Why Is Living Sustainably So Important?
Currently, there seems to be a pretty significant buzz surrounding sustainable living. Which is honestly great, I love that! However, I will say that it seems that this hype revolves more around the question, "What sustainable product can I buy to align myself with this trend or aesthetic?" rather than diving into the underlying importance of opting for sustainable choices. Another thing I believe we sometimes overlook is the production aspect of consumables. We focus more on the disposal process once we are done with them. It's important that we recognize that the majority of waste generated from these items occurs even before they get to us. So I just want to discuss why those things are important.
The process of creating even the "simplest" of items involves an immense consumption of resources. For my example I'm going to talk about a sticky note. A sticky note's primary material is paper, we get paper from trees. These trees can take around 10-20 years to mature before they can be harvested. Once cut down, these trees are transported to mills where machines strip off their bark, followed by a water-intensive washing process. A lot of the water through this process is being recycled through the steps from what I've read. The debarked trees are then chipped and subjected to pulping, a chemical process yielding a thick, less refined form of paper known as pulp.
Further treatments, including drying and additional processing, are required before the pulp can be transformed into paper. This involves passing the product through large machinery that squeezes out any excess water, followed by drying at temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Celsius. Chemicals are often sprayed onto the paper to enhance its durability. The paper is wound onto large reels, cut into smaller pieces, and put through more processing before being packaged.
Additionally, for colorful sticky notes, sulfur dyes are sprayed onto the paper, adding another step to the papermaking process. The sticky part of a sticky note is formulated from synthetic polymers derived from petroleum oil. The adhesive is applied to the paper through rollers and then dried in a large oven. Once they are are dry the papers are stacked, pressed, and cut into sheets that are most commonly 3"x3".
Now I'm not explaining the process of making a sticky note to bore you guys, that's just an example to show you how many resources and how much time and energy can go into something as small and humble as a sticky note. There are a vast quantity of trees, water, oil, and other resources used to make sticky notes, not to mention the resources used in manufacturing the machinery at every stage of the production. Considering all of this, it clear that even such a simple product can extract so much from the earth, and most likely a sticky note is a single use item that is used for such a brief time.
These are not renewable resources like we claim they are. Trees take decades to grow. The 1% of all water on earth that we are able to consume is rapidly running out all over the world. Oil is ridiculous at this point, it seems to do more harm then good. Before you come at me, I know that there are so many things we really do rely on when it comes to oil. I don't think we will ever see our society stray away from fossil fuels, but I do think we need to lesson the load on that particular resource. We can not depend on it forever especially at the rate that we are. Even after the products are made we use fuels to distribute them all over the world, whether that's by truck, plane, train or boats, they are all dependent on this resource. Most products are made to be thrown away whether that means they are made to be disposable or they have some kind of planned obsolesce.
Beyond that, there are also the issues with production processes including fair wages, child labor, and unfair/unsafe working conditions. There are so many elements to production that are far more important than wondering if the item can be recycled or composted.
The fact that got me started on my transition into sustainable living is that the average person will throw away around four pounds of trash every single day. When you do the math with how many people there are on the planet, that is a grand total of roughly 31.2 billion pounds of trash being thrown away. Every. Single. Day. That is absolutely fucking wild. How does that even make sense and why is that not a big issue that we talk about? How is any of this not a big issue that we talk about?
There is only about a 30% recycle/compost rate of all discarded items. All the "waste" generated is typically either disposed of in landfills which consequently sits in the ground for ages unable to breakdown because there is no oxygen to help it. It can also leach down further and pollute ground water in aquifers and soil. The other option is to incinerate it which would emit loads of carbon and release particulates into the atmosphere, contributing to ozone depletion and global warming. About 28% of garbage is packaging which is usually paper or plastic, 18% is clothing, 12% are yard trimmings, and food is around 21%. The remainder is generally durable goods such as household appliances and furniture.
Paper can be recycled, clothes can be reused repaired or repurposed, yard trimmings and food can be composted, and household goods can be repurposed or disassembled for parts and extracted for resources. The only thing that can not be continuously recycled is plastic. So why the fuck does it even exist? We are wasting all of these precious recourses on something that will eventually just have to go to landfill and far surpass the lifespan of all living beings. Like what? I can understand making a good product that generations can pass down and continue to use for eternity. That's great, let's do that, but using precious resources to produce a single use product that will sit in a hole in the ground until after my great grandchildren roam this planet, is absolute shit. No. Nope. That's dumb.
The earth only has so much to offer and we are depleting it's gift at such an insane rate that it can not sustain. This means that the earth is shedding all of it's layers for our consumeristic society so we can have the next best thing, when if we're being real the only important thing is actually having a planet to live on at all. So I think taking care of it and maintaining it's resources in far more responsible ways needs to be a top priority. We do not need sticky notes in todays society, everyone has a phone, every phone has a notes app. Your phone was built from these resources too, so why do we need to use two things that both exhaust resources when they have the same function. We don't need to do that.
We are being taught that we need all of these things in order to just live life and we don't, we really don't. The things that we are buying that we really don't need to be buying at all are wreaking havoc on the planet at all stages of their life cycle.
This isn't the most uplifting blog, I know that, but I really do feel like these things need to be talked about more. I think kids need to be taught how to not abide by consumer culture and how to practice sustainable living. In my opinion all the knowledge wasted on the past is limiting us to know what the future looks like. The past happened and a lot of it was absolute trash and pretty foul trash at that, but I think we should maybe spend more time teaching things that are crucial for today and tomorrow, as opposed to yesterday. Don't take that the wrong way, I know there are so many issues from the past that still have great importance in todays society and they should be taught so we can avoid similar outcomes. I'm talking more about things like the industrial revolution that spiraled out of control and is now killing the planet so maybe let's discuss it as such.
With April being Earth month I want this conversation to continue so we can dive deeper into why these issues need to be addressed. We live on such a beautiful planet that gives us so much every day and I truly believe we need to cherish it a little more.
