Happy October, everyone! Now is the time for fall festivities. Celebrations might look different this year due to the coronavirus, but that isn’t stopping Halloween waste from accumulating. Pumpkins are one of many items that we hope, as another article cleverly put, “won’t come back to haunt us”.
The facts:
This graph shows how many people planned to carve pumpkins for Halloween in the US over the past four years, making an average of roughly 148.73 million people per year, and being the most people this Halloween at 151.95 million planning on carving pumpkins.
Roughly 1.3 billion pounds of pumpkins end up in American landfills each year, while almost 40 million are thrown away in the UK, making a total of 1.34 billion pounds of pumpkins in landfills every year. As pumpkins decompose in these landfills, they emit methane, a greenhouse gas known to be ten times as potent as carbon dioxide when it comes to trapping heat in the atmosphere, contributing significantly to the warming of our planet.
I am not telling you to stop purchasing pumpkins, especially as we have more limited fall activities this year. Although the overall amount of methane produced from discarded pumpkins is not nearly as impactful as other emissions sources, we can still easily do our part in reducing the number of pumpkins sent to landfills this fall. Here are three environmentally-friendly pumpkin activities to add to your October agenda!
1. Eat it.
There are many ways you can consume your pumpkin after using it for carving or other activities. My personal favorite is to roast the seeds, and the skin is also able to be baked into chips using a similar method. Here is a simple recipe for both. (insert link into that last sentence please https://rediscover.co.nz/roasted-pumpkin-seeds-pumpkin-skin-crisps/?doing_wp_cron=1603082323.3222820758819580078125 )
The guts of the pumpkin can be used for many more pumpkin-related foods as well, including pumpkin pie, juice, butter, and hummus. Recipes for these foods and others can be found here. (insert link into here please https://www.wideopeneats.com/save-the-guts-11-ways-to-eat-your-halloween-pumpkin-carvings/ )
2. Compost it.
If you have a backyard garden, pumpkins are very effective in compost, as they have many nutrients and are 90% water. Simply cut up the pumpkin rind and distribute it in the dirt. Make sure to remove the seeds from the pumpkin beforehand though if you don’t intend on growing it, and cover the pumpkin remains with leaves or more dirt if you don’t want to attract pesky critters to your other plants.
3. Reusable alternative.
If for some reason you find yourself unable to try the previous two options, but you still really want pumpkins to provide some decoration, consider a reusable alternative instead of trashing a decomposing pumpkin every year. Although there are environmental downsides to purchasing a plastic pumpkin, the benefits include it being a one-time purchase as opposed to an annual one, reducing the overall carbon footprint from pumpkin usage.
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