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Cigarette Butts are Huge Water Polluters
Often, I feel that I’m metaphorically planting seeds when I take an initiative. This week, one of my seeds became a beautiful flower:
In 2021, my city organized a picture competition on littering. Many participants submitted photos of litter that left me wondering how it ended up there in the first place.
I handed in a picture with three bottles, filled with cigarette butts, which I put in there to make clear that they are small, but many. And while they are small, one butt can poison the water we drink in about 2 years! So, by putting all these butts in bottles, it becomes clear how severely they harm our environment and us (these 3 bottles contain over 2300 cigarettes!).
As these bottles visualize this problem, why the local university recently asked for permission to include my photo in one of their articles.” And there it is, my flower, in their special issue on “Sustainable development and ethics of science — mutual impulses and challenges”.
This is how actions we took in the past can make a positive influence today. So, please think again of your decisions today. How will you feel about them in a few years time?
As sustainability advocate, I ask myself these questions every day and make sure they will again be seeds … for more and more flowers in the future.
What seed did you plant today / what positive action did you do today? Share your story in the comments and inspire us all.
