It shouldn’t be a surprise.

Last week, I saw a report on WFAA-TV, the local ABC affiliate, that didn’t surprise me at all. I just hope thousands of viewers learned about “The surprise inside your water bottle.”

The surprise? The water in that bottle comes from municipal water sources.

Duh.

Walmart’s brand, Niagara, comes from Grand Prairie, Texas. And it says it right on the label.

“Kroger’s bottles don’t say where their water is sourced, but it’s Dallas City water from Irving.

“Aquafina’s bottle says their product comes from “public water sources.” A company spokesman says it’s Dallas water from Mesquite.

“Tom Thumb’s brand, Refreshe’, doesn’t reveal its source. It’s bottled by Advanced H20 near Duncanville.

“Dasani, a division of Coca-Cola doesn’t give a clue where it comes from on the bottle. Headquarters says that its source is Dallas water mains.

“Nestle Pure Life’s label does say its source is public water supplies, Dallas, Texas.”

The main point of the story is that people are being duped into thinking they’re buying “better” and “cleaner” water. When actually what they’re paying for is plastic bottles, shipping costs and lots of advertising. And don’t even get me started on the fact that, according to the story, only about 25% of water bottles are recycled. But I doubt the recycling rate is even that high. It’s probably closer to 15%.

But here’s a great statistic: “North Texas bottlers are putting enough water to fill 60 Olympic swimming pools into 40 million plastic bottles every month.”

Now that’s a visual.

What am I supposed to do with this?

Salad container made from corn

I’m a super recycler. I even throw the little cards that fall out of magazines into the recycling bin.

But last week I ran into a problem. As I was getting ready to toss the empty container – that once held organic salad – into the bin, I noticed the small corn icon in the lower left-hand corner.

“Packaging made from CORN. A 100% renewable resource.”

Well, isn’t that just great. Now I can’t recycle it. And I almost start twitching at the idea that I’m going to have to throw it away.

Oh, sure, I could compost it. But we don’t have a composting facility in the area. The nearest one is in Melissa, Texas – at least a 50-mile round-trip jaunt. That’s not going to happen.

I guess I should be glad that the packaging isn’t plastic, but now this wonderful, renewable resource is going to be buried in a Subtitle D landfill where it will be mummified forever.

Sometimes being green isn’t as easy as it looks.

“Food”

Wanchai Ferry(TM)

Ever since I saw the movie “Food, Inc.” I’ve really been trying to be more aware of what I’m cooking at home and getting when I eat out. I’ve learned a lot…and it’s very scary.

The first segment on yesterday’s installment of To The Best of Our Knowledge on NPR featured Michael Pollan – food guru and author of In Defense of Food. He was also interviewed in “Food, Inc.” See the Eco-Tip for October 6, 2009 for more on that interview.

One of the main points he makes in the interview is that what is being sold on supermarket shelves isn’t really food. It’s “edible foodlike substances.”

So, of course I noticed this Associated Press article “Great time for US consumers: America is on sale,” by Rachel Beck. The article interviews Karen Wilmes, a mother of two in Hopkington, RI, who is loving the steals. “During a recent trip to the store, she bought a basketful of goods, including Eggo waffles, Kleenex tissues and Betty Crocker cake mix. The retail price: $63.89. Wilmes paid $7.31 by buying items on sale and using coupons.”

At first, I thought, “Wow!” But then I really thought about it. And picked up the three batches of coupons that came with my Sunday newspaper yesterday. Let’s look at some statistics, shall we?

• 53 “food” coupons
• 1 USDA organic food coupon – Oikos Greek Yogurt Makes me wish I liked yogurt.
• 1 Gluten-Free, Non-GMO (genetically modified) whole soy bar – SoyJoy (See Apple Walnut ingredients here) While most of them look okay, I want to know what’s hidden in the “Natural Flavors.” I’ve actually tried the Berry bar and I thought I was chewing on a piece of cardboard. But that’s just me.

So, where’s my $$ savings if I’m trying to eat only organic, healthy food?

Of the 53 “other” coupons, there were actually two for Wanchai Ferry – a frozen chinese entree from General Mills that contains about 50 ingredients. Looking at the Sweet & Sour Chicken page (simply because that’s the bag featured on both coupons) is pretty darn scary. Shoot, just the 850mg of sodium (per serving) should scare the bejeezus out of you. That’s 1,700mg per bag – 70% of your total daily recommended intake of salt!!

So I dug through the stack again and found a coupon for Nature Valley’s Granola Nut Clusters. “100% Natural” it says. Uh huh. Fifteen ingredients – one of which is “natural flavor” – isn’t natural.

Forget Halloween, folks. The supermarket is scary all year long.

RIP NRC

Times they are a’changin’. When I started in the solid waste industry in the mid-90s, the National Recycling Coalition was the top dog of recycling organizations. The conference and trade show in Pittsburgh was enormous (for a woman who had come from a very small graphics firm to the big city).

And now it’s gone. Boom.

Financial trouble didn’t sink the organization, though. No, it was its own selfish membership. Apparently the only thing that was going to keep NRC from going over the cliff was a merger with Keep America Beautiful. NRC management told its members that if the merger didn’t go through, it would be NRC’s funeral. Yet a majority of the voting members, stuck their heads in the sand and voted no on the merger. “Oh, no,” those ostrich-like members said. “We’ll never get in bed with those corporate-funded ninnies at KAB. We’d rather die.”

If you listen very carefully, you can hear taps playing in the background.

So, what happens next? Who will the state organizations turn to for education, information, resources, advocacy?

According to an article in Waste & Recycling News, a new non-profit is being formed in Colorado: Recycling Organizations of North America. But it turns out that this group started forming back in July, way before the final Chapter 7 announcement by NRC on September 4.

What’s going to happen next? <shrug>

All I know is that even though the markets are down (down, down) and municipalities are cutting back on education programs, we can’t let residents forget how important it is to keep our curbside programs going. We have to continue pushing recycling and other sustainability issues within business and industry.

Because that’s what we do best.

Footnote: Be sure to take the RONA survey that will help determine what the new organization will look like and what services it will offer its membership.

I’m blown away…

I spent yesterday afternoon in a dark theatre in Dallas, with my hands periodically covering my eyes. Was it a horror movie. Actually, yeah, it was.

In all of the reading I’ve done over the past few years regarding sustainable lifestyles and businesses, I’ve read a little bit about the sad state of our food supply in America.

But now. Now I’m more than concerned. I’m frightened.

If you don’t want to know where your food comes from and how it’s raised and harvested, do not go see this film. Unfortunately, EVERYONE should see this film.

I told a co-worker about it this morning and I received what I guess is a pretty typical response. She won’t see the movie because she “doesn’t want to know.”

Would that be considered denial or naiveté?

Food, Inc. It’s powerful.

Go see it. It will change your life.

Quite an experiment.

Making laundry detergent at home.

Every Tuesday I send out an Eco-Tip for Home. Something simple, that anyone can do.

Last April 29, my tip was Detox your laundry! that included a link to recipes for making your own laundry detergent at home. Since I’m always trying to green my home as much as possible, I decided to give “detergent making” a whirl.

No, it wasn’t quite a “don’t try this at home, kids” kind of experience, but it certainly didn’t turn out as well as I would have liked.

I decided to try the powered detergent recipe. It called for 2 cups of finely grated soap, 1 cup washing soda and 1 cup borax.

By far the hardest part was grating the soap. I used a bar of Dr. Bronner’s Castile Soap (available in the cosmetic section of Target®). It took about 20 minutes to grate 2 cups worth of soap.

Then I added the washing soda (found at Kroger®) and the borax (in the laundry section of almost any supermarket).

The container in the center of the bottom photo shows how much detergent I ended up with.

Four cups.

The recipe says to use 2 tablespoons per load. When I added it to the water, there were no suds. So I added another tablespoon. Still no suds. But a colleague pointed out to me this afternoon – when I related this experience to him – that suds aren’t necessary for clothes to get clean. Okay.

When I took the clothes out of the dryer… (No, I haven’t set up a solar clothes dryer yet; that’s next on my list) …they smelled clean. I don’t use dryer sheets, just dryer balls to fluff, but that’s a whole different posting.

So the good news is that my homemade detergent cleaned my clothes.

The bad news is that the recipe (and required grating of soap) only made enough detergent to wash about 15 loads, if I’m lucky.

More good news is that the 100 oz. jug of Seventh Generation® detergent is on sale at Target this week.

New tool for teaching climate change

I receive lots of emails with links to the latest and greatest sustainability teaching tools. But the one I received from Patty Senna, Environmental Education Coordinator for the EPA’s Region 6 immediately got me wondering how I could start implementing the activities right away.

Climate Change Wildlife and Wildlands: A Toolkit for Formal and Informal Educators “is designed for classroom teachers and informal educators in parks, refuges, forest lands, nature centers, zoos, aquariums, science centers, etc., and is aimed at the middle school grade level,” according to the site. It also includes a tool that “allows high school students to estimate their school’s greenhouse gas emissions and conceptualize ways to mitigate their school’s climate impact.”

The toolkit materials are all available for download and the site says that the list will continue to grow, so check back often.

It’s colorful, it’s well-written and I can’t wait to get started!