TRASH ON YOUR BACK® 5 DAY CHALLENGE

Sustainability News & Entertainment®’s TRASH ON YOUR BACK® 5 DAY CHALLENGE was founded by Diana Dehm & inspired by MIT/Dartmouth College to innovate & motivate, and ask the simple question…”What is my personal trash impact on the planet?”

Mission

To collectively create a Zero Waste Nation & Globe, through human innovation while eliminating one piece of trash to landfill at a time.

Description

What did 2300 people from 6 countries have in common in 2013?  The Sustainability News & Entertainment® TRASH ON YOUR BACK® 5 DAY CHALLENGE, we had 27 states represented – 6 countries; USA, Australia, Israel, Jamaica, Canada, Uganda. Our Core Team included Drew Jones of MIT’s Climate Interactive, Green Schools National Network, CEO Jim McGrath, Sustainability News & Entertainment® Radio (founder), US EPA Pollution Prevention, Matt Bogoshian, Global Conscious Leadership CEO, Tara Sheehan; Seattle Mariners & Green Sports Alliance Co-Founder Scott Jenkins; Former Mayor/City Council Member, City of Huntington Beach, CA; University of New Hampshire, US Navy Rt Admiral Len Hering (RADM, USN (ret), Randolf Elementary, Chris Castro, Co-Founder for Ideas for Us (US, Uganda, Israel), ECOSafe Bags, and Sustainable Business Partnerships™, Waste Management, and many others from Cities, Fed Gov, Major League Sports, Media/Radio/TV, K-12 Schools, Colleges & Universities, military, manufacturing, businesses, etc.)

We learned collectively that the US averages 4.4 lbs of trash per day per person, and that the USA spends $12B per year on waste management (tipping fees etc.). The TRASH ON YOUR BACK® TEAM from around the world averaged .8% of trash per day vs. 4.4 lbs the average = through behavioral choice and not wanting to literally carry all the trash, we cut the average by 82%! Imagine if we cut conservatively 50% vs. the 82%, through our choices made, and we look at the $12B we spend each year, we collectively uncovered an approximate 50-82% economic reduction opportunity to save the Nation $6B per year in “waste management”!

UNH also helped us to understand that our complete human impact is actually 250 lbs per day based on the average American use of water, energy, carbon, and waste. We can’t manage what we can’t measure – we made the invisible visible – through hands on grass roots experience and walking our talk together because our next generation is depending on us!   Join us in 2014 during Earth Day Week for the TRASH ON YOUR BACK® 5 DAY CHALLENGE HAPPENING AROUND THE WORLD.