John's Weird World

Books per se are not that green.  They use lots of resources in their manufacture, are printed in one place and have to be carted all over the place and are heavy.  Most are only read once and then sit in a bookshelf... OK, bookshelves are a way of sequestering carbon, but really we should share our books and use libraries more... but I am going to suggest you go and buy a good book. (And when you've read it, lend it to friends!)

I am very fond of Kate Lock, whom I first came accross as a columnist in the York Press, and soon met as she was having some problems with her compost and she asked a volunteer York Rotter to come and sort it out.  It turned out that she was on some kind of mission to be greener and that my assisting her meant that I would appear in the book she was crafting.  That book is now on sale and I have spent a good few hours of my holiday immersed in it..   'Confessions of an Eco-Shopper, the true story of one woman's mission to go green' (ISBN 978 0340 954676, Hodder & Stoughton 2008) is an excellent read, with everyday challenges such as having a veggie-box delivery and wondering what to do with unknown veg,  growing her own herbs and salads, ethical fish suppers, dispensing with the bleach and using vinegar instead, experimenting with 'green and reusable' sanitary protection, finding out if fair-trade tastes as good as 'ordinary' teas and coffees.  Kate put a lot of effort into researching the book, trialling all-sorts of products and lifestyle changes.  Of course my favourite 'Isle' (its arranged like a supermarket!) is the one on rubbish and recycling, where we follow her path from non-composter to happy and successful rotter, even trying out a wormery and 'Bokashi' to recycle her cooked and meaty foodstuff wastes.

I read the book cover to cover, and learned a lot.  It is really good to read a female approach to living a greener life... so many commentators are male, and they tend not to write about clothes, cosmetics or sanitary-wear.  So I am going to shamelessly plunder some of these topics for future blog posts.  Although Kate thanks me for helping her with her composting, I'm sure she will see this as a 'fair swap'!

I get the feeling that it's actually Gordon agreeing with me... has he been reading this blog?  Well, maybe, but I was pleased that the issue of wasted food was raised at the highest political levels, at the G8 Summit in Japan.  Many people were not pleased at Brown's 'advice' and the fact that the group had a huge multi-coursed meal with associated..... WASTE!!!

Plastic pervades many areas of our modern lives and is incredibly useful, durable, cheap and easy for manufacturers to make into 'stuff' for consumers. I am not a particular 'fan' of plastic, as it is mostly made from oil, a non-renewable resource, but I have a balanced opinion as I do (we all do!) have a lot of useful objects made from it. I demonstrated my ambivalence in a recent letter to the York Press commenting on a petition to 'ban plastic bags', which I don't understand nor agree with... I think that taxing them would be better, as in Ireland where a 15 tax to the consumer had reduced use by 80%. The issues are that we use millions of them, mostly only once, and throw them away where they add to landfill, or if we throw them around, they may become a litter-item, caught in a tree or hedge (the Irish call them 'Witches Knickers'!) or get swept out to sea where they look uncannily like jellyfish to unfortunate jellyfish-eating turtles and birds. So it would be better if we used fewer of them, reused them many times and disposed of them properly. My friend in America says she can take her old ones to a recycling point... why can't we do that here?

Some plastic is made from renewable materials, the compost caddy liners I put on my home compost heaps are made from corn starch, although the issues surrounding the use of food materials (in this case sweetcorn) to make non-food items (including biofuels) are helping to put up the price of food... Other plastic has an additive called d2w which makes it 'degradable' in air after a set length of time, so refuse sacks may be designed to last for 18 months but bread bags start to fall apart in just a few weeks.

However, there is another side to plastic which is less well known which is also to do with some of the additives. Some plastic has phthalates in it, which soften it or make it flexible. Some reports link these chemicals with cancer and possible hormone disruption. Then there's DEHA and BPA which may also be less than healthy if ingested.... and these chemicals may leach out of plastics if they are chewed, heated, or re-used repeatedly. Unfortunately, the internet is awash with conflicting reports... some research indicates that there are potential problems, other industry-supported information tells readers that the 'myths are bunk' and there is no problem whatsoever. So I don't know the truth, and I'm not a chemist, but I will keep my 'ear to the ground', and will report on any new findings.

A good way to eat at least your 'five a day' portions of fruit and vegetables is to have some of them dried... it's also an excellent way to preserve certain vegetables and fruit if you have a glut or manage to get a job-lot of cheap items or 'buy one get one free' deals. Dried food doesn't have as much 'goodness' as fresh, as some vitamins are lost, so I am not suggesting substituting dried fruit for fresh, but having some can be an enjoyable change or an addition. I mainly eat my dried fruit in my home-made muesli, but my children, who haven't graduated to muesli, have dried fruit instead of sweets (they have some sweeties too!)

A few weeks ago I was on the Carbon Rationing Action Groups website and up popped a message saying "use your tiny carbon footprint to get into the corridors of power". Curious, I clicked on the link, and arrived at the Oxfam website. They had a competition to find three people with small carbon footprints, and these people would be invited to meet Hilary Benn and his shadow counterparts Peter Ainsworth and Steve Webb at Westminster. To enter the competition, I had to do the Government's Carbon Calculator 'Act On CO2'. I had filled in a few other carbon calculators before but not the 'official government CO2 calculator' so I was pleased to give it a go. It was easy and fun, and came up with a household footprint of 1.8 tonnes, and then I realised I had to submit an individual footprint so I re-did it and it came to 0.46 tonnes/year. This only covers home energy, heating and transport, so the average UK citizen's score would be about 6 tonnes.

When the Co-op shop round the corner put up a 'Mosquito' device a while ago, I was quite pleased. Firstly, I could not hear it... being over 40, I'm well past the age of being able to hear the high-pitched siren, and secondly, it meant that I wasn't being asked by teenagers to get them some cider, which had happened on several previous occasions. However, the device has been deemed to be unfair to children and young people by Children's Commissioner Al Aynsley-Green, and he has called for it to be banned. I don't agree with him that it breaches their human rights, but I do believe it should be used with care.

I do not celebrate or do anything special for St. Valentine's Day. I do remember sending and receiving Valentine's cards when a teenager but since I've been married, and have been aiming to consume as little as possible, it just looks like another way for big business to make money, often at the expense of the environment. However this year I have been approached by a friend doing a media studies degree who wants to interview me about my views or experiences of the day, so as it approaches, I have been unusually aware of all the advertising and activity connected with it, confirming my cynical view.

I'm not a big fan of supermarkets, but when I heard about a co-operatively run 'ethical' supermarket, I felt more positive. I decided to become a supporter of The Creative Consumer Cooperative with a small financial stake in the company. I followed its development, with a growing string of shops called 'Out Of This World', selling only organic, fair trade and local products in a supermarket format.

It's an ethical jungle out there. What should 'The Ethicist' write about this week? There's so much in the news! Should I agree with Dr. John Sentamu, Archbishop of York, that consumers of chocolate should only buy fairly traded chocolate? Or should I get all excited about the recent cancer research findings that indicate that being overweight or eating processed meat, including bacon and ham increases the risk of getting cancer. Maybe I could discuss the research about organic fruit and vegetables having far more nutrients and being better for us, or the air pollution spike caused by festive bonfires and fireworks...

Some of you will have noticed that is 'Organic Fortnight', a time when producers and retailers celebrate and promote products grown without artificial fertilisers and pesticides... and hopefully persuade even more of us to choose to buy organic.