The Last Challenge and the Next Challenge

For those brave individuals who joined the No Disposable Water Bottle Challenge! Congratulations. According to our calculations, this effort resulted in us saving a whopping 2,400 water bottles from even being made. Nice Work!

And for the next challenge...

The NO Plastic Bag Challenge!

Given the state of our planet, one of the easiest things we can do to lessen our reliance on nonrenewable resources (such as the oil used to make your handy-dandy smily face plastic bag), is to simply stop using plastic bags. Believe it or not, we didn't always have them, plastic bags came around at major department stores in 1974 and at grocery store check stands in 1977. What a nightmare the early seventies must have been.

Compelling Reasons to go Bag-less

Over 380 billion plastic bags, sacks and wraps are consumed in the U.S. each year.

Only 0.6 percent of plastic bags are recycled.

Once in the environment, it takes hundreds of years for plastic bags to break down. They break down into smaller and smaller toxic bits which may contaminate soil and waterways and enter the food web when animals accidentally ingest them.

There is a giant floating mass of plastic in the ocean twice the size of the state of Texas.

Go out and get a tote and join the challenge (if you have not already), email brooklyngreen@gmail.com and write No Plastic Bags! Please include first and last name and estimate # of bags you use per week.