Chick fil-A used to be my guilty pleasure, especially when traveling. When I’m rushing through airports that seductive red and white sign always calls for a detour and a Chicken Deluxe. Now, thanks to about the plastic chemicals found in food packaging, that sandwich is dead to me. A team of scientists and concerned citizens recently tested more than 300 unique foods for harmful plastic chemicals. My beloved treat sat near the top of the inauspicious leaderboard.

My regular readers know that I have long been concerned with the scary amount of plastic chemicals that we interact with as we Ìęgo about our daily lives.

There’s the black plastic in our utensils. And the PFAS (a.k.a forever chemicals) found in everything from our clothing and furniture to our beauty products and toilet paper, the foaming agents in our toothpaste and laundry soaps.

The list goes on and on. We are a society addicted to plastic chemicals and all the modern conveniences they afford. Meanwhile, cancer rates in people under 50 are . I am in doubting that this is merely coincidence.

But nothing freaks me out more than chemicals making their way into my family’s food. Who among us could ever enjoy a bite of a Chicken DeluxeÌęagain if we knew it were laced with poison?

I decided to look into what we know about chemicals in food packaging, what regulators are doing about it, and how we can protect ourselves.

Plastic Chemicals Pervade Our Everyday Food

I’ve been seeing pop up in my newsfeeds about plastic chemicals in food. I’ve had moments of paralysis in the grocery story trying to find a decent head of lettuce that wasn’t swathed in a plastic.

A group of Californians felt the same way. TheyÌęembarked on a six-month research project to test common food items—from local grocery stores and take-out joints—for the presence of chemicals that enhance the performance of plastics. Phthalates, for instance, are a class of chemicals used to make plastic more pliable. Think: milk jugs and yogurt cups. Bisphenols are plastic hardeners found in beverage bottles and linings of canned goods.

The independent group, working under the name PlasticList, purchased 775 food samples of 312 items. Everything from Almond Breeze milk (currently sitting in my fridge) and grass-fed steak from Whole Foods to Taco Bell chicken burritos and, yes, my beloved Chicken Deluxe from Chick fil-A. They then tested those items for the presence of 18 common plastic-related chemicals that fall under the umbrella of endocrine-disrupting chemicals (or EDCs). Ample proof exists that EDCs cause like cancer, diabetes, and reproductive and neurological disorders.

The is pretty shocking: the PlasticList team detected plastic chemicals in 86 percent of the food tested. “But this doesn’t mean we should all freak out,” says Yaroslav Shipilov, the PlasticList team leader. “Although it was surprising to discover the presence of plastic chemicals in such a huge percentage of the food we tested, in all but 24 specific cases, the items are still safe to eat according to the three major regulating bodies, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).”

Shipilov hopes that his findings will spawn more testing. He also hopes that the regulating bodies will update their outdated safety limits, which are decades old and often contradictory. “For example, in some cases we have chemicals that have been banned from children’s toys, but not food. This suggests that they are not safe for toddlers to touch, but are fine for them to ingest,” he says.

Are Plastic Chemicals Harmful to People?

Make no mistake about it. A rapidly growing body of evidence proves that plastic chemicals are really bad for human health, not to mention the harm they cause the environment.

To get an overview of the health impacts, I reached out to Philip J. Landrigan MD, a pediatrician and biology professor at Boston College. Landrigan serves as director of both the Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good and the Global Observatory on Planetary Health.

In October 2023, Landrigan published , a wide-ranging report covering the many health and environmental implications of plastic chemicals.

“Plastics have allowed significant benefits to humanity in the fields of medicine, electronics, aerospace, and more. But it’s also clear that they are also responsible for significant harms to human health, the economy, and the earth’s environment,” says Landrigan. “Thousands of chemicals—including carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, neurotoxicants, and persistent organic pollutants—leach out of plastics and harm human health at every stage of the lifecycle, from production to discard.”

For example, Landrigan says, consider the coal miners and oil field workers who suffer from cardiovascular disease and lung cancer. (These workers extract the raw materials that create plastic.)ÌęThe plastic production workers who have an increased risk of leukemia, lymphoma, and brain and breast cancer. The plastic recycling workers who contend with high rates of toxic metal poisoning and neuropathy. The workers in the plastics textile industry die of bladder cancer and lung disease. And the families who live near plastic production facilities who have increased risks of premature birth, low birth weight, asthma, childhood leukemia, lung cancer, and a host of other life-threatening ailments.

The report says that these harms exceed $500 billion per year in health-related costs in the U.S. alone.

“What’s most concerning to me as a pediatrician,” says Landrigan, “is the risk that chemicals in our food pose to pregnant women and young children. We all need to be more aware of plastics’ threats to human health. And we need to take intentional steps to reduce our exposure and our children’s exposure to plastic.”

Food Packaging Regulations Are Rolling Out–But Not Fast Enough

The federal government has been slow to respond in a meaningful way to the growing body of evidence that plastics in our food system are poisoning us.

Just last week, a group of environmentalists filed a new lawsuit against the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) over the use of phthalates in plastic food packaging. For close to a decade, the FDA has ignored calls to take stronger action against phthalates. We lag far behind the European Union in this regard.

Reporting from suggests that this refusal is due to pressure from the chemicals industry, which would surely suffer in the face of a phthalates ban.

Still, some states have begun to take independent action to protect our food from plastics chemicals.

“States have taken the lead on phasing out dangerous chemicals from food packaging and containers,” says Gretchen Salter, policy director for Safer States, a national alliance that works to protect people and the environment from toxic chemicals. “Our shows that 16 states have adopted 29 policies to remove chemicals like PFAS, phthalates, and bisphenols (chemicals like BPA and BPF)Ìęfrom food packaging. Additionally, Washington state has recently Ìęto ban allÌębisphenols in drink can liners and require disclosure of the use of allÌębisphenols in food can liners.”

5 Ways To Protect Yourself From Plastic Chemicals in Food

Try as we might, avoiding plastic food packaging altogether is downright impossible. But there are some things we can do to not only limit our exposure to their inherent chemicals (like phthalates, bisphenols, and PFAS), but to be part of long-term solutions that will protect our kids, grandkids, and all the generations to come.

1. 1. Avoid fast food and take-out. When you can’t, get that hot food out of its packaging as soon as possible to avoid chemical leaching. Even pizza boxes contain PFAS.
   2. Bring your own take-out containers. When dining out, bring a glass or metal container from home for leftovers. And avoid putting plastic take-out containers into the microwave. Although the specific research around this practice is , most experts believe this can cause additional contamination and leaching.
   3. Opt for fresh, whole foods. Skip the packaging whenever you can. For example, buy loose veggies rather than those ensconced in plastic. For meat and fish, buy direct from the counter. Ask for it wrapped in paper, rather than picking up a package from the chiller, where it’s been resting in a plastic package for who-knows-how-long. (Note: even that butcher’s paper likely has chemicals on it, so unwrap it as soon as you get home.)
   4. Ditch all plastic from your kitchen. Yep, you heard me—all of it. Storage containers, colanders, utensils, cereal bowls. Start to replace all of those items with glass, wood, metal, and ceramic. I’ve scored some really high quality replacements at the second-hand stores I love to frequent. And don’t forget the Saran Wrap and Zip-Lock bags. Transition away from those, too, and go with beeswax bowl toppers and silicone baggies.
   5. Speak up! It takes one minute to to create a Global Plastics Treaty. Do it! Another powerful action you can take is to write a letter to your state congress representatives. Urge them to support the Global Plastics Treaty as well as state laws to ban toxic plastic chemicals. Here are to get you started.

Kristin Hostetter is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s sustainability columnist. Sadly, she has eaten her last Chick fil-A Chicken Deluxe. But she’s currently working on recreating a healthier version in her home kitchen.Ìę Follow her journey to live more sustainably by for her twice-monthly newsletter.Ìę

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I’ve read more books on climate action than I can count. So I don’t say this lightly: I’m obsessed with the one I just finished, byÌęAyana Elizabeth Johnson.

In it, Johnson, a marine biologist and co-founder of the nonprofit think-tank , conducts interviews with 20 experts in everything from finance to farming to film and asks them to imagine what a replenished and healthy world might look like if we use the collective wisdom we already have to combat climate change.

I read this book in mid–November, right after the 2024 presidential election, and I was pretty gripped with climate anxiety.

This is not another preachy enviro-book. It’s not pushing hope for hope’s sake down our throats. Instead, it spotlights innovative solutions that are already working—like an increased reliance on renewable energy, greening up transportation and buildings, regenerative agriculture, and reducing food waste—and urges us to consider the possibilities when these things scale. Interspersed throughout the interviews are lists of jaw dropping facts, poems, and essays. And plenty of calls to action.

There was one paragraph that really hit me. In her interview with Paola Antonelli, senior curator for architecture and design at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, Johnson asks her a question that recurs throughout the book: “How can we be part of the solutions we need? Is there a call to action?”

“The call to action is really to be better humans,” Antonelli says. “I don’t know how else to put it. Be better humans by understanding that we live for others. Otherwise we don’t have much reason to live. And when I say ‘others,’ I mean also the rest of the environment, all creatures and things. The answer is love.”

I decided to reach out to Johnson for a climate pep talk. The book hit shelves in September 2024, and we’ve had a presidential election—and a lot of global unrest—since then. I was curious how Johnson felt now, and whether her attitude or ideas had shifted with the socioeconomic and political tides. Plus, I just really didn’t want the book to end. Johnson’s casual, conversational style of writing left me feeling like we were already friends and hoped I could glean even more insight from one of the most exciting minds in the climate movement.

OUTSIDE: Talk me off the ledge: the book’s premiseÌęponders what theÌęworld would look like if we get climate action right. But can we actually get it right? In the time that we have? How?Ìę

JOHNSON: I have a lot of angsty journalists on my calendar right now and I’m just like, at what point did I become everyone’s climate shrink? How did I become the pep talker? It’s sort of funny because I am decisively not an optimist. I’m well aware that this climate scenario could very easily go even further off the rails. But it has literally never occurred to me that we should give up because that’s absurd, right? You don’t give up on life on earth.

And so it just always comes back to the question of what can we do to make it better? Because not trying is not an option. I was raised by two people who were in various small ways active in the movement for civil rights. At no point did people in that movement say, “This is too hard. Let’s just give up and be unequal forever.”

Sometimes I think there are a lot of people out there who are just quitters when it comes to climate change. They think the odds are too long and they’ll be gone anyway. But that’s a very weak and sad response.

Part of the problem is that we’ve been told that we have to stop or solve climate change. And those verbs are clearly delusional because we can’t solve it and we can’t stop it. But we can make things much better than they otherwise would have been if we didn’t try.

People just need to roll up their sleeves and get their heads in the game. I don’t really know what to say about the anxiety that most people are feeling except to say this: you will feel a hell of aÌęlot better if you’re doing something about it.

Most of the people reading this interview care and want to take action. But unfortunately there are so many who don’t, who just go about their lives, and intentionally or unintentionally don’t think about what the world will look like in 50 years. What would you say to them? Wake up! As the saying goes, if you’re not part of the solution,Ìęyou’re part of the problem.

You use a Venn diagram exercise to help people find their niche in the climate movement. Can you explain how it works? To ensure a livable future on this planet, we need to move beyond the platitudes of reduce, reuse, recycle. There is no one person or one entity that can fix this problem. We need to create a culture where everyone has a role to play. Are we gonna put our heads in the sand or pitch in?

The Climate Action Venn Diagram is a tool that helps everyone find their unique role by finding the intersection of three questions. 1) What brings you joy? 2) What are you good at? 3) What work needs doing?

The book is the result of my Venn diagram.

The Biden-Harris administration has arguably taken more climate action than any in history. A lot of environmentalists are bummed—even scared—about the results of the recent presidential election. You wrote the book before it happened. How did the election impact you personally and how will it impact your work and message moving forward? The last Trump administration rolled back well over 100 environmental protections and we don’t want that to happen again. In this current environment, I think we may need to do some reframing. We may get more traction if we talk less about “climate change” but keep pushing on the solutions. For example, there may be some openings in just the basics like the government protecting clean air and clean water, and we can reframe a lot of climate stuff in those terms because all Americans care about that.Ìę

When you feel like you’re banging your head against the wall, stop doing what you’re doing and find a different way. Because if yelling climate facts at people was enough, we would have solved this already, right?

I also think it will be really hard for the Trump administration to turn its back on the economic benefits we’ve seen from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Especially when so many red states are benefitting the most. Texas and Iowa lead the nation on wind energy. Not because they’re a bunch of hippies but because the finances just make sense. As of 2022, the clean energy sector employs more than 3.3 million people, over three times more than fossil fuels.

My reaction to this election was OK, what does this mean for me and my work? My answer, after reevaluating all my projects: I just need to double down. That includes focusing on what city governments can do to adapt to climate change, via my think tank Urban Ocean Lab, and supporting the next generation of climate leaders through teaching at Bowdoin college, and consulting with corporations that are trying to get it right since the federal government isn’t adequately regulating their climate impacts.

But overall, the role that I see for myself in climate work is to welcome more people into it. We need way more people working on climate solutions. So how can I help people get creative and find their own personal approach?

Was your book tour, which really wasn’t a book tour in the traditional sense, part of that approach? Yes, the Climate Variety Show, which we put on in Brooklyn, Los Angeles, and Portland, Maine, was born out of my own complete lack of desire to read my book aloud in bookstores across the country. What could be more boring? People are already bored of climate change, so how do I entice people in? I feel like there are things we haven’t tried yet as far as communications and influencing our friends and family.

So the was all about taking climate seriously without taking ourselves seriously. It was basically like a high school talent show—comedy, dancing, hula-hooping, poetry, games, music, puppets, and magic all mashed up into an evening of delightful chaos.

And everyone there filled out their Climate Action Venn Diagram in real time. If you want to get a sense of what it was like, you can hear audio clips in and see a in my Substack newsletter.

In What If We Get It Right?, you end each chapter by asking your interviewee the top three things they wish everyone knew about their particular area of expertise. So I’d like to ask you: What are the top three things you want everyone to know about your book?

1. It’s quite a fun, spirited read. I’ve been told the vibe of the book is like eavesdropping at a dinner party with me and 20 dear friends and colleagues, because the book includes interviews with these brilliant folks who are showing the way forward to their “visions of climate futures,” as the subtitle puts it. And if you listen to the audiobook, you get to actually hear these conversations.
2. There’s magnificent art and poetry mixed in.
3. I envisioned this book as something that people would read and discuss together, so, for book clubs and teachers, I made .

Oh! And as a bonus, the very last page has , which I spent an inordinate amount of time putting together and includes anthems for victory, love songs to Earth, tunes for tenacity, and sexy implementation vibes.

Kristin Hostetter is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s sustainability columnist. This column is the result of a similar Venn diagram exercise she did several years ago when she became a founding member of the . Follow her journey to live more sustainably by for her twice-monthly newsletter.

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Auden Schendler, one of the biggest climate advocates in the outdoor industry,Ìędoesn’t start his new book, Terrible Beauty, with any of the myriad lessons he’s learned over decades of environmental work. Schendler, who is vice president of sustainability at Aspen One (parent company of Aspen Snowmass), doesn’t drop into scare tactics, or data, or the myriad ways global warming is harming recreation, business, and our ability to thrive. Instead, he opens with a camping trip in the Utah desert with a couple of buddies, chasing down dirt devils for the sheer glee of being outside in a storm.

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The book goes on to examine the ways we need to approach environmentalism if we want to experience that joy in the future. In his 25 years heading up sustainability initiatives for one of the ski industry’s biggest corporations, Schendler has been at the forefront of climate action. He converted Aspen’s utility to renewables, convinced its tissue supplier to stop cutting down old-growth trees, and led the outdoor industry in political lobbying. But he says we need to do more. A lot more. Corporate sustainability is failing, he says, and individuals aren’t leveraging enough of our personal and political power because we’ve been cowed into thinking we don’t have any. And now, the clock is ticking. According to Schendler, modern environmentalism is broken—but he has some ideas about how to keep it moving forward.

Terrible Beauty: Reckoning with Climate Complicity and Rediscovering Our Soul is a book about citizenship, the pursuit of purpose, and uphill battles you might not win but have to keep fighting anyway. It’s a book about right now.

What do you hope people take away from this book?

I want to suck people into the joy of the universe, then give them that technical payload on climate in a way that motivates them. When you ask people, “What do you care about?” It’s things like community and family and wild places. But when you ask them, “What are you doing to protect those things against this existential threat?” they throw up their hands. I wanted to give people tools to figure it out. So there’s a bunch of stuff about banks and how the financial sector impacts climate change, but this is a book about the human experience. I’m trying to say modern environmentalism is failing, but what can replace it? Can it be exciting?

Let’s talk about that failure. You’ve that skiing is toast, and that we’ve failed on climate as a society. How do we go forward in the face of that?

When you’re in a movement that’s losing it’s not glamorous, but this is where I think there’s a connection to the outdoor world. The purpose has to come in the doing of the thing. It’s like type 2 fun. It’s not about winning or losing—I think in any human endeavor it’s very rare to be able to say,Ìę“yes, we won.” Instead, we have to think about it like a practice. We’re improving the world. As much as a day in my life as a climate fighter is depressing, it’s also fascinating and weird and filled with these odd twists and turns and micro wins and crippling losses. There’s a lot of glee in getting into mischief.

You argue that the ways we’ve largely been doing environmental work, particularly corporate sustainability, isn’t actually addressing the root causes of global warming. How do we change?

When we discovered that CO2 was going to be a problem in the fifties, we should have started getting off [fossil fuels], but we didn’t because we were misinformed, or because politicians were bribed, and since then we’ve been working toward targets that are in line with what the fossil fuel industry would want. For instance, in my world, the outdoor world, you could say, “let’s talk about recycled skis,” but that doesn’t really move the needle. Instead, we need to be publicly lobbying our peers and elected officials on climate.

What can someone like me, who isn’t part of a big business or advocacy group, do to move the needle?

My prescription is this: You get a six pack and you get a few smart friends, and you ask each other “Where do we have power?” You come up with an answer, then dismiss it if it’s not to scale.

Think about environmental activist Greta Thunberg, who said “I’m going to sit in this one spot for a year.” That helped. You have to just try some stuff. The question is really: Do we want to be citizens or not? Can you go to a town council meeting and talk about the planning and zoning board? You can’t just sign an online letter and call it good. You have to do real stuff and move your body and get out into society, instead of giving into the inclination to stay in or avoid confrontation.

That requires bandwidth, and there are people who don’t have that, and that’s OK too. Revolutions don’t come from 100 percent of the population mobilizing, it’s typically 4 to 9 percent, and that can make a difference.

Bandwidth, and who has the ability to act on climate, seems like a really big part of the conversation.

When climate is forcing you into survival mode, you don’t have the leisure that humans need to thrive. You can’t just be recovering from the last fire or flood all the time. This is environmentalism writ large right now. You think I have the luxury to care about climate? I can’t feed my family or pay my health care bills. This gets to the broader question of whether we’re actually taking care of each other, and we’re not.

The tension in the book is that the thing that could destroy us is also a fundamental opportunity for change as a society. How do you walk that line?

The cover of the book meant to express that. Like, “Damn, this thing is kind of fucked up, but it’s still beautiful.” I think about Tolkien’s idea of the long defeat, and how we’re in this long battle of good versus evil. We’re slogging through Mordor. I think this is humanity’s biggest project but we’re still making things better. It’s going to be uncomfortable and hard, but it can still be full of purpose and joy.

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Update (January 9, 2025): The study cited in this article had a mathematical typo in calculating the exposure risk of a harmful chemical called deca-BDE, inflating the number by tenfold. As a result, some news outlets have canceled the study. But the recommendations to avoid black plastic in the kitchen remains, according to co-author of the study, Megan Liu: “Due to our miscalculation (not included in the abstract, highlights, or conclusion) the estimated exposure of one of the chemicals detected, deca-BDE,Ìęin kitchen utensils is an order of magnitude lower than we originally reported. But our recommendation to use alternatives such as wood and stainless steel, especially with kitchen utensils, remains. Deca-BDE is a banned flame retardant that can still pose health hazards, especially to children. Plus, our study also found 10 other harmful flame retardants in certain black plastic items. None of the chemicals tested are regulated in recycled plastics. And they should be.”

Fair warning: if you invite me to dinner at your house and I spy a black plastic spatula in the utensil canister on your counter, I’m confiscating it. Not because I’m a thief, but because I care about you. I don’t want black plastic anywhere near your scrambled eggs or anything else that goes into your mouth.

A published in Chemosphere, a scientific journal covering environmental chemistry, sounds the alarm on the toxicity of black plastic, which is commonly used in kitchen utensils, take out containers, sushi and meat trays, and even childrens’ toys.

The study tested 200 household items for bromine, a chemical that indicates the presence of dangerous brominated flame retardants (BFRs). Of the 87 items that contained bromine, the 20 with the highest concentrations were then analyzed for BFRs. 17 came back positive. The items with the highest levels of BFRs: a take-out sushi tray, a black plastic spoon, and a children’s pirate necklace.

For me, the scariest part of this discovery is that BFRs have been banned in the U.S. since 2004. So why are they showing up in products on our shelves today? It’s because we’ve recycled BFRs into places that they were never intended to go and it raises big questions about the safety of plastics recycling in general.

Is It Safe to Use Black Plastic?

The growing consensus among experts is that black plastic poses risks to human health and the environment. BFRs are linked to including endocrine, liver and kidney toxicity, cancer, adverse effects of fetal and child development, and more, according to The National Institute of Health Sciences.

“Our study showed that BFRs (including one called deca-BDE which has been banned in the U.S.) still exist in a percentage of new black plastic household items,” says Megan Liu, co-author of the study and the science and policy manager for , an environmental health and advocacy nonprofit.

The problem, she says, is that BFRs is a broad class of chemicals and only a handful of them have been outlawed. (This is a common challenge with chemical regulations, as I discovered when researching an article on PFAs, aka forever chemicals.) When a specific iteration within a large class of chemicals is banned, companies often switch to a similar—and equally harmful—one. It’s been likened to a dangerous game of whack-a-mole in which companies technically stay compliant but exacerbate the danger.

Liu says black plastic contamination traces back to electronics or e-waste recycling. For decades, BFRs have been added to electronics to prevent fire-related injuries and damage to property. BRFs—both the banned ones and their cousins— are still in circulation as old and new e-waste makes its way into the recycling system.

“Without regulations to end the use of harmful chemicals and prevent them from being recycled, toxic flame retardants will continue to enter our homes through the back door and show up in products,” says Liu.

Plastic Was Never Meant to Be Recycled

This black plastic study reveals an inherent and much deeper problem with our plastic recycling system. Despite how desperately we want to recycle the plastic we consume, it was designed to be durable by its very own founding fathers.

Consider thisÌę against Coca-Cola and PepsiCo. The suit alleges that the mega companies contributed to the plastics crisis by misleading consumers with advertising that praises the recyclability of single-use beverage bottles. “Except at the margins,” the suit reads, “it is theater—a show designed to make consumers feel good about, and be willing to, consume unprecedented volumes of defendants’ single-use plastic.”

But don’t take my word for it. Take it from one of the early champions of disposable packaging. At a 1963 plastics conference, Lloyd Stouffer, editor of Modern Plastics magazine, gave a horrifyinglyÌęcelebratory speech about the disposable nature of their darling packaging material and all the money it would make them.

“The package that is used once and thrown away, like a tin can or a paper carton, represents not a one-shot market for a few thousand units, but an everyday recurring market measured by the billions of units,” he espoused. “Your future in packaging does indeed lie in the trash can. You are filling the trash cans, the rubbish dumps and the incinerators with literally billions of plastics [sic] bottles, plastics jugs, plastics tubes, blisters and skin packs, plastics bags and films and sheet packages–and now, even plasticsÌęcans,” he said. I picture him raising his fist in celebration, dollar signs in his eyes. “The happy day has arrived when nobody any longer considers the plastic package too good to throw away.”

You can read the text of for yourself, and you should because it will blow your mind. It reads like an SNL parody. He waxed on and on about how all the different types of throw-away plastic–jars, bottles, cigarette boxes, shrink wrap–were replacing reusables at a staggering rate. All while saving companies millions.

In this room full of industry titans, Stouffer was leading a pep rally for pollution.

Jackie Nuñez, advocacy and engagement manager for Plastic Pollution Coalition, summarizes the fundamental in four words: “Toxics in and toxics out.” In other words, that should be taken out of the recycling system all together, and dealt with as the toxic/hazardous waste that it is.

“It’s ludicrous,” says Nuñez. She even takes issue with the word “recycling” when it comes to plastics. She argues that when plastics are reclaimed and melted down, they deteriorate and lose some of the function they were originally designed for. “Every time you heat up plastic, the chemical bonds weaken,” she says. “To turn it back into usable new plastic, virgin plastic must be fed in, perpetuating our hunger for plastic.”

It sounds like the evil twin of a sourdough starter that needs to be fed in order to rise.

Is It Better to Not Recycle Plastics?

Our long-term goal, according to both Liu, Nuñez, and many other environmental and health experts, should be to phase out plastic production.

According to Plastic Pollution Coalition, about 460 million metric tons of plastic are now produced annually. That number is expected to triple by 2050. Yet, ever made has been reclaimed. Recycling rates for other materials, like aluminum, glass, and paper, are far higher.

“This black plastics study brings to light a disturbing fact about plastic recycling,” says Liu. “We can’t recycle our way out of the toxic plastic crisis. It is critical that governments adopt strong restrictions on harmful chemicals and plastics to protect the health of all people.”

While Nuñez agrees that we need strong policies and regulations, and that polluters should pay for the harm they’ve done, she does not think that we should just give up and stop recycling.

“Yes, consumers should still separate out and sort their plastic according to their local guidelines,” says Nuñez. “This is our current, albeit flawed, system. It’s not broken, it’s just contaminated with plastic.”

How Can You Be Safe from Plastic?

While it’s clear that single-use plastic is bad for us and for the planet, it’s also, very hard to avoid it in today’s world. ThatÌę said, here is anÌęever-growing list of ways that I try to keep myself and my family safe from its harmful effects.

• Speak up! This is perhaps the most important thing you can do to create meaningful change. Ask your grocers and favorite restaurants to offer packaging choices that are nonplastic. Ask them to allow and embrace reusables. Write to your legislators and local officials and tell them we need to break free from plastic. Vote for politicians who support these views.
• Throw out your plastic kitchen utensils. This includes spatulas, spoons, strainers, bowls, cups, cutting boards, and containers.
• Shop smart. When you have the choice between plastic and any other material, steer clear of plastic. This is especially important when it comes to food packaging and anything that touches food.
• Adopt a reusable mindset. CarryÌęyour own water bottle. Bring your own cup to the coffee shop. Even tote your own container to restaurants for leftovers. This not only keeps youÌęsafe, it sends a message to the proprietors that you do not approve of single-use plastic.
• Know your local recycling guidelines. Really know them. Call your town or local recycling center and ask specific questions about exactly what they’ll take and won’t take.
• Sign petitions. It’s a fast, easy way to be part of collective action. Here are two you can sign today in minutes: supports federal legislation that would limit plastic pollution. supports a global treaty with the same goals.

Kristin Hostetter is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s sustainability columnist. She is on a perpetual quest to banish plastic from her life. Follow her journey to live more sustainably by for her twice-monthly newsletter.

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The leaves are starting to fall here in New England and that perennial urge to bust out the rake and leaf blower is nagging at me. But for the first time in, well, forever, I will resist that urge. Because it turns out, raking up and bagging or burning those leaves is not only bad for soil health. It also takes away habitat for important wildlife like bugs and birds, who are critical pollinators.

I know what you’re thinking. What will my neighbors think if I ignore my yard work? We’ve been taught—by society, by our homeowner’s associations, by our parents, and by our landscapers—to keep our yards clean and tidy. To remove leaves and branches as they fall. To whack back our shrubs and perennials after they bloom. And to invest in big fall and spring clean-ups that scour our flower beds free of debris. Your neighbors might think the alternative—a yard with fallen leaves, long grass, and flowers gone to seed—is untidy, or even a threat to property values and health (by attracting bugs and animals).

But ecologists say we need to rethink our preconceived notions of beautiful, well-maintained yards. Lawns comprise 44 million acres in the U.S. alone, more than double the acreage of all our national parks combined. And as satisfying as a perfect green lawn may be, it’s an ecological dead zone that doesn’t support any of the essentialÌęfunctions—like pollination, carbon sequestration, and nutrient recycling—that sustain our ability to live on this planet.

According to a by NatureServe, a nonprofit specializing in biodiversity data, more than one third of species and ecosystems in the U.S. are at risk of disappearing. This kind of biodiversity loss would be catastrophic for humans, ecologist and entomologist Doug Tallamy told me in an interview for a story I wrote about rewilding.

Thankfully, natural landscaping is trending. According to House Beautiful, the practice—which includes native perennials, wildflower and pollinator gardens, xeriscaping, and lawn reduction—is one of . That’s good news for folks on a budget (and those who want to reclaim their fall weekends) because natural landscapes are way less cost- and time-intensive toÌęmaintain. It’s also good news for all the bugs, birds, and bees, which are so critical for biodiversity.

But back to raking. As I write these words, I can hear the buzz of leaf blowers in my neighborhood. I can see a big truck piled high with collected leaves, about to be carted off to who knows where. Meanwhile, in my yard, I’m watching them fall and wondering how to harness their glory.

Why Experts Say Don’t Rake

“Leaves are not litter,” says Matthew Shepherd, the director of outreach and education at Xerces is a nonprofit focused on protecting and conserving insects and other invertebrates. “They provide critical food and shelter for butterflies, beetles, bees, moths, and other invertebrates. And we need to stop thinking of these tiny creatures as pests, but rather as heroes. Instead of banishing them from our spaces, we need to roll out the welcome mat.”

Insects are critical to humans because they transfer pollen from plant to plant, which helps plants and crops reproduce. “Without these pollinators, and ample habitat for them, our global food supply would be drastically diminished,” says Shepherd. Insects are also a valuable food source for birds, reptiles, and other insects, and they help aerate soil and decompose organic matter.

Additionally, leaf debris helps build healthy soil that holds moisture. Leaves are nature’s fertilizer: free, nutrient-dense organic matter that breaks down and feeds the soil. It’s pretty ironic that we sweep our yards clear of them and then run to the garden center to buy chemical fertilizers (which, according to The Freedonia Group, a market research firm, is a $4 billion market).

Here’s How to Get the Most Out of Your Leaves

As I watched the leaves pile up on my lawn, I started to wonder whether there were any downsides to letting them be. Is there such a thing as too much leaf litter? What if they dried out—could they be a fire hazard? I reached out to Jamie “Dekes” Dedekian, an organic lawn expert I’ve come to trust at my local garden center, Country Garden, in Hyannis, Massachusetts, to get some basic best practices.

“If you let leaves build up on your lawn over time, and just let them sit, the answer is yes, they will smother and could kill it,” Dedekian told me. But the answer is not to do a big fall clean up. Instead, he recommended a few easy “clean-in” techniques that will harness all the goodness in those leaves and distribute them in a beneficial way across your yard.

As they start to fall, blow whole leaves into your flower beds, where they’ll create wildlife habitat and eventually decompose and feed the soil and plants. Once you’ve created a blanket in the beds that’s a few inches thick, then it’s time to feed the lawn some leaves. “Remove the bag on your mower and mulch them up into small pieces,” he says. “It’s essentially a free compost application. As those small bits of leaves decompose they will actually help your lawn, not hurt it.”

If you live in a wildfire-prone area, you will also benefit from some leaf redistribution, because dry leaf litterÌęcan pose a fire hazard in hot, dry, windy conditions. Shepherd suggests raking them into a pile a safe distance away from structures—the U.S. Department of Agriculture at least 30 feet from the home—and letting them decompose naturally there.

“Even a small pile of leaves can make a positive impact,” Shepherd says. “Just find a corner of your yard, make a pile, and let it be. The animals will find it, and they’ll appreciate it.”

5 Pro Fall Tips for the Eco-Conscious Gardener

As I wrapped up my conversation with Shepherd, I asked him what yard tasks I can be doing to improve the health and beauty of my space this fall. After all, I love gardening and yard work, and with less raking to do, I’d have lots of time on my hands. Here are his ideas.

1. Relax and watch. “Just sit and enjoy your morning coffee while watching the finches feed on your seed heads and the bees buzz around the last of your lavender,” says Shepherd. “Sometimes protecting and promoting habitat means doing less. Part of gardening should be just sitting back and enjoying it. Actually taking time to notice and watch and appreciate the wildlife that you’re bringing in.” It’s also a good time to make notes about plants that thrived and those that didn’t, and make a list of new plants you want to try next year. Think about your bloom period through the year. “Did you have periods when you didn’t have a lot of bloom? Are there native plants you could introduce to fill those gaps?” he says.

2. Collect seeds. Are there plants you love and want more of? For me this year it was cardinal flowers, which drew hummingbirds into my yard every day. I’m leaving many of the seed heads intact for the birds to feed on, but I’m collecting some to plant.

3. Make a brush pile, also known as habitat pile. Find a lonely corner of your yard and start building a pile of sticks and branches for animals to. Start with the largest logs and branches on the bottom, and keep adding as time goes on. Be sure to leave gaps for airflow and wildlife access.

4. Save the stems. Some bees nest in the stems of shrubs and perennials, so resist the urge to chop them down to nubs.

5. Split native perennials. Fall is a great time to divide many plants. Dividing entails digging plants up and splitting the root ball into smaller sections to replant in different spaces. This practice promotes growth and is a great way to fill in gaps in your garden. I’ve got tons of splitting to do this fall: black-eyed Susans, daisies, catmint, sedum, and lavender to name a few.

Kristin Hostetter is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s sustainability columnist. On most weekends when she’s not out hiking, you can find her puttering in her garden or in the kitchen cooking up the fruits of her labor. Follow her journey to live more sustainably by for her twice-monthly newsletter.

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With all the greenwashing that goes into destination marketing, it can be easy to lose sight of the true meaning of “sustainability.” It’s simple: “Sustainable” travel is travel we can keep doing. And a huge part of that equation is going to places that have are committed to climate neutrality, where you can trust that your behavior upon arrival is sustainable by default.

These destinations have put serious thought and resources into creating sustainable experiences for travelers who want to do better and feel better about how they use their precious vacation days. More than most other places on Earth, there has been significant governmental investment in public transportation, tourist education strategies, environmental rehabilitation, and waste management. They’ve weighed all that behind-the-scenes stuff that you don’t have a lot of control over on a short trip—the environmental overhead, if you will.

To make this list, we looked for cities, countries, and regions that are internationally recognized for environmental innovation. We considered places withÌęimpressive public transportation networks, where you can easily get deep into the backcountry without renting a car. We also looked at rankings of per-capita carbon footprints, which correlates to how sustainable daily life is for the average resident. These destinations stood out for being easy to get around (without cars or commercial airlines), protective of cultural traditions, and sustainable overall by design.

1. Sweden

With one of the lowest per-capita carbon footprints in all of the developed world, it’s no surprise this Scandinavian nation offers perhaps the most guilt-free traveler experience you can find—whether you’re going for urban sightseeing or outdoor adventure. For starters, the country has an incredible waste management system. Earlier this year, Sweden enacted a law that requires everyone—individuals and businesses alike—to separate food waste from regular trash, which is then converted into biofuel. The country also recycles 35 percent of all plastic waste, and 82 percent of aluminum.

About 60 percent of Sweden’s electricity comes from renewable sources, and the country intends to achieve net-zero emissions by 2045. (In comparison, the United States gets only 20 percent of its electricity from renewable sources, according to the Department of Energy.)

More significant commitments to green energy abound in various Swedish cities. The port city of Gothenburg has been ranked the world’s most sustainable city on the Global Sustainable Destination Index for seven years running. Nearly its entire public transit system runs on renewable energy, and over 90 percent of its hotels have been environmentally certified. Stockholm’s whole land-based public transit system also runs on green energy, and the Swedish capital aims to make all of its ferries carbon-neutral by 2030. In the far north, the city of SkellefteĂ„ is currently working on electric snowmobiles to offer visitors a quieter way to spot wildlife in the winter.

Access to nature is ingrained in the country’s ethos, which means there’s a broad “right to roam” for hiking and camping pretty much everywhere. Even still, the government has recently started investing more heavily into building waymarked trails in lowland regions. To that end, Sweden has spent about $600,000 on the brand-new , which connects roughly 170 miles of new and existing trails across 22 islands using a series of ferries. As of October 2024, you’ll be able to thru-hike the Archipelago from north to south (or vice versa), starting with a ferry ride from Stockholm itself.

I recently got a sneak peek of the trail on a visit out to the islands of Utö, NĂ„ttarö, Sandhamn, and Ålö, and was stunned by how pristine, quiet, and diverse the land was. Some sections traverse soft, sandy beaches where you can swim in solitude even in mid-August. Others wind through evergreen forests dripping with so much moss and lichen that they seem enchanted. You can backpack the entire trail, camping for free on beaches and in forests, or you can stay in well-equipped inns, B&Bs, and guesthouses on every island.

Flight-free travel is easy across the country. Sleeper trains and overnight ferry services connect the major urban centers in the south to other mainland European cities, and the whole country is well-connected by train. From Stockholm, long-distance trains will take you directly into the Arctic.

Beyond all this, Sweden is helping other countries lower their environmental footprints, too. Swedish companies including Northvolt are . Spending your tourism dollars in Sweden contributes to this green economy.

2. Switzerland

Don’t even think about driving a car in Switzerland. There’s just no need—as soon as you arrive, you can take trains, buses, and trams right into the mountains. And if that’s not enough, gondolas, chairlifts, cable cars, and funiculars can dump you right out onto the trails. The entire nation’s public transportation network is at your disposal with a , which grants you license to hop on and hop off as you please.

Behind the scenes, about 75 percent of Swiss energy comes from renewable sources, and the country has a serious commitment to recycling. 82 percent of PET bottles actually get recycled in Switzerland, compared to about 30 percent in the U.S.

Switzerland is a vocal champion of international climate issues while also putting policies into practice at home. The nation’s tourism board has attempted to make the country synonymous with sustainable travel through its long-running “Swisstainable” campaign, which promotes environmentally-friendly businesses throughout the tourism sector. In order to work with the campaign, partners have to undergo a grading process to prove they meet minimum criteria for sustainable practices.

The national tourism board is also addressing overtourism by touting lesser-known regions eager to welcome visitors. Val Poschiavo, for example, is one of many gateway towns to the , an ancient trade route-turned-hiking-trail. The region has excellent infrastructure but relatively few international visitors, which is an extra bonus for you if you’re looking for a destination where travel feels—and is—easy while also seeming completely different from your everyday life.

3. Costa Rica

Costa Rica has long been synonymous with eco-tourism for the abundance and diversity of wild experiences within its borders. More than a quarter of the country’s land is formally protected, and according to the Global Alliance of National Parks, that makes it the world leader in percentage of land protected.

Over the last few decades, Costa Rica has worked hard to repair the damage of previous deforestation. In 2019, it received a Champions of the Earth award from the United Nations for those efforts—the highest environmental honor the UN awards. In 1987, the nation was only about 40 percent forested, and today that’s increased to over half. But the nation has no plans to stop there. Currently, the country generates about 98 percent of its energy from renewable sources. By 2050, the country hopes to be entirely carbon neutral.

Costa Rica does have some work to do with regard to recycling and waste management. In 2018, it was found that only nineÌępercent of renewable waste was recycled, though the country is now taking measures to address this. Earlier this year, Costa Rica passed laws banning the free distribution of single-use plastic straws and bags at the point of sale. Companies selling single-use bottles also have to agree to at least one of several measures to increase their use of recycled plastic, contribute to waste-management programs, or reduce their use of plastic packaging.Ìę ÌęÌę

4. The Highlands, Scotland

Unlike the rest of the United Kingdom, Scotland has a broad “right to roam” that mimics that of Scandinavian countries. Even on private land, you’re allowed to camp, hike, and paddle pretty much anywhere you like as long as you’re respectful of people’s homes and personal space. Protecting the land is an important aspect of Scottish culture, so you’ll also find a strong bent towardÌęsustainability here. The government has committed to reaching net-zero emissions by 2045.

If you want to take a guided adventure, go with Wilderness Scotland, an outfitter based in Aviemore. They’ve long been a leader in the tourism industry when it comes to building and operating sustainable trips, and I’ve seen first-hand how the company uses sustainable, locally-owned partners to elevate their small group adventures (starting at $1,825 per person). On one trip to Cairngorms National Park, we e-biked through the mountains to the off-grid Loch Ossian Youth Hostel, which can only be reached by foot or bike. The company uses trains where possible and has a fleet of electric vehicles to cart travelers when private wheels are necessary. They’ve also scored every single one of their offerings so you can see how your carbon footprint on, say, an overnight, island-to-island kayaking and camping trip around the Hebrides compares to a trip where you’d stay in local inns and hotels.

Best of all, you can take the swanky Caledonian Sleeper Train straight from London to trail towns like Fort William, a terminus of the West Highland Way, and Inverness, where you can walk to put-ins for the .

5. Kyoto, Japan

Japan is a world leader in public transportation and plastic recycling. But the city of Kyoto wins for more than just environmental sustainability. The city has done an impeccable job of preserving its history and cultural heritage, too. It , like woven and dyed textiles, woodcrafts, and handmade washi paper, to keep them alive. There are also , which have been lauded for their dedication to maintaining their original form even as they age and restoration becomes inevitable.

Kyoto offers a fascinating balance of the new, the old, and the natural, all of which are connected by near-perfect public transportation. Within the city limits but worlds away from its busyness, you’ll find the rural town of Ohara hiding among the foothills. Here, the natural environment blends seamlessly with urban comforts. Enjoy a stay in a ryokan to get a sense for traditional Japanese hospitality. Bathing rituals at onsen, or spring-fed baths, offer a glimpse at traditions that have evolved over more than a thousand years. Several temples in the area provide a quiet place for reflection among well-manicured grounds.

The city is also a leader in sustainable tourism among other peer cities in Asia. In 2019, it was the first Asian city to join the , which measures cities’ progress on various sustainability measures and creates benchmarks for improvement. Of course, there’s also ubiquitous public transportation connecting Kyoto to the rest of Japan, offering guilt-free access to adventure and culture well beyond the city limits.

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For about a year now, I’ve been a devoted thrifter. I estimate that about 75 percent of the clothing and household items I’ve purchased have been second-hand finds. My main motivation, of course, has been the environment. But I’ve also saved a ton of money along the way.

And maybe the biggest boon of this lifestyle shift is my new mindset. Before, if I wanted something and could afford it, I’d just buy it. I’d scoop things up because they were a good deal, even if I didn’t need them. (Hello, cute $5 Old Navy T-shirts in three different colors!) I thought nothing of plopping things in my Amazon cart and clicking that Buy Now button for the instant gratification of it all.

As a thrifter, my spending is on a slow burn. I realize that I don’t need that metal colander (to replace my old plastic one) in two business days. I can survive without it until I find one on the wonderfully crammed shelves of Goodwill. And I know I will, eventually. (In fact, I did, for $3.)

The “need it now” mindset is expensive and carbon intensive, what with all that packaging and shipping. It’s also mentally exhausting and stressful. Where do you think the term “shop til you drop” came from?

On the flip side, I’ve found that by slowing down my shopping habits, I start to see more sustainable opportunities everywhere. I fix things more often, rather than replace them. By waiting before I buy something, I realize that I can get by just fine without it. Or at least until I find it in a pre-loved condition.

And I’m not alone. The resale market, a.k.a. thrifting, is booming.

The Rise of Thrifting

According the ThredUp’s annual , the global market for secondhand stuff will reach $350 billion by 2028 and is going three times faster than the overall apparel market. The boom is driven by the surge of online marketplaces and the shopping habits of Gen Z and Millennials.Ìę Thrifting can take many forms: yard sales, estate sales, flea markets, Goodwill and Salvation Army stores, vintage shops, and online marketplaces like Poshmark, The RealReal, and ThredUp.

Options for outdoor gear also abound. Companies like Geartrade and Out&Back Outdoor will resell your old gear (for a small commission), and also offer great deals on pre-used stuff. Companies such as Patagonia, The North Face and Arc’teryx have their own and even brand-centric resale platforms. Remember classified ads in the back of the newspaper?

Embracing the resale market has a significant impact on the environment. Thrifting reduces waste, keeps items out of the landfill, slashes energy use and greenhouse gas emissions, and it cuts demand for “fast fashion.”

In no particular order, here are my favorite thrifting finds. Happy hunting!

1. Beautiful Bird Bath

Community “Buy Nothing” groups and local virtual yard sales can yield some great treasures. I wanted a pretty stone bird bath to entice hummingbirds to my yard, but new ones are upwards of 100 bucks. So I went on Facebook, found my local virtual yard sale, and made a post: “Seeking a cement bird bath, any condition.”

In a matter of days, someone from a few towns over DM’ed me saying I could have theirs for free. I picked it up, patched the cracks, and now it resides happily in my garden.

2. Heirloom Skillet

I’ve ditched all my nonstick cookware because it contains toxic forever chemicals and downsized my pot and pan collection. I realized that I didn’t need three different 8-inch skillets and five similarly sized sauce pans cluttering up my cabinets, even though I’m a dedicated home chef. Now I have just a couple of stainless steel pots, a big copper skillet, and a medium sized cast iron one. But I wanted a small one for single servings.

I scored a super high quality, “collectible,” 8-inch Griswold skillet at a flea market for $12. It needed a little love, but I was happy to oblige and now it’s as good as new. ( to revive and reseason cast iron.) The same skillet on eBay goes for over $100.

3. Go-To Hiking Boots

I’ve loved my Hoka Anacapa Mid GTX hiking boots for years. In fact, I’ve loved them to death and I needed to replace them. Thanks to a free Chrome extension called , I found an almost new pair on Poshmark for $47 (they sell for $195 new). When you search something on Google, Beni automatically scours more than 40 resale sites to find the exact product. I highly recommend downloading Beni.

4. Forever Garden Clogs

I’ve burned through several cheap plastic pairs over the years and wanted a permanent solution. Poshmark to the rescue again. My $30 bid for ever-so-gently used L.L.Bean Boot Rubber Mocs (new they go for $60) was accepted. This is likely the last pair of garden clogs I’ll ever buy.

5. My Favorite Jeans

Everyone knows old jeans are the best jeans. Old, thrifted jeans are even better. And not just because they’re the most comfy, but because new denim has . That’s why I was stoked to meet my favorite pair ever in a humble church basement thrift shop: vintage-y Levi’s, all soft and perfectly broken in, with cute rear pocket stitching. They set me back 8 bucks.

6. Preppy Madras Pants

When I was a kid, I was obsessed with the preppy look. (Does anyone remember ? It was my teenage fashion bible.) My drawers were filled with classic button down shirts and lots and lots of madras. When I found a pair of slightly obnoxious madras J. Crew clam diggers at a second-hand store, I was filled with nostalgia for feathered hair and mixed cassette tapes. They were a steal for $7.

7. Not Your Grandpa’s Overcoat

Even during my preppy high school days, I was a thrifter. I’m not sure whatever happened to that oversized brown tweed men’s overcoat I rocked to school each day back then, but I recently found a similar version for $12 in mint condition. Even though I’m more of a puffy jacket girl these days, this is my new cool weather go-to when I want to class things up a bit.

8. Kitschy Party Shirt

I’m always on the lookout for quirky-cool clothes for my sons. My ski-obsessed youngest loves this fun button down printed with vintage French resort ski posters. It’s 100 percent cotton, nice quality, and it was ours for a fiver. Mom for the win!

9. Birthday Guitar

My son is a strummer and a traveler, but the two don’t often mix. Sitting around a campfire not too long ago, he wished he had his six-string. I thought back to a long ago review of a packable Martin guitar I edited for BACKPACKER. Back home, I fired up Google and found one in great condition on GuitarCenter.com for $184 ($319 new).

Ìę11. Travel Art

The vast majority of art you find while thrifting is crappy–faded Norman Rockwell prints, sappy animal portraits, and Impressionist train wrecks. But once in a while, you find a real treasure. My favorite is a simple street scene that reminds me of my travels. Is it Spain, France,Ìę Italy, or Peru? Who cares? I wish I were there, and the frame alone is worth more than the $40 I paid for it.

10. Garden Helper

So many new tools are cheap and plasticky, while the old school stuff is often higher quality and made from metal and wood. I love trolling the quirky and aptly named Used Tool Store near me when I need a specific piece of equipment for a project, like a drill bit extender or a compost turner. That’s when I found a funky two-point garden fork with super-skinny tines that fluffs my compost perfectly. It set me back $10.

Kristin Hostetter is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s sustainability columnist. She buys everything she can through thrifting and loves the thrill of the hunt.Ìę Follow her journeyÌęto live more sustainably byÌęÌęfor her twice-monthly newsletter.

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If you were to unfurl all the toilet paper that Americans use in a year, it would stretch more than 930 million miles. That would reach from the Earth to just beyond Saturn.

Toilet paper is one of those ubiquitous household items we all use every single day. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never given my bum-cleaning tool too much thought.

But consider this: per year, producing our toilet paper bridge to outer space churns up tens of millions of trees and uses approximately 197 billion gallons of water per year. And production emits as much greenhouse gas as 12.4 million gasoline-powered passenger vehicles. When I read these mind-blowing numbers, I started to give a crap about toilet paper.

What Is the Most Environmentally Friendly Toilet Paper?

Not all toilet paper is created equal, says Ashley Jordan, corporate campaign advocate for Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).ÌęNRDC is a nonprofit environmental advocacy group that leverages science, policy, law, and people power to safeguard the earth.

NDRC publishes an , analyzing and grading (A to F) the environmental impact of top brands. This grade takes into consideration the impact tissue production has on Canada’sÌęboreal forest, a massive swath of old growth trees that stretches for 1.2 billion acres from Newfoundland to Alaska.

The Canadian boreal forest is an environmental superhero. “Its soil and vegetation stores more carbon acre-per-acre than any other terrestrial ecosystem on Earth,” says Jordan. “But every year, Canada clearcuts a million acres of boreal forest, in part, to feed U.S. tissue consumption. The toilet paper we choose can have a major impact.”

But not all toilet paper comes from this embattled ecosystem, and the NRDC also examines products generated from other sources.

Breaking Down the Impact of the Three Major Types of Toilet Paper

Forest fiber

Most toilet paper brands come from wood pulp harvested from trees. Think Charmin, Scott, Cottonelle, and Kirkland (Costco) as well as most low-budget brands. “Each roll of forest fiber toilet paper uses around 1.2 to 2 pounds of wood,” says Jordan. “It requires twice as much water and has three times the carbon footprint of recycled fiber tissue.” No surprise: all the 100 percent forest fiber toilet papers received Fs on NRDC’s report card.

Many forest fiber brands display “FSC Mix” label—a certification that requires a product to be made from a blend of recycled wood and trees harvested from specific forests (including the Kirkland brand that I’ve bought for years). “FSC Mix brands brands get some additional points in our methodology,” says Jordan, “but ultimately, they still earn F grades.”

Bamboo

The wood-like plant is often touted as an environmentally friendly alternative because it’s fast growing and has a lower land use impact and carbon footprint than forest fiber. “It is a better option,” says Jordan, who notes that bamboo toilet papers received Bs and Cs on NRDC’s report card. “But where that bamboo comes from is an important factor. Did it come from a bamboo plantation that was clearcut and converted from a natural forest? Or did it come from a natural bamboo forest?”

Jordan says it can be difficult to tell, so she recommends looking for the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) “100%” certification label. “It indicates that the bamboo was sourced in a way that limits negative forest impacts,” says Jordan.

100 Percent Post-Consumer Recycled

These products comeÌęfrom paper that has been diverted from the landfill through recycling, then de-inked, re-pulped, and turned into tissue. This is the most environmentally-friendly choice, Jordan says. “As opposed to pre-consumer recycled content, which comes from scraps at manufacturing operations or unsold paper products, post-consumer recycled products have that added element of helping divert waste from landfills and fostering a more circular economy,” says Jordan. The brands that use 100 percent recycled fibers all received As and B+s.

Are Bidets More Environmentally Friendly than Toilet Paper?

The short answer is yes, bidets are more sustainable than toilet paper. They save trees and, surprisingly, they save water, too.

Unless you live in a water-scarce environment, bidets win over toilet paper because spritzing your bum uses far less water than wiping it. Here’s some conservative math: A typical bidet uses about one-eighth ofÌęa gallon of water per-flush. A single roll of standard forest fiber toilet paper requires six gallons. (Recycled toilet paper uses about three gallons). So one roll of standard toilet paper, which lasts my family of four maybe two days, equals 48 bidet sprays. If we each spray twice a day, that means a bidet uses 33.3 percent less water.

And there’s another factor to consider, too. Toilet paper, like so many of our household items, , which I wrote about several months ago. Also known as PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, this family of chemicals has been linked to a whole host of environmental and health problems like cancer, liver and thyroid problems, reproductive problems, and increased risk of birth defects, among others.

Since we know that the skin absorbs PFAS through contact, it’s a scary thought: with each wipe we could be exposing ourselves—in the most intimate way—to extremely toxic chemicals. Bidets avoid this exposure.

My Bidet Experiment

Bidets have been around since the 1700s, and while about 70 percent of the world uses them regularly, Americans have been slow on the uptake. That all changed when the pandemic hit and we were all scrambling to stockpile toilet paper. Since 2020, bidet sales in the U.S. have grown by .

I decided to see for myself what all the hype was about, so I ordered up one of the most popular, affordable bidets, the . After a simple 15-minute install, I was in business.

The Classic 3.0 is a simple insert that attaches to the base of the toilet between the bowl and the seat. A control panel juts out to side. A knob on the panel controls the spray. Here’s how it works: You sit. You poop. You spin the knob which controls the pressure, and a targeted jet of water hits you where the sun doesn’t shine. After about five seconds, you turn off the jet, grab a square of (recycled) toilet paper, dab dry, and off you go. (Tushy also offers washable bum towels as an alternative to toilet paper, but I have yet to make that leap.) My toilet paper use has plummeted by about 90 percent.

It’s been about a month of butt-washing, and I adore it. Seriously, there is nothing not to love about using a bidet. It saves trees, it saves water, it saves money, and my bum has never, ever been so clean. I’ll be ordering Tushys for the other bathrooms in my house. Heck, I’ll be ordering them for people on my Christmas list.

The upgraded model, the , is intriguing. It includes a seat warmer, a blow dryer, and the ability to control the water temperature. (I will surely appreciate this winter months!) But the Ace requires an electrical outlet near the toilet. I plan on installing one before the cold comes.

*The internet is rife with conflicting data about toilet paper. I made a few assumptions based on reliable sources (listed below) and relied on to determine the amount of resources that toilet paper consumes. Note: I calculated the numbers for forest fiber toilet paper. The reality is that an indeterminant portion of U.S. toilet paper usage is recycled.

• The average roll of toilet paper weighs 5 ounces and stretches .03 miles, according to my actual measurements.
• U.S. population is 345,000,000, according to
• The average person uses 85 rolls or 28 pounds of toilet paper per year, according to Statista. I adjusted this number conservatively because Statista’s assumption that a roll of toilet paper weighs just three ounces seemed way light compared to the variety of rolls I measured.Ìę

Hostetter has invited several friends over to poop on her bidet. Each one left a convert. Follow her journey to live more sustainably by for her twice-monthly newsletter.

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One lovely evening last summer I was enjoying a cocktail in my friend Joanie’s backyard. As we sat there sipping tequila and sodas in the gloaming, about a half dozen hummingbirds showed up to join the party.

We watched them for more than 30 minutes, sipping nectar from her feeders and then zipping over to her tangle of butterfly bush, where they’d hover over a flower and push their long beaks into one scarlet bloom after the other. It was mesmerizing: the calming buzz of their wings (which beat up to 5,400 times per minute), the precision of their beaks, the deftness of their flying, the way their feathers turn iridescent green when the light hits them a certain way.

Joanie, an artist and landscape designer, had intentionally created prime habitat for hummingbirds. And not just because they’re freakingÌęcool to watch. She did it because they, like bees, are pollinating superheroes. And pollinators, in case you didn’t know, are critical to both human survival and a healthy planet.

I was hooked and began wondering how to attract hummingbirds to my yard. After some research, I hatched a plan.

How Do Hummingbirds Help the World?

According to Pollinator Partnership, an astounding of food we eat can be traced to the work of pollinators like hummingbirds (along with other birds, bats, bees, butterflies, and beetles).

“Many plant species depend on hummingbirds as their main source of pollination,” says Anthony Colangelo from Pollinator Partnership, a nonprofit devoted to preserving and protecting the health of pollinators in North America.

Hummingbirds, Colangelo told me, are considered a keystone species. It means that their presence within an ecosystem has a disproportionate effect on other organisms within the system. How? “They are relentless workers and fast fliers, visiting 1,000 to 2,000 flowers in a single day, transferring pollen, from one plant to the next,” says Colangelo. “They provide an essential service in our food web and help maintain healthy levels of biodiversity.”

What Role Do Hummingbirds Play in Pollination?

In its simplest form, pollination is like sex for plants. It’s how they reproduce and form fruits and new flowers. Think of a pollen grain as a sperm. “When a pollen grain moves from the anther (male part) of a flower to the stigma (female part), pollination happens,” says Colangelo. “This is the first step in a process that produces seeds, fruits, and the next generation of plants, and it can happen through self-pollination, wind and water pollination, or through the work of hummingbirds and other pollinating animals that move pollen within the flower and from bloom to bloom.”

This summer, watching this in action has been one of my favorite pastimes. Here’s what it looks like: A bird appears, seemingly out of nowhere, and I hear that wonderful vibrating purr. It hovers at a flower and inserts its long beak into the bloom for a few seconds. “As it’s lapping up the nectar, pollen grains stick to its beak and facial feathers,” says Colangelo. “It’s kind of like the flower is rewarding the hummingbird for visiting it.”

Next, the bird flits to another bloom, inserts its pollen-dusted beak, where it touches and fertilizes that flower’s reproductive organs and also gathers more pollen on its face. Then off it goes to the next bloom, and the next, and the next.

In an ideal world, hummingbirds have an endless pathway of native flowers to visit. But sadly, they often don’t, which is where we come in.

What Happens If Hummingbirds Go Extinct?

If hummingbirds went extinct, . “90 percent of the world’s flowering plants and 87 of the top 128 global food crops need animal pollinators,” says Colangelo.

Of the 366 different hummingbird species (all of which live exclusively in the Western Hemisphere), “about 8 percent are endangered or critically endangered due to habitat loss and fragmentation, climate change, and invasive plants outcompeting natives in the landscape,” says Colangelo.

In the winter, like many living beings (including humans), hummingbirds migrate south to warmer weather. That’s why creating pollinator pathways—cohesive networks of pollinating flowers and habitat—is crucial.

“Hummingbirds live such energetic lives so they require lots of nectar (carbs) to fuel their daily flight,” says Colangelo. “Having lots of connected pathways reduces the amount of energy they have to spend finding food so they can expend that energy in other ways that keep their populations healthy, like finding mates, building nests, having and caring for babies, nest building, parental care.”

5 Ways to Attract Hummingbirds

Even though I’ve been an avid outdoorswoman my whole life, birding has never been something I’ve been that into. So it’s surprising and kind of ridiculous how hummingbirds now thrill me. In fact, of all the sustainability actions I’ve taken in my life, this one is perhaps the most gratifying. A year ago, I had no hummingbirds. Now they visit me every day, pollinating my little piece of the world. And all I had to do was roll out the welcome mat.

Here’s how you can do it, too.

1. Plant a few key plants

Hummingbirds are attracted to bright red, orange, and sometimes yellow flowers. They prefer those with tubular blooms, ones that accommodate their long beaks. I chose ruby red cardinal flowers (Lobelia cardinalis), which are native to my region. (Find your local native plantsÌęwith these .)ÌęJust three plants placed in the border of my vegetable garden did the trick. Almost every time I look at the beautiful red flowers, there’s at least one hummingbird nearby.

2. Hang a feeder or two

Feeders are a great way to attract hummingbirds to your space because they give you the opportunity to watch and fall in love with them. But don’t rely on feeders alone, cautions Colangelo. “Feeders are like Gatorade,” he says. “They provide the birds with a fast and easy hit of energy so they can keep working, but hummingbirds can’t pollinate from a feeder. For that they need the native flowers.”

You can buy hummingbird feeders like , which I like because it’s made of red glass rather than plastic, or make one yourself. I fashioned my own using a purchased , a recycled wine bottle, bits of wire, and some old red jewelry to attract the birds.

To fill the feeders, I make my own nectar by heating one part white sugar with four parts water until the sugar dissolves. Resist the urge to purchase hummingbird food tinted with red dye, which could harm the birds. And regularly: twice per week in hot weather and once per week in cooler temps.

3. Provide water for drinking and bathing

I made two water sources for my hummingbirds. The first is an ancient bird bath I scored off a Buy Nothing local Facebook group. It had cracks which I patched up with some quick-set concrete mix. The second is a lovely little fountain I made with an old garden pot, some river stones, and a purchased .

4. If you have an outdoor cat, put a bell on it

Cats are a big threat to hummingbirds and can snatch them right off of low-hanging feeders. Be sure to hang your feeders at least four feet off the ground, and consider putting a bell on your cat’s collar to warn the birds of their presence.

5. Support conservation organizations

Nonprofits like and Ìęwork to educate the public on the importance of pollinators as well as provide tools and resources for people who want to rewild their yards to welcome pollinators.

If it’s 5 o’clock, you can probably find Kristin Hostetter sitting in her pesticide-free backyard on Cape Cod with a cold drink and a bird book watching the hummingbirds. Follow her journey to live more sustainably by for her twice-monthly newsletter.

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It’s one of the first lessons we are taught in kindergarten: when you make a mess, you clean it up. This premise, called the Polluter Pays Principle, is at the heart of a wave of lawsuits—many of which have been launched by citizens—that demand accountability for the climate crisis we all face.

The lawyers managing these suits point the fingers at two culprits responsible: state governments that have failed to protect citizens from climate change, and Big Oil, which has lied about the impact of emissions on the warming planet, fought the transition to cleaner energy sources, and continued to drill, baby, drill.

“We’ve seen a significant and steady uptick of climate cases in the last 15 years or so,” says Michael Gerrard, faculty director of Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, who tracks climate change litigation around the world.

Something else that has seen a major uptick in recent years: big storms, wildfires, droughts, floods, and heat waves. These weather atrocities have become normal; we’ve come to expect the weather to be one of the top stories on the morning news. Lawyers and advocates believe citizens should be allowed to sue for damages that arise from these and other climate-related events.

“These are not ‘normal’ natural disasters,” says Aaron Regunburg, senior policy counsel with Public Citizen’s Climate Program, which fights the climate crisis by promoting clean, affordable energy and holding polluters accountable. “These events are caused by climate change and are the result of specific decisions made by Big Oil. They result in many deaths and billions of dollars of property loss and emergency services.”

In lawyerspeak, this translates to well-defined legal offenses, such as public nuisance, reckless endangerment, and outright homicide, among others. And attorneys around the globe are suiting up for a fight.

Youth Climate Cases Are on the Rise

Of the almost 1,800 U.S. climate lawsuits in Gerrard’s database, about 25 of them have been filed on behalf of children by Our Children’s Trust (OCT), a nonprofit public-interest law firm representing kids from diverse backgrounds who suffer the effects of climate change. According to Gerrard, these cases, which center on youth telling their impact stories, attract the most media attention. “They involve appealing young people who tell compelling stories, without the dry technical details involved in many other climate cases,” he says. “And it’s easier to talk about constitutional rights than complicated statutes and regulations.”

Our Children’s Trust has had some big recent wins.

In 2023’s Held v. Montana, the firm represented 16 kids from Montana, and argued that the state’s policy of ignoring greenhouse gas emissions when approving energy policies violated plaintiff’s rights.ÌęThe children testified that climate change had both physical and psychological effects on them, such as distress, anxiety, and asthma. In what has been heralded as a landmark win, the district judge ruled in favor of the children and ordered the state to incorporate greenhouse gas emissions analysis into future environmental projects.

The organization celebrated another victory in June, 2024. In the case (HDOT), OCT sued the state government on behalf of 13 children, arguing that its transportation system generates high emissions and violates the plaintiff’s constitutional rights to live healthy lives. The case reached a settlement which forcesÌęHawaiÊ»i to overhaul its ground and inter-island sea and air transportation systems to achieve zero emissions by 2045.

These victories raise public awareness and put pressure on governments to address climate change, says Gerrard. They are a key part of the strategy, and when climate cases like these are won—validating our constitutional right for a clean climate— they set important precedents that can help build cases against the real villains: the fossil fuel companies.

Holding Fossil Fuel Companies Accountable: A Key Piece of the Climate Crisis Puzzle

Suing Big Oil is no easy feat. Preparing a case requires exhaustive preparation, time and patience, and deep coffers. It can be a daunting prospect for overworked district and states’ attorneys.

Enter: Richard Wiles, the president of The Center for Climate Integrity (CCI), a nonprofit funded by philanthropists who support climate work, like the Rockefeller Family Fund. CCI’s mission is “to empower communities and elected officials with the knowledge and tools they need to hold oil and gas corporations accountable for decades of lying about climate change.” Wiles compiles evidence and creates strategies for attorneys to use to prosecute fossil fuel companies. Wiles’ work has supported pending cases in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Colorado, among others.

The common thread in his cases is the allegation that Big Oil willfully ignored climate change and that decades ago they actually predicted the climate change devastation we are now witnessing. He and his firm have amassed troves of evidence. A reads: “Present thinking holds that man has a time window of five to ten years before the need for hard decisions regarding changes in energy strategies might become critical.” And from 1981 says: “. . . it is distinctly possible that the CPD (the acronym for Exxon’s corporate planning department) scenario will later produce effects which will indeed be catastrophic (at least for a substantial fraction of the earth’s population).”

In other words, they knewÌęthe climate crisisÌęwas coming, they covered it up, and they lied, all so they could continue raking in billions.

Wiles likens this scenario to Big Tobacco’s coverup of rising cancer cases in smokers in the eighties and nineties. Cigarette companies knew their products were going to cause massive damage and kill people, but they lied about it and engaged in a massive disinformation campaign. In the end, Big Tobacco was found liable for knowingly deceiving the public about the risks of smoking and in 1997 the four largest tobacco companies were forced to pay more than $350 billion in damages. “It’s the same scenario with fossil fuel companies,” Wiles says. “For decades, they’ve been protecting their profits, ignoring the health of the planet, and we’re looking for them to pay for their deception.”

In September 2023, Governor Gavin Newsom of California announced The People v. Big Oil, a high-profile deceptionÌęcase alleging that five fossil field companies knew about all the havoc climate change would a wreak and hid it, causing taxpayers to pay for the damage and destruction. California is seeking a multibillion dollar abatement fund to provide for mitigation, adaptation, and resilience.

In Wiles’ opinion, more cases alleging climate deception is a positive for the environmental movement.Ìę“Accountability is a predicate for good policy. And we can’t get the climate policy that we need until we hold these companies accountable for the damages,” he says. “Once Big Oil loses 50 or 100 cases, once they’re found liable for damages, lying, racketeering, wrongful death, and other atrocities, we’ll be in a different place. If we don’t hold them accountable, if they continue to be able to lie, if they continue to be able to just pollute with impunity and greenwash us about their commitment to climate solutions, we’re never going to solve the problem.”

Wiles acknowledges that winning lawsuits alone will not stop climate change or alterÌępolicy. But he believes that climate change cannot be stopped without these suits, which erode the social license of the companies he believes should be held accountable.

Wiles points to the legal saga pharmaceutical company Purdue Pharma as an example. Years of court cases over the company’s sales and marketing of opioids, such as Oxycontin, eventually eroded the company’s public credibility.Ìę“Nobody’s looking at Purdue for advice on much of anything anymore, right?” says Wiles. “They have no pull in Congress anymore, and nobody is lining up with them.”

In other words, Purdue Pharma has become toxic and lost its clout. Wiles wants to see fossil fuel companies in the same sinking ship.

How to Get Involved in Climate Cases

So, how can you flex your own legal muscle in the ongoing fights against climate change? The experts I spoke to said you don’t need to hire a lawyer or join up with a class-action lawsuit in order to have an impact. There are easier ways to get involved that don’t require court cases and lawsuits.

The big one is voting. As citizens, it’s the most powerful action we can take to ensure that climate-friendly politicians are in place to make policy changes.

Regunburg also recommends leveraging your district attorney. “Know who your DA is and be sure to support the right ones,” he says. “Influencing a local DA is a helluva lot easier than influencing a senator. Call them and encourage them to file a climate deception suit.”

You can also take one minute to add your name to to encourage the U.S. Attorney General to keep the Big Oil lawsuits coming. Because death by a thousand cuts is still death.

Doing right by the planet can make you happier, healthier, and—yes—wealthier. șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s head of sustainability, Kristin Hostetter,Ìęexplores small lifestyle tweaksÌęthat can make a big impact.ÌęÌęfor her twice monthly newsletter or write to her atÌęclimateneutral-ish@outsideinc.com.

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