Last week my Nerdy Books partner and I had a booth at a local business expo. The expo gave each vendor a free coffee ticket so I rushed down to grab a cup. (My friend ran the catering booth so I knew the coffee would be good.)
I was so mad at her when I saw this pile of styrofoam cups sitting next to the free coffee. I told her that I just couldn't drink out of styrofoam. (I only have a couple of steadfast, environmental convictions, and that's one of them.)
Did you know that each year Americans throw away 25,000,000,000 Styrofoam cups? Even 500 years from now, the styrofoam coffee cup I almost drank out of would still be sitting in a landfill.
After apologizing profusely, my friend told me that several of the vendors were giving away free, ceramic coffee mugs. I grabbed a couple (after listening to the sales pitch), poured our coffee, then carefully walked through the expo hall and up the stairs carrying two cups of hot coffee with no lids. Just imagine if the other 500 people getting free coffee had done the same thing. There'd be no styrofoam in the landfill and no ceramic mugs left in the expo hall.
6 Comments:
I bought a birthday card for a friend at the supermarket on my way home. I had the checkout guy put my food items in my handy canvas bag, but he still put the birthday card -- all by itself -- in a plastic shopping bag. I quickly yanked it out and politely told him it was environmentally friendly. Whether he understood the message or not, I can't say.
By Bob Flisser, co-author, www.nerdybooks.com, at 11:28 PM
...that should be "environmentally UNfriendly."
By Bob Flisser, co-author, www.nerdybooks.com, at 11:31 PM
A tip from Julia Butterfly Hill's tips for saving the planet. Refuse Styrofoam leftover containers! I keep several reusable containers in a nice cloth bag in my car. Whenever I eat out I take my bag and put my leftover into my own container. Now I've eliminated the Styrofoam and have my lunch all ready for work the next day! You'll be amazed at the smiles and nodding of heads that comes from the other tables. And best of all, other people will get the idea as well.
By jbookgirl, at 11:53 AM
"Just imagine if the other 500 people getting the free coffee had done the same thing". Yeah, the company that graciously provided them would have run out a lot sooner. I'm sure they would have been so pleased to do this little service for those 500 people.
By Anonymous, at 8:03 PM
You know, all those ceramic mugs have to be rinsed (using water) and sometimes washed (using energy to heat the water, and soap, which can make its way into the "wild" ecosystem). The most environmentally friendly thing would be to skip the coffee (very resource-intensive in its preparation) and get a drink from a water faucet (never bottled water!).
By Anonymous, at 11:33 AM
The ceramic mugs has to be cleaned, using detergent & energy. Next time why dont you just bring your own mug from home is you really want to be environmentally aware.
By Anonymous, at 6:12 PM
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