by Tina Kelly –
Drain drain go away. Updating nursery rhymes with environmental messages may just become the next big thing. It’s a fact: drains do go away – away from the driveway, street or parking lot, and away from the sink, toilet, bathtub and shower, but have you ever thought about what is at the other end of that drain? Often we don’t stop to consider the answer; we’re just happy to have whatever it is disappear. The short answer to the question is the ocean.
How many drains do you have around your house? Here are some tips and tricks to implementing positive habits when it comes to the connection between drains and our ocean.
• Seek out environmentally friendly cleaners or make your own with help from the CRD’s Clean Green Cookbook (www.crd.bc.ca). Doesn’t lemon, vinegar, baking soda and water sound healthier than caustic soda and alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chlorides?
• Use good old-fashioned ingenuity and physical strength to unclog drains. Instead of pouring a commercial product containing sodium nitrate and aluminum shavings into the drain, invest in a Zip-It or auger – that can be reused again and again – to remove the clog. Both of these items cost less than $20 at your local hardware store.
• Flush only the three P’s: pee, poop and paper.
• Skip the microbeads. Purchase or make personal hygiene products that do not contain plastic beads for exfoliation.
• Keep FOG’s out of your drains: fats, oils and grease are not only bad for the ocean (they deplete oxygen and damage fish), they can clog pipes causing overflows and backups. Use a paper towel to wipe up sauces, dressings or frying pan fats and dispose of them with your kitchen scrap pick up. Collect cooking grease in a container and store in the fridge or freezer until it is full, and then dispose of it on garbage day.
• Return unused prescription and non-prescription medications to a local pharmacy for proper disposal.
• Drop off household hazardous materials at the Hartland Landfill for safe disposal; there is no charge for this service.
Outside of the home, storm drains allow a substantial volume of pollutants to reach the sea. We rarely take notice but with every rainfall, oil and gas from leaky vehicles head down to the sea. Keeping vehicles tuned up can keep leaks at bay and opting to action some errands, or commuting, by foot, bike or bus are also a step in the right direction.
We may not always notice the rainbow shimmer of oil and gas sliding across impervious pavement, but litter can be right in front of our eyes. Consider taking “three for the sea” – with each trip out into your neighbourhood or community, endeavor to pick up at least three pieces of trash and keep them out of our storm drains and waterways.
Margaret Mead once said: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” If we all took a moment to audit our daily actions and altered a few or all of them to include the suggestions above, imagine the collective positive power of how our behaviour could change the world.
