Photo credit: unknown Spring weather has officially arrived, and as I pull out my bike from winter storage I realize that it may need a few tune-ups so I consult my dear colleague Marie-Pier’s blog on cycling tips. And after making some adjustments I decide to go for a nice ride downtown Ottawa, although fearful at first, it turns out alright. I am fairly nervous biking downtown because the majority of my biking experience stems from growing up in the countryside where your biggest worry is the traffic around five o’clock when all the neighbours are coming home from work for the day. I’ve had a few close calls biking along highways that had no additional room on the side other than choppy gravel that pulls you into the ditch, but other than that my biking experience at home has been very enjoyable. This year I decided to bring my bike to Ottawa with the promise to wear my helmet at all times to my mother and to be cautious when biking on busy roads. The first few weeks of school I plan...

We just finished World Water day, and as Canadians, we tend to undervalue our water systems and exploit them ruthlessly through personal, industrial and agricultural use. One could argue that this is due to the “staple thesis” or Canada’s economy being reliant on the extraction and production of natural resources but really? That’s kind of a lame excuse I would expect to hear from someone in economics (sorry, sister). In terms of water, Canada is well off geographically. It is surrounded by three oceans, has the large basins of the Great Lakes and Hudson Bay and is riddled with smaller lakes along its surface- particularly in the Niagara Escarpment region. In fact, Canada possesses the third largest amount of renewable freshwater in the world following Brazil and Russia. However, Canadians are terrible at using their water. This precious resource is being exhausted by Canadians who each use on average 335L a day! Per capita, our country ranks second last in water consumption- followed ...

Photo credit: unknown En route vers le Canada, je trouve que je me suis quand même bien débrouillée pour vivre sans déchet à New York, surtout malgré le fait que la ville n’offre pas de service de compostage pour ses huit millions d’habitants. Voici quelques-unes de mes péripéties: 1- Vous pouvez voir ce que j’ai fait avec ma tranche de citron du restaurant indien sur vidéo ici. 2- Pour acheter une salade toute prête sans déchet, regardez ceci (à venir sous peu; la vidéo est avec ma copine). 3- Pour ce qui est de mes déchets organiques, je les ai compostés un peu partout en faisant du «gorilla composting»; c’est-à-dire que j’ai creusé un pouce dans le sol pour les y enterrer. J’ai rendu le sol heureux à Central Park et dans une plante-bande sur une rue au centre-ville. 4- Je me suis forcée à manger un brocoli, la moitié d’un poivron et un demi concombre crus parce que je n’avais pas le temps de les cuisiner, que je partais et qu’ils allaient probablement se perdre. Mmm, des pieds de br...

Photo credit: Brigitte Morin Last week end, I attended the Ottawa Green Expo at Lansdowne Park. I was impressed with the crowd numbers; we had to squeeze through the masses of people to get just about anywhere. For the promotions, I don’t know what they did, but keep doing it; it works! However, on the Expo side, I didn’t see any new innovative products or amazing new technologies, nothing impressive. The products being displayed were on average too expensive for the average person (a $ 70,000 solar panel is really nice, but I do not have the means to purchase it!). Also, I was extremely disappointed (MEGA disappointed) that all the sample containers were made of compostable materials, which would be great…if there were any COMPOST receptacles! I didn’t know that people still think that compostable containers will decompose rapidly in a landfill; they will not, in fact they become worse than waste as they will produce methane when they eventually decompose in the landfill (just like fr...

Photo credit: Brigitte Morin La fin de semaine dernière je suis allée à l’Exposition Verte au parc Lansdowne à Ottawa. J’étais impressionnée du fait qu’il y avait tellement de personnes à l’expo, que nous devions de faufilé parmi les centaines de personnes qui bloquaient tout passage. Pour la promotion, je ne sais pas ce que vous avez fait, mais ça fonctionne! Par contre, il n’y avait pas vraiment de démonstrations innovantes, ni nouveau produits abordables pour la personne moyenne (c’est bien beau des panneaux solaires à $70,000, mais je n’ai pas les moyens d’en acheter!). Aussi, j’ai été extrêmement déçue (vraiment, méga déçue!) que tous les démonstrateurs servaient leurs échantillons dans des contenants compostables, ce qui serait formidable….s’il y avait des réceptacles pour le COMPOST! Je n’étais pas au courant que la personne moyenne croyait encore que des contenants compostable ne se décomposent pas s’ils ne sont pas compostés! C’est incroyable, la ville d’Ottawa a un système d...

Earth hour approacheth! And as I’m being bombarded by Facebook events inviting me to attend this great event, I’m starting to wonder exactly how we can all get involved. The event was created in hopes of creating awareness about climate change across the world. With roots in Australia, the event has spread throughout the globe to 128 countries and territories and has expected further turnout this year. The typical participation of this event includes the simple action of turning off your lights for one hour to reduce energy consumption and promote energy conservation. Although this event is only celebrated once a year, there is a lot you can do to save your money and the planet year-round. -Flick off the lights when they are not in use -Turn down the heat five degrees when you go to bed, and wear sweaters on cold days instead of turning the heat up -Crack a window in the summer instead of jumping to air conditioning or those heavy duty energy gobbling fans -Unplug ALL appliances when ...

Photo Credit: Jonathan Rausseo En tant qu’étudiantes travaillant au bureau du développement durable du campus, il va de soi que ma collègue Merissa et moi tentions de relever le défi de vivre sans déchets. La théorie est assez simple mais la pratique se révèle être beaucoup plus difficile qu’on aurait pu penser! Il est facile d’oublier à quel point c’est facile de jeter. Les poubelles sont partout; les occasions abondent de se débarrasser de ce qui nous incombe. Mes pires ennemis durant cette semaine furent le plastique et les mauvaises habitudes des autres. Comment refuser un lunch qu’un ami te prépare dont le contenu est entièrement enveloppé dans du plastique non recyclable? Quoi faire quand tu es en visite chez des gens qui ne recyclent ou ne compostent pas? J’ai réalisé qu’une grande partie des choses que je consomme sur une base régulière sont vendues dans des plastiques qui ne sont pas acceptés par le programme de recyclage de plastique de la ville d’Ottawa. De même, en partici...

Photo credit: Jonathan Rausseo Lorsque j’ai commencé mon défi, je m’inquiétais du temps; que ça allait prendre tellement plus de temps à préparer ma nourriture. Je croyais absolument devoir planifier tous mes repas une semaine en avance, faire mes listes d’épiceries plus d’une semaine en avance, etc. J’avais un calendrier avec une liste d’épicerie spécifique à chaque semaine dans un fichier excel. Ça fait déjà plus d’un mois, et le défi est de plus en plus facile; j’ai moins de recherches à faire pour trouver des produits alternatifs, et je sais ce que je cherche aux différents magasins. Les employés me reconnaissent tous, et je n’ai plus à demander pour avoir mes produits dans mon contenant réutilisable! J’ai jeté un coup d’œil à mon calendrier hier soir et je me suis rendue compte que je ne l’utilise même plus, je crois que je l’ai seulement utilisé lors des deux premières semaines. J’ai probablement passé plus de temps à m’inquiéter de ce que j’allais mangé et où j’al...

Photo Credit: Jonathan Rausseo On Friday, February 25, Annux Dossitt (age unknown) was seen preparing for the DILA (Day of Information for a Lifetime of Action) at uOttawa, an annual youth conference featuring a multitude of awareness-raising workshops intended to motivate. "I’ve been to 'youth inspiring' type events before", Annux reported "so I’m used to the routine: listen to a handful of keynote speakers, go to workshops and develop your newfound inspiration, then think of ways you as an individual can go about solving the issues you’re passionate about. It’s not something I thought I’d do again, so it was nice being a part of that. What I wasn't used to was experiencing it from the opposite side; this time around I was the one leading and inspiring, rather than the one being led and inspired.” Annux’s group decided to take part in the 'Human Trafficking' workshop, which raised awareness towards human slavery, and how is still very much a prevalen...

Photo credit: Jonathan Rausseo Deux mois sans déchet? Rien de plus simple! On sort les contenants réutilisables et les sacs de toile, on fait un peu de recherche, on se dégêne et le tour est joué. Le truc: demandez et vous recevrez! La première fois que Brigitte m’a dit qu’elle apportait son «Tupperware» pour acheter du fromage, j’étais en extase. Quoi? Un commerçant te donne du fromage dans ton Tupperware? C’est merveilleux! Alors, comme Brigitte l’a mentionné, j’ai posé la même question à un commerçant près de mon bureau, La Botega. On m’a immédiatement répondu «Yeah, sure, no problem!». Je n’aurais jamais pensé que ça serait si facile... Jusqu’à maintenant, on ne m’a jamais refusé mon contenant réutilisable. Petite anecdote d’un défi survenu jusqu’à maintenant: alors que je déballais un nouveau savon que mon copain a acheté, j’étais vraiment impressionnée par l’emballage en me disant que c’était une superbe initiative de la compagnie que d’utiliser du papier fait à la main - c’était...

Photo credit: Jonathan Rausseo Almost all hygiene products have a waste-free alternative (or environmentally friendly alternative). Your tooth paste can be purchased in a fully recyclable container (Jason toothpastes – just look for the recyclable text under the recycling logo). You can buy recyclable toothbrushes (Radius offers them, and soon you will be able to recycle all plastics on campus). The best wax product that I have found is the Nair roll-on beeswax – the packaging is completely recyclable (and the reusable strips are made of paper fibres which can be recycled if you clean them with warm water) The Body Shop offers a wide array of fully recyclable beauty products (they also offer pump bottles as an alternative to spray cans for hair products). You can make your own or buy reusable handkerchiefs (Hankettes makes a great organic cotton handkerchief). You can choose to use reusable feminine hygiene products such as the Diva Cup and the Luna pad. Am I forgetting any? YES! I am ...

Photo credit: unknown It has officially begun, this week I am going WASTE-FREE with my co-worker Marie-Pier. Although not as hardcore as Brigitte Morin (Waste Diversion Coordinator) who is undertaking this feat for the entirety of RecycleMania, I am still making an attempt to lower the impact I have on the planet. The average Canadian produces 1 840 lbs of waste per year, an obnoxious amount that gets sent to landfills. If we simply decrease our waste we can decrease the effects on the planet- including that of not only the trash baking in the sun; releasing harmful pollutants and leaching into the soils but also decrease the emissions released by transport trucks. I understand that I will have much difficulty shopping tonight after work, as so many foods are packaged in unnecessary amounts of plastics that are not yet recyclable in the City of Ottawa. However, following Brigitte’s blogs on waste free tips will surely aid in my quest- see previous posts for details. Putting in place th...

So in the world of scary news we have some developments over in the Fauteux building. It turns out that not all buildings on campus are created equally. You would think that every building produces about the same amount of waste on a per capita basis (waste per person). Not so it would seem. Brigitte Morin, our waste diversion coordinator, just completed an evaluation of the waste coming out of the Fauteux building and compare it to the Lamoureux building. The results... Fauteux generates about 4 times more waste than Lamoureux. This brings up a tonne of questions. First, can these two buildings actually be compared. Well it turns out that the Fauteux building is only about 5% biger than Lamoureux; both buildings have a cafeteria; both buildings host tonnes of events; both buildings host professional programs. So on the surface it seems like the two buildings are pretty similar. The second question, do lawyers inherently create more waste than than teachers? This one is a little less s...

Photo credit: Merissa Mueller Recap: Merissa attends Sustainable Business Conference on Friday February 11th, in order to finally prevail over her siblings during a dinner table discussion regarding globalization. She learns plenty of interesting things about incorporating sustainability into the business workplace and how it is NOT detrimental but beneficial to businesses (example: identifying steps within a product’s life cycle analysis that waste can be limited by remanufacturing/recycling material, saving money and my planet). Furthermore, she eats delicious vegetarian and vegan foods because the conference was catered by Depanneur Sylvestre and finally understands the term “Business Casual”. Overall, Friday was an amazing success and congratulations to the Tefler School of Management for holding such an informative conference featuring some incredibly knowledgeable people. Application: Interestingly enough, the next day I stumbled upon some sustainability in practice, or rather,...

Photo Credit: radiuslife.blogspot.com Jour 16 sans déchets. Tout va super-bien, je suis de mieux en mieux organisée au début de la semaine pour ma planification de repas. Cette semaine je me suis fait du ‘Potatoe kale’ du livre à recettes de ‘The Green Door’ et des scones à la citrouille (toutes mes recettes seront disponibles sur notre site web). Depuis que j’ai commencé à faire mes courses ‘sans déchets’ j’ai découvert plusieurs nouveaux produits que j’utilise qui son disponibles dans des contenants recyclables; ex. saviez-vous que la sauce béchamel est disponible en vrac dans une cannette? (sans pellicule de plastique) À date, le seul vrai défi est la soie dentaire; nous avons trouvé un produit qui est biodégradable, mais il n’est pas encore disponible dans tous les magasins. ( http://www.radiustoothbrush.com/naturalflosses.aspx ) Ce qui m’inquiétait le plus lorsque je me suis engagée à vivre sans déchets pour deux mois c’était le fromage. Si je ne pouvais pas trou...