EARTHLUST

It is the third week of GREENmarch, a month full of environmental awareness campaigns and events brought to you by Earthlust, Green Advisors, EJ, and Good Food. If you haven’t participated in any events yet, please try to! And keep an eye out for some chalkings around campus soon…

Upcoming GREENmarch events:

Wednesday, March 25
Green Roof Tours, Scott Arboretum Office, 12:00-1:30 PM
David Schlosberg “Rethinking Climate Justice” Lecture, Scheuer Room, 7:30 PM

Thursday, March 26
Farmer’s Market / Make-A-Dorm-Plant Parlor Party, Parrish, 9:00 PM

Friday, March 27th
Arboretum Composting Facility Tour, Facilities Office, 1:00 PM
“Recycled Runway” Fashion Show, Upper Tarble, 4:30 PM

Saturday, March 28th
Stadium Protest in Chester, Chester YWCA, 10:00 AM
Earth Hour Acoustic-in-the-Dark Show, Olde Club, 8:00 PM
RAVE the Environment Party, Olde Club, 10:00 PM

And after the break,

Some Knowledge for the week:

Monday March 22nd: What Would the Lorax Do?

There is a reason people like to hug trees. They put oxygen in our atmosphere, they’re important habitats AND they’re great carbon sinks. Try and keep as many of them around as you can. This past fall Swarthmore printed out 1, 016, 857 sheets of paper in our public printers.

You Can: Always pick up your print outs. Don’t print out endnotes. Always check and make sure your document is double sided. Can you change the margins or make the font smaller if it’s not a paper you’re turning in for a class? See if you can do some of your reading online. Drop your lightly used Blackboard readings off with the Green Advisors at the end of the semester so another student can reuse them.

Tuesday March 23rd: Junk Your Junk Mail

In 2005, U.S. companies sent a mind-boggling 100 billion pieces of junk mail to American mailboxes. But we’ve got worse news. Less than 36% of that was recycled. As a result, millions of tons of catalogs and other direct mailings ended up in the municipal waste system—enough to fill up a line of garbage trucks stretching from Atlanta to Albuquerque.

You Can: Check out New American Dream’s “How to Declare Your Independence from Junk mail” guide and then send the link to your friends and family.

Wednesday March 24th: Green Your Wardrobe: Reuse

According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, textiles make up approximately 4.5% of all waste sent to municipal landfills. Yet since 99% of that material can be reused, textile recycling is becoming a cost effective and less-resource intensive method for making new materials. If textile recycling isn’t available in your area, however, consider creatively reusing fabric based materials yourself.

You Can: Learn more about textile recycling options in your area. Make a rockin’ tote bag out of an old tee shirt like the ones featured on BringYourOwn.org. Have a tee shirt exchange with your friends—it’s like thrift shopping without the middleman.

Thursday March 25th: Reduce

The average American uses around 100 disposable cups per year. A single paper or plastic cup that ends up in a landfill will take around 150 years to biodegrade.  Landfills take up space, are responsible for 32% of the U.S.’s methane emissions, and leech toxins into streams and groundwater. If a cup doesn’t go to a landfill, it will get incinerated. Unfortunately, there are troubling consequences for this course of action as well. Studies have shown that people who live near incinerators have higher cancer and asthma rates. (FYI: All of the cups that we throw away (and everything else) are taken to Chester and incinerated in their community).

You Can: Use a reusable mug for your coffee. Bring your own mug to PubNite and other parties. Compost your cups in Kolhberg and Science Center coffee bars!

Friday March 26th: Recycle

This is an easy one. But you have to actually do it. The U.S. produces about 230 million tons of garbage per year and guess what? 70% of that actually could have been recycled. Every time you recycle, you prevent a manufacturer from having to extract more raw materials to meet consumer demand.

You Can: Recycle every day.

Saturday March 27th: Green For Life

Climate change is happening. We’re using natural resources at an unsustainable rate. These problems aren’t going to fix themselves.

You Can: Keep yourself informed. Check out New American Dream, National Geographic’s Green Guide, Ask Umbra a question on Grist.org, and visit Treehugger.com, etc. for more tips on how to reduce your environmental impact.