Playgrounds · Eco-Chick

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Eco Play by Safe Play Systems

Safe Play Systems creates enticing recycled playgrounds, called Eco Play, that utilize post-consumer HDPE #2 plastic – milk jugs. Each playground is comprised of approximately 30,000 milk jugs. These PVC-free play environments are not only made from recycled materials, they are re-recyclable also. The company will buy back the playgrounds when they are no longer needed and recycle them in their entirety.

If you are looking to help your town, daycare, church, or school acquire a new play area for kids, this seems like a potentially great option. The sets are colorful or naturally hued, depending on the surroundings in which they will be placed. And let’s not forget, most importantly, they also look fun!

Safe Play educates consumers on the dangers of PVC, supplying information regarding the hazards created by perpetuating the use of toxic materials and allowing children to play amongst them. Also, as opposed to simply throwing money at carbon offsets, the company does its part to minimize waste and maximize resources. They feel strongly about walking the walk;

We have discussed carbon offsets and even though they have some merit, we see huge conglomerates, that have ravaged our environment for decades, hiding behind the carbon offsets that they purchase as a badge of honor while they continue to destroy the environment. When you really make a commitment to go green you start to see many options that make a difference.

In our factory all of the oil from trucks, fork lifts and extruders is recycled. We purchase recycled paper. Newspaper, magazines and scrap paper are recycled. All restrooms have recycled toilet paper products. New lighting was installed that increased the candle power by 15% but reduced our energy cost by 20%. We had to change out a motor on one of our extruders. The new motor has increased production by 20% yet decreased our electric usage by 40%. Pallets that we ship our playgrounds out on as well as the packaging materials (strapping, shrink wrap) are recycled.

We feel very strongly that our actions speak much louder than any offset we would spend our money on. Have you ever been to a green event where someone has been given an award for their giving, or maybe attended a charity auction where someone spent a huge amount of money, only to find them leaving in their gas guzzling Hummer. You glance inside and see the Styrofoam coffee cup and a candy wrapper falls out and they don’t bother to pick it up. Just because they feel guilty for the way they live, they give $$$. Money helps but with each of us doing our part we can make this a better place to live.
~Bill Orser, Director of Business Development for Safe Play Systems

green toys, kids, playgrounds

Nature Kids, Hot Water Woes, and Pellet Stoves

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by Starre Vartan · 02/01/08

I want my child to connect with nature, but how can a suburban park be designed to both protect visitors from Lyme disease–carrying ticks and restore the natural ecosystem?
—Lena Crandall, Scarsdale, NY

The funny thing about wildlife (even the kind that finds its way into parks and playgrounds in developed areas) is that it’s wild and therefore not completely controllable. In order to eliminate Lyme disease–carrying ticks, you would have to ban all warm-blooded animals and pave over the greenery. Still, you wouldn’t be creating an optimal environment for children. “In a matter of a few decades kids’ interactions with nature have been reduced significantly compared with all of human history,” says Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods. “A new body of evidence suggests getting kids out-
side, which engages all the senses, leads to a longer attention span, increases in cognitive development, and [reduces] stress.”

So unless you want your child to grow up playing in a parking lot, the best way to avoid deer ticks is prevention. “You can’t really prevent ticks from being in outdoor areas, but you can be proactive about your own actions,” says Beth Herr, pro-
gram director at New York’s Westchester County Parks Department. (New York had more cases of Lyme disease in 2006 than any other state.) “Be sure that you tuck your pants into your socks, wear light-colored clothing, and check yourself and your child for ticks right after using outdoor facilities.”
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I’m considering buying a tankless water heater. With all their great energy-saving features, why haven’t these systems caught on?
—Louis Weiss, Berkeley, CA

Whoever invented the storage water heaters most of us have in our homes today must have been thinking of how best to waste energy instead of save it. Think about it: Conventional systems keep water warmed to skin-scrubbing temps 24/7 even though hot water is needed for only an hour or two a day. Tankless (or demand) types do just the opposite: Water is heated instantly when you turn on the shower. Since roughly 13 percent of a home’s energy is used for this purpose, making the switch to a tankless kind could save an average of about $180 a year, and also help reduce your family’s carbon footprint.

If you choose a natural gas–burning model, it will use about 30 percent less energy than an electric one, and you can up the efficiency even more by picking a unit with an intermittent ignition rather than a constantly burning pilot light. (Two companies that sell such models are Bosch and Takagi.)

You will also save water. “You don’t need to run the shower waiting for the hot water, which wastes an average of five gallons every time you do it,” says Claudia Chandler, assis-
tant executive director for the California Energy Commission.

So why haven’t these caught on? Tankless heaters supply two to five gallons of water a minute, which might not be enough when you want to take a shower and run the dishwasher at the same time. A simple solution is to just add another unit. You will never run out of water completely, as with other heaters. While a tankless unit might be more expensive up front, you will save so much on your electricity bill it could pay for itself in as little as two years. You might also enjoy a windfall come April 15. The federal government and many states (see Energy Star and DSIRE) now offer rebates and tax deductions for energy-efficient appliances, including a $300 credit for certain tankless water heaters installed between January 1, 2007, and December 31, 2007.
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I might start heating my home with wood pellets. Is this a sustainable resource?
—Jon Bradford, Lancaster, PA

What could be cozier than the smell of wood smoke drifting over a snowy landscape? Until the early 1900s, 90 percent of Americans heated their homes with wooden logs, which are a renewable resource, since trees can be planted to replace those cut for fuel. When fossil fuels became cheaper and more widely available, many people switched from the messy fires that needed constant stoking to furnaces that burned oil or natural gas (which are both finite, nonrenewable fuels).

Concerns about global warming, rising fuel prices, and ground-level air pollution have led some homeowners to rethink how they heat their homes, and wood is slowly making a comeback. Unfortunately, traditional wood stoves and fireplaces contribute to local air pollution, since they produce particulates (few older stoves have an air smoke filter), and they can be high maintenance to keep going. Stoves that run on pellets instead of logs are cleaner and require less upkeep (picture a bag of half-inch-long pellets instead of logs).

The fuel for these stoves is also sustainable, as most pellets are made of compacted sawdust, waste paper, and bark, all by-products of the paper, agriculture, or lumber industries. Sawdust wood pellets produce the least amount of ash. Some stoves can also burn other biofuels, including soybeans, corn kernels, nutshells, barley, and cherry pits, that might otherwise end up in landfills. But make sure your stove can handle alternative fuels before trying them.

You might also have an energy auditor or certified provider come check out your house to see what size stove you need based on the area you want to heat and how well it is insu-
lated. Most pellet stoves do need to be plugged in to run their fans and controls; you can expect to use about $9 worth of electricity per month. Setup for a pellet stove is faster than for a wood stove, and about half the price. Although a pellet stove costs considerably more than a wood stove ($1,700 to $3,000 compared with $400 to $700), the pellet stove could pay for itself in as little as four years.

From my column “Green Guru” at Audubon Magazine.

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