Living The Clean Coast Life

STORY BY CLEAN COAST COLLECTIVE

Clean Coast Collective takes us through one of the biggest threats to the wild places we love – modern society’s consumption of plastics – and how the daily grind is contributing to this problem.

Clean Coast Collective cleaning beaches in remote Cape York Peninsula. Photo by Angus Kennedy

I’m sure you know the feeling – and I bet you experienced it when the calendar clicked over into October – where has the year gone?! The weeks fly by, weeks then turn into months, and then boom, it’s Christmas. The New Year strikes and we settle back into the fast-paced cycle all over again. Modern life has hit a crescendo and we’re starting to see the negative effects of our obsession with ‘busy-ness’ on our mental and physical health, but what impact does our fast-paced life have on the environment?

In our haste to cram as much into our weeks as possible, we’ve fallen victim to the habits of convenience – we grab our coffees to go, our lunches to take out and our dinners pre-made. And at the centre of these habits is a material we’ve all come to thoughtlessly rely on; plastic.

Lightweight, cheap to produce, waterproof, rigid or flexible – plastic was the ‘miracle’ material that was set to change the world for the better. But it didn’t catch on straight away – when plastic bags were first introduced into American supermarkets, customers had to be convinced that they were better than the paper bags they were used to. Plastic manufacturers launched marketing campaigns to persuade consumers that they needed plastic in their lives – that it would make their lives better.

5 trillion pieces of plastic float in our oceans – it's time to break up with plastics. Photo by Angus Kennedy

Slow down, consume mindfully and avoid plastics.

The #CleanCoastLife

Now we’re realising that the properties that made plastic revolutionary five decades ago are exactly what make it disastrous for our planet. Plastic was invented to endure, which is great when products are created to be used for a lifetime, but not so great when we talk about ‘disposable plastics’. The plastic bag you carried your groceries home in won’t ‘break down’ for 20 years. And that plastic bottle of water you bought instead of filling a glass from the tap, that bottle will be around for 450 years… at least!

The things is, we don’t even know how long plastic lasts in the environment for, whether that’s in landfill or in our oceans. But we do know that it never fully breaks down or decomposes, its chemical makeup prevents this. There are plenty of statistics out there – an estimated 5 trillion pieces of plastic in the oceans kill over 100,000 marine animals every year – but how about we think about it like this; should something we use for 5, 10 or even 30 minutes last in the environment beyond our own lifetime?

It all seems incredibly doom and gloom, but the solution is so simple:

  • Avoid unnecessary plastic packaging – buy your food in bulk, or opt for fully recyclable packaging like paper, cardboard and glass
  • BYO every chance you get – take your own bag to the supermarket, use your own mug for takeaway coffees, take your own cutlery and containers when buying food good to-go
  • Ditch plastic straws – you’ve got nice lips, use them
  • Buy quality products that last a lifetime – ask yourself, how long will you use it for and will you need it tomorrow, next week or next year?
  • Slow down – give yourself 5 minutes in the mornings to sit down in the cafe to have your coffee, eat your lunch away from the desk instead of rushing out to grab takeaway, and spend time cooking your own meals. Don’t we deserve a little ‘us’ time in our days?

At the end of the day, avoiding plastics isn’t just about keeping our oceans clean and our landfills empty, it’s about slowing down and being mindful in our consumption. When you can’t escape the city for a bush walk or surf, a sit-down coffee in your favourite cafe breaks the daily rush and is the moment of calm you deserve.

Let’s break up with ‘busy-ness’. Bring some mindfulness back into your life. Take moments for yourself. And start thinking about what passes from your hand to the bin.

Skip the takeaway coffee cup by taking your own mug

Read more about Clean Coast Collective’s projects and lifestyle tips at www.cleancoastcollective.org