And not botanicals …
With the likes of Sir David Attenborough telling us almost daily that we’re killing the planet with plastic, and we all know that animals are suffering terribly because of the stuff, we at GINblogger decided it was time to ‘do our bit’ to cut our waste. So, our first blog that isn’t about gin; but hey – why not? Other blogs support worthwhile causes.
My other half is, in fact, a building civil engineer, so he liked the idea of making ‘ecobricks,’ which we’d seen on TV a while back: being used to build homes and schools on the subcontinent. Unfortunately, we can’t use them in the UK, as they don’t meet current standards for thermal insulation, or current fire regulations – although we can use them for garden walls, sheds or to make stools, benches and tables.
Just to point out, we’re not actually “TQ9” – the postcode by which our friend, Carol, fondly refers to the beautiful, but decidedly ‘woke’ Devon town of Totnes (where veggie/vegan shops and other ‘alternative’ venues abound). If I wear my elephant-printed trousers, for example, she will tell me “you’re looking very TQ9!”
However, waste and particularly littering “gets our goat” so I researched ecobricks, and found a website called ecobricks.org – or the Global Ecobrick Alliance. This organization is in its infancy, but is aiming to get us all filling empty plastic (perhaps tonic) bottles with the non-biodegradable plastics councils don’t recycle, and which end up in landfill or worse, our rivers and seas.
The rules are simple in that you have to stuff bottles with non-biodegradables only: all kinds of plastics, foams, packaging and cellophanes. No paper, glass or sharp metal is allowed. They also suggest you use a stick to pack bottles as tightly as possible, alternate “stuffing, packing, stuffing, packing” apparently gets the best results.
Then visit the website to find your nearest drop off point; I haven’t investigated where ours is yet, but wouldn’t be surprised if it was located in TQ9!
