Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Green Behavior Shifts: Community level discussions

Small community group talks about greening and changing behavior:

For cleaning: do you use church volunteers or a cleaning service?  Non-toxic cleaning supplies can be cheaper, and as effective, if you stay mostly with homemade supplies rather than the premium-price stuff from the local healthfood store.   The premium priced stuff has its place, but it should be used only when something cheaper won't do.  I use the premium "natural" dish detergent, but my all-purpose surface cleaner is white vinegar, with a squirt of dish detergent, in a spray bottle.  My cleaning bible is Annie Berthold-Bond's "Better Basics for the Home".   I don't have the hard numbers but I know it is doable.  A cleaning service might be harder to deal with, just because they usually want to clean as many spaces as possible in as little time as possible, which means standardized products with a proven track record.  However, you have a few things on your side:
1) the green products are getting cheaper (Clorox has gotten in the market, which will certainly bring prices down)
2) there is more of a demand for "green cleaning services" which again will bring prices down and quality up.  
Example: one of the products Berthold-Bond had difficulty finding was "green" carpet shampoo to use rug cleaner.  Last week, I saw some at a mainstream chain grocery store with the rental rug cleaners. There is also a social justice aspect to this: people who clean buildings (too often minorities, immigrants and women) are at even more of a danger from hazardous cleaning chemicals, due to the amount of their exposure.  Could you negotiate with your social justice committee to cover some of the premium of a green cleaning service?

For paper, I would make sure you are reducing and reusing before I would think about paying for recycled paper.  Let's face it, if someone is printing three single sided drafts of a 5-page paper, using new paper each time, have we really gained much by making them use 50% post-consumer recycled-content paper?  Behavior changes may be harder, but they may save a lot more in the end than changing purchasing patterns (which I understand to be the ultimate goal of Green Sanctuary anyway).  It will also make it easier to buy more expensive "green" products if you have to buy less of them.

As for the windows, I found this site through Grist.org, http://www.efficientwindows.org/index.cfm.  And this column on dealing with inefficient windows that can't be replaced, http://www.grist.org/advice/ask/2006/11/08/inefficient_windows/index.html.  And while I can't find it now, I did see an article that pointed out that energy efficient windows don't help much if the building is not decently insulated.  I rent, so my experience with windows is mostly in trying to get landlords to clean them regularly.  Again, insulation and caulking may be an easier sell, even if .

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