The Green Room

Effie Carson from Toronto, ON writes:

I have started an initiative at the Toronto District School Board high school where I teach. We are saving up photocopying "errors" and over-runs to use as printing paper in our computer labs and the school administration has started to use the "second side" of paper for internal memos. We call the collection bins for the paper "Suzuki Paper."

Great idea Effie! I’m often dashing to the office printer to flip the page and print double-sided. I also like to reuse paper for rough notes instead of using a fresh page, and I encourage minimal use of the fax machine and printing emails. Thanks for sharing! Elizabeth

Lindsay Queen of Green has had a bunch of people comment that they’re in love with their microfiber cloths. She says: if you’ve seen them you’ll know that you only need water to do surface cleaning of your home. Great. Farewell toxic cleaning products!

Well, there’s a catch. Microfiber cloths are made from petroleum-based fabrics. That’s right, a non-renewable resource. But one could argue that the life span of such a cloth and its ability to reduce toxic cleaning products in your home — plus the fact that you’re not using paper products — still makes microfiber cloths a desirable choice. And that’s the best part — you have a choice!

I stopped buying and using paper towels about 30 yrs ago when friends returned from living in Australia and told us paper towels weren’t available there. ….so they learned to live without them!
Then I thought - what do I really need paper towels for that I can’t use reusable cloth wipes for? The only thing that came to mind was to absorb excess fat from frying bacon or other fried foods. (We don’t eat many of those these days, either)….This is an easy thing to give up and it can save so many trees, energy and excess garbage that I wanted to pass my story on.

JGR, Toronto Ontario