Can you remember a school field trip you took as a young person? Did it have an impact on how you view the world today? Many people I speak with, when asked these same questions, smile and can’t wait to share the details of fond memories and experiences. Personally I remember the pivotal excursion that illuminated my world view, and ultimately started me on the path to creating Bay Area Green Tours.
As a youngster growing up in New York City, I was very aware of the rows and rows of overflowing garbage cans outside apartment buildings and began to wonder: where it would all go, and would the city be overrun by trash by the time I was an adult? Subsequently our fourth grade class studied a book filled with graphic images about the marvels of the NYC plumbing system, followed by a field trip to a waste water treatment plant where we were able to explore the dark winding labyrinth of underground sewers. The idea for my 4th grade science project was born! I took what I learned from the intricate underground system, created a diorama and envisioned a network of similar arteries that would whisk away the disgusting garbage from apartments and sidewalks, eventually to be incinerated in the center of the earth. The technical details were a bit hazy back then, and I didn’t strike it rich as an inventor, but my two important passions for sustainability and field trips were spawned. Since then they have morphed into Bay Area field trips for people of all ages, focused on creating a positive and sustainable future.
My youth parallels the experience I hear about from many students today: they love learning but don't love school. As a former student and teacher, and now as the Executive Director of Bay Area Green Tours, I believe that field trips bridge this gap by providing more invigorating, hands-on, sensory encounters that can leave a lasting impression, and provide a slice of real life experience masquerading as school. Reading and hearing about waste streams and decomposition rates, for example, pales in comparison to actually visiting (and smelling!) a landfill, and learning directly from the workers about how they manage the mountains of waste and ever present swirling plastic bags. I’m particularly proud that many of our tours showcase green jobs which are accessible via various routes, including for people who opt out of college in favor of apprenticeships, trade schools or technical training. Who knows what seeds have been planted in the minds of the students who attended our recent Zero Waste Tour! (see below for details.)
As we embark upon this new year in which we’re weaning ourselves in many areas from plastic bags at grocery stores, we’ve devoted this issue of our newsletter to the goal of Rethinking Resources and Zero Waste. BAGT’s mission is to showcase inspiring models and people -- like the local heroes we spotlight below who disseminate inspiring information about food waste, and others who have saved garbage for a year and created zero waste homes. We have also included inspiring stories of what’s going on around the world including a short video of the Landfill Harmonic, a children’s orchestra which creates instruments from materials found in the landfill - enjoy!
In service,
Marissa LaMagna
BAGT NEWS
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New Collaborations on Altamont Landfill and Zero Waste Tour
“This was a very inspirational field trip, because of the amazing sights we saw and the incredible knowledge we took in.” - Omar, Skyline High School Student
BAGT recently received a grant from Altamont Landfill to provide Skyline High School Green Academy students the rare opportunity to participate in two stellar behind-the-scenes Zero Waste Tours. Simultaneously, we were thrilled to learn that EarthTeam received an Altamont grant to provide one of their fantastic Waste Action Projects for Skyline High - so we partnered to provide a truly in-depth understanding of waste and discard management.
EarthTeam’s Waste Action Project is a service-learning project that teaches and inspires students to address waste on their school campuses and within their communities by practicing the 4R’s (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot). Prior to our Zero Waste Tour, EarthTeam representatives visited the students for an introductory presentation on the importance of natural resource conservation, waste reduction, and their links to climate change and environmental justice. Next they conducted a student-run waste audit to assess the campus’ current waste and recycling system by identifying, categorizing, and quantifying the school waste collected over one day.
Because these students had already been educated and become concerned about the issue of waste-reduction, when BAGT then followed-up with our Zero Waste Tour*, this experience became far more valuable. The magnitude and significance of the issue of waste production and management became readily apparent to them. EarthTeam staff concluded by going back to the classroom where the students were shown the audit results, brainstormed solutions to the garbage generated on campus each day, and were inspired to mount their own campaign to put the consensus solutions into action! Rae Johnson of EarthTeam shared that the students who experienced our Zero Waste Tour were the first group to voluntarily extend their “Action Plan” to include the community beyond their school. We look forward to deepening our relationship with Earth Team, and continuing to develop our presence as experiential environmental educators!
Hills Surrounding Altamont Landfill
Tractors Compressing Waste
*Our Zero Waste Tour began at Back to the Roots, where we explored creative approaches to material reuse. During our visit to Oakland Technology Exchange, students learned how they could become involved in OTX’s programming that reduces e-waste, encourages resource-sharing and offers a free computer to all Oakland students. Then, at Alameda Point Collaborative, we got our hands dirty (Go Team “Pooper Scoopers!”) and examined community approaches to resource management.
As our tour finished at the Altamont facility, we were reminded that visiting a landfill is an experience that is simultaneously poignant and inspiring, and thus has a strong power to initiate action.
Altamont Landfill and Resource Recovery Facility, a 2,170-acre site, has rapidly gained international recognition as an advocate for environmental stewardship. Altamont boasts leading green energy technology solutions, including their liquified natural gas plant and electricity-generating gas-powered turbines and windmills. It’s no wonder the landfill has quickly become one of our most requested tour stops!
Students help planting
Student gardening!
Leah Dockstader, Program Director Bay Area Green Tours
Bay Area Green Tours is Hiring! - Part time Sales Associate
Are you passionate about sustainability and supporting the local economy? Do you want to inspire school kids and corporate groups about environmental responsibility? Do you want to spread the word about social justice and what each of us can do while visiting real businesses on an engaging and fun tour? We are looking for enthusiastic part-time sales associates to help connect public, private and educational groups with our made to order tour services and events!
Please see here for more information on how to apply.
BAGT RECOMMENDATIONS & COMMUNITY NEWS
Events
Starting February 6th until March 20th [HUB Workbench Plus]: Building a Good Company: How can you build a company that measures results by its nurturing of vibrant communities and the sustainable use of natural resources? Through a series of lectures by leading entrepreneurs and exercises, this course will help you build a plan for creating or transforming your business.
Presentation and Tour: Mysteries of Wastewater Treatment
Sunday, February 10, 2013, 2pm - 3:30pm, Environmental Education Center, Don Edwards SF Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Alviso; cost: free - RESERVATION RECOMMENDED - contact: 408-262-5513, ext. 104
Order your book
Book
Zero Waste Home
Author: Bea Johnson
Price: around $16
Release date: April 9, 2013
Order
From the publisher:
"Inspirational story of Bea Johnson (the Priestess of Waste-Free Living) and how she transformed her family’s life for the better by reducing their waste to an astonishing one liter per year; part practical, step-by-step guide that gives readers tools and tips to diminish their footprint and simplify their lives.
In Zero Waste Home, Bea shares her story and lays out the system by which she and her family have reached and maintained their own Zero Waste goals—a lifestyle that has yielded bigger surprises than they ever dreamed possible. This book shares how-to advice, essential secrets and insights based on the author’s own experience. She demystifies the process of going Zero Waste with hundreds of easy tips for sustainable living that even the busiest people can integrate. Stylish and completely relatable, Zero Waste Home is a manual for readers to improve their overall health, save money and time, and achieve a brighter future for their families—and the planet."
This topic of waste is crucial, ignored, and particularly suited to visual media - so this month we have three great documentaries for you! Check out the two bonus videos on our website.
Film Trailer
The Light Bulb Conspiracy
Director & Producer: Cosima Dannoritzer
Facebook Watch in English
This favorite phenomenal French film shows how the culture of consumption became a lifestyle of waste over the last century. It touches on trade secrets, advertising, greed, environmental justice and the internet as a democratizing tool. In the end innovation and consumer choice, the very forces that were destructively channeled to produce a wasteful world, may hold the key to creating sustainable economies with simpler living. Will corporations and consumers embrace this path?
From IMDb, the world's most popular and authoritative source for movie, TV and celebrity content: “In the past, products were made to last. Then, at the beginning of the 1920s, a group of businessmen were struck by the following insight: 'A product that refuses to wear out is a tragedy of business' (1928). Thus Planned Obsolescence was born. Shortly after, the first worldwide cartel was set up expressly to reduce the lifespan of the incandescent light bulb...During the 1950s, with the birth of the consumer society, the concept took on a whole new meaning, as explained by flamboyant designer Brooks Stevens: 'Planned Obsolescence, the desire to own something a little newer, a little better, a little sooner than is necessary...'. The growth society flourished, everybody had everything, the waste was piling up (preferably far away in illegal dumps in the Third World) - until consumers started rebelling...”
SUSTAINABLE SPOTLIGHT - Zero Waste
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by Silke Mueller with Rachel Fessenden
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Zero Waste Lives
What is Zero Waste?
Many of us have the gnawing feeling that we could and should do more to limit our impact on the environment, and adopting a ‘zero waste’ mindset is an ethical response to this desire. The concept encompasses every aspect of consumption and attempts to close the loop, preempting unnecessary purchases and ensuring that any products chosen are made to be reused, repaired and/or recycled back into nature or the marketplace. For example, instead of buying a regular plastic toothbrush you could buy a toothbrush made out of recyclable bamboo or recycled yogurt cups. Or instead of buying packaged food, you could buy food in bulk including bringing your own container to events.
In my opinion the most important thing about zero waste is that it aims to eliminate rather than manage waste. This is more difficult than simply reducing it, because you have to change your way of living - instead of just separating your garbage from recyclables and ignoring the next step after you throw something away. Zero waste is a simple recognition of the reality that in a finite natural world abundance is an illusion and there is no such place as ‘away.’ Still, to achieve it in practice would be an epic accomplishment...
A Year’s Worth of Trash Becomes Art
In an unusual local example, Berkeley's Ari Derfel documented his experience collecting his trash for a whole year. Ultimately he reduced his waste - discarding just 400 pounds instead of the typical 1700 pounds Americans throw away annually - he saved money, and was inspired to support local artists with the trash he collected.
Read about his project, watch the video, and check out the art which resulted from it!
Healing a Wasteful World
When city governments fail to manage waste, their citizens may be forced to take matters into their own hands. Take the Italian city of Naples, for example. When its garbage collection services reached crisis levels in the summer of 2008 after a municipal worker strike the previous year and the national governments actions under Romano Prodi, and later, Silvio Berlusconi continually delayed resolving the issue to this twenty year old problem, frustrated citizens took action. Emiliana Mellone, a 27 year old student at the time, was resentful that her city had gained an international reputation as a garbage dump. Global newscasts were showing pictures of some of the 200,000 tons of uncollected garbage that had piled up throughout city streets. The citizens of Naples, along with their local fire departments, were left to their own devices.
Desperate for change to happen, Emiliana took to social media and began blogging under the title: CleaNap (“clean up” and “Naples”). She appealed for volunteers to help separate the heaps of rubbish and spruce up the increasingly grungy public piazzas. The results were far better than expected. Volunteers appeared in the hundreds, and then in the thousands. Flower shops and local retailers began donating plants and tools for their guerilla gardening projects, and soon, the Italian media was reporting about “the new angels from Napoli.” One of CleaNap’s most successful actions took place in the woefully neglected Porta Capuana section of the city, when mothers, children, students, homeless and illegal immigrants participated in cleaning up their area.
To see how other locales are innovating to tackle waste issues, read the full article on our website .
One person’s trash is often someone else’s treasure. Here are a few great examples:
Landfill Harmonic: This remarkable film features a musical orchestra in Paraguay, where the musicians play instruments made from trash! Cateura, Paraguay is a town essentially built on top of a landfill. The film shows how trash and recycled materials can be transformed into beautiful sounding musical instruments, but more importantly, it bears witness to the transformation of precious human beings.
Landfill Harmonic Concert
Landfill Harmonic Documentary
Urban Ore - Berkeley, leads the movement to end the “Age of Waste” by helping rebuild the reuse and recycling industries. This company has an established reputation for being the most wondrous site for salvaged and recycled resources. Walking through the General Store, one might encounter the expected selection of clothes, shoes, kitchen utensils, tools, etc... as well as the less-expected oversized dragon head, a colorful field of bathtubs, and an incredibly well-organized library of refurbished doors. By salvaging and scavenging resources, Urban Ore diverts an enormous amount of “wasted” materials from the landfill. Through this work and their active engagement advocating for progressive recycling policies, this visionary company is working to reclaim the value of resources and facilitate a shift in discourse.
Recology - San Francisco, manages municipal disposal processes and services that span across urban, suburban and rural communities in San Francisco. Their work supports the mandate, made by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, to divert 75% of waste from landfill by 2012 and attain Zero Waste by 2020. As a 100% employee-owned company, Recology seeks to stimulate the local economy as well as responsibly manage resources. They facilitate a unique Artist in Residency project which provides support and discarded materials to individuals engaging in creative conservation.
25th Street Collective - Oakland is a colorful shared workplace in Oakland which is home to artisans practicing “local, ethical manufacturing, and innovative resourcefulness”. This creative incubator is comprised of studios, storefront gallery, wine bar, and more. The 25th Street Collective community includes members like Platinum Dirt, a venture which creates handmade jackets using reclaimed, vintage auto upholstery from the genuine leather interiors of old luxury vehicles. Another member, GhEttO GoLdiLocks, uses exclusively recycled, re-used, rescued, and reclaimed materials to create unique and one-of-a-kind handmade pieces of wearable art. Make sure to stop by during your next visit to Art Murmur!
Ending Food Waste in a Hungry World
As food is essential to life, so tackling food waste is integral to the Zero Waste approach.
It is tempting to think that compost is the universal solution to the problem, but data shows the shocking amount of healthy edible food that comprises food waste. The Institution of Mechanical Engineers’ recently published survey on the food waste of industrial countries reveals that between 30 and 50 percent of food isn’t eaten! Globally we produce about 4 billion tons of food every year, too much of which will land in the garbage. This points to the sad reality that we could feed the growing world population, including those hungry today, if we properly divert this edible overabundance.
The reasons for this massive food waste are inefficient agriculture methods, and poor storage and transport opportunities. Many food suppliers only accept cosmetically perfect food while pushing excessive consumption with “two for one” offers. In Europe and the US, consumers throw away about half of their food, resulting in needless waste of the land, water and energy resources used during its production, processing and distribution. 550 billion cubic meters of water are wasted worldwide every year for harvesting food which will never be eaten, according to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
On our website you can find the full article which includes great ideas and information about organizations focused on saving food.
A Trashy Test
Many of us know that it is important to reduce waste by recycling, reusing, composting, and reducing consumption. However especially in a consumer culture like ours, it takes a conscious effort to come up with ways to send less trash to the landfill. Just how large is the problem of waste in the United States, and how much of a positve difference do our efforts really make? Take the quiz below to find out!
1. How many pounds of trash does the average person in the U.S. generate each day?
a. 0.5 pounds - b. 1.7 pounds - c. 3.6 pounds - d. 4.3 pounds
2. What percentage of food waste was composted in 2008?
a. 1% - b. 2.5% - c. 5% - d. 7.5%
3. How many years does a plastic bag from the supermarket take to decompose?
a. 10 years - b. 100 years - c. 1,000 years - d. 10,000 years
4. Using the same amount of energy it takes to make one completely new aluminum can,
how many cans can be made from recycled aluminum?
a. 5 cans - b. 10 cans - c. 15 cans - d. 20 cans
5. It takes about _______ times as much energy to produce and transport the average
bottle of water to Los Angeles as to produce the same amount of tap water.
a. 15 - b. 150 - c. 1,500 - d. 15,000
We provide educational tours and events that demonstrate the sustainable economy in action, inspire support of local green businesses, and empower people to incorporate environmental responsibility and social justice into their personal and professional lives.
Tax Deductible Donation?
In order to be sustainable ourselves we need to rely on grants, sponsorship and donations.
Please consider making a tax deductible donation to our 501(c)3 to help connect more people to solutions for our future. Your donation can help get more students into the field to witness potential jobs for their future!
Here are ways you can help support our mission: Donate through Paypal on our website here (donate button on right)
Send a check to 2150 Allston Way Suite 280, Berkeley, CA 94704
Become a sponsor: please contact Marissa@bayareagreentours.org
With gratitude for your consideration,
Marissa LaMagna
