BPA / #7 plastic - confusing, possibly bad news

Like Teflon, Polycarbonate plastic pops up in the news fairly often.

The typical pattern consists of a warning, often alarming, posted by an environmental group (Greenpeace, Environmental Working Group etc.) followed quickly by a denial from The Society of the Plastics Industry (S.P.I.), usually drawing on historical data from previous case studies.

Back and forth, the unending war between those groups apparently most concerned about health and those apparently most concerned about wealth. Add the fact that the plastic is hard to recycle (it's #7 in the PIC, plastic identification code) and my spidey-sense tells me something's up.

No one seems to disagree with what this plastic does; it leaches BPA, bisphenol A, into whatever the bottle contains, which is typically water or formula as food-grade polycarbonate seems most often utilized in water and baby bottles. The disagreement stems from what amount is considered to be an acceptable, tolerable level.

Because BPA mimics estrogen in our bodies, it is considered to be an endocrine disruptor.

And that's not good ...


From The Hormone Foundation,
"via a network of glands and organs that produce, store and secrete certain hormones ... the endocrine system works with the nervous system, reproductive system, kidneys, gut, liver and fat to maintain and control;
* body energy levels
* reproduction
* growth and development
* internal balance of body systems (homeostasis)
* responses to surroundings, stress and injury

Not a system you'd want to obstruct, especially given the prevalence of related diseases.

So while they duke it out, deciding if 100 micro-thingeys is acceptable, but 101 maybe isn't, I figure I'm better safe than sorry, so goodbye water bottle. I'm still looking for the best substitute, which hopefully isn't a donkey bladder. Glass is heavy and I'm clumsy so I might go with stainless steel and select a SIGG bottle with a safe lining.


Unfortunately, now I'm hearing more and more about the presence of BPA in canned food, due to the epoxy resin lining. Again, we know it's there but the one hand says it's poisoning and the other hand says it's better than botulism.

Seemingly, fewer and fewer folks are continuing to use the old Nalgene bottles (especially since companies such as M.E.C. have stopped selling them), but everyone has a can opener. For all I know there's a correlation between the amount of canned food one consumes and the incidence of certain diseases - yikes!

As diligent as we are about eating non-packaged, minimally processed foods, like most people in similar climates there are periods of time when we're can-opening, not peeling, while preparing portions of our meals.

Not including my emergency kit which is heavy with cylinders of beans and soups, we generally eat three foods out of cans; baked beans, organic tomato paste and organic tomatos. And as much as I'm inclined to pat myself on the back and think oh goody for me, we eat very little canned food, it occurs to me that highly acidic food like, say, tomoto products, could pose a higher risk of jeopardizing the integrity of a can's lining. And what of temperature levels? My canned food is stored in the kitchen yet perhaps it should be kept in a cooler place. I suddenly have many questions for the canning industry.


While I'm at it, I should also explore the validity of Eden Organics claim that they don't line their cans with epoxy resin, presumably making them safer.


And what of the people who produce that little bit of canned food I regularly eat? I don't know enough about any of these companies, so I guess I'll contact these three (Heinz, Utopia and Ontario Natural) and ask them to respond to my fears of contamination; as when visiting the doctor, we have to be our own health care advocates.

Fingers crossed - I'm not ready to start baking my own beans.

bobbin' in my noggin'

A few things I'm working on ...




Toothpaste
- why can't I swallow it (there's actually a warning on the tube) and should my sensitivity toothpaste have additional whitening agents? They all seem to, but don't they cancel each other out?
- the C.D.A. crest - it's the dental industry's badge of honour, but is it reliable (or is this another "Heart Check" program)


Recycling
- why the residents of a neighbouring Township can recycle more than we can in St. Thomas, and what I think we can do about it


Packaging
- Germans can undress in the supermarket - maybe we should too



BPA / #7 Plastic
- more bad news, and something possibly worse (for us Canadians at least)


bio*life @ Shopper's
- I trust Environment Canada's EcoLogo, but can I trust those who display it?


Eckart Tolle and Oprah
- we've joined the world's biggest classroom for a 10 part webinar beginning March 3

Our Hoop House
- this time next year, we could be eating "green" greens from our own backyard

Our $500 Facelift - Part 2 - Feeling Good

House paint can be pretty nasty, and the toxicity is largely due to the presence of V.O.C.s (volatile organic compounds) releasing chemicals into our air, impacting our health and increasing smog.

This is why, simply put, paint is stinky.

Most surface coating manufacturers now have low V.O.C. “green” collections, while some, such as Safecoat in the U.S., make nothing but low or no V.O.C. coatings.

Environment Canada’s Environmental Choice Program slaps an Eco-Logo on products which meet strict requirements including ceilings on the levels of V.O.C., making it a bit easier when shopping. It gets complicated for me when I have to put my money where my mouth is. Many paint companies, particularly those selling to the eco market, seem to consider “safe” or “healthy” products to mean “exclusive” and therefore charge premium prices.
It can be tough to keep your integrity without being fleeced. Realistically, how much extra am I willing to pay for something that should be the norm?

There are three outlets for paint in St. Thomas. I wasn’t going to bother with hardware stores because I am trying to learn from my mistakes and, therefore, thought we should be establishing a relationship with a company that was going to do more than sell us paint one day, and a steel brush with which to remove it the next.

Our first stop was PARA Paints; I was armed with room measurements and a criteria document from Environment Canada.

As soon as we uttered “green”, we were escorted to a collection called “Boomerang”.

A clever concept offered by many paint manufacturers, this is a recycled product made from re-tinted leftover paint. Available in a limited, but not unattractive palette, it wasn’t what we were looking for, but something to check off my “this company should be like this” list.

If Boomerang was within our colour scheme, at $15 per 4L can, this collection would have saved us roughly 65% on paint costs. It would also satisfy my minimal toxin requirement as all latex interior paints stocked by PARA are low V.O.C., with plans in the future to make them even lower.
At 90g/l for Boomerang, and 83g/l for all other PARA collections, the V.O.C. count is well within government 50g to 150g parameters (the variance is due to finish texture, from flat at 50g to gloss at 150g).

In addition to the $$$ savings, the recycling concept would have meant a substantial “green” plus - as Boomerang appears to be the only recycled paint made in Canada, it’s our water table that old paint is being diverted from.

Interestingly, in the blurb you can click to above, Laurentide Inc. claims "the V.O.C. content of Boomerang® brand water-based paints (90 g per litre) is significantly lower than Environment Canada’s 2008 standard, 250 g per litre for recycled paint" when in fact the maximum allowable amount is 150g. So, still very good but a little over zealous.

Since PARA doesn’t produce a special low V.O.C. collection, the bottom line for us was we were able to choose any colour and pay regular prices. I also like the fact that PARA has been 100% Canadian since it’s beginnings in 1915.

Check, Check, Check – we were sold and my checklist was mostly complete.

Then we were shown something called an “Enviro-Kit”, by Dynamic Paint Products in Mississauga. It consisted of the usual roller, roller brush, edger brush and tray, but the difference was that the tray was 100% recycled plastic and the edger brush had a replaceable head.

Final check.

So, PARA provided affordable, low V.O.C. paint in the colours we wanted with recycled supplies all backed with, quite honestly, superlative service and advice.

Our next big job is the basement floor with its on-going saga, and our weeny woony loo, it’s wallpaper torn off and the toilet still not cooperating.
I thought I was ready to start planning that, before our neighbour Laura showed me a magazine from Australia which featured a toilet with a sink in the top which directly collects the grey water for flushing …
Hmmm …

Our $500 Facelift - Part 1 - Looking Good

Astrologically speaking, 2 Cancers living together equals some serious pressure on the crab shell to satisfy a wide range of nesting needs.

Add to that the fact my wish list is quite different from Robins; he wants to stay ahead of structural weaknesses and has some clear ideas about landscaping, whereas I want the building to be extremely energy efficient with the ability to function off-grid if necessary.

Our wee home has brought us both more than halfway to our goals, for which we are very grateful. But prior to mapping out further depletion of our nestegg, we agreed it was time to inject some colour into our surroundings. After 8 months of living in the house, experiencing dark days and bright full mooned nights, it seemed the calming, austere palette wasn’t working for us.

It was time to paint.
And paint we did, from the inside front door foyer, through the living room, down the hall to the bedroom, the office, kitchen and dining/sun room.

One full week, five rooms, seven colours … (and two feedings from friends and family)

From the front door, a turquoise called Wasaga Beach runs from the foyer, folding around two sides of the living room where it meets a wall of Vermillion.

These three walls are balanced with a warm grey covering the north-south expanse, the longest in the house. We had applied a beautiful, lemony yellow on this wall but found it too intense, even for us.


The arches in the closest, foyer and hallway are now fully three dimensional, popped out or sunken with contrast, and the ultrawhite woodwork and ceilings now appears pristine.

The warm grey continues south, now appearing sepia tinted, backing a gallery, which once was a hallway pass through.

The bedroom is three sides Victory Garden green, inspired by and matching perfectly a felt-like throw we recently brought home from Ikea.




The remaining fourth wall, the only in the room without a door or window, is coated with a different, warmer and greener grey.












The kitchen, once oak cupboards and pastel walls trimmed with wallpaper, is now backed in deep Balsamic with celery-like Spring Fling cupboards.




Continuing our favour of 3 walls one colour–1 wall another, we’ve applied the purple brown to 3 and covered 1 in the green.







The 10.5 ‘ x 8.5’ dining room was cool and soft, and quite bright even in the evening. Too bright for me but the sun's warmth provides much of the heat.





With the three outside walls being 80% window, I wanted to see more depth in the room, more character and warmth.






Now, the room boasts five sides of Victory Garden green, as we’ve painted the ceiling as well. The horizontal blinds are gone, replaced with Roman blinds in cream and red plaid, lined very well to prevent drafts and block blinding afternoon sun.






Its cosy and fresh, like sitting beneath a weeping willow with green arching up the solid, trunk-like wall, blocking the sky, branching down occasionally to interrupt the 180 degree window view to the outside. Some see Christmas, but we see Lodge.


My office, which is also the spare room, is study-like with three grey walls and one of green balancing the wood of the shelving, floor and furniture.




Robin’s work looks brilliant throughout the house, newly framed with these strong colours, debunking the myth the paintings show best on neutral walls, and I’ve re-set all our blinds flush within the window frames, patching the holes from where they were mounted on the outside top.



As tricky and stressful as it was to choose colours and colour combinations, to patch and tape and sometimes work freehand edging one colour to another, to disassemble the kitchen and paint cupboards, replacing hardware, as hard as that all was, the big worry for me was finding the right source for paint.

Of course, I’d done my research; Part 2 - Feeling Good

Our Ex-Christmas Tree

Our first christmas tree in our first house brought some sparkle to our living room and is now providing shelter and perching- possibilities on our deck.

We had expected, as with our past trees, we'd be dragging a dry, needle-dropping stick outside to toss somewhere into the garden for the birds. We were nicely surprised to find our tree not only hadn't lost a needle, it was still absorbing water, so we gave it a new home in our outside living room.


Though we removed all our ornaments, we left on a string of white LED lights, set on a timer, giving us something pretty to look at as we eat our supper. Apart from aesthetic pleasure for us and convenience for the birds who are accessing our feeders, it also provides our feathered neighbours some necessary protection against our bigger winged friend, Mr. Goss Hawk, who grazes our backyard for slow moving Hors d’Oeurves.

We're also enjoying our time with Frankie, exploring the highs and lows of St. Thomas walking paths.

The highs are the abundant railway tresels, remnants of a time when St. Thomas was Canada's railroad capital.














Some of these lofty roadways, like this one, are somewhat abandoned; one set of rails and ties have been removed and the surface is now so dense with earth and vegetation that you forget you're two hundred of feet above solid land (until you notice a "hole" in the ground and see cars racing past far below). Never gamblers, neither of us were willing to venture close to the railing, just in case.

The lows are the many ravines snaking their way through town, still hosting the rivers that carved them so long ago. These valleys, stocked with tall trees, are often connected to each other via dozens of pathways, and occasionally divided by roadways, high up at street level.
In a drier or colder time of year, we'll be able to journey more easily by traveling through tunnels which are presently funneling water (if not dammed with debris and branches).

For now, we'll enjoy the challenge of climbing uphill, crossing roads, then climbing back down to rejoin the river.

These unofficial parks, our less-public, public lands need protection and respect. By being good stewards of the few remaining natural water and air purification systems we have, we may buy us some extra time while we gather steam for the storm which inevitably lies ahead.