Craig Piepmeier

FPL has a FPL SolarNow Program where you can enroll and $9 per month will be added to your bill. Funds go toward the construction of solar energy projects in local public areas, such as parks, zoos, schools and museums. It seems like a good program that can help the community and our energy usage footprint. If you are interested, go to your FPL account online and look for the Solar option link at the bottom of the page.

We have been focusing on reducing the single use plastics that come with items we purchase and it is tough. Many stores wrap food in plastic maybe in an attempt to keep things more sanitary. Some places like Lucky's in Melbourne make it easy to buy things in bulk but is it worth the ecological impact of driving for 40 minutes to do that? Luckily the  Produce Place of Suntree is closer and we do shop there more now. At Target yesterday I struggled with buying four boxes of Kleenex wrapped in plastic on sale versus single boxes. I believe our garbage and recycling output has reduced over the last few months but plastic is just everywhere you turn these days.

In general, we don't have that sense of neighborhood that we once did but I think this is one area where small condo's do help. We are in a six unit building and we know all of the people in the building very well. It makes it easy to share tools and other rarely used items. We often gather socially on the dock in the late afternoon and I think that is the key to creating community for us. Ideas and planned projects are often discussed and it provides the opportunity for someone else to volunteer their time or resources. It isn't always harmonious but community and families are like that. I believe if you keep the goal of helping your neighbors in mind then sharing economies are just one of the benefits.

I spent some time on Google trying to find a local place to scrap some metal, DVD's and VHS tapes. The DVD's and VHS tapes had personal information on them but not sensitive. I found that earth911.com is a good resource along with Recycle Brevard. There was a place in NH that you could send DVDs to and they would recycle for free but only requested a donation in support of their efforts. It seemed odd to me that they did not take VHS tapes. Locally, I found TMR in Rockledge takes most types of metal so I plan a trip there later this week. I've asked neighbors if they have anything they would like me to take. Our town where we lived in MA had drop-off dumpsters at a city run transfer station for this kind of material and that sure made it easier to recycle this type of stuff.