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Social Action Council Environmental Action Committee |
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How to Reduce Solid Waste
Compost yard waste and kitchen scraps and limit garbage disposal use The Howard County website is a great resource for Home Composting .
Recycle metal, glass, plastic, cardboard, and paper Check out the Howard County Recycling Program , a great resource. You can also recycle newspaper for fund-raising at OBIC and some Howard County schools.
Purchase recycled paper products If everyone in the US used just one 100% recycled TP roll per year, ½ million trees would be saved.
Use re-usable towels, rags, wipes and napkins
Use re-usable plates, flatware, cups
Buy in bulk rather than in many small containers
Avoid excess packaging on take-out food
Limit use of highly packaged “convenience foods” (microwave dinners, snack packs, individual servings)
Shop with reusable shopping bags Americans use an estimated 84 billion plastic bags annually, and the production of plastic bags worldwide uses over 12 million barrels of oil per year. Unrestrained bags create environmental problems such as long-lived litter on land and sea where they are especially harmful to marine life. Stores such as Giant sell sturdy long-life shopping bags.
Halt mail delivery of unwanted catalogs Unwanted catalogs can be minimized by paying unassociated companies to do the job for you. You can also go onto the catalog companies’ websites in many cases and accept their offer to cancel catalog delivery or write them an e-mail in the “Contact Us” area requesting non-delivery. If all else fails, you can bundle all of your unwanted mail and write “REFUSED” on it and place it in the PO box. Some newspapers, such as The Examiner, offer you to opt out of delivery. You can also go to http://www.catalogchoice.org/ to reduce the number of mailed catalogs |
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Upcoming Events |
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Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbia
Owen Brown Interfaith Center, 7246 Cradlerock Way, Columbia, MD 21045 (410) 381-0097 www.uucolumbia.net |