INDIVISIBLE Lambertville NJ / New Hope PA

Category: Environment

  • Time to THRIVE

    Time to THRIVE: From the multilateral racial, health, economic, and environmental crises to the THRIVE Agenda

    Contributed by Alexis Berends.

    In recent years, the deep links between racism and climate change have been coming to the forefront. Issues of Environmental Injustice have been highlighted in such catastrophes as Hurricanes Katrina and Maria, the fight to protect our water at Standing Rock, as well as within the Covid 19 crisis.

    Climate change and racial inequality are the direct result of industry – from clearing lands to grow cotton, sugar and tobacco in our early colonial history, to modern industrialization of agriculture, fishing, and the extraction of fossil fuels. In order to expand the colonial agricultural industry, the colonial countries in the Americas enslaved the Native populations, forcing them to exploit the lands they spent 11,000 years developing an intimate stewardship with. Others were expelled from their lands, or worse. Later, Africans were brought across the Atlantic in shackles, solidifying the industrialization of the Americas and forever imprinting a framework for systemic racism.

    These practices exist to this day, albeit in seemingly innocuous policies. We still force Tribal communities from their sacred lands to extract fossil fuels and build coinciding infrastructure under the guise of “energy security.” It exists in our use of immigrant labor, many with indigenous roots, to work our fields in illegal and inhumane conditions; in our crowded prisons where a disproportionate number of black and brown inmates make many of the products that proudly bare the label “Made in America”; and by underpaying workers in the critical healthcare and service industries which are traditionally dominated by women, especially women of color. Since its birth, America has been mistreating the environment, people of color, indigenous cultures and lands, and women alike. We can and must do better.

    BIPOC and marginalized communities bear the brunt of our unsustainable industries. For example, New Jersey is home to the most superfund sites per capita, most of which are in the Black and Latinx neighborhoods of Camden and Newark. Pennsylvania is #3 on the list of having the most superfund sites per capita, primarily in the communities surrounding Philadelphia and Chester counties. People in these areas commonly suffer from chronic lung diseases, such as asthma, which have exacerbated COVID-19 infections disproportionately. They have been screaming “I can’t breathe” for generations, and it’s no wonder that both Eric Garner and George Floyd had asthma.

    The COVID Crisis has put more pressure on our already fragile system. We face staggering unemployment levels, a broken economy, increased stress on women and mothers who are forced to assume multiple roles in unprecedented circumstances – especially women of color, and an overburdened healthcare system. At the same time, climate scientists are urging us to dramatically reduce carbon emissions by 2030 – just nine years away – and meet carbon neutrality by 2050 in order to slow global warming by 1.5 degrees celsius above pre-industrial levels. A dire existential threat is staring us in the face yet we have our blinders on.

    So how do we build a more just world? What policies are being introduced that could create a more sustainable future – environmentally, socially, and culturally?

    The THRIVE Agenda: Transform, Heal, and Renew by Investing in Vibrant Economy

    Now that the American Rescue Plan has been passed, the next step is to focus on how we will recover from the multifaceted crises we are currently facing. The THRIVE Agenda is a recovery package that calls for transformative, sustainable, and equitable change with meaningful action to respond to the Climate Crisis. THRIVE will provide access to healthcare, childcare, elderly care, and assistance for the disabled and chronically ill, and provides a framework for the just transition to sustainable development, particularly in the energy, agricultural and construction industries. Within this framework the resolution will focus on economic, racial, health, and environmental recoveries through 8 interrelated pillars:

    • Creation of 16 million good, safe jobs with family sustaining wages that have access to unions;
    • Investment in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities;
    • Combating problems of racial and environmental injustice and ensuring healthy lives for all, as declared by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights of which the United States is a signatory;
    • Ensuring fairness for workers and communities affected by economic transitions;
    • Building the power of workers to fight inequality;
    • Strengthening and healing the nation-to-nation relationship with sovereign Native
      Nations and implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
      Indigenous Peoples, adopted by the United States in 2010;
    • Averting climate and environmental catastrophe while building climate resilience to mitigate against the impacts of global warming and rising sea levels;
    • Reinvesting in public institutions that enable workers and communities to Thrive.

    Support for the THRIVE Agenda
    At present, the THRIVE Agenda is supported by 89 members of congress, 10 Senators and roughly 300 organizations, including leading labour unions such as the American Federation of Teachers; racial justice groups including Movement 4 Black Lives and the NAACP; environmental groups such as the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and Natural Resources Defense Council; indigenous groups, immigrants’ rights groups, women’s rights groups, faith groups, think tanks, and even Indivisible. In a survey done by Data for Progress, the majority of Americans, including in swing states and battleground House districts, support the 8 Pillars of the THRIVE Agenda with support for each pillar ranging from 54-77% of all registered voters, and as high as 72-91% of registered Democrats.

    Call to Action

    While there is growing support in both the House and the Senate, we still need to apply pressure on our elected officials. Many Democrats are still needed as cosponsors, and zero Republicans have yet to sign on. So far, only 3 congresspersons from both New Jersey and Pennsylvania respectively have signed, and both Malinowski and Fitzpatrick have yet to cosponsor.

    Reach out to your representatives and let them know we support the THRIVE Agenda. Give them a call, shoot them an email, and tag them on social media using the hashtags #TimetoTHRIVE so they can see how strong our movement is.

    It is time for us to recover as a nation by addressing the multilateral economic, racial, health, and environmental crises we have collectively experienced en masse this past year. We have been given an opportunity to rewrite the future of our country to ensure that it provides a healthy, economically and environmentally sustainable life for all. Don’t let this opportunity pass us by. This is our time to THRIVE.

  • Just the Facts:  Climate Opportunity

    Contributed by Olga Vanucci.

    • Every $1 invested in climate action yields $4 in benefits.
    • Bold climate action could yield a direct economic gain of $26 trillion worldwide through 2030 compared with business-as-usual.
    • President Biden has said his new $2 trillion infrastructure plan will allow “transformational progress in our ability to tackle climate change” by bolstering investments in clean energy, electric vehicles and building homes resilient to threats posed by the climate crisis.
    • The THRIVE Agenda would be even bigger.  It includes as one of its eight pillars:  Averting climate and environmental catastrophe, including with new investments that will spur the largest expansion in history of clean, renewable energy, emissions reductions, climate resilience, and sustainable resource use.  The $10 trillion plan, proponents say, would create 15 million new jobs and cut emissions in half by the end of the decade.

    Sources:  Climate Finance | United Nations and Biden’s $2tn infrastructure plan aims to ‘finally address climate crisis as a nation’ | Environment | The Guardian and THRIVE Agenda

  • Recycling Needs a Top-Down Approach

    Contributed by Amara Willey.

    If you’ve seen the recent John Oliver piece on plastics on Last Week Tonight, you know that recycling is left up to the consumers and isn’t working too well in this country. So what would it take for us to do a better job at keeping the planet, or at least our corner of it, clean?

    “It’s up to you, the consumer, to stop pollution,” Oliver states as his thesis in his take-down piece on the plastics industry. He makes the point that only 1 & 2 plastic are regularly recycled (less than 5% of all the other numbers 3-7 are recyclable given our current system). Also, virgin plastic is often cheaper to produce than utilizing recycled plastic, encouraging most manufacturers not to use recycled plastic in their products.

    Right now recycling programs are left up to the states, and locally, to counties and even municipalities. There are literally hundreds of different recycling programs in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The lack of efficiency is mind-boggling, and leaves everyone confused about what is even recyclable in your community. According to John Oliver, that’s on purpose, so that we feel good about our recycling efforts without questioning the bigger picture.

    By 2030, European countries have committed to recycling 65 percent of their waste. Here’s how some other countries are doing it better than we are.

    Wales, Sweden, South Korea and Germany are all hailed as excellent recyclers. They all require by law the separate collection of dry recyclable materials and bio waste. They hold producers financially responsible, tax landfills, and provide deposit refunds to consumers.

    Sweden is an oft-touted example. Less than 1 percent of Sweden’s household waste ends up in landfills. The rest is recycled or burned, which converts it into district heating, electricity, bio-gas, and bio-fertilizer. Swedish law also makes the waste producers responsible for handling all costs related to the collection and recycling or disposing of their products. 

    Sweden became so good at the incineration game that it began importing waste from the United Kingdom, Ireland, Norway and Italy at the price of $43 per ton of waste. This generates $100 million annually for the Swedish government, according to Blue Ocean Strategy, the website for the bestselling book by that name and a business consulting organization.

    “By converting its waste into energy, Sweden has reduced its carbon dioxide emissions by 2.2 million tons a year,” the website states. “Between 1990 and 2006, carbon dioxide emissions went down by 34%, and greenhouse gas emissions are projected to fall by 76% by 2020, compared to levels in 1990.”

    Sweden educates its children about the importance of recycling, which begins with special training for teachers. Recycling stations are located near every residential area, and residents are incentivized to use them. In new urban developments, waste-to-energy converters enable residents to transform their trash into energy for their homes.

    The downside to Sweden’s recycling program is the environmental pollutants released by the burning processes. Incineration is not recycling.

    We need look no further than San Francisco for inspiration on better recycling management. In 2003, the city set a 17-year goal of zero waste, defined as “sending nothing to landfill, incineration or high temperature technologies.” By 2018, the city had reduced its annual landfill waste by 80 percent. Although the city is nowhere near its zero-waste goal, it is doing better than any other US city or even the European goal of 65 percent by 2030. San Francisco reset its goal last year to cut all the waste it produces by 15 percent and reduce landfill waste by another 50 percent by 2030. 

    The city implemented what it calls “The Fantastic Three,” a three-stream curbside program for commercial and residential use. The three prongs include “commingled recyclables; compostable materials, including all food scraps, food-soiled paper and yard trimmings; and any remaining trash in three separate bins with various size and rate options,” according to a case study by the Environmental Protection Agency.

    In 2009, San Francisco passed laws requiring all businesses and residences to recycle and compost. It also banned hazardous packaging materials like Styrofoam and plastic grocery bags. In addition, the city set trash collection rates much higher than recycling and composting rates, which encourage its residents to do the right thing with their trash.

    The city uses one waste management company, one facility to process the compostable material and turn it into fertilizer, and one recycling facility, which makes administration and oversight of the whole process much easier, as compared to how we handle this locally with our hundreds of different systems.

    While San Francisco’s waste management system costs about $300 million annually, the program is funded solely through waste collection fees, which are no higher than average for the Bay Area, as reported by CNBC.

    What is needed is for the EPA to take the case study of San Francisco and turn it into national legislation. Some of the options at the federal level would include incentivizing recycling and putting a carbon tax on landfills. The federal government could also prohibit hard-to-recycle plastics and standardize waste stream production, making it easier on consumers to comply. Jeff Spross at The Week suggests that the government get into the recycling business, creating a national “public option” recycling system which could partner with local governments. 

    CALL TO ACTION:

    1. Put pressure on our MOCs to pass national recycling laws.
    2. Keep in mind that Reduce, Reuse, Recycle is a mandate in chronological order, with recycling being the last choice in the slogan.
    3. Cut down on your use of items with plastic packaging (see How to live lighter on the planet for ideas). 
    4. Check your township’s website to see which items are recyclable. Make a commitment to throw out the items that aren’t recyclable even if they have the “chasing arrows” recycling logo on them. “Wishcycling,” that is wishing that items were recyclable even when they aren’t, costs recycling programs money, uses fossil fuels in transporting them, and can jam machinery at recycling plants.
    5. Watch the John Oliver piece. It’s entertaining and informative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fiu9GSOmt8E

    What’s recyclable in Lambertville: https://lambertvillenj.org/public-works-page-list/233-recycling-information

    What’s recyclable in New Hope: https://www.newhopeborough.org/179/Recycling-Program

     

    Sources:

  • How to Live Lighter on the Planet

    Contributed by Alexis Berends & Amara Willey.

    Remember the slogan “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.” Recycling is the last option and is not guaranteed, even after you put it in your bin. It is important to first reduce your plastic usage, reuse whatever plastics you cannot avoid, and THEN recycle if you can’t avoid it. Make sure to closely follow your local recycling rules as well to ensure they make it to the next stage in the process. 

    The best way for individuals to contribute to the greening of the planet is to increase the use of sustainable products and packaging. We suggest that you start simple. Choose one way to live more sustainably, make it a habit, and expand from there. Something as simple as taking your own bags to the grocery store adds up over time. Or taking your own cutlery rather than using plastic when you get takeout or convenience food at the store.

    Here are some other suggestions. If you have other tips, please leave them in the comments below.

    Groceries

    • Choose produce without plastic packaging: Bring your own produce bags to the grocery store, or buy produce from farmers markets who generally avoid plastic usage. This has the added bonus of keeping your money in the local economy, and avoiding fossil fuels that are used in transportation.
    • Get a produce delivery service such as Misfits Market. Their packaging is pretty green; the plastic ice packs can be donated to the local food bank.
    • Sign up for local CSA boxes. Some good farms in the Lambertville/New Hope area are Locust Light Farms, Spring Creek Farm, Gravity Hill Farm, and North Slope farm.
    • Buy in bulk and skip a lot of packaging. Basil Bandwagon offers bulk supplies, as well as a few places online. Bring your own cloth bags so you don’t have to use the plastic ones. (A friend made some for me from an old cotton sheet.)
    • Bring your own bags & containers to local bakeries, the butcher shop and the fish store. You can often use them at the specialty counters at the grocery store, as well.
    • Stop eating seafood, altogether. Over 50% of all the plastic in the ocean is from the fishing industry. 45% alone is from discarded “ghost nets” which continue to kill fish for decades, if not centuries to come. If you absolutely must eat seafood, grab a rod and reel and get it yourself! But remember, over 90% of seafood species tested have plastic in their cells.
    • Do your own preserving and fermenting to keep veggies throughout the cold season. There are added health and immunity benefits to eating preserved and fermented foods as well, so this is great for the colder months when we get sick a bit easier.
    • Bring your own growler to a brewery or certain liquor stores to fill instead of getting plastic-lined cans with plastic can toppers. While the can toppers are made from recycled plastic, they cannot be tossed in your regular home recycling and need to be dropped off at special locations. They are only able to be recycled once more thereafter, which limits their lifespan. Moreover, the brewing industry is largely moving away from glass bottles and to plastic-lined aluminum cans. Bringing a growler (crowler, or mini-growler!) is a much more sustainable way to get your beer…it’s fresher, and way more fun too! Pine Creek Liquors in West Amwell offers growler services, as well as Odd Bird Brewery in Stockton, Triumph Brewery in New Hope and Princeton, Lone Eagle Brewery in Flemington, and most other local breweries.
    • Jump on the home brewing bandwagon and make your own beer, wine and mead. Reusable beer and wine containers with pressure tops are available.
    • Buy tea in bulk and use tea defusers to brew your own tea. Most tea bags are made of plastic. Arbor Tea is a good source for bulk organic tea.

    Yard

    • Grow food, not lawns! There is something magic about growing, harvesting, and cooking your own food. Even if you only have a small window in an apartment, it is still possible to grow at least your own herbs. Americans spend so much time and dump so many chemicals on their (usually non-native) grass lawns, which goes into the watershed causing eutrophication – over enrichment that leads to algal blooms and kills off animal life. Converting even part of your yard to grow lettuces, kales, potatoes, peas, etc. will cut down on fossil fuel transport as well as plastic shipping and baggage. It will also give you the added bonus of getting your hands in the dirt which is good for both your immune system and your spirit!
    • Compost. Even if you are in an apartment, you can compost. Sometimes your local farm or a friend with a garden will take your compost. Apartment composters are also available (I got mine used on Craigslist).

    Household 

    • Use soap nuts instead of laundry detergent. They are compostable, a natural surfactant and fabric softener, and plastic free! Add some essential oils for added fragrance, vinegar in place of bleach, and baking soda as added fabric softener.
    • Dansoap, which is available at Basil Bandwagon, is a power that comes in a cylindrical cardboard container lined with a compostable plastic bag and has a cardboard scoop.
    • Thrift Books is great for second-hand books. So are library book sales. Or just use your local library and keep books only as long as you are reading them.
    • Use walnut or coconut husk scour pads for the kitchen, as well as natural fiber dish brush;
    • Use a dish soap block instead of liquid soap from a plastic bottle. Dish soap blocks are usually castile soap and eco-friendly too. Cutting out liquid products helps with the carbon cost of delivery too since you aren’t buying extra water with your products.
    • Choose tea towels and rags over paper towels. I bought 100 percent cotton washcloths that I use over and over to clean everything. I even wrap food in them to bring for lunch and then use them as my napkin.
    • Use reusable silicone plastic sandwich and freezer bags rather than single use plastic bags.
    • Choose beeswax wraps over plastic wrap. These are reusable and smell great!
    • Toilet cleaning balls and bath bombs can be used instead of liquid cleaners.
    • Reel toilet paper is made of bamboo, wrapped in paper and comes in a cardboard cartoon. They sell paper towels as well, if you aren’t able to use rags.
    • Don’t hit the print key. Try to keep all your data, music and videos in electronic format.

    Personal Care

    • Only use certified, non-nano Reef Safe Sunblock. The most reef-friendly sunblocks include pure zinc, coconut oil (spf 5), or raspberry seed oil (spf 28-50 to UVB and UVC, and spf 8 against UVA, so use in conjunction with coconut oil and/or zinc, depending on the level of protection you seek).
    • Use a metal razor with replaceable blades. Albatross razors are great. They are stainless steel and you can even send back your used razors blades for them to recycle.
    • Skip the plastic bath puff and use a loofah. Loofah actually comes from gourds and you can grow them in your garden!
    • Radius dental floss comes in a cardboard container and is waxed cotton
    • Use bamboo toothbrushes, brushes and combs. Bamboo is basically a weed and so is much more sustainable than wood-sourced products.

    Clothing

    • Shop second hand! Consignment shops and thrift stores help move away from the “fast fashion” industry. There are great second hand places online if you can’t find any in your area. Staying local will be the best way to avoid the environmental impacts of shipping, but there are a few great sites online that offer second hand (or even free) products so you don’t have to buy virgin materials. Poshmark is great for clothing, as well as Freecycle, Craigslist, or even Facebook Marketplace.
    • There are several companies who use recycled plastic to make clothing as well, such as Teeki, Waterlust, Vaga Bella Swim, and even Adidas who teamed up with Parley for the Sea and use only plastics reclaimed from the oceans.
    • Get together with friends for clothing swaps (outside during the Great Pause) and refresh your wardrobe.

    Travel

    • Bring empty water bottles, travel mugs, and reusable take out containers with you. Empty water bottles in the airport can be filled at a water fountain past the security check in and brought on the plane.
    • Silicone plastic bags are resealable and reusable 

    Resources:

  • Call for Climate Action, Awareness, and Communications

    Contributed by Alexis Berends.

    The year is 2050. My son is 34 years old and has his whole life ahead of him. But what does his world look like? Is the spring equinox throbbing with birdsong as flowers emerge from the depths of winter? Are the coral ecosystems still teeming with life and diversity? Are forests still abundant? Or did people choose to ignore the fire in the kitchen when he was just a child, robbing him of the grandeur and splendid beauty that generations before him experienced? 

    After the murder of George Floyd in May of 2020, we collectively said enough. Many white people, such as myself, started to take a deeper look into systemic white supremacy in order to create a better future for generations of BIPOC people the world over. As Layla F. Saad said, we decided to become better ancestors. We began to recognize the inherent risks of ignoring the systemic problem of white supremacy in order to create a more just world for the generations ahead. This work is far overdue and will take many, many years, but we are starting to understand as a global society that it is incredibly necessary to face the ugliness of racism and white supremacy, as challenging as it may be. 

    At the same time, the climate issue is burning right before us and we are hiding in the shadows of ignorance, much as we have hid in the shadows of ignorance towards our own systemic racism. Somehow we believe if we ignore these things long enough they will disappear, but that simply is not true. It’s time we emerge from the shadows and do the work to lay a more sustainable foundation for our children.

    If we continue down the path of “business as usual” in regards to climate future generations will inherit a world vastly different than our own. We have fished our global oceans to the brink of extinction, losing over half of our global fish populations since 1960. Freshwater fish populations, like those in our own Delaware River and its watershed, have declined by 76% since 1970, and 95% of fish sampled in the Delaware River contain microplastics.

    Within our own lifetimes we will face a global refugee crisis that is unprecedented in human history as people flee the disastrous impacts of Climate Change. BIPOC communities in our own nation face the most direct threats, much as we witnessed during Hurricane Katrina and the resulting horrific inaction of the government. 

    At present, only 20% of the global population knows that more than 90% of scientists agree we must meet carbon neutrality by the year 2050 to slow the rate of global warming to 1.5 degrees celsius. That means 80% of people remain in the shadows and lack the understanding that we need to radically transform society if we want to save humankind from imminent demise. 

    Sir David Attenborough said that Climate Change is a communications issue. People aren’t pressing for change because they simply do not understand. Humans aren’t hardwired for crises as existential as the Climate Crisis. But it’s time we start learning and teaching those around us the importance of protecting our environment on a radical level. We need to start having difficult conversations about animal consumption, the fishing industry, the use of pesticides and herbicides in our gardens, and our terminal addiction to plastics. 

    ACTIONS: 

    Do the work to investigate your personal footprint on this planet. Hold yourself accountable and challenge yourself to make the necessary changes. Switch to a plant based diet or drastically reduce your consumption of animal products. Vote with your dollar by buying local food and products with sustainable packaging (glass, aluminum, paper, cardboard – avoid plastics at all costs because we don’t authentically recycle them). And lastly, get involved in the conversation by becoming an environmental advocate. There are countless ways to volunteer – from picking up trash from the sides of the road to demanding Congress take action.

    We must also hold industry and elected officials accountable for instances of environmental injustice and inequity, demanding they build resiliency in BIPOC communities and close toxic industrial production in those communities. Investigate what sort of industry might be polluting BIPOC communities that you don’t see in your own neighborhood. Ironbound Community Corporation is a fantastic place to start. Push elected officials to pass substantial policies such as the Thrive Agenda, Environmental Justice for All Act, or the Break Free From Plastic Pollution Act – all of which Representative Malinowski has yet to sponsor as of this writing. Familiarize yourself with Cory Booker’s introductions of the Justice for Black Farmers Act and the Climate Stewardship Act. If you live in Pennsylvania, urge your Senators to sponsor these bills. 

    We must end these toxic industries, clean our waterways, and reevaluate our diets, while increasing Green Jobs in order to guarantee well paying, sustainable jobs to BIPOC communities and beyond. In order to protect our children’s futures, we must spark the conversation and emerge from the darkness.