How to Celebrate Earth Day at Home | 15 Things You Can Do for the Planet

Earlier this month I wrote a long blog post about 18 Ways You Can Celebrate Earth Month at Home.

That guide was very much focused on individual action, easy swaps, and small personal changes which are all wonderful things to do.

This guide, on the other hand, is going to be a bit more action-oriented.

Maybe you’ve already made a lot of easy swaps and are looking to have an even bigger impact outside of your consumer choices. If that sounds like you, then you’re in the right place!

I hope that you’ll be inspired to implement a few of these this week and beyond. Be sure to let me know which actions you’ll be taking in the comment section down below.

I’ll be covering ways you can be an activist and without ever leaving your couch and listing a few ways that you can celebrate Earth Day from home.

1. switch your energy:

Up first, let's talk about energy. On average, 40% of global CO2 emissions are emitted from electricity generation. (source)

So one quick thing you can do whether you live in an apartment or rent is to switch your energy provider which is a lot easier than it sounds!

Companies like Arcadia Power and Clean Choice Energy are energy suppliers.

When you sign up, they work with your existing utility company to make sure all of the energy you use is supplied by clean energy sources.

This doesn’t cost anything extra for you and in fact, you’ll probably see your electricity bill go down!

If that doesn’t match your needs, check into community shared solar.

2. eat more plants:

It’s no secret that eating a plant-based diet is one of the easiest ways to have a positive impact on the environment.

Making bread has become a favorite leisure activity in recent weekk so maybe you can pair that freshly made loaf with broccoli and cheez soup or my favorite curried carrot soup.

Try adding a few more plant-heavy meals in your rotation. If you’re looking for some inspo, the comment section on this post is overflowing with delicious recipes and meal ideas!

When I switched to plant-based eating, the hardest part was breaking down my preconceived notions of what a “meal” constitutes.

Once I understood the building blocks of creating meals, I had total freedom to cook easy, inexpensive, and filling meals in under 30 minutes.

I’ll be hosting a workshop the first weekend in May to teach you exactly how to create this practice in your own life.

If you’re interested in learning the 5 Best Principles to easy, quick, and zero waste meals, join my community. All of the details will be sent over next week!

3. divest!

Have you thought about what your bank does with your money? Anything from CDs to savings accounts, banks invest your money and use it to give out loans.

When I first heard that my money was being used to give people loans, I thought, “Cool! My money is being used to help someone buy a home or help someone open a small business in my town.” Which isn’t wrong, but it’s just not the whole picture…

Banks also use that money to fund a lot of projects that you might not agree with like big Tobacco, the fossil fuel industry, tar sands pipelines, and the list goes on and on.

For many of us, the most money we’ll ever have in on place is our 401ks. Make sure that money is working for both you and the planet.

You can get my full guide to Ethical Banking and Divesting you 401k from Fossil Fuels.

4. support ecocide law:

I first heard about Ecocide Law when I was researching ways for people to help with the bush fires in the Amazon that were burning last fall.

The goal of ecocide law is to add The Crime of Ecocide to The Rome Statute, known as Crime Against Peace, which is one of the most powerful documents in the world. Currently, the law makes four crimes punishable in International Criminal Court.

1. The Crime of Genocide
2. Crimes Against Humanity
3. War Crimes
4. The Crime of Aggression

The goal is to add The Crime of Ecocide so people who are knowingly destroying the environment, which endangers all of humanity through climate breakdown, can be taken to court. You can learn more and I would encourage you to lend your support!

5. compost:

The average US household produces 650 lbs of organic trash a year, but most of that is landfilled.

In fact, 60% of our landfills are full of organic matter because many people think their food scraps will return to the Earth, but they won’t!

Landfills are designed for storage - not decomposition.

There’s no oxygen in a landfill so organic matter can’t break down creating a limbo state that releases methane. On average, methane is 30x more powerful than your average greenhouse gas like CO2.

And, 16% of ALL methane emissions come from landfills.

An easy way to fix this is to start composting, and as a bonus, you’ll reduce your trash by at least 50% with this one swap.

RELATED: 3 Easy Swaps to Reduce Your Waste by 80%

As you read that you probably thought, “I’d like to compost, but I just can’t!” So, before you make any decisions, I’d love for you to do a bit more digging.

Composting is WAYYYY easier than you think. I promise!

It doesn’t smell, it won’t attract rodents, and there are literally 20+ different ways to do it so you’re bound to find the perfect method for you.

I’ve gone ahead and separated them into two separate blog posts. If you have a backyard and you’re feeling up for the challenge check out The Ultimate Guide to Backyard Composting.

If you live in an apartment or you’re looking for something very, very low-maintenance check out The Fool-Proof Guide to Composting in an Apartment (even if you don’t have a balcony).

6. save water:

71% of the Earth’s surface is covered in water, but only 3% of that is freshwater, and of that 3% most of it is locked under the Earth’s surface, in ice, atmosphere, and soil.

This leaves only .007% of the Earth’s water available to fuel and feed its 6.8 billion people. (source)

As population rates climb this small percentage of water has to serve more people.

On top of this, water is becoming more scarce due to climate change fueled droughts meaning there will be even less water to share among us.

Average daily indoor water use in the US is around 60 gallons per person per day, but our virtual water use, in other words, how much water goes into the food we eat, the clothes we wear, and the products we use every day, is in the thousands of gallons.

Don't believe me? Check out the Water Footprint Calculator - it's very eye-opening. The US Average is 2,220 Gallons/Day think you can beat it?

My water footprint came to 1,262 Gallons/Day which is still a lot, and I would love to try and cut it down.

4 simple ways you can shrink your water footprint today is:

1. eat more plants!

2. shop secondhand.

3. choose reusables like cloth towels.

4. choose products made from recycled materials.

For more information and 6 more tips check out my blog post 10 Tips for Saving Water.

7. donate:

If you have the means, I urge you to donate to a cause you believe in.

I think my friend Alden lays this out really well, “If you have a limited amount of time and money, it’s more effective to donate that time and money toward nonprofits addressing environmental and systemic racism issues, than to stress yourself out trying to be perfect, or blow your budget on expensive fair trade clothing.”

Donating to organizations doing good work is easy and one of the MOST effective tools we can use.

I have several recurring donations set up each month, and I donate a portion of every sponsorship I do. One of my goals this year is to create a more consistent donating schedule each month to benefit the organizations I love.

When it comes to choosing an organization, it’s always good to check them on Charity Navigator. They rank charities for effectiveness and transparency.

Here are a few of the charities I have recurring donations set up for and donated to last year:

• Plastic Pollution Coalition

• Plastics for Change

• Drawdown

• Earth Justice

• Rainforest Alliance

• Rainforest Action Network

• Sierra Club

• World Wildlife Foundation

• Oceana

• Environmental Defense Fund

8. documentary:

While you can’t organize a community viewing of a documentary right now, you can definitely organize something virtually.

Organize a Netflix Party with your friends and look into streaming one of these eco-documentaries this Earth Day.

1. our planet

2. before the flood

3. true cost

4. plastic ocean

5. chasing coral

6. river blue

7. biggest little farm

9. strike:

A lot of strikes have moved online from School Strike 4 Climate to Firedrill Fridays. Try joining in on one of these events!

School Strike 4 Climate / Future for Fridays is doing a 24-hour live stream this week. I find their website a little clunky to navigate, but it appears that all you have to do to participate is tune into their YouTube channel!

Firedrill Fridays meet on the first Friday of every month and they’re clearly have their reasons for striking listed on their channel:

1. A GREEN NEW DEAL

2. NO NEW FOSSIL FUELS

3. A RAPID PHASE-OUT OF EXISTING FOSSIL FUEL PROJECTS AND JUST TRANSITION TO A RENEWABLE ENERGY ECONOMY

This week, in particular, there’s also lot going on at Strike with Us. They have a huge roster and even have an online workshop dedicating to helping you divest.

Try and pick one of these organizations to join and tune into their live stream.

10. plant a tree:

Did you know that planting trees is one of the easiest, cheapest and potentially most effective tools we have for combatting climate change and drawing down carbon from the atmosphere? (source)

Why not plant a tree this Earth Day?

We could reverse the last 10 years of carbon emissions by simply planting 1 trillion trees. One Tree Planted is a non-profit organization, and they plant trees in North America, South America, Africa and Asia.

Trees are vital parts of our eco-systems that help clean the air we breathe, filter the water we drink and provide habitat to over 80% of the world's terrestrial biodiversity.

They also provide jobs to over 1.6 billion people, absorb harmful carbon from the atmosphere, and a key ingredient in more than 25% of all medicines.

To make this even sweeter, it only costs $1 to plant a tree. That’s right. $1!

11. email your reps:

Hey, keyboard warrior. Crack your knuckles and get ready to work, because it’s time to email your representatives.

Your representative’s job is to represent you, and they can’t do that if they don’t know what’s on your mind.

It can feel overwhelming to reach out and cold email someone you’ve never met, but don’t worry about it. I’m going to walk you through it step-by-step.

My first recommendation is to check out your local Sierra Club Chapter.

The Sierra Club does a good job of rounding up the current bills in your current legislative process, and the best way to find it is google, “Sierra Club Legislation in (Your State)”, I looked up 10 different states and they all popped up within the first five results except for Alaska.

To give you an example, here's California's page. 

As you can see, everything is easy to read, and they tell you which bills to support or oppose so all you have to do is copy the bill number into an email or fax to your representative, and ask them to either oppose or support those bills.

I highly recommend making this a monthly practice.

12. get the kids involved:

Have a young kid at home? Or just feeling extra hands-on and in the need of testing a good hypothesis?

Try one of these 3 easy sustainable science experiments from things you can probably find around your home.

1. conduct a food waste audit: By recording what you throw away for a week, you’ll have a better sense of where your food waste comes from, and then, be able to address how to decrease this misuse of nourishment.

2. regrow some of your food from scraps: learn how to regrow a vegetable from a scrap, monitor its vertical growth for 2 weeks and discuss the ecological importance of reducing food waste.

3. landfill simulator: We’ve talked about what happens when food breaks down in a landfill - it releases methane gas. In this experiment, you can actually SEE the process!

Check out all three simple sustainability science experiments.

13. join a local organization:

Now is the perfect time to research a few groups and organizations you might want to join.

Since everything is digital and not much is happening in person, it’s the best time to get the feel for a new group and ways that you can get plugged in, in a very low-pressure environment.

I’ve gone ahead and listed a few organizations that you might be interested in joining.

• The Citizen’s Climate Lobby

• The Sunrise Movement

• The Sierra Club

• Your local Greenpeace Chapter

• Surfrider Foundation

And, of course, you could also make plans to either create a Green Team at your workplace or think up a few new ideas to keep everyone inspired with sustainability.

If you’re looking for something a little different, be sure to check out my blog post Tips for Finding a Local Zero Waste Group.

14. offset your carbon footprint:

Have you ever calculated your carbon footprint?

The quiz at footprintcalculator.org is my favorite one. You can pop over and plug-in the details of your life/last year, and then it will calculate how high your carbon footprint is including how many Earth’s we’d need to survive if everyone lived like you.

Back when I lived in the tiny home, my carbon footprint was one earth. This was great because we have one earth, but now that we moved to a slightly bigger place Justin and are at about 1.3 earths.

It can feel a little discouraging when you feel like you’re doing a really good job, but still can’t get seem to reach that one earth goal.

In my blog post How to Offset Your Carbon Footprint and Why You Should, I go over everything you need to know about offsetting your carbon footprint and why you should.

I tell you what to look for, and how to choose a reliable organization to handle that for you. 

15. write companies and businesses:

I challenge you to write to three different businesses and ask for them to make changes this week. I wrote a great post on addressing businesses about their packaging, but it was very restaurant and packaging focused which might not be the best goal at this moment.

Here are bulk bins are saran wrapped shut, we’re not even allowed into the grocery store with reusable bags, and cafes suspended all in house dishwashing in lieu of disposables before we were ordered to shelter in place.

I think those things will be totally appropriate to ask and write about when things start to normalize, but I’m not sure it’s the best use of your time right now.

Instead, I would like to turn your attention to Fashion Revolution week. April 20, 2013 is when the Rana Plaza factory collapsed and killed 1,138 people and injured many more.

The anniversary of the collapse is used to highlight the severe problems in the fast fashion industry. If you’re looking for more information I highly recommend the documentary, which is under the documentary subheading) the True Cost.

Fashion Revolution has done a great job setting up an easy to use template that will take you 10 seconds to email brands to demand more transparency in their supply chains. Here’s the link on their website where you can fill it out lickity-split.

No matter what time of year it is, it’s always a good idea to give these things a try. In fact, I even have a blog post that goes over 50 Way to Celebrate Earth Day (even if it’s over).

I don’t think that we should be supporting and thanking our planet only once a year, do you?

After all, the Earth is pretty great! She gives us delicious tasting food, beautiful scenery, flowers, and so much more!

If you’re looking for a book recommendation that will completely reframe the way you see the world, I highly recommend Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer.

It’s a beautiful love story to the Earth that completely changed my world view and my climate activism in 2017.

I hope that you found this blog post helpful. I would love to know what you’re going to be doing this Earth Day. Will you still be celebrating?

5 Secrets for Finding Joy in Life

If you’ve been around my website or Instagram for a while, then you know one of my favorite tag-lines and words that I use to describe myself is a 'climate optimist.'

Being a climate optimist is all about finding joy in life. Even when things look bleak, it's believing that together we can turn things around!

This post was sponsored by Josie Maran, all thoughts and opinions are my own for more information please see my disclosure policy.

On my instagram, @going.zero.waste, I run a series where I round up positive environmental news stories each week.

I'm sure you wouldn't think positive news is controversial, but - oh, boy. I've caught quite a bit of flack for seeing the glass half full and choosing to focus on positivity.

A lot of people see that series as naive and harmful - yes, the word harmful has been used.

They're afraid if people see positives, then they'll stop trying to make a difference or quit pushing for change.

For me, it's just the opposite. When I read depressing climate news, I would feel sad and hopeless. It made me feel like giving up... like what I did, didn't matter at all.

But after reading good news, it encouraged me to keep fighting and proved that my actions do, in fact, matter. 

Focusing on the positive fills me with joy and makes me more productive. 

reducing stress:

These past few weeks have been stressful, and one of the main ways I've been reducing stress is setting aside a little bit of time to pamper myself.

One of the brands that's helping me do that, all while having a great impact on the environment is Josie Maran.

I've been using their argan oil in my hair after showering and it's added an amazing shine. I’m also loving their whipped argan oil body butter and their LIPSTICKS!

Josie Maran's argan oil comes from a UNESCO-protected region to help prevent deforestation and over-harvesting.

A single argan tree can live for more than 600 years and produce fruit throughout its entire lifecycle!

For every argan oil purchase through Sephora, they're donating $5 towards One Tree Planted, and on top of that they're doing a $10 give-back donation to first responders - which I think is amazing!

Their whipped argan oil face butter, whipped argan oil body butter and argan liquid gold self- tanning body oil are produced in facilities that utilize 77% renewable energy.

Most of their products are sold in glass bottles and jars which are perfect for upcycling. But they take full responsibility over all of their packaging because Josie Maran is partnered with TerraCycle to take back all of those empties.

find what brings you joy:

A few weeks ago, I was chatting with one of my friends about how I was feeling really down.

I was in a general funk, and this friend, who happens to be a psychologist asked me a really important question...

"What things do you do regularly that bring you joy?"

I kind a looked at her blankly because I couldn't think of a single thing!

The only thing that came to mind was working. It was amazing to realize how much of my self-worth was tied up in my career and business.

When things started to taper off (like they have for a lot of businesses during this time) I felt lost.

Now was the time to start finding joy in other (healthier) places.

So, I started a practice documenting five things that bring joy into everyday life.

This should be a no-pressure exercise. These things don't have to be earth-shattering - heck, they don't even have to be different.

If wearing your favorite lipstick brings you joy today and tomorrow and the next day, take a mental note of it every day.

As you're going throughout your day, find the small moments that bring you joy and happiness.

Try it for a week, and if you notice things repeating, try and make time for those things especially on days when you’re not feeling 100.

I've been doing this practice for over a month and it's been so eye-opening!

I've listed a few of my favorites below, but make sure to check out my YouTube video to see even more!

• house plants
• putting on lipstick <---- I am in LOVE with the color 'LOVE IT' from Josie Maran!
• Nala
• flowers
• fancy drinks
• pampering my skin
• walks with my family
• SUNSHINE!
• dancing to my favorite tunes
• singing
• hot water
• spending time with friends (currently via facetime)

learn to celebrate all the things:

I stopped celebrating a long time ago. Big or small, the celebrations ceased to focus on more “productive” tasks. 

Instead of feeling proud, I'd jump straight into the next project and never give myself a second thought.

One way I’ve brought more joy and happiness into my life has been celebrating the small things.

So whenever I do something I'm proud of like putting up all of my laundry instead of letting it linger in the basket for five weeks, reformating all 600 of my blog posts, or finishing a chapter in my third book, I take a few moments to recognize the accomplishment and congratulate myself!

For too long, I've waited on recognition from others instead of giving it to myself. 

Try it out this week! Allow yourself a moment or two to say, "Good job!" Pat yourself on the back, and allow yourself to enjoy that feeling of accomplishment.

I’m congratulating myself right now. Because damn girl. I'm proud of you! Look at you. You're almost done writing this blog post and it's FABULOUS.

express gratitude:

This one should come as absolutely no surprise, but expressing gratitude is consistently associated with greater happiness.

But, don't just take my word for it, here's the research.

Practicing gratitude shifts your perspective and changes the way you interpret situations.

It allows you to focus on the good instead of the bad, which will automatically help you have a better and happier day.

When you get into a gracious mindset and intentionally start looking for the good, the easier it becomes to both find it and recognize it.

Thankfully, it was pretty easy to find all of the good Josie Maran's doing when it comes to the planet!

They have some ambitious goals, and are already on their way to achieving them! By next year:

• All boxes will be made using 100% recycled material
• Their materials will be both Green e-certified and FSC-certified, meaning it’s always held to the highest social and environmental standards
• Their product boxes will be printed in completely carbon-neutral facility
• An even greater reduction of waste in manufacturing

you have to choose happiness:

People ask me all the time, how I continue to stay positive even when the outcome seems bleak, and the answer is simple.

I am an optimist because I choose to be optimistic. I'm not just finding joy in life, I'm actively looking for it.

While some of us might be natural-born optimists, most of us have to train ourselves to seek out the good.

I used to dwell on a lot of negative emotions like sadness, jealousy, and anger, but everything shifted when I heard this Buddha quote, "Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die."

All of the negative emotions I had bottled up weren't solving my problems, and the only person I was hurting was myself.

I honestly thought, if I worried enough or were upset enough or if I CARED enough then I could solve the world’s problems, but it’s just not true. You don’t have to feel bad every day to prove that you care.

Related: 5 Tips for Dealing with Eco-Anxiety

slow down:

Lastly, I’ve been finding joy in the slow and small moments. Being busy is overrated.

Worrying is one of my brain’s ways of feeling productive and active during ‘downtime’ (you can read more about that here) because I’ve become so tied to the idea that my worth = my productivity.

Logically, I know that’s false, but it’s going to take time for my subconscious to catch up.

Slowing down encompasses so many of the things we've already talked about in this post.

It's about taking time to celebrate the small things, focusing on what brings you joy, and taking a deep breath to focus on the present world.

It's amazing how shallow I breathe when I'm not paying attention or living in the moment, but when I take a deep breath it's so much easier to bring myself back into the present moment.

So when my mind starts to wander into the future or thinking about what comes next, I just take a minute to slow down and focus on the task that’s right in front of me whether that’s doing the dishes, watching a movie with Justin or getting ready for the day and putting on my favorite lipstick.

I would like to thank Josie Maran for sponsoring this post

If you'd like snap up a bottle of their beloved argan oil, I want to remind you that they're donating $5 towards One Tree Planted, and offering a $10 give-back donation to first responders this month!

3 Simple Sustainability Science Experiments To Do At Home With Kids

Times are weird right now. So much is different. While many of us are dealing with a whole new world of stress and uncertainty, it's nice to find a silver lining sometimes.

With so much extra time at home with our kids, it has been a great time to teach our youngsters a few of the life lessons and educational tidbits that often got pushed to the wayside during "normal business hours". 

In our house, we've been cooking and baking together more than usual and even started teaching our boys to clean bathrooms this past weekend.

We’ve also had time for more creative projects and experiments. Today, I want to share three fun and educational projects about sustainability that you can do with your kids, including teenagers.

Yes, even teenagers.

RELATED: 7 Ways Your Teens and Tweens Can Go Green and Still Be Cool

I promise they are far more exciting than cleaning toilets and maybe even more fun than baking brownies.

As we share with our kids the importance of reducing waste and caring for the environment, these three experiments capture the science behind our sustainability initiatives. 

All three of these sustainability science lessons came from Jess of Thoughtfully Sustainable.

Jess is a former high school chemistry teacher and mom of two. On her Instagram account, she shares weekly Sustainability Science Sunday experiments. 

Many of her lessons include plans in English and Spanish, to help teachers and parents explore the science behind sustainability and eco-friendly living with their children and students.

Her lesson plans are free, linked to the U.S. National Science Standards and Common Core Standards for ELA and Math, include details about materials needed and any set up that is required (though most of her experiments require very little preparation).

Not only are they great for science skills, but they are perfect conversation starters for discussing environmental issues with our kids in a way that is accessible to them. 

1. food waste audit experiment:

A couple of weeks ago, we tried a food waste audit to track how much perfectly good food ended up in our trash cans or compost bins.

It's pretty interesting how much we can learn about our unconscious behaviors when we start to track them. 

Through the food waste audit, my boys paid a whole lot more attention to how much food they wasted.

Each person in our family was responsible for writing down their own food waste, which added an additional element of individual accountability.

The experiment also gave them a chance to practice science and math skills like measuring volume, tracking activities, creating and maintaining a data table and adding.

the science behind the experiment:

Globally, food loss and waste accounts for a tremendous amount of greenhouse gas emissions.

The World Resources Institute stated that “if food loss and waste were its own country, it would be the world’s third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases - surpassed only by The United States and China.” (source)

One main reason that wasting food is a serious issue has to do with how it decomposes.

When food is placed in the trash and sent to a landfill, it breaks down anaerobically, which means in the absence of oxygen.

RELATED: The Ultimate Guide to Backyard Composting

This decomposition process creates carbon dioxide and methane gas. When food is composted or breaks down naturally (like an apple that falls from a tree and rots on the ground) it breaks down aerobically, which means in the presence of oxygen.

The decomposition process creates carbon dioxide and water vapor.

The problem lies with the production of methane gas.

Scientists have determined that this gas is really good at trapping heat in our atmosphere - approximately twenty-five times better than carbon dioxide.

Due to methane’s heat-trapping power, along with its lifespan in our atmosphere, it is a key player in raising our global temperatures, which causes our climate to change.

There are many individual ways to avoid food waste.

However, in order to avoid wasting food you must first identify what is being wasted in your home.

That’s where this experiment comes into play. By recording everything you throw away for a week, you’ll have a better sense of where your food waste comes from, and then, be able to address how to decrease this misuse of nourishment.

2. food scrap growth experiment:

If you follow Kathryn regularly, you know she's a fan of growing food from scraps.

It's such a great way to remind ourselves that what we might initially consider trash isn't necessarily waste. The "remnants" of our food can be used for so many things like growing food scraps, composting, feeding chickens, and more. 

RELATED: How to Grow a Windowsill Garden

In this experiment, Jess shows us how to pot certain types of food scraps and watch them grow. In her lesson plan, she incorporates skills like making observations, measuring, creating a graph and analyzing data.

Your kids could even try creating a hypothesis before you start to experiment and make educated guesses along the way about what will happen next. 

the science behind the experiment:

As stated previously, when leftover food gets thrown in the trash and sent to a landfill, it creates a gas called methane.

This gas is really good at trapping heat in our atmosphere. As more heat gets trapped, the climate of Earth changes, affecting the plants and animals, including humans, that live there.

There are lots of ways we can avoid food waste.

Planning your meals ahead of time with your family, donating or sharing food you aren’t going to eat, eating leftovers, freezing food scraps to make soups, regrowing your food scraps and composting are all ways to save food from being wasted.

In this lesson, you will learn how to regrow a vegetable from a scrap, monitor its vertical growth for 2 weeks and discuss the ecological importance of reducing food waste.

3. the landfill experiment:

Food decomposing properly with oxygen in a compost bin is a much different process than food decomposing in a landfill without oxygen.

Jess uses this experiment to show us how different foods produce different amounts of greenhouse gases when sent to a landfill.

the science behind the experiment:

We’ve discussed what happens when food breaks down in a landfill.

This experiment allows you to actually see the process!

By choosing different types of foods, (as some foods are prone to produce more gases during decomposition than others) you will be able to watch the chemical breakdown of each food source and the relative amount of gas it produces.

By filling each test bottle completely with water, you create anaerobic (oxygen-lacking) environments that simulate the rudimentary conditions found at a landfill. You’ll be surprised by how quickly some of the balloons inflate!

This experiment can lead you and your learners to investigate the type of landfill that your waste travels to.

Is it a methane-recapture landfill, in which the methane that is produced is trapped and used to produce electricity, thus mitigating some of the negative effects of the landfill?

Or does your waste get sent to a traditional landfill that does not capture the gases that are produced?

Or maybe your waste doesn’t get sent to a landfill at all, but rather an incinerator? Researching what happens in your community can be a gateway to shaping young learners into environmental stewards.

All three of these experiments are really interesting for kids and adults, and they can be set up in just a few minutes with materials you probably already have at home.

why these science experiments are important:

We learned last year that our young people might be the best hope for motivating our leaders to be change-makers. 

We can teach kids about the importance of environmental issues through books about the environment, educational podcasts, school programs, and more.

But by letting them experiment with the science allows for a global issue to become local, making the lessons much more impactful. 

By educating young people about the science behind why sustainability matters, hopefully, we can make them even more effective advocates for the planet (and stay sane while quarantined at home in the process). 

GUEST POST: Jen Panaro is a self-proclaimed composting nerd and advocate for eco-friendly living for modern families. On her blog, Honestly Modern, she shares ideas about how families can incorporate low waste and sustainable habits into everyday living. She’s a serial library book borrower, a messy gardener, curator of the Bring Your Trash To Life series, and mom to two boys. Additionally, she may or may not spend an unusual amount of time admiring the hard-working worms in her compost bin; the jury is still out on the matter. 

GUEST POST: Jess Purcell is a Chemistry teacher turned stay-at-home Mom who is passionate about explaining the science behind sustainable living. She is the creator of #sustainabilitysciencesunday, a weekly series on Instagram that provides simple sustainability science experiments that can be done at home. Jess lives in central Pennsylvania with her husband, two kids, and two cats and can usually be found outside, either digging in her gardens, hiking with her family or attempting to read a book while being cajoled into a game of hide and seek. You can find her on Instagram @thoughtfullysustainable.