Battling Plastic Waste on World Environment Day: June 5th Annually

Rather than my typical Wednesday posting, 

I'm posting this on Tuesday, June 5: World Environment Day. 

A global event. This year's theme: Beat Plastic Pollution.

Earlier this spring I wrote about the National Geographic's Planet Versus Plastic Campaign. It still weighs heavy on my mind.

Especially right now, having just returned from the grocery store from our weekly shopping adventure.  I will say I'm a lucky girl as my husband does the lion's share of our grocery needs--however today I accompanied him. With plastic on my brain, it was eye opening seeing it here, there, and everywhere at the store:

• At the deli, I got 3 different types of lunch meat & cheese, each offered to me on a heavy plastic slice of what-was-once-waxed paper to sample as he sliced them for me. 
• Of course there's plastic wrapped & bagged breads, pretzels, corn chips, and more all throughout the store. 
• The beverage aisle has numerous bottles of this flavored drink next to that flavored drink. 
• The thin-one-layered bags in the veggie department for buying bulk tomatoes, apples, corn...

Plastic is everywhere, even when you bring your own cloth bags to the store!

Just when it all seems overwhelming, you happen upon innovative and inspirational ideas which are at the heart of solving our plastic waste problems. Here's handful of ways people are working on battling plastic (including some things you do):

Using Plastic Waste as a House Construction Material:



Using Plastic Waste to Build Furniture:


Plastic Bank & Social Plastic:
"By enabling the exchange of plastic for money, items or Blockchain secured digital tokens, we reveal the value in plastic. This empowers recycling ecosystems around the world and stops the flow of plastic into our oceans. All while helping people living in poverty build better futures." (Quoted from the Plastic Bank website.) Social Plastic is Plastic Bank's charity/donation site where you can offset your plastic footprint.

PBS Newshour's Earth Day "How Can Individuals Combat Plastic Pollution"
A lot of information is packed into the 5 minute video interview between Jenna Jambeck and Hari Sreenivasan. Jenna stresses that little steps we each make end up making a huge collective difference.

The Guardian's Article: "I Kept All My Plastic for a Year – The 4,490 Items Forced Me to Rethink"
This article details Daniel Webb's mural he made with one year of his own plastic waste.

Plastic Fishing:

 

Videos from https://www.facebook.com/attn/videos/184907045672067/ ; https://www.facebook.com/WeNeedThisbyattn/videos/210857729416100/; and https://www.facebook.com/attn/videos/1602754103093376/; National Geographics Planet or Plastic from https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/planetorplastic/?beta=true; Buckminster Fuller Quote from http://www.azquotes.com/quote/104095; and Plastic Pollution by Numbers from https://me.me/i/plastic-pollution-by-numbers-thrown-away-35-billion-plastic-water-18953637