5 minute read
Eco-Friendly Enterprises
BY JENNIFER JULIA
When you live in a place like Telluride, surrounded by this spectacular natural environment, it stands to reason that the pristine beauty inspires one to go the extra mile to protect it. This is our hope for all who live and visit here, and it’s the credo maintained by many of our local businesses that are incorporating green and sustainable practices, bold steps towards protecting our environment locally and globally.
Take GoodLight Candles for instance. Seeking to create a cleaner, safer alternative to paraffin-wax candles, David Callicott, along with two friends, founded GoodLight Candles in 2010. David and his wife, Sarah, are now at the company’s helm, making affordable, plantbased candles from sustainably-sourced palm oil. GoodLight candles contain no phthalates, synthetic fragrances or chemicals, and the company is plastic-free, using recycled and recyclable paper and plant-based inks for their packaging, as well as using pure cotton wicks.
Through their membership with the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil and partnerships with the not-for-profit organizations Wild Asia and the Orangutan Land Trust, GoodLight works to promote sustainable palm oil production among smallholder farmers. Altruism also drives their business: GoodLight donates 1 percent of their annual revenue to nonprofit organizations through their membership with One Percent for the Planet, spreading good light — literally and figuratively. >>
Ryan Bonneau
If you’ve spent any time on the streets of Telluride, chances are you’ve seen Mark Sturdevant
of Dirty Sturdy’s Mountain Compost on his electric tricycle and trailer rig, pedaling from house to house collecting compostable household waste from his 100-plus clients. Utilizing this eco-friendly and inventive mode of transport, Sturdevant composts an average of four tons of waste per month. “By keeping this waste out of the landfills, I’m diverting greenhouse gases,” Sturdevant says, explaining that when food waste is dumped into landfills, it rots and creates methane, a potent greenhouse gas. “Instead of creating a harmful gas, I’m creating a healthy, useful substance.”
Dirty Sturdy’s teams with community gardens, regional food growers and organic farms in a symbiotic relationship: the farms provide the composting space and in return receive half of the compost (the other half is given to clients). Sturdevant’s joy in his work is palpable. “The most important aspects of this work for me are community, connection and education.”
As for Rob Wagner, when the longtime local became a Colorado State University-certified Colorado Gardener, he knew he wanted to do more than just landscape, he wanted to do so in a green, sustainable way. Teaming up with like-minded partner Billy Schwengel, the duo
set forth to create Telluride Eco Lawn & Garden, a landscaping business with an environmentally-based mission.
Every piece of equipment in the company’s fleet, including lawn mowers, leaf blowers, string trimmers and garden cultivators, is electric battery powered. This means no emissions, no exhaust and, best of all, no noise. “Because we are entirely battery powered, we are very quiet,” Wagner explains with a grin. “No bothering the homeowners or their neighbors.” The company uses all-organic, Colorado-based fertilizers, and they compost 100 percent of the yard waste. “It was pretty serendipitous that we formed our LLC on Earth Day,” Schwengel notes of what seems like an enthusiastic thumbs up from Mother Earth.
And then there’s The Butcher and the
Mark Sturdevant
Baker. Step into this much-loved main street bakery and cafe and you’re liable to be seduced by their fresh salads, juices and baked treats. The eco-friendly aspects of its offerings are just as delicious, though. In 2019, owner Megan Ossola received a Telluride Green Grant, funding from the Town of Telluride that is administered by Telluride Eco Action Partners to “reduce greenhouse gas emissions through energy efficiency, renewable energy and other innovative means”.
Ossola utilized her grant to purchase a dump trailer, which she makes available for community composting. She and her team process the compostable waste at her farm in Montrose, using it to grow produce that in turn is used at the eatery. In addition to a farm-to-table menu that emphasizes sustainable, regional ingredients, “Butcher” uses compostable packaging and has implemented carpooling measures among staff. “Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world,” Ossola says, quoting Howard Zinn. “That’s most definitely my mantra.”
Lifetime memories. Daily trips.
New 4-stroke sleds!
A sustainable Guide
The Official Guide to Telluride and Mountain Village has taken an important step toward sustainability by enrolling in Print Releaf. The initiative is clever. With the slogan “You print one, we’ll plant one”, Print Releaf has worked closely with industry experts in print and forestry to develop standards for measuring, offsetting and verifying the successful reforestation of paper consumption. The results? Through partnerships with certified reforestation programs around the world, new trees are planted to offset the amount of paper used in each print run of the Guide.
Says Telluride Tourism Board President and CEO Michael Martelon, “We believe that communities and organizations cannot thrive without a healthy planet, so it makes sense to us to take steps like this that minimize our own impacts on the environment and promote sustainability. In addition, we see sustainability as a business opportunity, not a cost or burden, and Print Releaf fits that vision really well.”
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