Reducing plastic usage

Caterina

KOh nice bottles! I treated myself to a Kleen Kanteen for my birthday, as I used to have a Sigg and read that even the Siggs have a plastic lining inside the aluminium.

Finding naked organic veg, especially salads, is almost impossible anf I cannot always trek to the farmers markets, so that's where I compromise, I get them wrapped then recycle the wrap. Sometimes I even reuse the wraps to keep other stuff fresh, or use them as mini rubbish bags, or sandwich wrappers. I did the same with pasta packets, but now I am buying the 3Kg bags so at least it is only one bag to recycle instead of 6, it makes a tiny difference. I can only but try!

I am still investigating where to buy loose bulk pasta, really too much effort to make my own from scratch every time (I do it on rare special occasions though as it's delicious).

Frozen veg are plastic wrapped and I try to buy the biggest bag I can, but that's another of those things that are impossible to find unplasticked. Even the paper boxes, like fish fingers ones, have an internal plastic coating.

I cook a lot of stuff from scratch, from fresh ingredients and forgive myself for the occasional use of convenience plastic wrapped foods.

So many things are almost only made with plastic. For example toothbrushes, I know you can buy the natural fibre ones at a fairly high cost, and I don't even like them. So I use a plastic one but it's the one with removable heads, so I only throw away the head, and it's recyclable.

At the moment I have a huge stash of shampoos and shower gels, in plastic bottles, from past stock ups, but once I have used them up I know where to go and get refills for shampoo, likewise for laundry and cleaning liquids, and won't bother with shower gel.

Maybe one day I will experiment with laundry and dishwashing gloops, but as it's only the two of us we use everything very frugally and a big laundry bottle lasts us ages.

I keep exploring ways of reducing plastic, but I am convinced that a total ban, for us at least, would be too expensive and inconvenient. However I hear and read all over the place that more and more people are becoming interested in a plastic free lifestyle, so maybe one day in my lifetime there will be more alternatives, there will be a shift, a "hundredth monkey" effect, I can only hope.

fuddle

I haven't read the whole thread Caterina as I'm about to but just wanted to mention that Lush make shampoo bars without packaging.

I made laundry gloop and because I wash on low temps I managed to block my machine a few year back. The gloop wasn't disintegrating at low temps so watch out for that.

I do store my dried goods in glass jars but I feel like it's in vain I daren't even imagine how long have they been stored in plastic before I decant. Given we live in such an oil fuelled world I think we're going to find this difficult if we really get into it but I'm with you. I do not like the amount of plastic that goes into my recycle bin and want to change that.

Edit to add now I've read the thread: I too plan to move to loose tea after reading on the forum about the bags containing plastic.

Children's lunch boxes. I can't think about how to change this and I expect it to be something that I won't find a suitable solution. I bought a plastic box for the girls. It has different compartment for different foods and seal together as you fold the box up. Originally it was to reduce my plastic food bag usage as a cost factor but seems I have opted for a different textured plastic instead. Any ideas for a plastic free way of taking kids lunches to school?

Rainy-Days

It's very difficult to avoid plastic, but the 80% redeuction in plastic bags has gone some way to making an impact on it. I am not seeing so much litter and especially the obligatory plastic carrier bag flying around much, if at all, now!

The thing is plastic is cheap, it's convenient and it makes sense in terms of weight and useability. Plastic will be here for decades to come yet because there is nothing that replicates it as well at the moment!

[Deleted User]

FUDDLE look up 'Tiffin Boxes' we got ours from 'SPICES OF INDIA' online and they are stainless steel lunch carriers that clip together with a carrying handle you can get two, three, four tiers and I think maybe as many as six. They are so useful as you can keep salads separate from cake without having to use any extra wrapping and pickles separate from fruit etc, each compartment stacks on top of the one below it and the handle secures it all into a carry box. Very useful snd we've had them for quite some time now. We also have aluminium water bottles which I found reduced in a camping shop many years age, they do have plastic screw on tops but that's all.

They have a 4 tier Appa Tiffin Box with graduated sized containers for £19.99p and a straight sided 4 tier box for £12.99p. Useful bit of kit!

Goodness me I've just looked at Fleabay and they have them in varying sizes from £5.99p!!!

Blue_Doggy

Rainy-Days wrote: »

It's very difficult to avoid plastic, but the 80% redeuction in plastic bags has gone some way to making an impact on it. I am not seeing so much litter and especially the obligatory plastic carrier bag flying around much, if at all, now!

The daft thing is, if I want a bag to line my pedal bin, I can buy a roll of new bags at a price which works out at 5p each. They'll get used once, unless I tip the contents into a dustbin bag with the household rubbish, which will then go half-full into the bin.

Or I can buy supermarket's carrier bags at 5p each, carry my shopping home (use 1), line my pedal bin (use 2) and there may still be intermediate uses for them, like carrying Christmas gifts around in rainy weather, before they end up in the dustbin via the pedal bin.

The plastic which really annoys me is mailing bags for magazines sent out by environmental charities ....

Ben84

suki1964 wrote: »

I don't worry too much about it tbh. It's a by product anyway so I will be produced no matter what. And I like the convienence of it, being washable, lightweight and strong

I have often heard plastic is a by-product of the oil industry, and that with all the oil we use for other things like transport and power plants, the plastic is just a thing we make with the leftovers. However, from what I understand of the chemistry, the part of oil that plastics are made from is entirely useful for many things. It's also quite practical to burn it for energy. As far as I can tell, there's no fraction of oil leaving the refinery that has no reasonable use other than making plastics.

Anyway, I have mixed feelings about plastics. They are very resource efficient compared to other materials, like paper, card, metal and glass. Generally they use far less energy and produce less waste. Just put a 1 litre glass bottle on the scales, then a 1 litre plastic bottle. The difference in weight is huge. Just a few grams of plastic will often do the same job of tens or hundreds of grams of other materials. There are some credible environmental arguments for choosing plastic over other materials.

Still, using less of anything disposable is good, including plastic. I've been using reusable silicone food covers for a long time now to avoid cling film. Also I use wet tea-towels over dough when it's rising. Been using mostly reusable bags for a long time too, but that's probably fairly common now with the 5p bag tax. I buy lots of items unpackaged at the market, where they tend to come out of a big box rather than individual wrappings. I don't deal with the waste at home, but some is made. It's much less per item however.

Caterina

MrsL, thank you for mentioning the tiffin boxes in response to Fuddle's query, I would have suggested the same. Another alternative, still using the plastic boxes (no point in wasting them) but not letting the food be in direct contact with the plastic, by wrapping it in (recycled) paper bags, or even cloth tissues, sandwich pockets etc. When I was making DH's packed lunches I used paper bags that I had salvaged from the market shopping and he would carefully bring them back, they would be reused many times until finally they got used to pick up fry-ups' fat and eventually composted.

Ben84 thank you for your contribution, I think you have a point about some of the advantages of plastic in general terms. Like everything, it has its pros and cons. It is the overuse, though, the all-pervasive presence in every aspect of life, the toxicity and hormonal disruption, the VOCs, the single use, these downfalls are too big for me to overlook. However I would not advocate getting rid of all plastic just for the sake of it, but gradually replace obsolete/worn plastic items with more salubrious and natural materials where possible. Reusing a shopping bag many times makes perfect sense, I have a dwindling stock which I use carefully to wrap bread (over the paper bag) to store in the freezer, or as bin liners then empty all the rubbish in the one big bag, saving the individual bags in the small bins etc...

Reduction and careful use are my goals for the time being, I would just go round the bend if I had to try and be a zero plastic purist!

Spendless

I have bought my Mum this for Christmas
http://www.zpm.com/products/eco-shopping-bags/Trolley-Dolly-Eco-Bag-Kits-Get-Sorted/Default.aspx

It comes with some net bags for putting loose fruit/veg in; something people have mentioned struggling with a few times on this thread.

I am hoping Santa has got me one too.;)

The net bags can be purchased as a set of 5

http://www.zpm.com/products/eco-shopping-bags/fruit-veg-produce-nets-for-storage/default.aspx


Until recently my DD had a metal lunchbox. It wasn't a tiffin style one. I bought it in Sainsbury's a few years ago, it had Russian Dolls on the front of it, so might still be on the market.

Blue_Doggy

Caterina wrote: »

MrsL, When I was making DH's packed lunches I used paper bags that I had salvaged from the market shopping and he would carefully bring them back, they would be reused many times until finally they got used to pick up fry-ups' fat and eventually composted.

My Mum used to do this for years when my Dad was working - most grocer's and greengrocer's goods came in paper bags at the time.

She also used to wash, dry, and reuse plastic bags from butcher and fishmonger when they started using those, and plastic boxes too.
She had a couple of cupboards full of reusable bags and boxes.

I bought some of those zipup mesh bags for vegetables some years ago, they're very good (although one gets funny looks from other shoppers sometimes) and they live in my lovely big round wicker shopping basket, along with the infinitely-expandable string bags. I stopped using them in the summer so that I could stock up on plastic carrier bags (for various uses, and because I hate being told what to do and what not to do) before the charge came in. Now they're back in use.

Spendless

Spendless wrote: »

I have bought my Mum this for Christmas
http://www.zpm.com/products/eco-shopping-bags/Trolley-Dolly-Eco-Bag-Kits-Get-Sorted/Default.aspx

It comes with some net bags for putting loose fruit/veg in; something people have mentioned struggling with a few times on this thread.

I am hoping Santa has got me one too.;)

The postman delivered them and yes I have one because despite asking my DH twice, if he was sure I could open the parcel, he said yes! When I said I was hoping for it under the tree, he told me he'd forgotten! I have the one on clearance as I said I didn't mind (and I'd rather have the extra tenner;)), it does have the 'sticky' feel that is described which includes on the handle and though I personally wouldn't buy it as a present (my Mum has the full price one) I do think it is manageable, those of you with a toddler won't notice the difference.:p It also came with an additional bag each as a freebie, so I have snaffled them both.:o