A zero waste grocery store in Sherbrooke Avrac A'davrac provides its customers with a recovery box for non-recycled packaging such as bags of chips. These plastics are supported by TerraCycle. Réjean Blais discusses it with Mourad Ben Amor, professor at the Faculty of Engineering and specialist in Environmental Life Cycle Analysis.   The TerraCycle company manages the "non-recyclable" like coffee pods, used pens, factory plastic gloves and certain types of packaging. The company works with private collectors, large firms, SMEs, local businesses, cities in more than 21 countries. It can divert billions of waste from landfill and incineration.

After the success of l’initiative d’une Sherbrookoise who organized last year's Halloween candy packaging collections, François Vincent, owner of the Avrac A'davrac grocery store in Sherbrooke, decided to take over.   Last October, the Sherbrooke trader participated in Hélène Boissonneault's campaign, which wished to divert the packaging of treats from the landfill.   A one-off initiative that did not continue due to the costs associated with transporting the packaging to Terracycle's facilities in Toronto.   Mr. Vincent decides to maintain the link with Terracycle. He set up a box on the premises of his bulk grocery store that cost him $ 250. To finance the service, he asked customers to pay $ 20 a year.   Candy, potato chip, soft bar or chocolate packaging… François Vincent makes sure to do a final sorting before shipping the packaging to Toronto.

Fancy lunch boxes, plastic-free toiletries, and beautiful glass containers are all nice things to have on deck when you’re trying to be a little more sustainable in your day-to-day life, but being kind to the planet doesn’t have to destroy your checking account. The idea that you need to buy a bunch of new things to cut down on your carbon footprint isn’t just wrong, it’s totally counter to the idea of sustainability.   For example: Just bought a new toothbrush? Don’t throw it out to get a bamboo one just yet—use it until it’s worn out and then send it over to TerraCycle. Have a bunch of plastic containers? Don’t toss them in the recycling bin and buy glass ones instead—use them. Reusing, after all, comes before recycling.   Taking advantage of what you already own also might save you some serious cash. After all, those reusable water bottles aren’t always cheap! In fact, taking a break from shopping altogether is the best first step toward a zero-waste (or, more realistically, a low-waste) lifestyle.   And you don’t have to go from zero to zero waste overnight. Get started with some small, incremental changes that will help you live a little greener. Let these tips set you off on the right foot. The good news is that you already have everything you need.  

Deep-Clean Any Jar

  When you look at that empty olive jar or burnt-out candle, I ask that you see a world of possibilities instead. Peel off labels and get rid of leftover stickiness by making a mixture of baking soda and oil (I use canola), rubbing it all over the jar, letting it sit for five to 10 minutes, and then scrubbing it clean. As for candles, just pop them in the freezer for a few hours—it should then be easy to break out any residual wax with a butter knife (just don’t scrape too hard or you’ll risk breaking the glass). —Rebecca Deczynski, lifestyle editor  

Then Use Them for Storage

  I reuse pasta sauce and jam glass jars. They are great as containers for dry bulk goods and even to hold makeup brushes and my son’s colored pencils. An empty jar is handy to keep on you at all times—it can be used for water, coffee, and even takeaway food or compost scraps. —Sarah Paiji Yoo, founder of Blueland  

And for Your Household Necessities, Too

  By far, one of my favorite low-waste hacks is repurposing glass bottles that might otherwise go in the recycling bin. The trick is knowing that many glass bottles have a universal one-inch-diameter bottle neck that can fit any number of salvaged bottle tops. A vinegar bottle can have a spray nozzle attached to it and be used to house an easy homemade all-purpose cleaning spray; a kombucha bottle can be plugged with a pour spout and used as a dishwashing soap dispenser or an olive oil cruet; a small glass whiskey bottle fitted with a pump can be filled with hand soap or lotion. Increasingly, these types of liquids can be found at local shops with refill stations so you have the double advantage of using a lovely glass bottle to house everyday essentials and the opportunity to refill them endlessly without creating any new garbage at all. —Erin Boyle, founder of Reading My Tea Leaves  

Use Up Everything in Your Fridge

  Make dinner with what you have on hand—think of it as a home version of Chopped. This alone will drastically reduce food waste at home, where, according to the NRDC, the majority of food waste occurs, more than grocery stores and restaurants. The food we don’t eat wastes precious resources, and when that uneaten food rots in a landfill, it produces methane gas, a greenhouse gas much more potent than carbon dioxide. Globally, food waste accounts for 8 percent of man-made greenhouse gas emissions. To put that into perspective, the aviation industry accounts for about 2.5 percent of emissions—and almost everyone can reduce their food waste! —Anne-Marie Bonneau, founder of Zero-Waste Chef  

Including the Scraps

  We save herbs like thyme, rosemary, sage, and any tasty odds and ends from veggies in a container in our freezer for later use in vegetable stock and bone broth. Just take four cups of vegetable scraps, add 10 to 14 cups of water (enough to cover the scraps), two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar, salt to taste, and whatever extra vegetables or herbs you’d like. (I like to add garlic, peeled ginger, bay leaves, fresh herbs, and shiitake or reishi mushrooms for added nutritional value.) Simmer for two hours on low; if you’re making a bone broth, simmer for four to six hours. Turn off the heat and let cool, and strain through a mesh sieve to remove all the solid pieces. Pour into glass jars to freeze—just make sure not to fill the jar all the way to the top to leave room for the liquid to expand.” —Alyson Morgan, founder of Maia Terra

A St. Catharines small business is helping Niagara up its recycling game with the hopes of ultimately enticing people to embrace a more low-waste lifestyle.   Garden City Essentials, a wellness and lifestyle boutique, is collecting packaging from health and beauty-related products to be recycled through TerraCycle.   “I feel like there’s an evolution that has to happen where people become more mindful of what they’re using, what they’re purchasing and I just really want to support that in my business,” said founder Jolene Antle.   “If I’m going to sell products, I also want to be a place where people can take things that aren’t recyclable.”   With waste overflowing in landfills and oceans, negatively impacting animals and contributing to climate change, Antle said it’s important to take responsibility of an issue we all contributed to creating.   “There’s thousands of ways we can all make changes in our daily lives.”   Even if it’s simply refusing single-use plastics or bringing reusable cups or containers to cafés or restaurants, Antle said those seemingly small changes add up to make a meaningful difference.   Four Zero Waste Boxes now sit in the front window of her James Street shop — one a free, Gillette-sponsored box collecting razor blades (of any brand), the other three she is paying for out of pocket to collect the remnants of products related to oral hygiene, beauty, personal care and cosmetics.   “I’d love to see other businesses and different institutions having boxes that relate to their products.”   It’s the smaller products — like razors, plastic tubes and caps, dental floss containers, lipstick tubes, empty makeup pallets and deodorant sticks — that aren’t accepted by some municipalities because they are small or sharp or inconvenient, said Antle. While these items are technically made of recyclable material, they can still end up in oceans or landfills.   The intention isn’t to be the place people put their packaging waste forever, she said, neither is it to judge anybody for their waste. But it was important to her to offer an alternative and hopefully incite a more thoughtful lifestyle approach.   Lifestyle changes don’t have to be instantaneous, they can happen incrementally, she said.   “I think people become more mindful and they will switch to more sustainable options when it’s time for them, when it’s accessible or when they can afford it.”   In the meantime, she said having a place to recycle those trickier items will at least keep them out of landfills.   Collected items are shipped to one of TerraCycle’s warehouses, located in 21 countries around the globe, where they are cleaned and weighed, said Sue Kauffman, the North American public relations manager.   Treatment depends on the type of material, but generally, she said it is shredded and broken down to its core elements then re-melted into pellets.   These pellets are then sold to other manufacturers to make new products like plastic decking, shipping pallets, outdoor furniture, basically any non-food grade plastic products.   “Walk through Home Depot and anything that’s plastic can be made out of this type of plastic material.”   There’s so much plastic material out there and all of it can be recycled, she said, but it often comes down to economics. Some items are just too expensive to recycle.   “Local recycling industries are trying their best, but they don’t collect everything … What we do is we pick up where local recycling facilities leave off.”   The company offers more than 150 different waste streams and both free (product-sponsored) and paid recycling programs.   In the short time since introducing the Zero Waste Boxes to her shop, Antle said she’s already seen a ton of interest and participation.   Yes, it’s a service that’s costing the shop money, but she said it’s completely worth it.   “If I can reduce my waste but also help people in my community do it, then why wouldn’t I? It seems like a small price to pay.”   For more information, or to purchase a Zero Waste Box of your own, go to terracycle.com.

They’re brushing away their carbon footprint.   Colgate launched a new recyclable toothpaste tube — with toothpaste that the company says has been certified by the Vegan Society.   The product, called “smile for good,” launched in Europe in the U.K., Colgate-Palmolive Co. said in a statement. The company has not announced plans to bring the product to locations outside of that area as of Wednesday.     The toothpaste is made from 99.7% natural ingredients, the company said, which are “listed clearly and explained on the front of the package.”   Parent company Colgate-Palmolive first launched the recyclable tubes under its brand Tom’s of Maine in the U.S. in a November 2019 announcement, with plans to transition packaging to the Colgate brand in 2020, according to a press release.   Colgate-Palmolive announced it would also share the recyclable toothpaste tube technology with competitors, which Noel Wallace, Chief Executive Officer and President of Colgate-Palmolive said is a “win” when standardized across all companies.   “We want all toothpaste tubes — and eventually all kinds of tubes — to meet the same third-party recycling standards that we’ve achieved. We can align on these common standards for tubes and still compete with what’s inside them,” Wallace said in a statement.   Around 1 billion toothpaste tubes are sent to landfills each year, according to climate activist group 1 Million Women.   Most toothpaste tubes are produced using a combination of plastics with a layer of aluminum “sandwiched” in between, according to Colgate-Palmolive.   The new recyclable tubes, however, are made from a combination of High Density Polyethylene plastics — which are used to make milk jugs — the company said in a statement.   Colgate previously established a partnership with TerraCycle — a company that creates national recycling programs — to recycle oral care product packaging and toothbrushes.

It takes two hours to spot-treat a growing zit with a pimple patch. It takes 20 minutes to de-puff the eye area with a mask. It takes only 10 to give your complexion a shot of hydration with a sheet mask.   Fifty years ago, or as recently as 10 or even five, one skin-care product could last you a few weeks or sometimes months. Now, beauty companies feed our single-use behavior — the super-convenient way of using something only once before discarding it — with a flood of non-biodegradable, non-recyclable disposable products.   Not only is there an abundance of sheet masks, but there are also derivatives sold to target specific areas like laugh lines or your derrière or your nether regions. There are cleansing wipes available from nearly every brand on the market. And there are zit stickers that come packaged in multiple layers of plastic.   “People haven’t been made as aware of the impact of beauty,” said Freya Williams, the chief executive of Futerra North America, an agency that helps companies with sustainability efforts. “We’re taught in school to recycle, but it’s focused more in the kitchen than in the bathroom, so it doesn’t seem as important.”   The single-use phenomenon is a fairly recent development, Ms. Williams added. And, she said, “it’s happening without anybody realizing how much these items are taking over.”  

The Overconsumption of Beauty

  It’s hard to resist innovative product introductions, seasonal trends and the promise of clearer, tighter, smoother skin. At the peak of the K-beauty trend, a 10-step beauty routine was not only heralded as the answer to a flawless complexion, but it also came to exemplify one form of self-care.   “We saw an uptick in the number of skin-care products consumers used at the height of the Korean skin-care trend, with many adding an additional mask or product,” said Larissa Jensen, the executive director and beauty industry analyst at the NPD Group market research consultancy.   Every extra serum or mask comes with problematic side effects, of course. Without our even realizing it, we’re driving up the environmental impact.   Elizabeth Mullans, a dermatologist in Houston, believes that a streamlined anti-aging regimen can be boiled down to three essential products: sunscreen with an SPF of 30 or higher, an over-the-counter retinol or prescription-strength retinoid, and a vitamin C serum.   “I don’t think you can use too many products — they will all be absorbed into your skin — but these three are going to help the most,” Dr. Mullans said. Other products can be added to target specific concerns, like benzoyl peroxide or salicylic acid for acne, or hyaluronic acid for irritation or dryness.   “Stay away from any product that contains collagen because the molecules are too big to be absorbed,” she said. “It’s basically a glorified moisturizer.”  

Luxury’s Excess Problem

  Many believe the industry’s biggest culprit — and most challenging hurdle — is packaging, with luxury brands being the greatest offender. “The way brands create ‘luxury’ is through layers of heavy packaging, which is often not recyclable and is being discarded,” Ms. Williams said.   Already we have reached a point at which overpackaging no longer feels luxurious. The industry watchdog Estee Laundry, an Instagram account that calls out bullying, copycats and social injustices, has long put brands on blast for waste. A recent target was Pat McGrath Labs and the excessive amount of plastic that comes with a single beauty product.   “Making sustainability synonymous with luxury is an opportunity, and it’s something we’re starting to see in fashion,” Ms. Williams said. “Invest in something that’s worthy of your time and money.”   Investing in waterless beauty products is one example. Anhydrous formulas eliminate water as a key ingredient to deliver on three things: higher potency (and in turn, greater efficacy); a longer shelf life (without water, there is less risk of bacteria growth); fewer toxins (because there is no longer a need for parabens or preservatives); and water conservation.    

The Clean Beauty Push

  Clean beauty is expected to generate nearly $25 billion by 2025, according to a report from Grand View Research. That may be only a fraction of the beauty industry (an $863 billion business by 2024, according to Zion Market Research), but the demand for products that are marketed as “clean” or “natural” continues to be strong.   “This focus on ingredients and whether they’re good — if they’re harmful to your skin or the environment — is why there’s a big movement toward clean beauty,” Ms. Jensen said. “Clean beauty ties into the wellness movement and the wellness movement ties into the environment, because it’s about what’s good for you and the planet.”   She added that demand for such products may help explain an NPD 2019 market report (from January to September) indicating that the skin-care category was up 7 percent in sales, while makeup was down 5 percent.   And as Gen Z consumers, whose priorities include transparency and sustainability, gain spending power as they age, this movement will likely accelerate.  

Every Action Counts

  If you look at beauty’s impact as a whole, the challenge can seem overwhelming. Everything — how ingredients are sourced, carbon emissions in production — must be considered lest it lead to harmful social and environmental impacts.   Products that use plastic, like glitter or microbeads, can contribute to ocean waste; certain chemicals in sunscreens can harm marine life; and if an ingredient is not sourced responsibly, it can to environmental destruction, like deforestation.   Some companies are making an effort to effect change. Unilever recently pledged that all Dove bottles will be composed of recycled plastic, that the Dove Beauty Bar will be plastic free later in 2020 and that refillable stainless steel deodorant sticks are in the works in an effort to reduce its use of virgin plastic by more than 20,500 tons per year.   For many digitally native, born-good start-ups, sustainability is embedded in their DNA, like By Humankind, a personal care brand dedicated to reducing single-use plastic by introducing plastic-free shampoo and conditioner bars and refillable deodorant containers.   LOLI, a zero-waste clean beauty brand, bottles its formulas in food-grade glass yogurt jars, which can be reused in the kitchen.   Cadence, a company committed to eliminating travel-size plastic, will begin selling its refillable containers on Jan. 21. They allow users to decant their products into durable, leakproof vessels, a percentage of which is made from consumer waste.   “Travel-size versions of beauty products are especially wasteful,” said Stephanie Hon, the founder of Cadence. “By delivering what you love — your beauty routine — we’re allowing you to bring what you want in a more sustainable way.”   She has a point: Consumers are fiercely loyal to their routines (it’s why the beauty industry has historically been immune to recession), which means it is that much harder for them to give up their products for a more sustainable option.   Even though 75 percent of consumers believe sustainability is very important, it’s the key purchasing criterion for only 7 percent, according to a study by Boston Consulting Group.   “Consumers think companies aren’t willing to change, and companies think consumers aren’t willing to change, so it’s a stalemate,” Ms. Williams said. “Once consumers aren’t forced to choose between sustainability and performance, that’s when you’ll start to see solutions taking off.”   There are, however, small actions you can take now: Look for packageless products (Lush has long championed them); avoid single-use products; swap disposable cleansing wipes and cotton pads for reusable ones; and recycle whatever you can. (TerraCycle offers programs for cosmetic products.)   “We’re nowhere near where we want to be, but taking the right steps is all we can do,” Ms. Jensen said. “At the end of the day, there are companies that are making money without any changes, but when it starts to affect a company’s bottom line, that’s when things are going to start to change.”  

A St. Catharines small business is helping Niagara up its recycling game with the hopes of ultimately enticing people to embrace a more low-waste lifestyle.   Garden City Essentials, a wellness and lifestyle boutique, is collecting packaging from health and beauty-related products to be recycled through TerraCycle.   “I feel like there’s an evolution that has to happen where people become more mindful of what they’re using, what they’re purchasing and I just really want to support that in my business,” said founder Jolene Antle.   “If I’m going to sell products, I also want to be a place where people can take things that aren’t recyclable.”   With waste overflowing in landfills and oceans, negatively impacting animals and contributing to climate change, Antle said it’s important to take responsibility of an issue we all contributed to creating.   “There’s thousands of ways we can all make changes in our daily lives.”   Even if it’s simply refusing single-use plastics or bringing reusable cups or containers to cafés or restaurants, Antle said those seemingly small changes add up to make a meaningful difference.   Four Zero Waste Boxes now sit in the front window of her James Street shop — one a free, Gillette-sponsored box collecting razor blades (of any brand), the other three she is paying for out of pocket to collect the remnants of products related to oral hygiene, beauty, personal care and cosmetics.   “I’d love to see other businesses and different institutions having boxes that relate to their products.”   It’s the smaller products — like razors, plastic tubes and caps, dental floss containers, lipstick tubes, empty makeup pallets and deodorant sticks — that aren’t accepted by some municipalities because they are small or sharp or inconvenient, said Antle. While these items are technically made of recyclable material, they can still end up in oceans or landfills.   The intention isn’t to be the place people put their packaging waste forever, she said, neither is it to judge anybody for their waste. But it was important to her to offer an alternative and hopefully incite a more thoughtful lifestyle approach.   Lifestyle changes don’t have to be instantaneous, they can happen incrementally, she said.   “I think people become more mindful and they will switch to more sustainable options when it’s time for them, when it’s accessible or when they can afford it.”   In the meantime, she said having a place to recycle those trickier items will at least keep them out of landfills.   Collected items are shipped to one of TerraCycle’s warehouses, located in 21 countries around the globe, where they are cleaned and weighed, said Sue Kauffman, the North American public relations manager.   Treatment depends on the type of material, but generally, she said it is shredded and broken down to its core elements then re-melted into pellets.   These pellets are then sold to other manufacturers to make new products like plastic decking, shipping pallets, outdoor furniture, basically any non-food grade plastic products.   “Walk through Home Depot and anything that’s plastic can be made out of this type of plastic material.”   There’s so much plastic material out there and all of it can be recycled, she said, but it often comes down to economics. Some items are just too expensive to recycle.   “Local recycling industries are trying their best, but they don’t collect everything … What we do is we pick up where local recycling facilities leave off.”   The company offers more than 150 different waste streams and both free (product-sponsored) and paid recycling programs.   In the short time since introducing the Zero Waste Boxes to her shop, Antle said she’s already seen a ton of interest and participation.   Yes, it’s a service that’s costing the shop money, but she said it’s completely worth it.   “If I can reduce my waste but also help people in my community do it, then why wouldn’t I? It seems like a small price to pay.”   For more information, or to purchase a Zero Waste Box of your own, go to terracycle.com.

The Pen Centre is challenging local artistic talent to build a team to create a masterpiece using recycled gift cards with a chance to win big money.   Artists in Niagara schools are invited to get creative to plan and design a one of a kind art piece using mostly recycled gift cards and a few recycled items. This is the first time The Pen Centre (TPC) has offered this exciting opportunity called The Pen Centre Gift Card Cycle Challenge for students in hopes of raising awareness around recycling and sustainability. According to Helen Edwards, marketing director for TPC, the idea began a few years ago when a Fonthill group called the Fonthill Nurdles approached the administration about the number of gift cards that end up in landfills. As they inquired further into the issue they found out that even though the card may be made of recycled materials not all municipalities can recycle the gift cards.   “[The gift cards] were still just being tossed out. If you think about how many billions of gift cards are out there, it broke our hearts. Shopping centres, as a whole, are a big producer of those so we thought we are going to turn this around and find a way they can be recycled properly,” said Edwards.   This started the gift card collection program. The community can bring old gift cards to customer service at TPC where they are then sent to a third party.   “We ensure they go to a company called Terracycle. They turn them into things like lawn furniture and other outdoor products and they are repurposed,” said Edwards.   Now with this challenge they are hoping to recycle and reuse even more gift cards. The participants are encouraged to start their own gift cards collection from family and friends to make their artwork.   “We really figured if we could inspire them to go out and get a collection as well, whether it be in their school or from their friends and family, we figure everybody benefits from that,” said Edwards.   To participate in the challenge, classrooms and/or school teams will fill out an application and provide a design sketch when the site goes live on Thursday January 16, 2020. The applications and design sketches are due by March 1, 2020. The Pen Centre will then notify the design teams that they can start to create their art using their collected gift cards from the community and observing the rules of the challenge. Then they will go on display at TPC to be judged and voted on by the community.   There will be three categories: elementary, secondary and post-secondary. The final judging will be done in May. The team that wins in each category will receive $1,000 for the team and $1,000 for their school.   This challenge is a great opportunity for classrooms or groups of artists to create something spectacular.   “We are hoping that teachers use it as an opportunity that if they know they have some students that are really strong when it comes to arts, they can inspire them to pull a team together.  This is a great way for a classroom to do a project to unite everybody for a common goal,” said Edwards.   Not only is this challenge keeping gift cards out of landfills, it is promoting creativity and bringing the community together through art and environmental awareness.   “For the community really the biggest hope is that it is going to highlight the amazing talent we have in the community ranging from a six year old to a university student that could be 40 to 50 years old because I think that is a strong part of who we are in St. Catharines,” said Edwards. “For the mall it is really getting the message across that we are trying to do our part to help the planet and the environment to get these gift cards out of [landfills] and if it inspires other people to think that way as well that’s the icing on the cake for us.”   Edwards and TPC have issued the challenge. Now it is time for Niagara students to put their best artistic skills to the test.

Many of us trust that our Brita water filters are removing contaminants from our tap water—but if you haven't replaced the filter in several months (er, years), it's probably not working as well as you think. In fact, if you have hard water, you may need to change your Brita filter even more often, as mineral deposits could build up and interfere with the filtration process.   To make sure your water filter is working properly and removing everything from lead to chlorine to asbestos, follow the guidelines below on exactly how often to change your Brita filter. Plus, learn how to recycle all of those old filters and save them from the landfill.  

How Often to Change Brita Filters

  Exactly how often you need to change your Brita filter depends upon how much water you filter through it, as well as which filter you own. On your Brita pitcher, activate the electronic filter change indicator, or use this timeline as a general guide.   The Brita Standard Filter (white) should be replaced after every 40 gallons, or about every two months. The Brita Longlast Filter (blue) needs to be replaced after every 120 gallons, or approximately every six months. And the Brita Stream Filter (gray) should be replaced after every 40 gallons, or about every two months. These estimates are based on a household that filters about 11 glasses of water per day, so if your household filters much more or way less, feel free to adjust your schedule.  

How to Change Brita Filters

  Remove the used filter from your Brita water pitcher. Then, flush the new filter with cold water for 15 seconds. Insert the filter into the pitcher, lining up the groove in the filter with the ridge in the water pitcher. Add cold tap water to the pitcher. Brita recommends either discarding the first three pitchers full of filtered water (or using it to water your plants!) because it will contain some carbon dust (aka, those black particles you see floating in the pitcher). After that, your water filter is ready to go.  

How to Recycle Brita Filters

  Throwing out a filter every two to six months may feel wasteful, but luckily, Brita has partnered with TerraCycle to save filters from the landfill. Here's how it works: Fill out the form on Brita's recycling page and a free shipping label will get emailed to you. Make sure the used filters are dry, place them inside a trash bag, pack them in a box, and mail them using the free shipping label.   Want one more reason to recycle your Brita filters? You'll rack up Brita Rewards points, which can be redeemed for free products or coupons.