2019 has been a fantastic year in working to tackle the climate crisis. Worldwide, we’ve taken some phenomenal actions and as the year comes to a close, we’re feeling really hopeful.
In March, the European Union took a giant step to ban a wide range of single-use plastic, including straws and cutlery. As the climate crisis has grown in mainstream awareness, our youth have found their voices as climate activists, standing up for climate change through strikes that grow in numbers every week And for the first time, renewable energy has outpaced coal in energy production in the US, making renewable energy, including hydro, solar, and wind, the second-largest energy source after natural gas.
Here at EcoVibe, we’re so proud to have made some amazing achievements in 2019 too! Read on to check out our top accomplishments of the year…
3,932 Trees Planted
Trees absorb carbon dioxide as they grow and the carbon that they store in their wood helps slow the rate of global heating. They also reduce wind speeds and cool the air as they lose moisture and even help prevent flooding and soil erosion, absorbing thousands of litres of stormwater – how cool is that?!
This year we’ve planted 3,932 trees. We know, that's a lot of trees! In fact, it's enabled to offset up to 86 tonnes of carbon dioxide over the next 40 years. That's equivalent to taking 21 cars off the road this year.
1.4 Million Makeup Wipes
Makeup wipes can be an easy way to cleanse our face, but traditional disposable wipes are a disaster for the environment! Most don’t disintegrate in the sewage system and are a huge factor in blockages. Even they do make it through, they can end up in our seas and consumed by wildlife. It’s said they can linger for up to 500 years in the ecosystem, so they’re unfortunately just as bad as throwing out a plastic bottle!
By selling our Reusable Makeup Remover Pads, we've helped prevent a whopping 1.4 million makeup wipes going into landfill, entering our oceans and creating fatbergs in our sewers in the next year.
271,000 Cotton Buds
High usage and improper disposal have meant that cotton buds make up a significant portion of debris found on UK beaches. In fact, between 2015 and 2018, cotton buds were in the top 10 items found during the Marine Conversation Society's Great British Clean. During 2018, 22 cotton buds were found for every 100 meters of UK beach2 surveyed.
But don't worry, we're helping reduce this shocking stat! This year, we replaced 271,000 cotton buds with biodegradable bamboo alternatives. Check them out here.
54,180 Plastic Carrier Bags
We could never be without our trusty tote bags, they're a great way of avoiding the scourge of plastic carrier bags. With the average person using 140 plastic bags a year (shocking how they add up, isn't it?!) or just 12 minutes each, by swapping to our reusable tote bags, our customers have saved approximately 54,180 bags just this year! By reusing those same bags next year, think how much plastic we could save.
13,257 Plastic Kitchen Utensils
Did you know most kitchen sponges and scourers are actually made of non-recyclable plastic? They'll take years to break down and release harmful microplastics into our waterways and oceans as you're washing up! Well, this year we've helped replace 13,257 kitchen cleaning utensils with natural, plastic-free alternatives in 9,202 households. Check out our cleaning collection here.
371,880 Dog Poo Bags
On average, a dog owner throws out around 28 plastic bags of poop a week, over a week that’s about 1,500 plastics bags a year. What a lot of plastic! When these bags escape into the environment, they can have devastating effects on wildlife, especially marine animals like whales and sea turtles.
We’re so happy to help replace lots of this plastic with our biodegradable and compostable poo bags. When disposed of correctly, these bags will break down naturally and return to the earth in just a few weeks.
7.77 Tonnes of Plastic in Total
All in all, this works out as 7.77 tonnes of plastic – we think this is amazing! Thank you so much for all your support in 2019, we really couldn’t have done it without you! We can’t wait to see how many leaps forward we can take together in 2020.