Greenversations

On Sunday night, I saw a computer monitor that had been left near the curb next to the trash cans four houses down from mine. My first thought was that some people are not really aware of the significant damage they cause the environment by tossing electronics along with their trash. I really hoped somebody would pick up this cast-off soon. Unfortunately, on Monday morning, my husband called me to say that he had seen municipal workers literally throwing a computer monitor into a public works pick up truck. The monitor broke into pieces as it landed in the truck’s bed. He was extremely worried about the harmful substances that would leak into the ground along with the regular trash once the monitor was disposed of in the landfill.

Obsolescence, development of new technologies and massive marketing campaigns that make people want to buy the latest models result in a fast-growing surplus of discarded electronic equipment around the world. Electronic equipment has revolutionized the way we communicate, but most of these items contain serious contaminants such as lead, cadmium, beryllium and brominated flame retardants that need to be carefully disposed of.

Many states have “diversion from landfill” legislation that requires electronic equipment to be collected and processed separately form garbage. In April 2000, Massachusetts became the first state in the U.S. to make it illegal to dispose of CRT (cathode ray tubes) in landfills. In Europe, these regulations and bans date to the 1990’s. As of 2008, 17 states in the U.S. had enacted responsibility laws and 35 states were considering electronic recycling laws. Earlier this year, the state of Washington passed legislation requiring manufacturers of electronic goods to pay for recycling and establishing a statewide network of collection points.

EPA has been working to educate consumers on reuse and safe recycling of electronics. This past Earth Day, two bills were passed by the House of Representatives to require EPA to give merit-based grants to universities, government labs and private industries to conduct research on the development of new approaches that would improve recycling and reduction of hazardous materials in electronic devices.

In our household, we throw out our unwanted electronics during an e-cycling drive. Last year, the local Engineers and Surveyors Association held a multi-city e-waste drive during which I not only disposed of an old computer monitor and fax, but also an old TV from my parent’s house. However, there are other options like donating the equipment for refurbishment and resale. The two latter are more common with cellular phones. All of them are much better than throwing electronics into the trash.

About the author: Brenda Reyes Tomassini joined EPA in 2002. She is a public affairs specialist in the San Juan, Puerto Rico office and also handles community relations for the Caribbean Environmental Protection Division.

Vi el monitor de computadora un domingo en la noche al lado de los contenedores de basura de una casa a cuatro residencias de la nuestra. De inmediato constaté que, aún con todos los esfuerzos de educación ambiental que hacemos, hay algunas personas que no entienden el daño que causan al ambiente tirando enseres electrónicos a la basura regular. Pensé que quizás alguien se lo llevaría antes que llegase el camión de basura. Sin embargo mi esposo me llamó el lunes en la mañana para indicarme como los trabajadores de recogido de desperdicios habían dispuesto del monitor tirandolo al camión de la basura y como este se hizo añicos ante sus ojos. Y fue así como nuestra mayor preocupación se tornó realidad. Este monitor que desprendía componentes y sustancias químicas peligrosas terminaría junto a la basura regular en el vertedero.

El advenimiento de nuevas tecnologías, la obsolencia de équipos electrónicos junto a campañas publicitarias que destacan las virtudes de tal o más cual equipo han creado a nivel mundial un exceso de electrónicos que son descartados cada año por un modelo más eficiente. Si bien han revolucionado la manera en la que nos comunicamos, no podemos perder de vista que muchos de estos equipos también contienen contaminantes como plomo, cadmio y berilio, entre otros, que necesitan ser dispuestos adecuadamente.

Muchos estados tienen legislación que prohibe de su disposición en los vertederos. Estos equipos deben ser recogidos y procesados fuera de la corriente regular. El estado de Massachussets fue el primero en hacer ilegal la disposición de tubos de rayo catódico (CTR, por sus siglas en inglés) en abril del 2000. En Europa muchas de estas leyes y estatutos de prohibición datan de los años 1990’s. En el 2008 17 estados de Estados Unidos habían creado leyes de responsabilidad y 35 estaban considerando establecer leyes de reciclaje de electrónicos. Al presente, el estado de Washington pasó legislación requiriendo a los manufactureros de equipos de este tipo pagar por el reciclaje de estos y establecer puntos de recogido a través del estado.

La EPA ha trabajado arduamente para educar a la ciudadanía sobre el reuso y el reciclaje seguro de estos equipos. Durante la conmemoración del Día Internacional de la Tierra este año la Legislatura aprobó dos medidas que le dan a la EPA la facultad de otorgar subvenciones a universidades, laboratorios del gobierno y la industria privada para llevar a cabo investigaciones sobre el desarrollo de nuevas formas de mejorar el reciclaje de electrónicos y reducir los componentes peligrosos en estos equipos.

En nuestro hogar llevamos nuestros equipos electrónicos al recogido anual que hace el Colegio de Ingenieros y Agrimensores. El año pasado llevé una computadora vieja y un fax junto a un televisor viejo de la casa de mis padres. Sin mebargo hay otras opciones como donar el equipo, revenderlo o arreglarlo. Las últimas dos son muy comunes con equipos como teléfonos. Cualquiera de estas opciones es mejor que tirarlo a la basura.

Sobre la autor: Brenda Reyes Tomassini se unió a la EPA en el 2002. Labora como especialista de relaciones públicas en la oficina de EPA en San Juan, Puerto Rico donde también maneja asuntos comunitarios para la División de Protección Ambiental del Caribe.

Instead of throwing it away, food waste can be composted and reused on lawns and gardens. Yet food waste remains single-largest component of the waste stream by weight in the U.S.

What do you do with food waste?

Each week we ask a question related to the environment. Please let us know your thoughts as comments. Feel free to respond to earlier comments or post new ideas. Previous questions.

En lugar echarlos a la basura, los desechos de alimentos pueden ser utilizados para hacer compostaje y reutilizarlos en el césped y jardines. Los desechos de alimentos continúan siendo el componente singular de mayor cuantía en el volumen de basura por su peso en Estados Unidos.

¿Qué hace con los desechos de alimentos?

Cada semana hacemos una pregunta relacionada al medio ambiente. Por favor comparta con nosotros sus pensamientos y comentarios. Siéntase en libertad de responder a comentarios anteriores o plantear nuevas ideas. Preguntas previas.

After the success of President Obama’s political campaign, it became impossible to ignore the importance of emerging Web technologies. A Web presence characterized by information sharing, social networking and online communities emerged as a powerful way to transform a fledging grassroots movement into a national campaign. In 2008, Craig Hooks, former Director of the Office of Wetlands, Oceans and Watersheds, recognized the opportunity for EPA to utilize Web technology to get citizens involved in addressing environmental challenges together. He proposed the idea of a video contest to engage the public and to help solve problems associated with non-point source water pollution.

Although there have been great improvements in water quality over the past three decades, there is still a massive problem resulting from human activity on the land. Educating citizens about actions that they can take to reduce their impact is vital to improving the nation’s water quality.

The contest was a new way for the Office of Water to experiment with participatory governance using the Web. I’m happy to say that it worked well beyond our expectations. We marketed the contest using social media channels, creating a special EPA group on YouTube and filming our own promotional video, publicizing it on various Web pages, such as VidOpp.com and Fastweb.com, creating a Facebook group page as well as using more traditional outreach such as listservs. It helped that I am a twenty-year-old intern, comfortable with these cutting-edge marketing technologies.

We had modest expectations. The Radon Video Contest conducted last summer by the Office of Air and Radiation generated thirty videos, and we assumed we would receive about the same number. We were wrong. As the contest drew to a close, we began to get overwhelmed. By midnight, more than 250 videos had been submitted.

The judging proved somewhat challenging because of the range of topics and variability in quality. But in the end, we selected two outstanding top videos, “Protect our Water-Check Cars for Oil Leaks” by Lucas Ridley and “Dastardly Deeds and the Water Pollution Monster” by Nora Parren, along with twenty-one videos honorable mentions.

This contest was a monumental success. Collectively, our YouTube contest channel generated more than 18,000 collective views at the contest close and 28,839 views as of today. The interest it has generated has been amazing, and EPA has begun to realize the potential for government to gain the public’s interest using emerging Web technologies. We have been flooded by calls and emails from other EPA offices as well as other government agencies and nonprofit groups that wish to run similar Web contests. On June 10, 2009 Web 2.0 became the one millionth word to be added to the English language dictionary, showing how truly epic this movement is. This is the beginning of a new age for the government and with social media tools at our disposal, individuals can truly participate in their government.

Check out the contest winners.
View all the contest entries.

About the author: Rebecca Neary has been interning with the Office of Wetlands, Oceans and Watersheds at Headquarters since January 2009. Rebecca will be beginning her Masters Degree in Environmental Policy and Natural Resource Management at Indiana University this fall.

In 2007, 245.1 million tons of municipal solid waste was generated in the United States. Of that waste, organic materials—yard trimmings, food scraps, and paper products—made up more than two-thirds of our solid waste stream. Even though organic waste makes up most of our waste stream, it is something that we can reduce. Composting can turn our organic wastes into valuable compost which can be used for landscaping and gardening purposes. By composting we can also reduce methane, a greenhouse gas with 21 times the heating potential of carbon dioxide which is largely produced from the organic wastes in our landfills.

There are many types of composting options to choose from. At the end of the composting process you will end up with a great, free product for greening lawns and producing strong, healthy garden plants.

So here’s how you can start. Look at your options. Some include vermicomposting, compost bins, or installing a composter in the sink like a garbage disposal. Discuss with your caregiver or principal which option works easiest and best for your home or school. Then work on making successful compost by watching what you put into the composter. EPA’s web site has great information for creating a compost pile right in your own backyard.

So take action against producing so much waste and reduce green house gas emissions. By composting you can eliminate the threats to climate change, water quality and pollution by transforming your waste into a product that will benefit your lawn and garden. Talk to your friends and family about how they can start a composting project at home. You can also become a climate ambassador by starting a composting program at your school. You will find that it can be fun, especially if you like to garden! Be sure to tell us your composting plans. Let us know which option works best for you, how much waste you will be reducing and what you plan to do with your compost.

About the Author: Michelle Gugger graduated from Rutgers University in 2008. She is currently spending a year of service at EPA’s Region 3 Office in Philadelphia, PA as an AmeriCorps VISTA

How much do you know about the environment of where you live? That’s right, not the rain forest, not the polar icecaps, but your neighborhood. Lots of us take our environment for granted. Water comes out of spigots and waste gets carted or flushed away. Unless there’s an environmental problem nearby, like a polluting factory, most folks don’t give it a second thought. Our environment just is.

But environmental protection starts at home, and it is important to understand how one thing affects another, so here’s the challenge (actually a great project for a class to do) – find out and then write up a report so others can understand your local environment too.

I did this a few years ago for the town in which I live, Narberth, Pa. I looked into:

• How our electricity is produced.
• Where the oil that runs my heater came from.
• Where the natural gas that runs my stove came from.
• The origin of my drinking water.
• Where my wastewater goes.
• What happens to the recyclables (plastics, paper, glass) that are collected.
• What happens to our yard waste that’s picked up.
• Where my household waste/trash goes.
• The quality of the air I breathe.
• The levels of radon from the ground.
• What happens to our rainwater after it goes down the storm drains.
• The name of our watershed and the location of our streams.
• Our climate and planting zone.
• Where our gasoline comes from.
• What mass transit is available.
• Our topography and geography.
• How our town is zoned.
• The location of our historic buildings.

In the process I discovered some interesting things. Some streams had been piped underground and weren’t on the surface anymore. Our household waste goes to an incinerator where it is burned to produce electricity. Our rainwater goes directly into streams; it’s not treated first. The oldest intact structure in Narberth is a Swedish log cabin. But since it has had many additions, it just looks like a normal house now.

My report is on the web at: http://www.narberthpa.org/environment.htm. Feel free to use it as a model for yours. Go out and discover your local environment!

Editor’s note: you can get started learning what EPA knows about your area with MyEnvironment.  Try it out or read the Greenversations post about it.

About the Author: Nancy Grundahl has worked for the Philadelphia office of EPA since the mid-80’s. She currently manages the web for the Environmental Assessment and Innovation Division. Before getting involved with the web, she worked as an environmental scientist. Nancy believes in looking at environmental problems in a holistic, multi-media way and is a strong advocate of preventing pollution instead of dealing with it after it has been created.

About the author: Cara Peck is an Environmental Scientist in EPA Region 9. For the past three years she has worked on the recycling of organic materials, but is now working on reducing the climate change and energy implications from the Agriculture Industry.

I love food. At various points along the day, it is a safe bet that I’m thinking about what to eat for my next meal. This could be the product of growing up in Northern California where we have amazing food, or it could be because I love to cook and eating logically follows cooking. Whatever the reason, I’m a huge fan of food.

While many share my love of the culinary world, there is an ugly and harmful side to the delicacies we enjoy- food waste. Organic waste, which includes food, currently makes up 25% of what is going to landfills. In addition to a host of other problems, landfills emit methane, a potent greenhouse gas. In an effort to try to get this food waste out of landfills, I started researching the anaerobic digestion of food waste. Basically, in an atmosphere without oxygen, bacteria feed on the food waste, break it down, and produce biogas in the process. Amazingly, biogas is an energy source, so in the process of reducing waste, energy is produced!

To further explore this project, I managed a few projects that investigated using this technology at wastewater treatment facilities. Many wastewater treatment facilities already use anaerobic digesters to break down sewage sludge. In addition, most of these digesters have excess capacity for something like… food waste!

Here’s a snapshot of how the process works: food scraps are collected at nearby restaurants. Then are sent to a local wastewater treatment facility, processed and injected into the anaerobic digesters. The bacteria go to work, break down the waste and produce biogas. The biogas is captured and used on site to power the facility, or even sent back to the grid. The residual that is left after the bugs have done their job is reduced, making it much easier to truck to the compost facility. Upon further composting, the material can be used as a soil amendment to grow more food. It’s a true closed-loop, sustainable system.

This technology has national applicability and I’m excited to see it more widely adopted in an effort to reduce waste and to combat climate change.

Since I do love food so much, I must admit that there isn’t often much waste left on my plate. However, I feel a little better about my love affair with food knowing that the waste that is left is going to a higher use and not contributing to climate change.

About the author: Sara Jacobs recently celebrated her 10th year working at EPA Region 9. She has spent most of her years in the Drinking Water Office, but is currently on a detail to the Superfund Division, working with the Navajo EPA.

When I saw that Lenore Lamb had been chosen as one of the EPA Pacific Southwest Environmental Award Winners, I was thrilled since I know first hand of Lenore’s accomplishments as the Environmental Director for the Pala Band of Mission Indians. I met Lenore in 2001 and three wells, three kids (two were mine), and eight years later, I have seen Lenore grow from a one woman show to managing a staff of 12. She’s gone from a young, eager environmental learner to an expert and leader in her field. Her efficiency and energy amazes me and I get the impression that she does the work of three people. (She tells me it’s due to large quantities of caffeine.)

Here are just some of her contributions:

• Providing safe drinking water and wastewater disposal for both the Pala Band as well as a tribal community in Mexico by securing funding and overseeing infrastructure projects.
• Developing a “Green Team,” with representatives from the Pala Casino Resort and Spa, that has implemented energy and water efficiency programs and diverted 170 tons of solid waste since implementation of their program last year.
• Active involvement in the Upper San Luis Rey Resource Conservation District. Lenore has been instrumental in the clean up of illegal dumpsites along the creek beds within the reservation boundaries.
• Supporting education and outreach programs through annual earth day events, tribal publications, exercises for the Pala Boys and Girls Science Club, and by developing a “Creating and Managing Tribal Transfer Stations” course.
• Securing tribal funding and overseeing design and construction of a transfer station. The facility is open to the public, includes electronic waste collection, a green waste and composting program, a secured hazardous waste collection location, a state certified buy back center for recyclables, and a used oil collection program.

From my own experience working with tribes, I know that tribal environmental managers face enormous challenges. I’m even more impressed by Lenore since her accomplishments are more forward thinking than many non-tribal governments, even in a state like California, which is often on the cutting edge. Lenore has not only made significant contributions to improving the environment at Pala, she has contributed to improving environmental conditions throughout Indian Country.

To learn more about the Pala Band’s environmental programs, go to http://www.palatribe.com/programs/environment/. Look for additional environmental tribal leaders in future posts.

About the Author: Michelle Gugger graduated from Rutgers University in 2008. She is currently spending a year of service at EPA’s Region 3 Office in Philadelphia, PA as an AmeriCorps VISTA.

There are many successful paper recycling programs that schools start every year and their efforts certainly make a big difference. For example, 28 schools in Central Virginia started a paper recycling program in 2007 and have been able to collect more than 156 tons of paper to date. The 156 tons of paper that they recycled have saved more than 2,000 trees, 823,000 gallons of water, and 411 yards of landfill space.

Why not become a climate ambassador and educate your classmates about the benefits of paper recycling? By recycling your schools used paper, you can save water, energy, landfill space and you can reduce the impacts of deforestation and global climate change.

If you are interested in starting a paper recycling program at your school, here’s a guide for you to follow to help make your program successful:

• Talk to your principal about setting up a collection for paper waste and finding a local paper recycler.
• Educate your school about the importance of paper recycling and what bins to recycle their used paper in.
• Organize a club to help make sure that the bins are being used properly.

You can make a big difference by starting a paper recycling program at your school. With every ton of paper that your school recycles, the EPA estimates that you can help save 7,000 gallons of water, 3.3 yards of landfill space and reduce one ton of carbon from entering into the atmosphere. So, become involved in helping your school protect the environment – start a paper recycling program and educate others on the importance of recycling. Be sure to let us know if you plan on starting a paper recycling program and why.