How to live
A Green Lifestyle
Going Green: Tips for a Zero-Waste Lifestyle | Haley Higdon | TEDxYouth@UTS
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[Applause]
all right
so somebody recently asked me how I
became so green and I really had to stop
and think about that for a moment
because I couldn't pinpoint a specific
event or a specific experience that
contributed to me living the lifestyle
that I am but I do know one thing when
my friends were dressing up as
Tinkerbell for Halloween I was dressing
up as a recycling bin so I know that it
started at a young age I've always been
concerned about the environment and I've
often been called an environmental
bulldog and I wasn't shy to share my
opinion and I wasn't shy to challenge a
professor who had printed our course
outline on single-sided paper for
example but I knew that I needed to be
doing a bit more I knew that I needed to
not just be talking the talk I needed to
be walking the talk so I started with
small actions like bringing a reusable
water bottle everywhere I went or
bringing a reasonable coffee cup and
oh hey I got to really put my arm out
hey there we go um but there actually
was one moment where in time where I was
forced to think about how I could live a
greener life and that was the summer of
2009 and some of you may remember I can
still remember the smell the garbage
strike the Toronto garbage strike which
lasted 36 days 36 days in the dead heat
of summer and like many Torontonians I
was forced to look at and to analyze the
garbage that I was producing and in that
moment I decided that I could and should
do more because I could also see the
garbage that was collecting at my local
park I could see it and I could smell it
so that's a picture of Christy Pitts and
so I decided to do some research and I
found out that Canadians produce the
most amount of garbage out of any
country in the world so in 2009 there
was a study and it showed that the
average Canadian produced 777 kilograms
of waste per year so for those of you
that still think in Imperial that is
more than 1700 pounds of garbage per
person per year so that is huge and that
those statistics actually kind of bummed
me out and I decided to reach out to a
friend that was pretty active in the
environmental movement and what she said
to me was I'm actually really glad that
you reached out to me because you were
the main or one of the main
Ellis for pushing me into the
environmental movement I thought to
myself me my small actions actually
contributed to somebody making positive
change in their life
somebody joining the environmental
movement and that was the exact
motivation that I needed to push me to
take steps toward a zero waste lifestyle
so the first thing that I did was do
research on what people were already
doing how they had transformed their
lives to have a zero waste lifestyle and
I came across baya Johnson and her
family of four they live in California
and they produce one mason jar of
garbage a year one mason jar for people
that's it and boy was I inspired so baya
also wrote a book called zero waste home
and in that book she talks about the
five R's and you might be thinking five
I only know three well baya includes two
others and those five R's are refused
what you don't need reduce what you do
need reuse what you actually consume
recycle what you can't refuse reducer
reuse and finally wrought so compost the
rest and these five hours have really
helped me to reduce the waste that I
produce so the first are the first are
AIDS refuse refuse what you do not need
and this is about learning how to say no
thank you I don't need that so I was at
an educational conference about a month
ago and when I registered I received a
goodie bag or a swag bag and my initial
reaction was to take that bag and be
like oh free stuff and then I got it
back to my hotel
and I looked inside and I realized I
didn't need any of it I didn't even need
the bag so I had to remind myself that I
needed to say no thank you
which is exactly what I did when I
brought it back to the registration
table so the easiest way to refuse is to
refuse single-use plastic that is
plastic we use only once that often
isn't recyclable or doesn't get recycled
and isn't biodegradable often so that
includes plastic bags plastic cups
plastic lids cutlery and straws so that
is somewhere that you can start and it
does take a little bit of planning so
for me when I leave my house I always
have my zero waste kit waiting which
includes a cloth shopping bag reusable
water bottle or coffee mug
bamboo cutlery a glass straw a cloth
napkin and a mason jar or a container
which is actually really convenient when
you go to restaurants because then you
get to keep all the leftovers so it
really encourage you to think about how
you can say no thank you
because every flyer and every pen and
every single use straw that you use or
you accept creates a demand for more so
I recommend that when you're at a
restaurant and you're ordering a drink
you just need to say no straw please or
when you go to a coffee shop and you
know you're gonna hang out with your
friend and you know you're gonna sit
down just remember to say for here
please and those actions can decrease
significantly the amount of waste that
you produce the second R is reduced and
this is about reducing what you do need
it is about simplifying
your life it is about quality versus
quantity it is about experiences versus
stuff and it actually makes cleaning so
much easier because you have so much
left to duct and organize but it's also
about reducing em and being an informed
consumer so what that means is when you
purchase things that you can't refuse
that you actually think about the
packaging involved so for example I no
longer buy stamps in booklet I buy
stamps in a roll to reduce the packaging
I buy soap without packaging and plastic
because that plastic is often not even
recyclable I also make all my own
toiletries so that includes toothpaste
that includes lip balm that includes
moisturizer that includes facial toner
and I reuse the containers and I buy the
products in bulk to also reduce
packaging and I have stopped using
plastic toothbrushes I use a bamboo
toothbrush which you can compost because
I cringe to think about the fact that
every single plastic toothbrush that I
have used in my life is still on this
planet so the next are is reuse so reuse
what you do consume and the best way I
think to reuse is to shop in bulk and
when I say shop in bulk I don't mean
going to the grocery store and buying
five tubs of mayonnaise and not being
able to use them before they expire when
I say shop in bulk I mean you bring your
own reusable mason jar your own reusable
container your own cloth bag to the
store to buy your product and they're
actually quite a lot of bulk stores in
Toronto that have been allowing people
to do this for a long time but
citing news in the zero-waste world is
that bulk barn the biggest bulk store
retail store in the country has just
introduced a reasonable container
program in all of its stores so this was
a huge win for the zero waste movement
so you can pretty much buy everything
you need in bulk so that includes pasta
not grains sugar flour and maple syrup
which I was really excited when I found
that one and even your favorite junk
food can all be found in bulk so there
is one more thing that I want to talk
about in terms of reusing and I don't
know if you remember that recycling
costume that I showed you at the
beginning of the talk well I actually
reused that costume the following year
and made a new costume so we're using at
its finest
so the fourth r is recycled and it's
really important to recycle what you
cannot refuse reduce or reuse to do
those three r's before you actually
recycle and when you do that there is
very little left to recycle and that's a
good thing so yes recycling does reduce
the amount of energy we have to use and
it does reduce the natural resources
that we have to source but it can't be
the only answer it can't be the way that
you are living a green lifestyle so I
really encourage you to think about
those 3 R's
before you recycle for example instead
of recycling batteries think about how
you can buy rechargeable batteries or
buy a product that doesn't even need a
battery in the first place or when you
go to the coffee shop bring your
reusable mug so you don't have to figure
out how to actually recycle a coffee cup
on the UFT campus
as you can see each thing has to go in a
separate bin and actually it's a luxury
that we can recycle coffee cups on
campus because in the rest of Toronto
you can't even recycle a coffee cup and
the final are is rot okay so that is
compost and basically it is the
recycling of all of the organic material
that you use and in Toronto we're really
lucky that we have a citywide green bin
program because a third of our garbage
and a third of our waste is actually
organic and should be kept out of the
landfills so I actually have my own
backyard compost because I really like
the process of adding all of my organic
waste in and seeing it decompose and
then eventually adding this nutrient
rinse rich soil back into my garden so
those are the five R's and I really
encourage you to start thinking about
those as you're living your life but
there's one more thing I want to talk
about and that is getting outside that
is spending time in nature that's
falling in love with nature because that
is going to remind you about why those
five R's are actually important why
living a green lifestyle or living a
zero-waste lifestyle is important so if
you're looking for more tips about how
to live a green or zero waste lifestyle
check out my blog 50 shades of green
Toronto giving you tips for whatever
shade of green you want to be and I want
to leave you with a challenge and that
is to take a step one small step one
small green or one small zero-waste step
and eventually that step is going to
turn into a sustainable habit
and then I encourage you to take a
nother step
and eventually you will be walking the
talk you will be living your values and
in order for us to have a sustainable
future we all need to be living a
greener lifestyle and that is the way
that transformation is going to happen
thank you
[Applause]
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