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10 Ways to Reduce Plastic in your Life

July 16, 2014 · 121 Comments

10 Ways to Reduce Plastic in your Life

So why would you avoid single use plastic?

Well, the main issues are:

* plastic hangs around in landfills for a very long time

* recycling plastic is inefficient and expensive

* it affects the environment, particularly marine life

* manufacturing of plastic makes a huge, negative impact on our environment.

* some plastics are known to be harmful to our health

 

 “Think about it. Why would you make something that you’re going to use for a few minutes out of a material that’s basically going to last forever, and you’re just going to throw it away. What’s up with that?” Jeb Berrier

 

reduce single use plastic

 

It can be quite overwhelming trying to avoid plastic. It has become such a pervasive commodity in our homes and our lives. My advice is to start small. Just choose one type of plastic you can avoid. Work on that. Then move to another type. Any small change you make, makes a difference.

 

Here are my top tips for reducing single use plastic:

 

1. Ditch the plastic grocery bags. Get yourself a stash of good cloth bags and get into the habit of putting them in the car. They are preferable to the ‘green’ bags from the supermarket that are made with petrochemicals. Cloth bags are biodegradable, durable and easy to wash. Check out these reusable bags.

 

2. Avoid plastic produce bags. When you buy fruit and vegetables, you have other options than using a plastic bag. You can use a paper bag or even better,  a reuseable produce bag. Buying bread or meat? Take a reusable bread bag with you to the bakery or butcher.

 

3. Give up the plastic straw. Okay you could just forgo the straw and use what you were born with – your lips! Or if you need to use a straw, you can get stainless steel, bamboo or glass straws these days. They are funky and they are easy to wash using the little brushes.

 

4. Don’t buy water in plastic bottles. Glass or stainless steel water bottles are so much better for your health and the environment!  Make it a habit to fill one up and take it with you every day.

 

5. Refuse plastic cutlery. I carry a bamboo spork in my handbag for those occasions when I am out and about and need to eat! It’s super cute. You could easily use some cutlery from home as well. Keep a stash in the car for family picnics and outings. Catering for a party at home? Head to the opshop and stock up on cutlery – it only takes a small effort to wash it up. Check out this great post Jo at Down to Earth Mother wrote about our disposable society.

 

Biome Eco Stores - Zero Waste, Toxin Free, Ethical Choices

6. Don’t buy plastic wrap. We gave up plastic wrap and it’s was surprisingly easy to do! Just get yourself set up with some reusable food covers and wraps and some glass storage. It soon becomes second nature to do without it.

 

7. No more plastic coffee lids or cups. Did you know that the lining of paper takeaway cups is also plastic? Take your own reusable coffee cup in to cafes and fill it up. There are so many great ones around these days to make it easy to find something perfect for you.

 

8. Rethink takeaway food containers. Hot food in plastic always freaks me out as the heat can cause toxins to leach into your food! Eeep! If you eat takeaway a lot, you might consider an alternative. Take in your own glass or pyrex dishes and get them to fill it up. Madeleine at NZ Ecochick does it!

 

9. Say no to the plastic toothbrush. Okay so maybe not a ‘single’ use product, but 700 million toothbrushes are manufactured each year. That’s a lot of plastic! Bamboo toothbrushes are a great option.

 

10. Swap garbage bags.  This is one area we still struggle with! However in doing a little research, I discovered that there are some good options out there. You can use newspaper to line your bins – find out how here or try a compostable bag.

 

11. Bonus Tip! Get a waste-free lunchbox for the kids! There are so many great ones with separate compartments so you don’t need to use any plastic wrap or buy food in portioned plastic bags or containers.

 

Did you know? Australians send 1 million tonnes of plastic waste to landfill each year!

 

Where to shop?

Flora and Fauna

Biome Eco Store

 

Want more?

My life without plastic wrap

Goodbye plastic, hello glass!

Smart swaps for single use plastics

How to negotiate the plastic bag ban

Why I’m breaking up with green bags

 

Filed In: HOME / Tagged: low tox, plastic, plastic free, plastic free July, toxin free, zero-waste

My life without plastic wrap

June 17, 2013 · 77 Comments

My life without plastic wrap

As a family trying to live a healthier and more eco-friendly life, one of our new years’s resolutions was to give up plastic wrap.

Once the last roll was used up after Christmas, I made the decision not to purchase a new roll. We had to start getting creative and finding alternatives! Six months on, we are doing just great without it and really wonder why we ever needed it!

Today, I am going to tell you some reasons why we gave it up and what we use instead.

 

Why give up plastic wrap?

 

♥ Eco concerns

Rebecca, eco warrior and mum, from 4 My Earth posted this on Facebook one day and it really hit home!

“We have worked out a rough guide as to how much a child would use in plastic wrap based on a sandwich, muffin and nuts/sultanas in their lunch bag each day for a year. We worked it out to be 105 metres of plastic wrap that would be dumped into our ever-increasing landfill. Times this by a small school of 450 students and it comes to a massive 47 250 metres per year!”

Plastic wrap cannot be recycled and is almost impossible to reuse. It takes hundreds of years to break down and once it ends up in landfill, it can be very damaging to our wildlife.

♥ Health concerns

Choice Australia tells us that “plastic can contain smaller molecule that are free to migrate into the food it’s in contact with. The plastic can slowly breakdown, releasing monomer.

• PVC (used to make bottles, cling wrap and the seals for screw-cap jars) contains added chemicals known as plasticisers. On its own, PVC is hard and rigid (it’s used to make drains, guttering and downpipes), so plasticisers are added to make it soft and flexible – in much the same way water added to clay makes it soft. Plasticisers can make up as much as 40% of the plastic material. Phthalates and DEHA (di-(2-ethyhexyl)adipate) are often added as plasticisers to the PVC that’s used for food packaging; again, recent research raises doubts about the safety of these compounds.

Phthalates are endocrine disruptors, meaning they can mimic the body’s natural hormones and thereby cause a raft of health problems. Infants and the very young are most vulnerable to exposure because of their lower body weight and because their growth and development are strongly influenced by hormones; the effects on health can be lifelong. These effects have been seen clearly and consistently in experiments with animals and when people or wildlife have been accidentally exposed to high levels of endocrine disruptors.

While these compounds are undoubtedly hazardous at high levels of exposure, scientific opinion is divided over the risk from the much lower levels that we’re exposed to every day in our food. There is, however, growing scientific evidence that even at these lower levels of exposure, phthalates  may be causing problems such as infertility, obesity, breast cancer, prostate cancer, heart disease and diabetes.“

 

What to use instead of plastic wrap?

We use a range of things, depending on the food and if it is for transport, for the fridge or for the freezer. Here are some of them:

♥ Food Covers. I invested in a few sets of re-usable food covers from 4 My Earth. We use them to cover bowls and plates of leftovers but they also go over things like cut watermelon and pumpkin. They are very easy to wash in the sink or in the washing machine and they last for years and years.

 

♥ Food Wraps and Pockets. Also from 4 My Earth, we purchased several food wraps and pockets (some in plain for the teenager!). The re-usable food wraps are great to wrap up sandwiches or slices of quiche. The re-usable food pockets are great for muffins and slices, nuts, dried fruit or grapes. They also come in handy for storing things in the fridge like cheese.

 

♥ Food bags. If you haven’t worked it out yet, I am a a huge fan of the 4 My Earth products!! The food bags come in large and small and I use them for cheese, bread, pretty much anything really.

But where they really come into in their own and solved a huge problem for me was for meat storage. You can take them along to the butcher and get your meat straight into the food bags and then when you get home, just push as much air as you can out of them, zip up and pop in the freezer. Defrost with a bowl under and then wash the bags in the washing machine. Get the food bags here.

The other way I freeze meat when I have run out of bags is to tightly wrap in the non-toxic baking paper and then pop into a glass storage container.

 

Glass storage in the fridge

♥ Glass containers. I bought a set of Pyrex glass storage containers and they do they job but the plastic lid does crack and break over time.  Unfortunately you can’t buy replacement lids in Australia. I use my food covers over the container. The food rarely touches the lid, so I don’t worry about the plastic in that. These are great for the fridge or the freezer. Next time though, I would get a Glasslock set.

 

My life without plastic wrap - storing in glass jars

♥ Glass Jars. Although there is sometimes plastic in the lids of jars, if it doesn’t touch the food, I don’t panic too much. We re-use glass jars for all sorts of things – including leftovers, bliss balls, soup and broth.  They go well in the fridge and the freezer. Here is a post I did explaining a bit more about it. Goodbye Plastic, Hello Glass!

 

♥ Paper products. We love the If You Care range of safe paper products. They come in handy for a range of things but they are usually a last resort!

 

My life without plastic wrap

♥ Plates. Quite often we just use a plate on top of a bowl as shown in the photo! You can also store fruit like melon and pineapple, cut side down on plates. You can’t get much simpler than this!

 

My life without plastic wrap - stainless steel storage♥ Stainless Steel Containers. I got this ‘tiffin’ for my husband to use as a lunchbox to take to work. It’s also good for storing things in the fridge (but you have to remember what you put in there!). Check out Biome Eco Store for a huge range of stainless steel containers as well.

 

Other things you might like to try:

♥ Beeswax Wraps. These wraps work similar to plastic wrap and keep product very fresh. They are also fully bio-degradable which makes them the perfect alternative. Using the warmth of your hands, these wraps will wrap produce tightly and seal in on itself. The beeswax can break off over time with use, but you can simply refresh them in the oven on a low heat to redistribute the wax.

Check out the beeswax (and vegan) wraps.

 

♥ Silicone Wraps. These are fairly new to the market and I have heard mixed reports. I am more than happy with my 4 My Earth products and they have lasted years so I haven’t been motivated to try these! They are made of silicone and can replace baking paper, cling wrap and alfoil. They don’t contain any BPA, PVC or lead and can be washed and reused.

Find out more about the silicone wraps here.

 

If  you want to go cold turkey on the plastic wrap like we did, get yourself prepared and invest in a few alternatives first. It took a bit of getting used to and changing our habits, but we did it. I am really happy that we don’t buy this product any more. It’s one small step to help the environment and improve our health.

 

(ends 13th May 2018)

 

I hope these tips for alternatives to plastic wrap have been useful. Let me know what you use and how it works for you.

You might also like to read:
How to store fruit and vegetables without using plastic

 

Filed In: HOME / Tagged: plastic, plastic free, plastic wrap, zero-waste

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