For those of you who are tired of the abuse we are inflicting on the Earth, Plastic Free July is a perfect opportunity for you to commit yourself to be more conscious about your plastic consumption and adopt new habits that decrease your use of plastic altogether.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\tJasmin Rostamnezhad, Austin Community College\u2019s Sustainability Coordinator, said that Plastic Free July is an \u201ceducational opportunity to bring this issue of plastic pollution to the forefront of people\u2019s minds.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\tThe month-long event gives people the opportunity to take on the challenge of decreasing their plastic consumption or eliminating plastic from their lives entirely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\t\u201cIt\u2019s not about telling people, \u2018Don\u2019t consume plastic for the whole month\u2019 and then don\u2019t think about it,\u201d Anne Cuzeau, a computer science major and sustainability steward at ACC\u2019s Energy & Sustainability department, said. \u201cIt\u2019s more about having a really big global conversation about plastic and how we can address this crisis.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\t\u201c[ACC] is always trying to come up with ways to do Plastic Free July all year long,\u201d Rostamnezhad said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2020, ACC officially became a styrofoam-free campus, Rostamnezhad said. This means ACC does not purchase products with styrofoam packaging. If a product arrives with styrofoam, the energy & sustainability department will reach out and notify the vendor that the school needs their products packaged differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\tAs many of us now know, recycling is not all it\u2019s cracked up to be<\/a>. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency<\/a>, less than 10% of plastics actually find a repurposed life as a new container, the majority of the remaining 90% is usually buried in the ground at a landfill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The folks at ACC\u2019s Energy & Sustainability Department have long recognized this and have taken concrete steps to embrace composting throughout its campuses. It\u2019s not hard to locate a compost bin when at an ACC location.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \tNot only is plastic harming the environment and its biodiversity, it\u2019s also harming the health of human beings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPlastic is made through the oil industry and the chemicals that are within the plastic can leach into the foods that you are eating from packaging or can leach into the foods that you heat up in the microwave,\u201d Rostamnezhad said. \u201cThose include a lot of cancer-causing chemicals so you\u2019re basically ingesting the plastic which is really bad for your health.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \tIn addition to the chemicals plastics can leach, microplastics, which are microscopic particles of plastic less than 5 millimeters, are another way plastics end up in our bodies, Rostamnezhad said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe average human eats a credit card of plastic a week,\u201d Rostamnezhad said. The study<\/a> by the University of Newcastle in Australia, which first made this assertion, says that most microplastics are ingested by humans via tap and bottled water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \tIn an effort to reduce her plastic consumption, Holli Sampson, a sophomore geology major at ACC, said that she implements creative ways to repurpose her plastic containers to organize and store her school supplies, spices, and makeup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \t\u201cIt becomes a fun game to see how you can reuse an item instead of sending it on its way to somewhere you\u2019re not sure of,\u201d Sampson said. \u201cAlso, it saves you money!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \tRostamnezhad is currently working on an educational flyer that explains exactly what steps people should take in order to reduce plastic waste in their personal lives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A few simple tips shared by Rostamnezhad, Cuzeau and Sampson are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \t\u201cAt the end of the day, just do your best,\u201d Cuzeau said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/157\/2021\/08\/Secondary_Photo.png\")
Anne Cuzeau, sustainability steward at ACC\u2019s Energy & Sustainability department, speaks to Pete Ramirez, ACCENT\u2019s Editor-In-Chief.<\/strong> <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n