ORO VALLEY, Ariz. (KGUN) — About a decade ago, Kevin Greene and his wife, Naomi, made a to-go bag that would help them avoid using single-use plastic when they go out.
“We leave this all in our kit, in the car, so that we’re ready for just about anything,” Greene said.
The kit has a reusable straws, utensils, a water bottle, a tumbler for hot drinks, grocery bags and produce bags.
It's not just plastic he's worried about but the production of plastic too.
“We’re just using too much," he said. "We're producing too much. We need to turn off the tap.”
The kit the two carry was just the start of their sustainability journey.
And after carrying the kit for a bit, the Greenes were inspired to try to be more sustainable inside their home too.
Kevin Greene recommends starting with something small and slowly incorporating more and more reusable products in your home.
In the kitchen, they use beeswax paper and silicone bags and covers to keep food fresh.
In the bathroom, they traded liquid soaps and shampoos for the bar equivalents, and, they use tablets dissolved in water for their hand soap.
Finally, in the Laundry room, they use reusable dryer balls or more natural versions of dryer sheets and refill their cleaning products like detergent at zero-waste store Cero in Tucson.
Greene said household cleaning is the hardest place to cut out single-use plastic.
“We’re trying to switch over as much as possible to get away from paper towels and things like that,” he said.
The couple has put reusable cloths next to the paper towel holder as a reminder to use those instead. Greene says he's even trying to make his own cleaning products, but is struggling to find a way to do so without single-use materials.
Greene says that though there are ways to lower personal plastic consumption, Greene says the overall burden is on the companies producing and packaging the products: “we really need effective government policies that will shift that responsibility from consumers to the consumer-brand companies and the package companies who are generating all this waste.”
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Alex Dowd is a multimedia journalist at KGUN 9, where her work combines her two favorite hobbies: talking to new people and learning about the community around her. Her goal is to eventually meet every single person in Tucson. Share your story ideas with Alex via email, alex.dowd@kgun9.com, or connecting on Instagram or X.
