Green Calgary's Blog

If you're anything like me, your power bills definitely spike in the winter. Between heating the house in our recent cold snap to using the electric kettle far more often to make some nice, warming tea, it can start to get pretty expensive! So, how do you keep to being sustainable, even in these conditions? Right now, I have three tactics that I use: 1. Don't turn up the heat. When it's cold, it can be tempting to hit the thermostat, but instead, I keep blankets and comfy sweaters in various locations around the house. Bundling up isn't only cozy, but it keeps the power bill down. 2. Have a snack and drink something warm. Digestion generates heat, so having a little snack will warm you up. I punctuate frequent little snacks with warm beverages. Oh, and I make a single batch of warm tea and keep it in a carafe so I don't have to keep using the electric kettle! 3. Get up and move. We all know that exercise will warm us up, but don't overdo it and get sweaty! Th...

Starting down the Zero Waste path is not easy. Most of us will find it very challenging, and many of us will have setbacks. But with some work and support, we can all start reducing our waste. Why do we want to cut down our waste? The Zero Waste philosophy is about waste management and planning - respecting the products in our lives and reducing our reliance on landfills. The benefits are many, such as reducing the plastic pollution in waterways, reducing the land use for landfills, and conserving our water and energy. “Canadians rank worst of all countries on earth for waste production per capita. Albertans produce the most waste of all the provinces and territories in Canada.” – Conference Board of Canada, 2014 How does it work? The Zero Waste philosophy is more about guiding principles than it is about hard-and-fast rules. Respect the products you use, and plan for the entire life of the product. Not all of the work can be done by people alone, and companies and ...

I love to get into the kitchen and cook. Many of us here at Green Calgary do. I also love that it's one of the easiest places to make a real difference in my environmental impact! The average Canadian throws out about 170 kg of food every year, making up about 40% of what we buy! So, I make it my mission to cook and eat as sustainably as possible, and I've found that, actually, it's not that difficult! I'll go through a little list here of some general tips, and some specific ingredients you can use! Here are your Green Kitchen essentials to live by: Plan your meals: My partner and I always plan two weeks of meals at a time, so when we buy groceries, we know when we're buying things we need versus things we just want... That helps remind us that we don't need to purchase too many unnecessary or unhealthy foods. Have a storage plan: Plan where all the food is going to go. Partly, this also means planning on what you do if your lettuce starts to go bad...

Last fall, I went to a volunteer recruitment event at Bow Valley College. After speaking with dozens of bright, and motivated people about the possibilities of volunteering with Green Calgary, I packed up the booth and, with my coworker Reka, headed to the elevators to take the materials back to the car. Once we had piled all our materials into the elevator car, and the doors began to close, someone called out: "Wait!" We held the doors for someone, and once she'd got onto the elevator, we discovered we were all going to the same parkade level. "What are you doing at the college?" She asked. We were clearly carrying lots of gear. "We were at the volunteer fair," Reka answered for us. The woman then noticed our name tags. "Green Calgary," she asked. We nodded. "You've heard of us?" "Yeah, you came to my daughter's elementary school a long time ago." The elevator came to a stop and we all got off. I divided...