Do you ever wonder why people continue to make unsustainable choices even when they are educated about the impact of their choices and the benefits of making different ones? I do. There are, of course, many reasons why people (myself included) do not choose green–from the perception or reality of added cost, to the inconvenience, to the difficulty of changing ingrained habits, to the structural impediments.
Structural impediments include things like development patterns that make it impossible to get anywhere without driving; school buildings and workplaces without full kitchens that make it impossible to wash dishes; and policies and regulations that do little to encourage energy efficiency and conservation. Many of these structural impediments need to be tackled on the political level but others literally hit much closer to home.
Consider line drying for example (I recently wrote a post about the “tricks of the trade” to successful line drying). I don’t know about you, but I live in a house that cannot easily accommodate line drying inside. When we remodeled our house in 2004 we created a laundry closet in our mudroom off the kitchen with space for a washer and dryer but not laundry racks. Nor does the mudroom itself have sufficient space: it’s narrow and rather small overall, it has many doors, and is called upon to fulfill many other functions that crowd out–literally– laundry racks. Fortunately there is a door to our backyard off our mudroom, so in the warmer months it is easy for us to hang out clothes outside to dry. But during the cold months and on rainy days we just do not have a good inside option.
This to me is a classic example of a “closer to home” structural impediment. For a passionate (or crazy) greenie like myself there are almost always creative solutions and adaptations to these problems. But for the other 99%–well they most likely won’t bother. Their knowledge that line drying is better for the earth, their clothes & their wallet doesn’t much matter in the face of such obstacles. But these are the people we need to worry about if we want to effect broader social change. We need to make it easy for everyone to make sustainable lifestyle choices.
While better public policy has an important role to play here, I want to touch briefly on how home design decisions can make an impact (when I wear my green home consultant hat I think about this issue a lot). When we build–or better yet, renovate–existing homes we can easily remove many of the obstacles people face to making greener choices. In fact we can renovate in ways that actually facilitate these choices. Looking to reduce water use? Specify low-flow fixtures. Looking to cut down on energy bills? Insulate, insulate, insulate. And, oh yeah, cut down on the size of that proposed family room addition. Want to encourage line drying? recycling? composting? Include provisions for these within the plans.
Residents shouldn’t have to be die hard green champions to reduce their environmental impact. Because the fact is that most of them aren’t. If those of us in residential green building do not design and build our projects so that the environmentally friendly course of action is the easiest course of action, many of our clients will not take it. To be sure, die hards can help illuminate the outer limits of what’s possible and in so doing cajole and inspire the rest of us to swim up stream sometimes. But in the end we need to make green living the new norm. And for that we need to remove the many structural impediments to normalization.
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If you read one of my recent posts about my green goals for summer, you know that I have (overambitiously) vowed to line dry all my clothes this summer. I’ve been working on line drying for a couple of years now, so I have a few of the tricks of the trade figured out. Which isn’t to say that I’m using them consistently–hence the goal.
The first trick is accessibility: Before you get started give some thought to where you are going to dry your clothes and what kind of system you are going to use: How close or far is your chosen spot from your washing machine? Will you string a clothes line? Use drying racks? Will you have a permanent system or one you have to set up and take down each time you use it? The bottom line is that if your line or rack is much harder to use than your dryer you probably won’t use it. And unfortunately many of us live in homes that were designed (or have been redesigned) for dryers but not for line drying. Which isn’t to say it isn’t doable. You just may have to get creative.
For me, outside drying is easy: my laundry area is in my mudroom, a mere 5 steps away from the clothesline strung out my back door, which remains strung all year long. Inside drying is a different story. I use racks when I dry indoors but there isn’t really enough space for them: my mudroom is too narrow and small to adequately accommodate the racks. Which means that we don’t hang our clothes to dry much in the winter.
The second most important trick to successful line drying is planning. I have found that in order to line dry all of my clothes I need to wash and dry a load of laundry almost every day (there are 4 in my family, not counting the dog who thankfully doesn’t wear clothes). Lack of planning and daily washing is currently the biggest barrier to my achieving my laundry goal. If I don’t wash every day we get backed up and inevitably end up relying on our dryer.
Which brings me back to my goal: the warmer months are my best opportunity to establish a solid line drying habit. And who knows, come late fall, it may be so ingrained that I’m inspired to come up with a creative solution to my indoor space constraints…
Do you line dry your clothes? If so, what tricks and techniques have you found to be most helpful? If you don’t, what do you feel are your biggest obstacles?
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When I was a newbie shareholder at Newton Community Farm I would often come home overwhelmed by both the amount and variety of produce in my weekly share. What on earth was I going to do with daikon radish or kohlrabi? And how was I going to manage to go through 2 huge bunches of kale in one week? Of course there were some items–lettuce, cukes and tomatoes come to mind–that I couldn’t get enough of. But there were many others that languished on my counter or in my fridge. That first season there were several items that never made it to our table. I find it somewhat comforting to know that they at least went in our compost bin, as opposed to the trash.
Fortunately I’ve learned a lot since then. Most weeks it isn’t hard to eat through our weekly share (although I still have the purslane from a couple of weeks ago; believe it or not it’s still looking fresh in the green bag I stored it in). We eat LOTS more veggies in the summer that we used to, which is a good thing.
I’ve also become familiar with lots of produce that I had never really cooked with before. I’ve tried lots of new recipes. And I’ve learned to experiment and “make do” with what I have on hand. Although it doesn’t really feel like making do. It’s more fun than that. When I leave the farm now with an unfamiliar veggie I look forward to the challenge of figuring out what to do with it. And since I also visit my farmer’s market, I get a chance to supplement and round out my CSA share.
Last night, as I was looking ahead to today’s weekly pick up, I scanned my produce bin to see what remained from the week before: 2 zucchini, a big bunch of scallions, green garlic, purslane, beets and lettuce. Well I know we couldn’t eat all of that in one meal, so I vowed to use what I could. The result: zucchini, scallion and potato (picked up at the farmer’s 
market) curry. I googled a recipe for zucchini curry to use as a base and 45 minutes later–voila, dinner was ready!
Now if only I could figure out what to do with the purslane…
CSA Curry
Ingredients
2-3 Tbs olive oil
2 zucchini (or squash, cauliflower, eggplant, etc), washed and cut into small cubes
2-3 medium to large potatoes, washed and cubed
bunch of scallions (or onions), cut into approx. 1 inch long pieces
handful of wax beans (or green beans, peppers, carrots, etc.), cut in half3-4 cloves of garlic, minced
1-2 Tbs. ginger, minced
1 Tbs. curry powder
pinch of cayenne pepper (or to taste)
1 cup of vegetable or chicken broth
handful of cilantro, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup of cashews, coarsely chopped
Directions
Saute potatoes over medium heat in olive oil for 10 minutes. Stir occasionally.
Add zucchini and saute for 5 more minutes, stirring occasionally.
Remove potatoes and zucchini to plate.
Add scallions and saute for 2-3 minutes.
Add garlic, ginger, curry powder, & cayenne and stir for about 1 minute, until fragrant
Return potatoes and zucchini to skillet and add vegetable or chicken broth.
Bring to a boil then reduce to simmer .
Cover and cook for 5 more minutes.
Serve with cilantro and cashews sprinkled on top
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One of the truisms–or cliches, depending on how you look at it–that I’ve been known to spout is that different seasons offer different opportunities for and challenges to green living.
In New England, spring brings us outdoors, making it easier to choose walking and biking over driving, and calling us to our gardens. But it’s also the time when we begin applying chemical fertilizes and pesticides to our lawns.
Summer provides an amazing variety of produce from a plethora of farms, making it an absolute pleasure to buy and eat locally grown. But it’s also the time when wasteful and inefficient irrigation can stress water sheds.
Especially for the parents of school-aged, fall presents us with a chance to make better choices about the food we parents send to school and the packaging we send it in. But the start up of extracurricular activities can mean a lot of driving, and the amount of planning to maintain a carpool can sometimes overwhelm even the most organized parent.
Then there’s winter, which can sometimes seem like one big green living challenge: no more locally grown food; it’s often too cold, snowy and dark to walk or bike to work; our old and drafty houses keep aging heating systems running overtime.
Of course many of the opportunities for and challenges to green living are not seasonally dependent–it’s no easier or harder to bring your own bags in the summer than it is in the spring. But the many seasonal variations got me thinking: perhaps it would be a good idea to think about my green living goals seasonally and to leverage seasonal changes to help me form better habits, especially in those areas where I’ve had difficulty making lasting change.
Let me give you an example: while I have almost entirely freed my family from disposable water bottles (the one exception is when we fly), I am still reliant on disposable coffee cups. I routinely forget my reusable mug when I’m out and about, and now that the hot weather is here I am much more likely to stop into a coffee shop and get an iced coffee or tea in the afternoon. All of which led me to think: OK, it’s time to finally give up disposable coffee cups. If I forget my reusable mug (which works for cold as well as hot drinks), then I won’t get anything.
So here goes: my green goals for summer:
- No more disposable food and beverage containers. And I mean no more. I’m going to buy reusable take out/left over containers for when I eat out and I’m going to forgo coffeshop drinks if I forget my mug.
- This includes–in a modified form–the grocery store. The bulk bins at my local Whole Foods are calling my name. I’m going to buy as much as possible in bulk and reuse the containers as much as possible.
- Line dry all my laundry. Right now we probably line dry 25-50% of our clothes, but during the summer there’s no reason not to aim for 100%.
- Build up a supply of preserves to help us eat local into the winter. We got a good head start from the 40 lbs. of strawberries we picked last month. My goal is to keep it up by preserving blueberries, peaches and tomatoes to last well into the winter.
- This one involves my husband but I’d like to see how many days a week we can leave one of our cars parked. I’ve been arguing for a couple of years that we could get away with one car and he doesn’t agree. Summer is perfect opportunity to put this to the test and see how we do.
So there you have it. My green goals for summer. Are you waiting on bated breath to see how it all works out? I’ll be sure to let you know!
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When you hear the word pollution what image comes to mind? Perhaps it’s oil washing ashore the gulf coast, or power plants spewing black smoke, or smog hovering over congested freeways.
Back when I was a kid we learned that pollution was a threat to the great outdoors: damaging habitats, rendering waterways unsafe for swimming, and sullying the beauty of the natural world. We also learned that we could do something: Woodsy Owl encouraged us to “Give a Hoot, Don’t Pollute!” We picked up trash and learned to recycle; and our government passed groundbreaking legislation—such as The Clean Air Act—that has gone a long way towards cleaning up our outdoor air and waterways.
But while we’ve been cleaning up the outdoors, another form of pollution has reared its head. It’s called indoor pollution and it has seriously compromised the health of our homes, schools, offices and other indoor spaces. Here are the grim facts:
- “Body Burden” studies conducted by the CDC have detected over 200 industrial chemicals in the blood and urine of test subjects. Many of these chemicals—including the now infamous BPA—are common in consumer products.
- Almost every week a new study comes out linking chemical exposure to a wide range of health risks from asthma and allergies to cancer to developmental disorders. Click here and here for examples.
While we no longer behave like the Drapers in Madmen, shaking picnic remnants onto the ground, we still have a serious pollution problem on our hands.
The good news is that Congress is finally acting to protect our health. The Safe Chemicals Act of 2010 would require safety testing of all industrial chemicals and give EPA greater authority to pull chemicals that are deemed a threat. You can voice your support for a strong bill by calling your representatives in Congress.
And here’s another piece of good news. When we change our behavior we reduce our exposure and our body burden. We don’t need to and shouldn’t wait for Congress to act. We can begin right now to make choices that will make a difference for our health & the environment. Here are some tips to help you get started:
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Yesterday my neighbor and I went out to Indian Hill Farm in Berlin to pick strawberries. We were on a mission: pick as many strawberries as we could in less than two hours (we had young kids with us and figured 2 hours was their limit).
I’m not going to lie and say it was easy work: our back were sore, our shirts were wet with sweat, our kids were complaining, and our arms were irritated by the vines. But the reward was oh so sweet: In 90 minutes we had picked 40 lbs of strawberries. And we’d probably each eaten a couple of pounds more while we were in the field.
What on earth will we do with 40 lbs of strawberries? For starters, we turned about half our haul into jam: 12 8oz. jars for each of us. The rest we froze (3 cookie sheets each) to use in the off-season for cereal, yogurt, desserts, etc.
Why on earth did we set out to pick 40 lbs of strawberries? Why didn’t we knock off after an hour, when we already have close to 30 lbs? All that hulling, jam making, freezing, storing–it’s all hard work. Why did put ourselves through that? Well, for several reasons:
- To save money: We paid $2/lb for our berries. That’s a savings of over certified organic strawberries from Whole
Foods.
- To supporting local & sustainable agriculture: Even though Indian Hill Farm isn’t certified organic, I would argue that their strawberries are a a more environmentally-friendly choice than organic strawberries grown on an organic “megafarm” out in California.
- To be self-sufficient: We are learning how to make things for ourselves.
- To teach our children that food comes from the earth (not the grocery store) and that it is hard work to grow and harvest .
- To have fun together.
I also find it uniquely enjoyable to eat food that I have grown, picked myself, or received as part of my CSA share. I think it’s partly because the food is enveloped within a story: Whenever I eat the strawberries we picked yesterday I’ll picture Indian Hill Farm and feel the sweat on my arms. I’ll taste the strawberries I ate in the field (and, yes, I’ll also hear my daughter complaining that she’s thirsty and wants to go home). I think unique enjoyment also arises from experiencing the land first hand. Unlike anonymous grocery store food, I know or at least have interacted with the flesh and blood people who have grown local food and cared for the land on which it was grown.
For me, then, pleasure and enjoyment is another reason why I picked 40 pounds of strawberries (and why I plan to do the same for blueberries). In fact, it’s probably the most important reason of all. For if I didn’t take pleasure in growing and eating locally grown food, I don’t think the financial, philosophical or scientific reasons would have enough pull to get me to do it.
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In my part of the world, we’re experiencing a very early season heatwave–both yesterday and today have brought near record temperatures (right now my computer is showing 91 for my town of Newton, MA. Temperatures like this are more typical for late July and August, not May.
Granted it’s only been two days of the extreme heat, but I’m happy to report that–at least so far–we’ve been living AC free. Here’s how:
- During the day we shut our windows and put down our shades to keep the sun from heating up the house.
- When the temperature begins to fall in the evening we open windows to introduce as much cool air as possible.
We use our grill for cooking and our microwave for reheating. Mostly we eat cold food like salads & sandwiches.
- We take cool showers before bed.
- We use powerful but fairly quiet window fans that fit snugly into the window, minimizing light infiltration.
Once summer kicks into high gear living AC free can become a lot more challenging, especially as high nighttime temperatures make it hard to maintain comfortable indoor temps.
Last year we did pretty well and kept our use of our central air conditioning system to a minimum (maybe 7-10 days the whole summer). But last year we didn’t consistently close our windows and shades during the day, so our house was probably hotter and more humid than it (hopefully) will be this summer. Stay tuned for updates…
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Remember the Weston water main break? It seems like a lifetime ago doesn’t it? Given our short attention spans and everything else that’s been going on in the world–Boston’s boil water order no longer remains at the top of anyone’s radar screen (including those of us who had to deal with it). But before we forget about it completely I’d like to share some of the things I learned from the experience. I’m hoping that by writing (or typing) them down, I’ll remember them the next time I turn on the water.
- I can wash lettuce in about a cup or two of water. Here’s how: fill a wide but deep bowl (like a salad spinner) with an inch or two of water). Take lettuce leaves one at a time and slosh around in the water. Shake to remove excess water and pile in strainer. Repeat for remaining lettuces leaves. Unless the leaves are really dirty you will find that an inch or two of water is enough to wash a whole head of lettuce.
- I don’t need to bathe/shower my kids every day.
- I don’t need to shower every day but I still do (I don’t know if/when I’ll be able to wean myself back on this habit).
- One or maybe two mouthfuls of water is sufficient to brush my teeth.
- Buying bottled water is a waste of money even in a water emergency, except if I didn’t plan ahead and boil at night for the next day we’d be stuck. (Fortunately my neighbor has a well. So relying on advance boiling and my neighbor, we mostly did without bottled water).
- Clean tap water is an amazing gift that I normally use way more of than I need to.
Since the boil water order was lifted I’ve caught myself wasting water in a number of ways. From running the sink water for a few seconds while I step away to get a dirty dish, to lingering in the shower after I’m done washing, to letting my kids help me “water the plants” (read: play with the hose), I have realized that I am not as conservative with water as I thought was.
The water ban has helped raise my consciousness about my habits and, I hope, will help me to cultivate better habits. Which isn’t to say that I’ll never linger in the shower or let my kids play with water again. But maybe I’ll linger one minute less or cut the hose play time in half (I have to be honest with myself: I often let it go way longer than I should because it gives me more uninterrupted planting time or cleaning time or whatever time…).
And I’ll (hopefully) never again take our clean water supply for granted. There are almost one billion people around the world don’t have clean drinking water, and 2.6 billion still lack basic sanitation. For many of these people even unclean sources of water are not close at hand–let alone flowing from a tap inside their homes. In fact, many people walk miles to access water. Could you imagine living like this? I can’t. I could boil water day in and day out, but walk miles to access water? That I can’t fathom myself doing. And yet… people do it every day.
It may sound saccharine but I guess I’m thankful for the water ban for reminding my just how lucky I am.
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Natick Community Organic Farm participates in Natick's Winter Market
Winter farmer’s markets are a growing trend, but what about spring markets? At least in my neck of the woods (Boston), many off-season markets close up in March (this includes the Natick and Wayland winter markets). So while I was happily munching locally grown lettuce in February, the past few months I’ve had to make due with organic lettuce from California (courtesy of Whole Foods).
As interest in local food continues to grow, I suspect that many off-season markets will continue straight on through until the “regular” farmer’s market season starts up in June or July. But in the meantime, how are we localvores going to satisfy our hunger for fresh, local fare?
In my area (Brookline-Newton-Needham) there are a few places where you can find local produce in the spring including:
- Allandale Farm in Brookline is selling produce at its farm stand. Today when I called they had rhubarb, kale, scallions and spring garlic.
- The Dedham Square Country Store is not so much a store as a traditional farmer’s market that sells local fare (much more than produce) every Sunday from 10-2. I have yet to visit this market but hope to soon (If you have visited, please share your comments) .
- Newton Community Farm is scheduled to open its farm stand this Sunday, May 16th.
- Stillman’s Farm located in New Braintree sells produce as it becomes available in Jamaica Plain (Bank of America parking lot, 677 Centre Street) on Saturdays from 12-3. Contact Stillmans for more information about availability and schedule. Stillmans also sells locally, sustainably raised meat as well.
If you live elsewhere in Massachusetts, Rhode Island or Connecticut, visit Farm Fresh to find farmers markets, farm stands, etc. in your neck of the woods (hint: click on your region in the map in the upper right hand corner to find farms close to you). Farm Fresh is a fantastic resource: you can search not only by location but also by food. It also contains lists of local food artisans and restaurants, retailers and caterers that source locally. For those of you who live outside this region there is a similar national directory called Local Harvest, although I have found that it isn’t always current.
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If you’re like me you’ve got a lot of broken stuff in your basement or attic or storage area. Thinking about my basement, I can picture the train table with a missing leg, some chairs with busted seats, and–oh year–an old laptop computer. I keep telling myself I’m going to have those chair re-caned and I’ll try to give the train table away to someone handier than me who would reattach the leg. But the laptop computer. It has never even crossed my mind that anyone–let alone me–could or would fix it. But we could.
First a little context: Ewaste is a devastating problem. According to National Geographic reporting, 80% of our used and broken electronics are landfilled in this country (this despite bans that seek to keep toxins from leaching into soil and water supplies). What about the 20% that is “recycled”? Well most of this gets shipped overseas where individuals are burning it–that’s right burning it–or ripping it apart in order to recover materials like copper that have a resale value. Meanwhile dangerous pollutants like flame retardants, arsenic and mercury are released into the air, water and soil. And how are the individuals conducting these “recycling” operations protecting themselves from exposure? They aren’t. And many of them are just kids.
There are solutions. On the legislative/regulatory side, we could and should require manufacturers to take responsibility for the end-life of their products. This would surely go a long way towards moving away from a conventional design practice called planned obselecense. Instead of designing products to become obsolete (motivating consumers to buy newer, better, faster products), such laws would incent manufacturers to design products that will last a long time and are easier to fix when they break and upgrade as new technology develops.
But even with better design, things will still break. Someone needs to fix them and most of us don’t have a clue to go about doing this. Enter solution number 2: Ifixit is an exciting young company that is working to create comprehensive online repair manuals for every electronic device and, thus, enable people to fix their broken down electronics. In a video on the company’s website, co-founder, Kyle Wiens, describes the effort as a “wikipedia-like” one. In other words, Ifixit is aiming to create a continually updated encyclopedia for repairing electronics. Not only that: they provide troubleshooting guides and sell parts and tools. Pretty exciting if you ask me.
If you want to learn more about the ewaste problem and how Ifixit is working to solve it, visit their website and make sure to watch the video. It’s devastating and inspiring at the same time–in my opinion, just the right combination to motivate change.
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Do you ever wonder why people continue to make unsustainable choices even when they are educated about the impact of their choices and the benefits of making different ones? I do. There are, of course, many reasons why people (myself included) do not choose green–from the perception or reality of added cost, to the inconvenience, to the difficulty of changing ingrained habits, to the structural impediments.
While better public policy has an important role to play here, I want to touch briefly on how home design decisions can make an impact (when I wear my green home consultant hat I think about this issue a lot). When we build–or better yet, renovate–existing homes we can easily remove many of the obstacles people face to making greener choices. In fact we can renovate in ways that actually facilitate these choices. Looking to reduce water use? Specify low-flow fixtures. Looking to cut down on energy bills? Insulate, insulate, insulate. And, oh yeah, cut down on the size of that proposed family room addition. Want to encourage line drying? recycling? composting? Include provisions for these within the plans.
