10 Sustainable Alternatives to Products Used Daily
10 Sustainable Alternatives to Products Used Daily. Are you looking to make your home more eco-friendly? There are plenty of sustainable alternatives to the products you use every day to help live a more sustainable life. Switching to environmentally friendly products is easy and affordable. Here is a list of the top 10 sustainable products and alternatives to help you transform your home into an eco-friendly paradise.
- Shampoo & Conditioner
- Nine million tons of plastic get thrown into the ocean every year (17). Much of that plastic is from shampoo and conditioner bottles. Shampoo bars are a great alternative because there is no need for plastic bottles. Also, they’re easy to pack and travel with. According to National Geographic, “glass and metals, including aluminum, can effectively be recycled indefinitely, without a loss of quality” (18). Many brands use alternative materials to plastic.
- Here is a list of 3 eco-friendly shampoo and conditioner brands:
- Composting At Home: Compost Bin For The Refrigerator & Composter Outdoors
- A compost bin is a container into which you place organic waste to turn into compost over time (4). Compost bins are a great way to recycle your waste. Some of the benefits of composting are that it enriches the soil, reduces methane emissions, and the need for chemical fertilizers (7). A great trick to keep your kitchen from smelling like decaying organic matter is to place your compost bin in the refrigerator or freezer. This will keep the smells at bay and when it is time to transfer to your outdoor compost bins such as these products, it is a simple and easy process. Also, check with your local municipality to see if your city or county gives away free compost bins to residents such as in Orlando, Florida.
- Bamboo Toothbrush
- Approximately 1 billion toothbrushes are thrown away in the United States a year which amounts to 50 million pounds of waste in landfills (9). Rather than adding more waste to landfills, why not use a biodegradable alternative? Bamboo toothbrushes are a sustainable alternative to plastic toothbrushes. They’re easily replaceable and won’t harm the environment. Here is a list of the 3 best bamboo toothbrush brands to purchase from:
- Recycled Toilet Paper
- Did you know that 27,000 trees are cut down every day to produce toilet paper (10)? Buying recycled toilet paper helps to reduce the number of trees used in making toilet paper. Trees provide us with shade and the oxygen we need to breathe. Recycled toilet paper is easy to buy at stores like your local Whole Foods or online. If you’re looking to purchase online, Who Gives a Crap is a great service that will deliver recycled toilet paper right to your door!
- Reusable Straws
- Plastic straws are notorious for filling landfills because they’re easy to use and discard. Unfortunately, most plastic straws are not biodegradable and therefore cannot be broken down by decomposers into non-toxic materials (12). For this reason, reusable straws are a sustainable alternative to plastic single-use straws. Reusable straws are easy to clean and transport. They are available in most major stores such as Target and Whole Foods. However, if you want to buy online, here’s a list of 3 reusable straw brands to buy from:
- Eco-Friendly Dishwasher Detergent
Water softener products
When it comes to household water, many people would install different kinds of water softeners, filters, or even give their water a suitable water treatment to get rid of hard water issues. Apart from your bathroom and kitchen where demand a huge amount of water treatment, the garden is another place that people usually do not know there is such an eco-friendly irrigation system that gives your garden zero-chemical water treatment, which removes the hardness in an environmentally friendly way by changing the solubility of soluble substances.
- Switch Deodorant Brands
- Many of the deodorants we buy in stores use plastic packaging. Approximately 79 percent of plastic ends up in landfills or as litter in our natural environment (16). Once we finish the deodorant bar, we throw them away and they end up in landfills. From there, the plastic takes years to biodegrade. Sustainable packaging bypasses the need for plastic so there is less pollution in our natural environment. Many brands are switching to biodegradable packaging without sacrificing the product’s efficiency.
- Here is a list of the 3 best smelling and sustainable deodorant brands you can buy from:
- Reusable Cotton Dish Towels
- Instead of using paper towels that inevitably end up in landfills, use an eco-friendly and reusable option like organic dish towels or cut up old towels for an at-home sustainable option. To make one ton of paper towels, 20,000 gallons of water are used (15). Overall, using dish towels conserves water and keeps paper towels from ending up in landfills. Repurposing an old towel is an easy way to create your own dish towels. However, if you rather purchase some online, here’s a list of 3 sustainable dish towel brands:
- If You Care Sponge Cloth ($6)
- Anneko Design Sweden ($6+)
- Skoy Cloth ($8)
- Instead of using paper towels that inevitably end up in landfills, use an eco-friendly and reusable option like organic dish towels or cut up old towels for an at-home sustainable option. To make one ton of paper towels, 20,000 gallons of water are used (15). Overall, using dish towels conserves water and keeps paper towels from ending up in landfills. Repurposing an old towel is an easy way to create your own dish towels. However, if you rather purchase some online, here’s a list of 3 sustainable dish towel brands:
- Sink Strainer
- Sink strainers are an easy and cheap way to protect your plumbing and local waterways from contaminants. Cleaning chemicals, food particles, and debris may pollute local waterways which will affect your drinking water and threaten the lives of local wildlife. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, “Unsafe water kills more people each year than war and all other forms of violence combined. Meanwhile, our drinkable water sources are finite: Less than 1 percent of the earth’s fresh water is actually accessible to us” (14). Using a sink strainer could help to prevent pollution of our drinking water and the local ecosystem for many living creatures. Also, without a strainer to filter out food particles and debris, your drain may get clogged. A strainer could prevent this blockage before it happens and is cheaper than paying for the drain to get unblocked. A great way to recycle your trash would be to use the chunks of food that are filtered out by the sink strainer for composting.
- Here are 5 of the best-rated sink strainers from Home Depot:
- Fit-All Replacement Strainer Basket in Stainless Steel ($2.34)
- Stainless Steel Basket Strainer and Spin Lock Strainer in Stainless Steel ($4.98)
- Standard Post Sink Strainer in Stainless Steel ($9.41)
- EZ Lock Sink Strainer in Stainless Steel ($12.78)
- Spin Lock Sink Strainer in Stainless Steel ($21.00)
- Rechargeable Batteries
- Most batteries, especially alkaline batteries, are used once then discarded in the trash. From there, the batteries end up in landfills and fill the air with heavy metals (13). Instead of buying single-use batteries, use rechargeable ones so fewer batteries are discarded into landfills. Rechargeable batteries work just as well and are nearly as affordable.
- Here are 3 rechargeable battery brands to buy from:
Make sure to share this post with your loved ones to inspire them to consider purchasing eco-friendly alternative products. Changing to reusable and biodegradable products is easy, affordable, and easily accessible. Switching to sustainable alternative products is a great first step to transforming your home into an environmentally friendly oasis. Even small positive changes can have a huge impact on our environment. Let’s work together to heal our planet by making sustainable changes in our day to day lives.
Sources:
- https://www.sustainablejungle.com/best-of-sustainable-beauty/best-sustainable-ethical-deodorants/
- https://grist.org/politics/most-lithium-batteries-end-up-in-a-landfill-a-new-bill-aims-to-change-that/
- https://sensibledigs.com/kitchen-sink-strainers/
- https://www.thespruce.com/compost-bins-and-how-they-work-2131027
- https://www.thespruce.com/compost-bin-from-plastic-storage-container-2539493
- https://www.thekitchn.com/my-quest-for-the-perfect-freezer-compost-bin-life-in-the-kitchen-220435
- https://www.epa.gov/recycle/composting-home
- https://nymag.com/strategist/article/best-compost-bins.html
- https://www.onegreenplanet.org/environment/plastic-toothbrushes-waste/#:~:text=According%20to%20research%20by%20Foreo,of%20waste%20added%20to%20landfills.
- https://earthfriendlytips.com/best-eco-friendly-toilet-paper/
- https://www.thespruce.com/best-dishwasher-detergents-4174089
- https://www.aza.org/connect-stories/stories/how-do-straws-hurt-the-environment#:~:text=Most%20plastic%20straws%20are%20also,decomposers%20into%20non%2Dtoxic%20materials.&text=Most%20plastic%20straws%20simply%20break,%2C%20people%2C%20and%20the%20environment.
- https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-rechargeable-batteries/
- https://www.nrdc.org/stories/water-pollution-everything-you-need-know
- https://www.drgreene.com/perspectives/13-facts-about-home-paper-products-that-may-inspire-you-to-hug-a-tree
- https://www.nationalgeographic.org/article/whopping-91-percent-plastic-isnt-recycled/#:~:text=The%20vast%20majority%E2%80%9479%20percent,tons%20of%20plastic%20in%20landfills.
- https://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/environment/2018/08/5-reasons-ditch-your-shampoo-bottle-shampoo-bar
- https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2018/10/5-recycling-myths-busted-plastic/