Green Initiatives

Saturday September 21st – 8:30AM – 15PM

In the past few years China has acted on its growing awareness of the monumental issue of plastic pollution. It has placed restrictions on plastics coming from abroad as well as implemented new regulations within its borders. This is one big step towards reducing the plastic issue we face. However, plastic pollution is everywhere – it’s in our water, the air we breath, in our food. The problem will persist until we adapt our individual behaviors.A face-2-face encounter with the problem helps to reduce the cognitive disconnect between our behaviors and our effect on the world around us. Making concrete how plastic trash accumulates in the environment (either on land or in the water, visible or invisible), helps us to cognitively experience the effects of our consumption. During this field trip, participants explored how plastic accumulates in what would otherwise be a natural and pristine lakeshore rural country side, generating an environmental problem, that affects every level of the ecosystem. Participants performed a clean-up session, quantified and analyzed the kinds of plastics present onsite. Then proceeded to sort and prepare the collected waste to send it to the appropriate waste management centers.