Developing a New Relationship with Plastics

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[Applause]

plastics

are perfect they’re lightweight

barely cost anything they don’t break

when you drop them

and they last forever unfortunately

a lot of those perfect qualities have

unforeseen consequences

they’re so lightweight that they blow

off of garbage trucks

and out of landfills and end up clogging

up our water systems

they can even destroy local economies

because nobody wants to go swimming in

an ocean where plastic bags get stuck

to your thighs they can destroy

ecosystems and even kill animals that we

love

love what’s love got to do with it

my first memory as a child is standing

on the shores of lake michigan looking

out

and thinking this is the biggest thing

in the world this is

important as a

water engineer and an environmental

sustainability consultant

i look at the earth and consider it

and its natural resources with every

decision i make

and i’m here to tell you that the earth

is nothing more than an extension

of ourselves the creek

or river that runs through your town

becomes the rain

that falls on the farm fields that grows

the food

that you eat and it nourishes our bodies

all across the world the air you breathe

outside is the same air in this theater

tonight

it’s the same air in your car in your

home

or in the factory that produces the

plastics that we buy

there’s one water there’s one

air we all share one earth

i was born an environmentalist but it

wasn’t until the u.s

embassy of thailand and the phuket

hotels association

deciding to work collaboratively to help

65

hotels reduce their single-use plastics

that i became a plastics expert

i got hired to collect data

and communicate that data to 65 hotels

to let them know different choices they

could make

in order to reduce their single-use

plastic and reduce their impact

on the ocean pollution

and i came with the idea that we need

to integrate environmental consciousness

into decision-making you see

it’s accountants and purchasing managers

with little to no

experience or expertise in environmental

sustainability

that have a huge impact on the natural

environment

and it’s not their fault they’re doing

the best that they can

we’re all doing the best that they can

that we can

but we can do better and i’m here to

tell you how

so before i embarked on this project in

phuket thailand

i had to give up single-use plastics of

course i did

how was i going to tell hundreds of

people to change their ways

if i didn’t do it first so i made a

commitment

no more plastics and soon enough i had

to go grocery shopping

one of the things on my list red

raspberries

so got to the produce section stood in

front of the red raspberries

and saw that they were only offered in

single-use plastic

oh gosh what to do i just made this

commitment

oh come on i’m only one person what does

it matter

no i made this commitment and then all

of a sudden

i felt tears running down my face i’m at

a grocery store crying

because i can’t buy what i want what i

need

what i think i deserve and this memory

of my childhood comes racing to my mind

when i was about 10 years old my mom and

i used to go pick red raspberries in the

backyard

and we had buckets full and i would run

inside

pour him over vanilla ice cream and our

whole family would eat sundays

together and we would laugh and have a

great time

i was denying myself this joy

i was giving up bad and i was feeling

worse

what a nightmare hopeless

i was really distraught i turned around

and as i was leaving

with no ideas in sight i saw apples hey

wait a second

we used to make apple pies together as a

family that was just as fun

and there’s a bunch of watermelon i used

to spit watermelon seeds

at my sister growing up that was fun

it wasn’t until i refused single-use

plastics

that i saw other viable options to move

forward

but i still had to find red raspberries

so i started shopping at farmers markets

and i found a farmer who would sell me

red raspberries in bulk

enough of them that i could freeze them

over the winter so i didn’t have to buy

the frozen kind in the plastic bag in

the grocery store

in january and i started planting my own

raspberry bushes

as soon as they started to fruit any

neighbor that walked by i offered him

some

we started talking sharing ideas

laughing creating new memories

i couldn’t imagine any of this before i

took that first step

environmental consciousness isn’t only

cutting out bad

it’s creating good new habits from a

place

of love no one wants to pollute

but most single-use plastic never goes

away

on planet earth we only recycle nine

percent

of all plastics used and it’s not

because we’re not trying

it’s because there’s a gap in the system

so i dare you to take action

today become aware

what if your name was written on every

single piece of plastic

you ever used and then you went home at

the end of the day you turned on the

news

and they they just brought in a whale

who died and washed ashore they opened

up her belly and pulled out eight

eighty plastic bags and one of them said

your name on it

another one said your neighbor’s name

a third one said your governor’s name

a fourth one said your grandkids name

how would you feel what would you

do i have to be honest with you

as soon as i started envisioning this it

made it

really easy to refuse single-use

plastics

step two create a practice

new habits wash your dishes with loofah

plants buy your dishwashing detergent

from a bulk store always

always always carry produce bags with

you when you leave the house

and a to-go mug

to do this work i dissected my life into

six parts

the kitchen the toilet the shower

the bathroom sink shopping and to go

eating and i slowly replaced every

single used plastic in each of those six

parts with eco alternatives i’m not

perfect but we don’t need to be perfect

we just need to start

the third step is leveraging change

by speaking out and living by example

change starts with self but then we can

start to influence our family

our community our work our city

our state our country and then the world

people watch each other in doing this

work i started a social media campaign

people follow me they take my advice and

more importantly

they give me advice that i take

we’re growing an all-inclusive equitable

team why because we don’t judge

judge each other because we’re doing the

best we can

the fourth step is vote vote for the

environment

every two years it’s the legislators who

write

bills who can stop the flow of

single-use plastics

into our natural environments

we have to communicate that we want this

both locally

and nationally and globally

so when plastics were created

they seemed perfect but now we know

better

you can measure the impact of your

choices by

asking would my grandkids support this

decision

in the name of love let’s get started

today

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you