Photo Hunt Garbage

The kids helping with recycling at school.

photohunt

And the rubbish will go in what?

Image by evelynishere via FlickrI just went to look for a plastic grocery bag to put some yucky rubbish in. We had ants in the kitchen earlier and we had a major cleanup. But where to put all the crap? Usually we have tons of plastic bags, but I have been a good environmentally friendly reusable bag user lately and have reduced my environmentally unfriendly?? disposable plastic bag collection. In our house, we rarely threw out plastic bags that did not have greasy, wet, smelly, mouldy, yucky stuff in them, so we were not really throwing them out were we??

We have now reached the end of the road, where I will have to break ranks with my wife (not a good idea) or succumb to disorganisation and forget the reusable bags.

This nightmare is in our very near future here in South Australia when plastic shopping bags are banned next May. Captain Garrett Master of the Good Ship Environment, on behalf of the Commonwealth Government tried to push for national ban on plastic bags earlier in the year, but that was rerouted to the further study department to be delayed as too difficult. Interesting that South Australia bit the bullet and moved forward. South Australia has been progressive on environmental measures before with the only container deposit legislation in Australia. Although the jury is out on the value of segregating recyclables, Ryan's Joey Scout Mob has gained over $100 from recycled beer bottles and cans from office since I started organising to recycle them a few months ago. Money for old rope I suppose.

I wonder if they will just charge an outrageous price to keep disorganised people like me honest and to keep up the supermarket owners margins as they make outrageous profits on all the new grocery carrying options that they will be able to sell and the plastic bags for rubbish that we will have to buy. Will we see a reduction in the cost of groceries? *laughs uproriously*

Rather like the enthusiasm for tackling global warming that was such a powerful force less than a year ago. That is out the window with the financial meltdown. People will be reluctant to make the required sacrifices required to meet some of the targets being set by the Australian Government. Many consumers like me will have a strong inclination to support the phasing out of plastic bags until the day that we have to buy them at the checkout. Then people will be grumpy.

So I suppose I have to admit that my inherent laziness just wants things to stay the same, regardless of the environmental issues. We can leave that for another few years, can't we?

Update. I went to the supermarket this morning and bought some plastic bags. Just as back up. You never know when I have garden poo patrol duties.

700 Billion - Chump Change?

It is hard to visualise 700 billion dollars.

How about 2,500 dollars for every American or 35,000 for every Australian.

Why not just give it to me. It would certainly stabilise my finances for a while.

I think it is time to Change the Chumps. The Fat Cats, the Regulators and the Politicians.


Carry on.

Meanwhile Mike offers a great (in hindsight) hedging strategy for your money.

Green Porridge Sewage Bar

And the one you all wanted to read about. From The Australian

An overwhelming majority of Australians would be prepared to drink recycled sewage to help ease a national crisis in urban water supplies that has forced escalating restrictions on water use.

In an exclusive Newspoll for the Australian, almost seven out of 10 people favour water from sewage treatment plants being supplied to homes for all household uses, including drinking, provided it is treated to the same quality as existing water supplies.

Most of the remainder say they would be prepared to use recycled sewage for non-drinking purposes, such as flushing toilets and watering gardens.

So there you have it. I am very surprised that so many people are prepared to consider this. I am trained and work in the environmental field and I have many doubts about this, not least the numbers of chemicals required to get to the point where you could safely ingest the water. Personally I will stick to beer. That was the safest liquid when I lived in South East Asia, where most of the drinking water was contaminated with ecoli. Bit expensive for bathing however. Perhaps I could start a recycled sewage mineral water business. Guaranteed to fail I don't doubt.