New Place, New Sustainability Challenges

I have learned this year that every time I move locations whether it’s to a different area of the province, across provinces, or across the world it brings with it new sustainability opportunities and challenges.

I have committed recently to moving to London, England after I graduate from University this spring and there are already things that I know will improve my sustainability and things that will at least initially hinder my efforts.

First, some things I am looking forward to:

• No car: I can’t exactly take it with me and I will finally be living in a place where I don’t need it
• Metered utilities: I doubt my budget will like this much, but I am looking forward to actually being accountable and at the very least be able to track my energy consumption, I think it will help me cut back a lot more effectively.
• Public transportation: kind of like not having a car, but in general I just rather like public transportation and it will get me to walk more
• Possibly gardening: There’s a small backyard where I will be living which I might be able to tinker with as a hobby

Some things I don’t think will help my sustainability:

• Having to start over again with food: I imagine it will take time again to learn how to tell where things are from, what is local, where to get local food, etc. 
• Continued limited food options: I know the grocery store nearest to where I will be living does not have the widest selection of products (it’s a pretty small grocery store) and plus it’s in the city so I’m not sure how many farmers there are nearby like there are here in New Brunswick.
• Contributing to increasing urbanization
• Having to relearn what’s really “green”: I’ll have to figure out what UK products and brands are really environmentally friendly, and what new/different eco-labels they have in the UK and their meanings

I’m looking forward to the move and what changes in sustainability it will bring. The flight over there won’t help with my sustainability, but I plan on sticking to their weight limitations without buying any extra allowances for my luggage. This will also help encourage me to cut back on all the goods I own and be less materialistic. Iceland Air, which I’ll be flying on, has approximately 144 pound limit for their overseas flights: two check bags and two carry on ones. It will be interesting to try to stick below that and still take everything I’ll need with me. I am very much looking forward to trimming down my possessions though and getting rid of a lot of things that I just simply don’t need. I’ll try to write a blog post in the future about what kinds of new homes I was able to give my various items.

~Jessica

Japan!

– Sunset from the Train: Water, Mountains, and Urban Living Merged

So I recently got back from a school trip to Japan. I was taking classes there for a week as part of an international exchange program. This was an amazing trip in so many way, but there are definitely some sustainability aspects that I feel are noteworthy.

This was probably a low point in my own personal sustainability. I took six flights to get there and back and throughout the trip had to eat mostly prepackaged food, whether on the airplanes or when I got there. I flew mainly Air Canada this time and noticed that their food offering didn’t seem to include as many recyclable and reusable parts as Air France had. Also, the flight from Tokyo to Osaka was definitely not full which is a bit of a waste of capacity (I found out later on that there are constant flights between Tokyo and Osaka and some people actually use it as a way to commute to work if they don’t have to go to work every day, the flight is about an hour long).

Some differences between India and Japan:

• Street trash: Most all aspects of Japan seemed very clean. Their was very little garbage anywhere that I could see, and lots of sorted garbage bins around, unlike India where there seemed to be little organized trash collection and lots of trash in the streets.
• Electricity use: One of the things I found surprising was that my hotel in Japan didn’t have the light switch card reader feature (where you put your room key into a slot in the hallway and it turns on the power to your room) which my room in India had. I found it was actually fairly difficult to remember to turn off all the lights before I left because our room, especially when I was in a hurry and I wonder how much more electricity is lost without using one of these kinds of systems. I also wonder if it’s because of India’s inconsistent and limited electricity that they would have more safe guards set up around it than in Japan where I imagine electricity access is not an issue.
• Food: Obviously there were more places like groceries stores and convenience stores to get food from in Japan than in India where I saw mostly open stalls or small specialty stores. I found though even when I was buying food at the grocery store in Japan, and especially in the convenience store, that there seemed to be a lot of packaging in Japanese food. There were a lot smaller portion sizes and snack packs and just various other products that had layers of packaging. Indian food did not seem as prepacked, though that isn’t necessarily a good thing either food-safety wise.

While there were cars in Japan, the public transportation seemed very good and most people don’t seem to own cars. We were able to use public transportation or walk where we needed to go most all of the time we were there but did use private buses for airport transportation and class field trips. I know it must get old pretty quick, but I really liked the 10-15 minute walk to school in the mornings, it was really refreshing, especially since the weather felt like a crisp fall day most of the time. The air quality felt clean too, as opposed to India where it could be a lot more dusty and smokey.

One of the things that struck me the most, and this might just have been my lack of experience in more metropolitan type areas, but there seemed to be so. much. shopping. I had honestly never seen shopping malls so big, and such large department stores (we went to an 8 story department store called Loft in Umeda which seemed to have anything you could possibly want that would fit in your house except clothing and food). It seemed like everything was for sale (Star Wars light saber chop sticks anyone?). I got a really distinctive impression that at least the area I was in was very consumption focused.

The things I did while I was there to help limit my impact were things like walking to school instead of taking the bus, buying groceries at the grocery store instead of eating out or getting food at the convenience stores and trying to limit my gift purchases and buy locally made products.

The whole trip was pretty amazing though and the people I got to get to know while I was there were great. I am very glad I got to go.

But now I’m back in one place again for the next couple months so that should help with improving my sustainability efforts.

~Jessica

India!

So, back from India, and man does it feel cold now!

The whole trip was definitely an interesting experience of consumer consumption.

I mentioned the whole big issue of flying so far, so I won’t bring that up again, but in all I took four different flights which I still feel pretty guilty about.

I did end up eating quite a bit on the planes though. Most of the planes I was on served at least two meals/snacks. All of it was individually wrapped and sometimes miniature versions of things. I was happy to see some hard plastic, assumingly reusable, plates and cups. Still, I have no idea if the rest of the packaging was recycled in any way. All of it seemed to be out of material that could be sorted and recycled but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it was I suppose (I was flying mainly Air France if anyone knows the answer to that).

India itself felt like a bit of a conundrum. There was often trash everywhere. It mainly looked to be made up of consumer goods, things like wrappers, containers, etc. Even in the most rural school which was made up of clay and wood buildings there was some tinfoil lids or other random debris around (though I was happy to see that that same school still had a recycling program). Now, as much as it looked like there was a lot of trash around, there also didn’t seem to be any overall trash removal system either. It made me wonder if North America didn’t have our waste system to truck it all away if our cities and streets would look the same, and honestly I think they’d look even worse with our consumption levels. We did pass an Indian landfill on one of the highways that looked pretty massive, but it’s hard to know whether they really produce more waste than we do. I think it would be safe to say that they recycle less of their consumer waste than North America, but I’m not sure if they consume less because of their economic standing than say, the U.S., or more because of their much greater population. I was impressed with how much they can often achieve with the limited resources and goods they do have. I visited some NGOs which seemed much more efficient with their resources than North American ones, though possibly out of necessity rather than choice.

My own consumption habits felt pretty limited while I was there. Bottled water was a must, but I also had a bad habit of forgetting my bottles at various places, requiring me to get more than I probably needed. Buffet food was mostly served which, at least from personal experience working at a banquet hall, can be very wasteful. I avoided buying random trinkets and gifts as much as possible. We did drive a lot while I was there. The first three days was pretty much all driving, and then there was regular transportation after that to and from places. Plus the driving to and from airports which were longer hauls. They did give me a large metal reusable water bottle which I’m very happy about, even if I couldn’t use it while I was in India. I had been really needing a new one.

Overall it was a very interesting trip and an interesting experience in ideas regarding sustainable practices. Lots of interesting new social enterprises trying to improve sustainability and its a beautiful country so hopefully they succeed.

Sunrise in Goa, India