Thanks to Dan Taylor and Hayley Russell who gave us a thought provoking presentation on ‘Reduce, Reuse and Recycle’.
The fifty or so people at the meeting were keen to know what happens to all our rubbish and how we can be more efficient in our use and disposal of everyday items.
One of the main themes of the evening was that our active participation does make a difference. Being reminded that a disposable nappy can take up to 500 years to break down and a plastic bag can hang around for up to 1000 years, reinforces the need for us to be vigilant about what we use and how we dispose of items when no longer needed.
We talked about some of the ‘tricky items’ – and South Hams have published clear information about where everything should go. (I will now remember to recycle Tetra packs in the blue sacks and their lids in the clear sacks!)
www.southhams.gov.uk/article/933/Your-Service-Guide-for-Recycling-and-Waste
Dan also told us about the scope of the incineration process at the Barne- Barton centre in Plymouth where all rubbish which can’t be recycled is incinerated rather than going into landfill. If there is further interest in this we can organise a site visit.
On an evening when we learned that the Great Garbage Patch in the Pacific Ocean is now twice the size of Texas with bits of plastic and debris spread over more than 600,000 square miles of ocean, it was important to reflect on what we can do in our own patch of Devon to begin to make a difference.
