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Twice a year there is an islands wide Great Islands Clean Up. Lopez has participated for the last five years, and this year we added a bit more fun to it! We invited all the other islands to try out an art challenge: to build a sustainable sculpture from the litter collected during this Spring's Great Islands Clean Up. Lopez and San Juan Islands had art teams. Lopez designed a mermaid, and gathered all the materials from litter collected from the 61 miles of beaches and roadsides cleaned this spring! Our team: Ron Norman and Nick Teague on structural design and fabrication, Nikyta Palmisani, Kate Scott, Vern Norberg, Jonathan Dahl, Luna Doherty, her friend May, and Colin Doherty on design fabrications and decor. Other folks kept dropping by and lending hands-- Thanks to Kerry and Sydney Ratza, Jack Pedigo, Page Read, and a host of others who jumped in! Our build team had the goal of a 36 hour build from start to finish, and we completed it! To see the art completed by Lopez and San Juan, come to the Talking Trash Workshop on San Juan Island, Thursday, April 25th from 5-7 pm. After that, Rik Rak will be on display at the Lopez Dump.

Take the survey to give your input for the Lopez Island Tool Lending Library (LITLL) here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DWCPDHG

THANK YOU so much for 2018's incredible Year to Zero Waste! Your zero waste challenges resulted in articulate and engaging blog posts (https://www.lopezsolidwaste.org/news-info/categories/zero-waste-challenge). In these posts we learned how to compost with Liz, Teri and Ashi. We learned that old recyclers *can* be taught new tricks from Scott and Ande. Liz and Kim gave us a peek into their incredible repurposed household and Jessica and Joel taught us about the value of repair, just to name a few examples. Y2Z got folks both excited and mobilized to make change and because of your participation, so many community based waste reducing innovations have become part of Lopez Island life. So to share these awesome waste reducing new happenings on our island and to celebrate *you* we are having a Y2Z Closing Party on Thursday, Feb 28th from 5-6:30 in the Lopez Library Conference Room (where it all began). There will be tea and treats and SO MANY great innovations to share, as well as information about what we learned was a great step to reduce waste: Reuse! So we have declared 2019: The Year of Reuse! Come learn about what we have in store for 2019 including more Repair/Fix it Cafes, a new Tool Lending Library, Lopez Trashion Fashion costumes going on the road to other local Trashion Fashion shows, and much much more!  Hope to see you there and thank you again for a fabulous Year to Zero Waste!

Hello makers! Are you curious about 3D printing, have prints you want to make, or just see it all happen in person? Well then come on down and join our 3D printing community. The first meeting will be an overview about free softwares we are using and a few demo prints. For designing we recommend Tinkercad: www.tinkercad.com. For software that takes designs and slices them into files for 3D printing we recommend Cura: https://ultimaker.com/en/products/ultimaker-cura-software. Please bring your own laptop preferably with these software programs already loaded on it. (Fusion 360 is also a great design program, but costs in some cases). www.Thingiverse.com is another great resource to see 3D designs ready to print and free. This group is free and open to all. Kids under 12 need to be accompanied by an adult. Please contact nikytap@lopezsolidwaste.org to reserve a space.

Documentary film maker Carl Davis volunteered his time to make this beautiful mini documentary about a Plastic Free Salish Sea. It features many LSWDD community projects inclduing our Year to Zero Waste Campaign, TIOLI and our object diversion into community reuse streams. Lopezian Mark Herrenkohl, San Juan County's Solid Waste Manager is included, and Pete Moe of the ORS Exchange along with partners from other islands. Well worth the 20 minute watch! Enjoy!

Come out on Thursday, December 13 from 6-8 pm to Grace Hall for our annual LSWDD Volunteer Appreciation party! It's a sweet or savory finger food potluck, with libations provided by SWAP. And if you have a great thing to included in the White Elephant Gift Exchange, bring it wrapped in a recyclable/reusable package! Looking forward to another wonderful night with the people who make us what we are. We could not do it without our volunteers!

LSWDD had the privledelge to give a site tour to students and teachers from Shaw Island. Here is the fantastic video thank you card of what they learned! Enjoy-- we loved it!

ZERO WASTE BLOG #2: MEDITATIONS ON PLASTIC Monitoring our garbage disposal during this month made it pretty clear that plastic is our biggest personal trash problem. Virtually everything we throw away - as opposed to composting and recycling - falls into that category. So, obviously, the only way to have any control over this issue is to buy less plastic. Wherever possible, we have switched over to buying products in bulk and glass. We rinse out and reuse plastic produce bags. We bring them to the store instead of taking new bags. We recently returned an unopened box of plastic wrap to the store, and now reuse our washed plastic bags to cover leftovers or rising bread dough. We try to be thoughtful consumers, careful not to buy unneeded plastic-wrapped gadgets, clothes, and other items. Since so many of our plastic containers and bottles are generated from purchase of toiletries, perhaps more direct communication with the companies themselves would be productive. Should we organize a write-in campaign? Could be a project for another day…. On the macro level, however, progress is being made. After a diving trip in Greece, Boyan Slat, a Dutch high school student, realized that the existing ideas for cleaning up the various giant ocean garbage patches were impractical, relying on nets to filter the plastic, which of course also scooped up too much marine life. Instead of being held back by the magnitude of the problem, he moved forward on developing his own solution - garbage-collecting booms. These are currently in trial runs in the Pacific Ocean and are showing a great deal of promise. Hurray for bold young minds! https://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/blogs/remember-kid-who-invented-way-clean-ocean-plastic-hes-back-and-its-happening?utm_source=Weekly+Newsletter&utm_campaign=1d14c73b2b-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_FRI1012_2018&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_fcbff2e256-1d14c73b2b-42076945 At the Shoreline Farmers Market a few weeks ago, we came across another ingenious solution: mealworms eating styrofoam! Yes, it turns out that the same critters that you hate to see in your flour bin are voracious consumers of this non-biodegradable plastic which breaks into tiny pieces and is the bane of beach cleanups everywhere. Not only do the worms dispose of styrofoam and other forms of polystyrene, but they turn it into frass, castings that can be used to fertilize your garden. Research is ongoing to determine how this can be applied to the global plastic pollution problem: https://news.stanford.edu/pr/2015/pr-worms-digest-plastics-092915.html However, all of these innovative approaches, while encouraging, are merely stopgap measures. They address mitigation of problems that we’ve created, but should not be mistaken for permanent remedies. Ultimately, the key is elimination of unsustainable polluting materials like all forms of plastic. In the meantime, reuse (e.g. 3-D printing) and transformation (e.g. mealworms) of existing stockpiles are useful responses. Zero Waste October has brought a higher level of awareness to the Finley household and a greater understanding of the magnitude of the problem as well as how we can contribute more effectively - in our own small ways - to the solution….like inspiring our granddaughter, Liliana, to join her school’s Green Team to pick up trash on the grounds. You never know where the seeds you plant are going to sprout. Don’t forget to vote to continue funding our beloved dump!

Let’s hear it for the Recycle Dogs who wrestle up savings for Lopez residents! Put on your work gloves, ear protection and safety glasses and imagine a whirring buzz of small tools coming alive on a Wednesday morning at the Lopez Dump. Meet a group of 12 volunteers who work diligently in the din, out of the spotlight and provide a heaping pile of recyclable metals out of discarded junk. Our own Lopez Solid Waste Recycle Dogs deconstruct and organize massive volumes of recycled scrap metal, breaking it down into smaller components with much greater value. The Recycle Dogs are a group of volunteers who meet one to two times a month for three-hour sessions. They joke that their work provides both a free work-out and the best kind of anger management as they sledge hammer old washers, dryers, barbecues and lawnmowers. Led by Jim Lombard, former LSWDD Board member, this group of highly skilled volunteers have a well-organized outdoor workspace that helps them accomplish their work efficiently and effectively. Their volunteer efforts help the dump’s bottom line. Over the past 18 months, metals sorted and scrapped by the Recycle Dogs have sold for a remarkable value of roughly $3,500 to recyclers! In this period, they have helped LSWDD recycle nearly 5,000 pounds of metal, ensuring top-dollar receipts for the most valuable metals, including steel, copper, lead, irony brass and aluminum. Metal recycling is also the latest focus of LSWDD’s “Year to Zero Waste Campaign.” Most Lopezians know you can easily recycle aluminum and steel cans in the recycle plaza. Many have seen the beautiful new bins for copper, aluminum and steel, but did you know that you can recycle small appliances and other objects that are 50 percent steel or more? To find out if an appliance has steel in it, apply a magnet. Only metals that are ferrous, or contain iron, will stick to the magnet. To recycle large appliances, like washers and ovens, there is a $22 fee. All appliances that contain freon require a $56 disposal fee, regardless of size, as they require specialized technicians to handle them. On behalf of Lopez, thank you, Recycle Dogs, for all your hard work! If you have questions about metal recycling or becoming a member of the Recycle Dogs team, email info@lopezsolidwaste.org or visit www.lopezsolidwaste.org.

Lopezians, LSWDD is hosting a *free* repair cafe at Grace Hall on Monday, Nov 12 from 1 -4 pm. This is where you can bring in items that need simple repairs in three main categories: appliances, furniture, and textiles/clothes. This event is to help get all those old, beloved items out of the corners of your houses and closets and back into use! If your item needs a replacement part, please get that part and bring it with you. Simple fixes are what we do, not major rebuilds. There are thousands of Repair Cafes happening worldwide. If you want to learn more about the history and the movement, check out www.repaircafe.org If you are interested in volunteering for this event, or future Repair Cafes, contact nikytap@lopezsolidwaste.org

As a household committed to the “Year to Zero” program, we chose October, designated as “Metal Month” to share our experiences. I cannot even guess how often a vehicle gets taken off Lopez to be recycled. Maybe half a dozen times a year? Although I travel fairly frequently on the ferry, I have never seen an end-of-its-life vehicle on board. Maybe most people have been lucky (or unlucky!) enough to have their auto call it quits when they were on the mainland - much easier up there than down here to get it taken away to a salvage yard. However, I have seen vehicles on Island that look as if they could be recycled - and I actually bought one. When I first saw it, if it had been anything less than a “vintage vehicle,” a seventy year old GMC pickup, I would have said that its highest and best use was to become recycled metal. From a recycling viewpoint, there were a couple of hundred dollars worth of steel and the copper/brass radiator was worth maybe another twenty-five dollars. Because the truck was so old, the only hazardous substances were the sulfuric acid and lead in the battery, oils in the differential, transmission and engine. Environmentally, the truck would be a piece of cake to dispose of, compared to modern vehicles with their airbags, plastic components and poisonous mercury trunk and hood switches. But, the truck was not yet destined to be mega-shredded in ten seconds flat into a pile of steel shavings and shipped to an overseas foundry furnace. It was over seventy years old, even in tough shape, I knew it was worth a lot more than junk value and so did its owner. I bought it and began a laborious restoration that would take over two years. Throughout the process, I repaired instead of replaced whatever I could. My project required disposal of unusable metal components, such as the gas tank, brake cylinders and rusted steel. It was easy to recycle these in the steel bin at the dump and to find clean steel (such as bed frames) at “Take It or Leave It” that I could use to weld patches and braces onto fenders and running boards. While Ruthie was volunteering at the dump, she found a new carpeting scrap that was going to be thrown away and it made a perfect floor liner. Lopez Solid Waste District can be thankful it is not responsible for recycling automobiles. It is challenging enough to deal with the ever-increasing solid waste stream. I have discovered some daunting statistics. Auto recycling has become big business, ranked the 16th largest U.S industry and automobiles are the most recycled product. Approximately 86% of a modern car is recyclable with about 14% of it ending up in a landfill. About 12-15 million cars in the U.S. reach the end of their lives and are recycled each year. The combination of planned obsolescence and commonly inaccessible technology has forced nearly all of us to recycle instead of repair. Restoring my old GMC is my way of opposing the “throw-away” mentality. On the Maine Island where I used to live, back in the 60’s and 70’s, I kept many clunkers going as long as there was anything to clunk so that fishermen didn’t have to lay out their hard earned bucks for newer vehicles. But, back then, you could lift up a car hood and recognize the parts. As a “dump dog” I am reminded that America is the most wasteful country in the world and am continually astounded by the amount and quality of items we recycle. For example, I can imagine how quickly everything we throw away would disappear if it were dumped in the Rio de Janiero landfill!. At least some items here get a second chance thanks to “Take It Or Leave It.” It should happen more. Also, as a dump dog, I see a need to reduce our waste stream and I wonder if there might be an opportunity for enterprising individuals to repair and resell many of the bigger items that come in for recycling, such as BBQ’s, washers, dryers, and lawnmowers. I’ve done time-consuming dismantling of many items that had years of life left in them if they were repaired. Anybody interested in a feasibility study? Of course, many things that come to the dump are too far gone, and modern recycling benefits the environment by keeping steel and poisonous substances out of landfills, such as mercury used in switches and sodium azide used in airbags. The disposal problems we Islanders face are daunting, as they can only worsen as the Island’s population increases, but they pale by comparison with what the rest of the nation faces. For example, there is currently no federal legislature in place that mandates or regulates recycling of airbags. With 34 million vehicles needing airbag replacement each year, there is an immediate need for a sustainable method of disposal. Once again, environmental concerns have taken a back seat. Although Ruthie has been an avid recycler since time began, she was not very enthusiastic about my truck project in the beginning. Now that it has become an “Art for Heart” vehicle, a way for her to benefit the community through donating all proceeds from her creations to local non-profit organizations, she’s pretty happy about it. Keep recycling, or better yet, look for ways to get the most life out of anything you can. See you at the dump – look for the green and black ’46 GMC!