Changing a Carbon Footprint

For several years, my family and I have been setting out items at curbside for recycling. When we moved to our newer house, I asked the recycling service to give me an extra recycle bin for when our to-be-recycled items exceed the capacity of the first bin. We've actually used the second bin quite a bit, especially when plastic and cardboard packaging materials start to pile up.

The last time we set out our garbage can, I looked inside to see just how much garbage we were actually contributing to the landfill. There at the bottom of the large bin I saw two kitchen-sized garbage bags and one smaller bag. That's it--for a family of four, for one week. I'm pretty proud of us. We also set out two recycle bins filled to bursting with used cardboard, paper, plastic, and steel cans. Every so often, we drop off items such as glass at the recycling center, since the curbside service won't pick up glass. We donate miscellaneous used items to a local thrift store, and we have two Earth Machine compost bins in the backyard, tucked away near the back fence between the garden and the roses, which not only help mitigate any odor (which is actually very little, if you have a good composter) but also screen the black plastic from view. I've mentioned before that these composters look like big Darth Vader helmets, but they get the job done. We dump veggie or grain-based kitchen waste into one while the other cooks away on an earlier batch of compost. When that one finishes, we'll switch. It's perfect for a family of four, and for a good three years or so, we haven't had to throw out any kitchen waste into the garbage unless it's meat-based. All the veggie peelings, fruit, grain and the like go into the composter--not to mention any of the lawn clippings that we don't need to lay on the pathways in the garden to help keep the non-edible weeds at bay. With the composters, we've been able to reduce our garbage down to a surprisingly small amount, when even in families of only two people, we've observed huge loads of garbage being thrown out. My daughters and I speculated recently about what the garbage men must think when they come to our house. Maybe they heave a sigh of relief and say, "Oh, good! There's the house where the garbage can is never heavy and never hurts my back." You're very welcome, Sanitation Engineers!

It's not that hard to change a carbon footprint. Recycling and composting can take care of most of the waste from even a large household, and it's so easy that after just a short time of doing it, it soon becomes an old, familiar habit. I really think that if we all just pitched in, cleaned up our acts and houses and recycled most of our waste, collectively we'd make a huge difference for our planet. I hope that soon more people will come to realize just how vitally important this is.