The team at EnviroCentre is in the midst of a baby boom, with 6 babies born or expected within less than 2 years of each other. And yet, by some calculations, having a child is the worst decision someone can make for the environment. How can we make environmentally friendly choices when raising our kids to lower the impact of that decision?
1. Use cloth diapers or get a diaper service
Newborns are notorious for eating, sleeping, and, well, going through a lot of diapers. Disposable diapers, however, take about 500 years to decompose. When you consider the mountain of diapers babies go through, it adds up quickly.
This is not to say that cloth diapers are necessarily a carbon neutral alternative, but they can be better. A few ways to make this choice even more eco-friendly include getting the diapers second hand, using the same diapers for multiple siblings, or registering for a diaper service (with the benefit that they do all the washing for you!). You can also hang your cloth diapers to dry in the sun, which is one of the best ways to help bleach them clean.
And, when your child no longer needs diapers, they can find a new home. Sell your diapers on Marketplace, gift them to friends, family, or neighbors who are expecting new arrivals, or even repurpose them! We have it on good authority that pre-fold style diaper flats make great mop pads.
2. Re-think how much your kids need
The middle-class expectation is to give your children everything. Unfortunately, that often conflates wants with needs, and the end result is children drowning in toys, clothing, and sports gear that they probably don’t need, or even use.
The average child owns over 100 toys, but only plays with 4-10 of them regularly. As many parents will attest, kids will frequently gravitate towards household items rather than use the toys provided. In fact, some studies have shown that the fewer toys children own, the better. They play with the toys they have longer, use their imagination to a greater extent, and can occupy themselves more easily than if they have more.
As a bonus, finding ways to reduce the number of items coming into the home means less time is needed to manage all those items. Less laundry to fold, fewer toys to pick up after play time, and less stuff that needs to be cleared out when it’s been outgrown.
3. Embrace the hand-me-downs
The middle-class expectation is to give your children everything. Unfortunately, that often conflates wants with needs, and the end result is children drowning in toys, clothing, and sports gear that they probably don’t need, or even use.
The average child owns over 100 toys, but only plays with 4-10 of them regularly. As many parents will attest, kids will frequently gravitate towards household items rather than use the toys provided. In fact, some studies have shown that the fewer toys children own, the better. They play with the toys they have longer, use their imagination to a greater extent, and can occupy themselves more easily than if they have more.
As a bonus, finding ways to reduce the number of items coming into the home means less time is needed to manage all those items. Less laundry to fold, fewer toys to pick up after play time, and less stuff that needs to be cleared out when it’s been outgrown.
4. Kid-friendly transportation
There is a narrative that the safest – nay, only – way to transport a child is within a car. Certainly, car seat technology has improved, and it can often be one of the most efficient ways to transport children over longer distances. But should it be the first and only choice?
Using bikes, strollers, or transit for transportation rather than just leisure walks, have benefits to our children beyond simply reduced emissions and having fewer vehicles out on the roads. In one study for example, researchers found that kids who were transported to school in a car had far more limited knowledge of their neighbourhood than kids who walked. These options also allow parents to have better conversations with kids, teaches them things like how to navigate a transit system, and makes stopping to play in a park with friends much easier.
The benefits don’t stop there. Older kids can get more personal freedom when they don’t need to rely on the Family Taxi, and fresh air and exercise is beneficial regardless of age.
5. Prioritize experiences over stuff
Give memories and adventures when you can! Museums offer learning opportunities for all ages, places for kids to run around, and potentially for a place for parents to socialize too! Most museums and galleries have a “free time” and if you go often, you can save a bit by becoming a member. Yearly passes also give you access to museums across Canada and the United States via reciprocal agreements. Don’t forget that you can borrow a museum pass from the library if you want to try one out first!
Other experiences could include activities such as going for a bike ride together, sharing an ice cream, or visiting a community party. The memories you make together will last longer than anything purchased. With many big events taking place along transit lines, it’s a great opportunity to park and ride and extend the family time by using transit part of the way.
6. The Joneses don’t need to be kept up with
When a new child arrives, our existing spaces can start to feel cramped, and a bigger car and home may seem like basic necessities especially when everyone else around you seems to have more space or be upgrading as well.
Beyond the fact that major lifestyle upgrades will cost more money, they also encourage more consumption. A bigger home with a dedicated play room, for example, means there isn’t as much immediate feedback about the volumes of toys that are brought into the home. Larger homes also take more energy to heat or cool, furnish, and maintain.
Staying in a smaller space can lower your environmental impact, but it doesn’t need to feel like a sacrifice. Getting creative with shared spaces, having kids share a room, or making use of multi-purpose furniture like murphy beds can help.
7. Involve your kids in food decisions
It’s very comfortable for kids (and adults) to default to foods that they know they will love. Unfortunately, those foods that picky kids gravitate towards tend to be heavily processed, which is not the best choice for either our bodies or our environment. As parents, trying to decide between an argument over food or accepting the children’s decision on what they want to eat can sometimes seem like a battle not worth fighting.
Bringing our children into the world of food growing and preparation can be one way of helping bridge the gap and encourage exploration with new food. Not everyone has access to a backyard or community garden for hands-on experience, but bringing the kids with you to the grocery store and letting them pick out a fruit or vegetable they’d be interested in trying is a good first step, even if they don’t end up liking it.
Look through some recipe books. The library is a great resource for lots of interesting ones! Pick out a recipe that they’ll help you make. You can challenge yourselves to pick a dish that has a new ingredient, or one that uses things already in your cupboards. Challenge yourselves to pick a vegetarian or vegan dish, as switching away from meat-based meals can have a huge environmental impact. Switching just one meal per week to vegetarian can save up to 100 kg of CO₂ a year!
8. Advocate for a more environmentally friendly future
Whether it’s supporting more cycling and transit options in currently car-dependent areas, advocating for increased density in your neighbourhood, or encouraging increased regulations and restrictions on the use of fossil fuels, your voice can be powerful. Individual lifestyle changes are not always possible, but systemic large-scale change at government and planning levels have huge global impacts in emissions reduction.
You can also use your voice to talk to others about the changes you’ve made. Maybe it’s the family Christmas plan to do Secret Santa instead of everyone buying presents for everyone else, the vacation where you’re taking the train instead of flying, or the heat pump you recently installed instead of a new furnace. Maybe it’s trying out a “buy nothing” month, or committing to one meat-free day per week. Whatever it is you’re doing, talk about it! As these things become more talked about, they become more common, helping us all ensure our children’s future is safeguarded.
Ultimately, the best way to offset the expected greenhouse gas impacts of having children is bringing up our kids to understand their own impact and how to reduce it.
This goes beyond learning how to recycle. Teaching things like conscious consumerism, the difference between wants and needs, how to repair our items rather than buying new, how to use our transit system or how to ride a bike, and how to use their voices to encourage leaders to make sustainable choices on a larger scale will ensure the next generation has a lower footprint than our own. We love children at EnviroCentre! They often come filled to the brim with a love of nature, hope, and so many brilliant ideas to make the world a better place.
Tips from parents at EnviroCentre
 | “My top tip for reducing environmental impacts of children is making active transportation a habit from an early age. My son now walks, runs, scoots, or bikes to and from daycare every day. It’s 2 km each way and since he was 18 months he has always commuted to daycare in a stroller, exposed to the elements. He assumes that’s just the way anyone would travel such a distance without considering getting in a car. We also walk to the shopping centre in our subdivision whenever we go out for dinner. Making active transportation the norm as much as possible is key.” — Lisa |
 | “The only reason to be on Facebook… Facebook Marketplace! You can get second (or third, or fourth) hand anything! Clothes of course, but also toys, furniture, gear, etc. Plus, you can sell things you no longer need or use on there to keep their life cycle going.” — Brodie |
 | “My husband and I decided to stay fairly close to the core when we were looking for a home to raise our family. By doing so, we ensured we could continue to use active transport and transit for many of our trips, rather than moving to a larger house and/or getting a second car. It means we are really conscious about how we use our space and what we bring into it. For example, our two kids will be sharing a room, and we just don’t have the space to have a playroom with lots of toys. The knock-on effect is we end up saving quite a bit of money on heating, homewares, clothing, and toys, as well as our transportation!” — Felicity |