Recyced HP Ink Cartridges

February 16, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Let us give numbers to computer-related wastes we dump to our planet. How many computers do you think is manufactured everyday? How many printers? How many computers do a person buy over their lifetime? How many printers? How long is the lifespan of a computer before we dump them in junkyards? How many HP ink cartridges are recycles today?

recycling hp ink cartridges
Since I was in high school, I used 4 computers already. The first one I shared with my siblings. The second one was bought by my parents for my college dorm. The third one I bought using my first few months of salary. The last one that I have is a laptop.

I didn’t know what happened to the first computer. It was just wasn’t there anymore. The second computer is still in our house accumulating dust in the storage area. I gave my 3rd computer to my cousin who’s in college when I bought my laptop.

Now, the story of HP ink cartridges are a bit more complicated. I have been using my HP Deskjet printer since I was in college. It’s reliable although now there’s always the paper jam every other page I printed. Since I started using the printer, when the ink has run out, I discard the ink like I discard a banana peeling and then buy a new one.

It just made me realize how much the earth is burdened with HP in cartridges. Imagine how many people use HP printers and imagine how many of them run out of ink everyday. Those ink cartridges will go to our junkyards and will still be HP ink cartridges for another thousand and more years.

This is why I just realized why it’s a good idea go buy recycled ink cartridges. I was hesitant to buy because they say that the printer gets easily broken down. But a lot of people are already using them and so far their printers are still running smoothly.

So as not to burden the earth more, I will start using recycled HP ink cartridges. I hope there’s a more permanent solution to that but in the mean time, I think it will help a bit.

Filed Under: Everyday Green, Recycling, Toxic Wastes, Water Conservation Tagged With:

Green Bath and Body Works Soap

January 5, 2009 By Leave a Comment

organic soap

    When we lather our body with our favorite soap, do we know how many chemical ingredients in the soap that gets in contact with our skin and may enter our body through our skin’s pores? These are some of the ingredients used in making commercially bought soaps:
    -Coco Diethanol Amide
    -Sodium lauryl ether sulfate
    -Sodium silicate
    -Sodium tripolyphosphate
    -Caustic potash
    -Ethylene diamine tetra acetic acid
    -Sodium phosphate
    -Benzalkonium chloride
    -Glycerine
    -Carboxyl methy cellulose
    -Triethanol amine
    These are only some of the chemicals that are used in making soaps. They are needed to give the soap the quality of a soap: hard, produces bubbles and can clean oil and dirt in our body. If we use a soap that has added qualities such as a moisturizing soap or a soap that has a scent, then more chemicals are added in those soaps.
    Most of the chemicals found in our bath soaps are not harmful but they are still chemicals. They enter our body through our skin. When they enter our body, they become toxins that need to get out either through perspiration or peeing. When they don’t get out and they accumulate, they will cause illness including cancer.
    Good news is that today there are a lot of stores that are selling organic eco-friendly bath soaps. These soaps may be expensive but they are not made from chemicals. The ingredients are all natural meaning they are sourced from nature.  Using organic bath soaps helps in greening our planet because thsee soaps are not manufactured with chemicals in the factories that use up a lot of energy.
    When we use handmade soaps and organic soaps, we can help in reducing the air pollution that the factories of popular bath soaps emit in their factories. Besides, organic soaps are really good to out skin. They don’t cause skin irritation and dryness. THey can smell really good too when they are added with natural oils such as lavender and rosemary.
Filed Under: Conservation, Energy Saving, Everyday Green, Green Homes, Green Tips, Pollution, Toxic Wastes, Water Conservation, Water Resources Tagged With: ,

Green Hair Shampoo

December 29, 2008 By Leave a Comment

natural shampoo

    Have you ever thought about what our ancestors used as hair shampoo when there were still no factories and no electricity? When my grandmother was still alive, she used a natural hair cleanser: gugo. Gugo is a Tagalog word for this brown thing that looks like very small branches. I remember when I was a child, my grandmother used to use gugo on my hair. I can’t remember where she got it.
    I am looking at the back of the plastic bottle of my hair shampoo. It’s a popular brand name of hair shampoo that I bought in the grocery and these are the ingredients: Sodium Laureth Sulfide, Sodium Lauril Sulfate, Methylchloroisothiazolinone, Sodium Benzoate, Glycol Distearate, Guar Hydroxypropyltrimonium and a lot more listed.
    I didn’t know I put that long list of chemicals on my hair everyday whenever I shapoo. Maybe I should get back to the natural hair shampoo. There are some people who use mayonnaise and avocado instead of conditioners and their hair are really shiny and soft. My roommate in College use beer to soften her hair. It didn’t smell nice but it did look healthy though.
    Come to think of it, using the bounty of our earth to clean our hair is not a bad idea. Here in the Philippines, “lauat” is a very popular herb for treatment of hair loss and dry hair. Green hair shampoo saves a lot of plastic bottle packaging and not to mention that toxins and chemicals that are produced that are harmful to the environment and to our own health.
    Maybe it’s time to go back to the basics. I regret I didn’t ask my grandmother where she get her gugo.
Filed Under: Conservation, Energy Saving, Everyday Green, Green Homes, Green Tips, Pollution, Toxic Wastes, Water Conservation, Water Resources Tagged With: , ,

Empty Mineral Water Bottles

December 10, 2008 By Leave a Comment

What Happens to Mineral Water Bottles

empty mineral bottles

When I was in college a few years back, every corner of the school has a drinking fountain. The water has a good taste, it’s cool and it’s accessible. Every 5 minutes of walk, you’ll find that stainless steel drinking fountain nearby.

Today, it seems they are doing away with these drinking fountains even in mall food courts. The only food court in Manila that I saw a drinking fountain is in Robinson’s Galleria. All the rest of the malls force you to buy softdrinks or mineral water.

Before I used to recycle mineral water bottles. I’ll put water into the bottle in the morning and use it again the next day. But my sister-in-law says that I shouldn’t recycle mineral water bottles. The plastic materials in the container leach to the water especially when the bottles were exposed to high temperatures. She said that the chemicals can cause cancer. O-oh, I have been using that bottle for months now. Scary.

So, if we are not to recycle the mineral water bottles, what happens to the empty plastic bottles? They’ll be thrown to the trashcans and landfills. In the case of the Philippines, they’ll be thrown to the roadside.

Since mineral water bottles are made of non-biodegradable materials, they will be in our landfills for thousands of years. Even if we bury them, they will stay under the ground for thousand of years.

What can we do about it? If you can do away with bottled mineral water, do so. You can buy a stainless steel drinking container as use that everyday for your drinking water. This is what I do. You can buy those in supermarkets and they can be as cheap as P150. You can use them for years and you’ll be sure that no chemicals will contaminate the water that you’re drinking.

Filed Under: Non-biodegradable Waste, Toxic Wastes, Water Resources Tagged With:

Pesticides and Water

December 8, 2008 By Leave a Comment

pineapple plantation
I came across this news that 2 of Davao’s watersheds are found to be contaminated with pesticides. They are the Talamo-Lapidas and Panigan Tamugan watersheds. These are 2 dams where the people of Davao get their tap water from.

Davao prides itself as a big exporter of fruits. It has huge tracts of pineapple, mango, papaya and banana plantations. The fruit export industry in the city gives a lot of jobs to the locals and big money for the government in the form of taxes.

But there is a negative effect to these developments. The study reports that the pesticides that were found in the watersheds are from the use of pesticides in the fruit plantations.

The pesticides are dissolved in rain water and seeped down to the ground water which runs off to the watersheds. What’s worse is that they found out that the pesticides content in the watersheds contain chemicals banned by the government.

What can we do with the pesticides? If the fruit growers in Davao will not use pesticides, can they still produce export-quality fruits? But if they continue to use pesticides, how many years before the water resources in Davao become completely contaminated with pesticides?

We need to take care of our environment mainly because if we don’t, then our health is at stake. This is happening already. Just consider how many people in the 1900’s died of cancer?

It is only now that people die left and right because of cancer. One reason is that today, there are more chemicals that we put into our bodies everyday. Today almost everything that we get in contact with has chemicals.

One of them may be coming out of our faucets or showers. Pesticides and water contamination are two big problems that we need to find solutions for. Now.

Filed Under: Conservation, Green Homes, Pollution, Toxic Wastes, Water Resources Tagged With: ,
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