Tips for Traveling Green
Posted by Chad Norman May 29th, 2007 .
Well I’m off to Vancouver, British Columbia for 5 days. I’m really stoked for the trip, but concerned about my greenness. Traveling always makes things difficult because I get out of my routine. Plus, at airports and hotels, everything seems to be disposable.
Jet fuel aside, just getting through all my meals without generating piles of garbage is going to be tricky. The hardest thing is going to be maintaining my pledge to have a water bottle-free summer — the plane, airport, and conference I am attending will have water bottles at ever turn… I’m scared!
So what’s a guy to do? Well, here’s a few things I’m going to try:
- Carry a Nalgene water bottle. This will reduce my chances of snapping up disposable plastic water bottles.
- Collect recycling in my hotel room, and then dispose of it before I leave. This might get a little sticky, literally, but I’m going to try.
- Bring my canvas bag with me for shopping. Buying things in a foreign land is no different than at the local mall — single-use bags should be avoided.
- I’m going to travel with two of our cloth napkins — I mean, why not?
- Using public transportation. I’ll be using whatever Vancouver has to offer since I won’t be renting a car.
Those are the things I’m focusing on, but there’s more I can do. This about.com article gave me some additional ideas:
- Reuse hotel towels and sheets like you do at home.
- Don’t use the free hotel toiletries if you brought your own.
- Turn of the hotel lights, AC, and TV when not in use.
- Ask the hotel about recycling, particularly the free newspaper.
- Purchase electronic tickets.
- Use public transportation.
- Fly on airlines that recycling waste (British Airways and Southwest Airlines are best)
And don’t forget to prepare your home to hibernate while you’re away. Adjust the temperature on your water heater and AC unit, turn off water inside and out, unplug appliances and electronic equipment, and stop your newspaper.
Upon my return to the Lowcountry, I’ll do a postmortem on my low-impact travel experience. Wish me luck!
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Hmmm… Carrying a nalgene bottle might be hard - unless you have one that only holds 3 ounces or less. Those darn security measures still don’t allow more then 3 oz of liquid. But - you can do what my husband and I did on our trip over the holiday weekend to Ithaca, NY - carry an empty one through security and once you get past, fill it up at a water fountain. Good luck!
Linds, that’s what I’m doing. If fact, when I arrived last night I realized I had water in my bottle from three airports! But so far so good - no water bottles yet. I’ve also started collecting my recyclables, and have turned down maid service for the day. Now if only I could get them to stop putting a free paper at my door - I bet most people just throw these away.
Great stuff Chad… just stay away from the more expensive polycarbonate Nalgene plastic bottles as they contain Bisphenol A, which can leach into the liquid and cause health problems. Read the “Possible health risks” section here for more info. The best plastics for consumption are 1, 2 and 5 (this is the number on the bottom in the recycling triangle). Polycabonates are 7. And DON’T heat any plastics and consume the contents.
Doh! Yeah, you’ve taught me a lot about the badness that is plastic, but I guess I overlooked that when going for the green. When does does an action go from being green to being healthy…or are one and the same (as in this case). I can certainly see a case for never using Bisphenol A for any application, as it’s got to be added to a product somewhere, and that somewhere is bound to have pollution containment issues.
Good to hear that you’re considering how to maintain the green ethos on your trip. Definitely take your own water bottle. You just have keep it empty when you go through security, and then fill it up with tap water from the restroom after you’re in the secure area. Yes tap water, what 80% of the people in the world drink.
As for recycling in hotel rooms, that’s really not a sticky issue except for those free newspapers. Bring along some kind of bag, and you can rinse out whatever containers you end up with in your hotel room and keep them in that bag. Actually, it wouldn’t be a bad idea if hotel guests started asking the management what that particular establishment’s practice is regarding recycling. Sensible hotel management will have to get on board with the idea sooner or later, and it might as well be sooner. Happy travels.