Jan, at Thanks for Today, was having a contest/giveaway to promote Earth Day, April 22, 2010, and sustainable living.
As I noted in my New Year's post, Sun Chips has announced that they will be selling their chips in "100% compostable" bags starting on Earth Day. VIS managed to find an early released one of them last week, and, thanks to the boy and his ever-expanding appetite, the bag has been emptied. I put it on the compost pile yesterday. Here it is tucked in so that it doesn't blow away. (Yes, that's snow in the compost bin.)
I will be checking on the bag periodically throughout the growing season and reporting on its progress. I'm hoping this type of packaging will catch on and that soon, every chip package will be compostable. Imagine the huge reduction in garbage that would result. (I'm imagining how much will be reduced just from my household. A preteen boy in a growth spurt eats a lot of chips.) We're going to be buying only Sun Chips until other chip companies start packaging their chips in compostable bags. I encourage everyone who buys chips to do the same. Money talks, and we can make a difference.
We already recycle all we can, use cloth bags for shopping, drink water from the tap, walk or ride a bicycle instead of drive when we can, and use low wattage light bulbs. We're also looking into installing solar panels on the roof.
*Jan extended the contest to April 15, so there's still time to participate. (Thanks, Kylee for alerting me to that.)
33 comments:
I love sun chips so this is really great I buy them every week :). They do not have the new bags here yet, hoping they have them here soon.
I haven't seen these bags yet and I eat Sun Chips. We will definitely have them. I will be interested to see how long it takes for the bag to compost.
I'd not seen these bags, yet. Way to go Sun Chips. You also have a great list of other things you do, MMD! Everything we do makes a difference. :-)
I'm anxious to see how this turns out, too. Of course, it is just in time for my annual "give up junk food and return to training food" switch. *sigh*
I saw this advertised somewhere recently and was thinking what a great idea! I agree, all the chip makers should jump on this bandwagon if they do indeed compost such as they say. I will let you be the judge on this one with your bag…
I have been very intrigued by the commercials for these, and my concern is that the grease on the inside (albeit light, Sun Chip-type grease) would attract animals. Please keep us updated!
I'd still want to know what the bag was made of, compostable or not, before I threw it in my bin. (GMO corn?)
I love Sun Chips, but I'd not heard about these bags yet! I'll be keeping my eye out for them and I'll be interested to see how your experiment turns out!
BTW, I think Jan extended the deadline on the giveaway and the posts.
I'm really glad you decided to do this and I'm looking forward to hearing the results. Fingers crossed that these things do what they say they'll do!
Yes, I'm a cloth-bag-everywhere person; I compost and recycle, drink my water from a faucet AND have the fun of wearing other people's clothing!
What a wonderful idea! Thanks for the information.
I love science experiments MMD! This is a good one....and will be fun to see the results. I have to admit, I've never eaten a Sunchip. gail
Experiments are fun! I'm going to try this too. Because I usually cut up large browns (and I'm assuming the bag counts as a brown, not a green), I will buy two bags (you know, I'll make that sacrifice), keeping one whole and cutting the other into smaller strips (perhaps running it through the shredder as I do with paper). The whole bag will be my control. (Yep, I used to work with scientists!)
Dear MMGD, How interesting! Although I do not eat crisps, I agree entirely that if all manufacturers were to follow this example it would make a very big difference. I look forward to seeing the progress of the crisp packet in the compost heap, it looks as if it is there to stay forever at the moment!
I'm glad you told us that otherwise I wouldn't have known. I wish companies would make a point of informing the public about earth friendly changes. I am more than happy to support products that make a difference.
Marnie
Ben - I'm sure they'll be available everywhere by next month.
Lisa - maybe I'm not the right person for this test because I'm a lazy composter, I rarely turn my pile and I don't do the whole alternating layer thing. But maybe that makes me a good person to do the test.
Shady - every little bit helps, but I feel like I need to make an extra effort because of all the energy used & garbage generated in the raising of children.
Susan - They're healthy chips. ;^)
ROR - I did rinse out the bag, but nobody has bothered it yet. (I don't have rats, only raccoons & squirrels.)
Caroline - I can't see how GMO plants would break down into anything more harmful than regular plants. I don't have a veggie garden per se, so it's not as much of a concern for me.
Kylee - thanks for alerting me to the extension. I started working on this post before she extended the deadline.
Sandy - I don't wear other people's clothes, but my boy does. Love hand-me-downs.
Monica - I probably should have shredded it first, but I wanted to see how long a whole bag will take, treating like one discarded in the trash.
Edith - as hard as it may be to believe, the compost pile has gotten marginally smaller over the winter, so it is still active. The snow is melting anyway.
Marnie - I guess you don't watch the right TV programs. I've seen commercials for these bags. It might have been during the Olympics.
I had never heard of these, either, MMD. L myooks like 13 yr old son will be eating a lot of sunchips with his lunches from now on! I extended the date last week in a separate post when Joe Lampl informed me that he'd arranged for Fiskars to donate a Rain Barrel for the Grand Prize. I like the idea of solar panels on the roof. I hope eventually all houses will be built with them. I'm trying to use cloth bags too, but when you get a huge load it's a little difficult not to have to use some of their extra's. Gradually I will build up enough, I guess. Thanks for your contribution.
I had not seen those bags either. Great idea and kudos to Sun Chips!
I do hope things slow down for you at Squirrelhaven. Things can be so darned hectic at times. Glad you made the deadline.
I haven't seen these bags on the shelves here yet, but I'll definitely look for them. Now I can feel good about eating chips--I'll be adding to my compost pile. Now if only chocolate could be wrapped in the same eco-friendly materials:)
I've found that most compostable bags/paper plates/plasticware are meant for commercial composting operations, where temperatures go much higher than in a normal composter. But I hope your experiment will prove me wrong.
Great idea, I hope it works. Please keeps us posted. My worries aren't so much from the bag, it's the dyes they use to color the bag.Do those break down as well?
Looking forward to seeing a bit of spring next week at the garden show in Chicago. Looking forward to seeing your take on the event.
I did not know this. I'll be on the lookout for them. Thanks for the heads up.
Hmm, sounds like a great excuse to munch a bag and then try the experiment too. Thanks for the excuse. ;-)
I know where to get sunchips and I'll be paying attention for the new bags. I'll be watching your experiment.
I hope the bags really do compost and it's good you are testing them :)
Like you, we do a lot of earth friendly things. Two improvements we did recently are buying a front loading clothes washer (from Sears) which uses way less water and energy to heat said water, and we added insulation in the attic. My husband did that and our heating bills went down dramatically.
I love this little green planet, and my name means Earth in Latin.
Terra
I love that you're testing it, and I've got one in the compost too to see how truly compostable it is.~~Dee
I heard about these bags - it'll be interesting to see your experiment!
That chip bag is not going to break down in an unmanaged compost pile. If you read the back of the chip bag it states that the bag will break down in a "hot, active compost pile" and the fine print says that it is intended to be composted in a municipal composting facility. I successfully composted the Sun Chip bag in my home compost bin, but it was a well mixed & aerated large pile with optimum moisture levels, and maintained a high temperature of 140F.
I bought a bag of Sun Chips in the compostable bag. I commend them for making the effort.
Did you notice how LOUD the bag is when you crumple it? OMG! Wonder how many decibels that thing is? LOL!
Thanks for your enthusiasm for the new SunChips compostable bag! We’re glad you decided to test out the bag yourself, so please go to www.sunchips.com to learn more about proper composting for the bag in Squirrelhaven. Also, be sure to become a fan of SunChips on Facebook.
Anon - I admit that I'm not a good composter, so this will be interesting, although I am shredding all future bags that I add to the pile.
Kylee - yes, I noticed the noise when my son was trying to talk to me from across the room & I was folding down & clipping the bag.
SunChips - I did take a look at your website after I wrote this. Even if it takes a very long time to decompose, it's better than me putting a bag in the garbage.
So what's the verdict? I started my Sun Chips compost experiment a month after you did, and... yeah, the bag's still there. I was hoping you'd have a follow-up post. If nothing else, catching up on your blog was WAY more interesting than the work I have to do today :)
Dave - I haven't looked at the bag. It's a kind of mosquito-hell back by the compost bins, so I spend as little time there as possible. I've also added cut bags to the pile. I will have to take a peek soon though. As you might have guessed, I'm a lazy composter.
Any updates? We have some SunChips but want to know if we should bother putting them in our lazy compost pile.
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