Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Blog # 6

The idea of styrofoam completely annoys me. As a resident of FGCU'S Biscayne Hall, I regularly eat at SoVi, the cafeteria that is made available to students who live in the dorms. One night when I decided I would take my food to go, I noticed that this facility uses styrofoam containers for to go boxes. I was taken aback because this university is known as a "green" school and is not wasteful with its resources. Next, I decided I would do some research on styrofoam and its effect on the environment. I found out that styrofoam cups do not dissolve in the Earth eventually like other materials do. It just sits there, taking up space and therefore is negligent to the environment. You can recycle styrofoam, like you can paper, but it is difficult, takes a long time, and it is also hard to find someone who will actually do it. Styrofoam also lasts virtually forever, or at least much, much longer than we'll live to be. Paper, on the other hand, is a lot easier to recycle and it will dissolve faster. This useless material also contains chlorofluorocarbons, which are very bad for the environment. All in all, I think that our university should reconsider using styrofoam as a means of containers and find a material that is better for the environment. It’s inevitable that we will use packaged items and that will create some waste. But, we can do our part to change the amount of packaging and waste we put out.

4 comments:

  1. Hey, I really like your blog because the point you bring out about saving the environment I also believe to be very important. I have not gotten anything to go from Sovie yet and I can not believe that they would use styrofoam for to go boxes! Your completely right this is supposed to be a green campus and that is completely hypocritical. I really admire you for taking your box back to them and for researching about styrofoam. I did not know about all those facts that you listed and some of them are quite interesting. Anyways I will see you in class and hopefully we can stop them from using those styrofoam take out boxes.

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  2. I too agree that the use of Styrofoam is on a "green" campus is kind of a oxy-moron. They could just as easily use trays and cartons made out of soy based products that are 100 percent natural and biodegradable. It is inexcusable for any college level school, especially ours to continue the use of Styrofoam in any way. Not only does it clutter the world for right now, it always clutters the world for 100 years down the road.

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  3. Hey Julia " how are u doing? I really appreciate your carefulness about the environnment ,I think it takes a smart man to understand how important the environnment is , and how to protect it and take care of it ... so I think u'r blog is quite interesting and I am looking forward to know more about Styrofoam...

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  4. caranva, I never imagine how bad those containers are for the environment, but is like everything else we just used and never realize what it is behind, and how easy for us could be do some thing to made a better world for everybody, if we just care a little bit

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