The Central Trend recently reached out to the Grand Rapids Climate Action and Adaptation Plan EE coordinator Kat Hart for her insight about the future for the plan and what it will look like.
How can students and community members aid in the implementation of a cleaner, healthier city?
I would focus on different parts of your life: what you eat, how you get around, what you buy, etc. Making small choices in each of these areas will really add up to a very real impact. As we try to reduce our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from our community—it will take all of us working on incremental progress. My top three tips to reduce the amount of GHG your lifestyle emits would be to:
- Reduce the amount of meat (specifically beef) you eat. I highly encourage everyone to try out “Meatless Mondays” or “vegetarian before 6pm” for at least one month to see how much you can focus your diet around plants and still be eating delicious food! The amount of GHG that is emitted by cows is huge compared to plants and even other types of farm animals. Above is a graph to show just how extreme this difference is.
- Plant native plants in your lawn or backyard. Kentucky bluegrass is not healthy food for bees, butterflies, or bugs. Native plants like grasses, trees, and flowers are built for our native pollinators, and we desperately need to invest in these plants for a healthy environment. I highly encourage anyone who has the space to try out a few milkweed or a packet of native wildflower seeds this summer.
- Refuse and reduce the single-use, disposable goods you encounter in your daily life. We all can recognize the “pre-trash” that we receive from various places in our life—it’s the stuff that you are almost certainly going to throw away.
- Common items that you can refuse would be
- receipts (which you cannot recycle because it is special paper)
- Plastic straws
- to-go cutlery packages (the ones with the utensils, napkins, and straws)
- free “swag” items—from events that are not durable
- paper flyers/handouts—you do not want
- Junk mail
- Single-use, plastic, bottles of water
Common items that you can reduce:
- Packed, single-serve foods (I could eat a Smuckers’ PB&J every day, but reducing the amount of these packaged sandwiches with ones I make myself has prevented so many plastic wrappers)
- Styrofoam (this type of foam has almost no value and avoiding it at all costs will make our planet healthier)
- Plastic clothes (fabrics like acrylic, polyester nylon, rayon, spandex, lycra, and polar fleece are all plastic and made from fossil fuels. As you wear and wash these clothes, this plastic will shed off and create microplastics that are a major threat to our environment.
Does the CAAP involve any new public transportation plans?…