50 percent of plastic waste in the U.S. is said to come from packaging and containers. According to the EPA, about 31 percent of all municipal solid waste in the U.S. was containers and packaging in 2008. That's 76,760 thousand tons—and less than half of that gets recycled.
Eliminating the option for packaging completely at the store means also eliminating a huge chunk of our nation's waste stream in one easy step.
If a store like In.gredients succeeds, will it push big brands to start providing bulk options in chain stores, and those chain stores to accept and promote those options? It'll be huge if we reach a point where you can bring a refillable bottle into Walmart or Target and fill it with shampoo or laundry detergent, and leave the store carrying all your groceries with no more packaging than you entered with.
I thought as long as I'm featuring this zero waste grocery store's attempted effort to open, I might as well also highlight some other zero waste and recycling news involving businesses. I'm a huge Treehugger fan so most of the links are from there.
Of course as I've mentioned in previous diaries, no need to wait for a specialty grocery store to come to your area. Most grocery stores that sell bulk foods, like Whole Foods, will allow you to bring in your own containers. You can get them tare weighted first so that you do not need to pay for the weight of the container. And even at the deli counter and butcher counter you may be able to persuade the person behind the counter to put the meat or cheese directly into your container.
My standard disclaimer: Zero waste is not the most important thing a person can do to reduce their carbon footprint. Taking public transportation over driving, particularly for a daily commute, weatherproofing one's home and turning down the thermostat, cutting down on air travel, switching to renewable energy sources, avoiding factory-farmed meat and most importantly political action to get the Republican climate deniers out of Congress are all bigger priorities in fighting climate change. Don't use zero waste as an excuse to rest on your green laurels.
I believe I wrote a diary on Bloom Energy when it first went public. I know I was pretty excited. That was before I heard about nefarious fracking, but at least the Bloom units are adaptable to different kinds of energy sources. Most importantly they are "zero waste"--in this case zero emissions and now in the news repurposing an old car factory. There will be waste at the end of the life cycle of the unit so not true zero waste. But this is my diary so I am bending the rules. Also American jobs!
Fuel-cell maker Bloom Energy to hire 900 in Delaware
California-based Bloom Energy says it plans to hire 350 construction workers this year, and 900 permanent workers by 2012, for a new factory at the former Chrysler auto factory in Newark, Delaware, which will produce Bloom Box-brand "fuel cells" to make electricity from natural gas.
Bloom has already built 150 of the 100-kilowatt units at its plants near Sunnyvale, Calif., and installed them at locations operated by Wal-Mart, Federal Express, Safeway, and other big companies in California, and plans to deliver 300 more this year, chief financial officer Bill Kurtz, a Mays Landing native, told me. It takes two to three units to power a Wal-Mart.
Bloom doesn't burn gas but uses a ceramic-based chemical catalyst to separate electrons from the hydrogen and carbon in natural gas. The process is more expensive than burning, but creates no air emissions and is attractive to businesses that need to lower emissions under government guidelines, chief financial officer Bill Kurtz, a Mays Landing native, told me. Bloom expects costs will fall as more units are installed and natural gas supplies are developed in Pennsylvania and other states.
Another story is zero waste at its best--putting wasteful practices to good use saving lives:
How Old Hotel Soap Can Save Thousands of Lives
After fleeing Uganda with his family during the reign of Idi Amin, Derreck Kayongo lived as a refugee in Kenya and eventually came to the United States, where he was shocked to learn how much soap gets thrown away in hotels, CNN reported earlier this month.
Drawing on the knowledge of his father, a former soap maker in Uganda, Kayongo founded the Atlanta-based Global Soap Project, which collects used hotel soap from across the country, cleans and reprocesses it, and sends it to impoverished nations in Africa and the Caribbean:
Also heartening is the pressure that consumers bear on retail stores, especially when it involves food in these tough times:
30,000 People Call on Trader Joe's to Stop Wasting Food
We know that food waste impacts climate change and squanders precious water. And yet stores continue to throw out astounding amounts of perfectly edible food every day. Now pressure is mounting on at least one major store chain to make a change, with over 30,000 people signing a petition to get Trader Joe's to donate their waste food and adopt a zero waste policy. But will they succeed?
Orchestrated by award-winning film maker Jeremy Seifert—producer of the food waste documentary Dive!—a campaign has been building at petition site change.org to tell Trader Joe's to stop wasting their food, donate soon-to-expire products, and implement a company-wide zero food waste policy.
I'm hoping that the petition results in real change.
And in Congress, working to recycle e-waste
E-Waste Export Bill Aims to End E-Waste Dumping, Boost Green Jobs
The bill will create a new category of "restricted electronic waste" -- waste that is not allowed to be exported but must be properly recycled within the US. Equipment that is still fully functional can be exported and resold in other markets, but anything that is no longer functional would not be allowed to be exported under this new legislation. Products that are being sent back to the manufacturer for repairs or are being recalled would also be allowed to be exported, since they aren't being sent to e-waste dumps.
Also jobs. Of course, the Republicans will probably block it just out of spite, even though it would be a win-win-win situation if it passed.
And finally....composting on steroids. This really is a brilliant idea, making more healthful protein feed for livestock, properly recycling food scraps, and freeing up land currently dedicated to raising soybeans to raising food fit for human consumption (I'm not a big fan of people eating anything made out of soy except for fermented soy products in very small amounts).
Grub Composting Turns Waste into Animal Feed in Hours
We TreeHuggers have been known to get pretty excited about the rise of worm composting as big business. But one composting advocate is arguing that the next phase of compost evolution does not lie with worms, but grubs. Most notably, black soldier fly larvae. The idea, he says, is to use larvae to eat food scraps, and even raw meat and fish, and to turn them not just into plant nutrients, but a direct replacement for animal feed. Once you see what a bucket of larvae can do to two whole fish in a matter of hours, you may just be convinced.
I'm embedding the video here. Warning...this is NASTY to watch, do not view while eating!