By Jacquie Ottman and Alexandra O’Hagan
How many times a day do you stop, cringe and exclaim, “What a waste!” We’re not talking about wasting time or opportunity (which are worth a dedicated blog of their own), but about the thoughtless dismissal of items deemed useless or worthless by people everywhere. Waste is the perfectly good sofa abandoned on a street corner awaiting an undeserving end in a landfill. Waste is the delicious plate of food mindlessly scraped into the garbage. Waste is every unnecessary light left burning. And every leaky faucet letting precious water escape its hold. This kind of waste is thoughtless, avoidable.
Waste not
There is no reason why we cannot prevent waste — we can find our furniture a new home, grab a to-go box, switch off the lights, and fix our leaky faucets. All it takes is a new way of thinking. Before deciding that you’re finished with an old clock, a trusty blender or pilled sweater, ask yourself if you’ve truly made an effort to squeeze out every last bit of worth it has to offer. This may mean going easy on that pair of shoes repairing them as you go. It means sharing a vacuum, espressomaker, or snowblower with neighbors. It means getting creative. How will you get that last drop of Palmolive liquid from the bottle? Creatively repurpose a package into something new and desirable? Learn to live only with what you really need?
Deep down it means that we understand the difference between legitimate waste and the waste we have the power to prevent. It’s about being smarter about what we consume and how we can lead a less wasteful life.
The benefits are many.
Our products will last longer. We will spend less money. We will live lighter on the planet. How liberating! What a sense of pride and accomplishment! So what’s there to lose? Nothing — but unnecessary waste.
Let’s talk! How much do you hate waste? What do you do to prevent waste in your life?
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June 11, 2012 at 9:11 pm
One of the wasteful efforts that gets me mean muggin’ is packaging. Why do we have to over package everything. I saw bacon in a plastic container complete with plastic top, wrapped in plastic. Nothing Kosher about that.
Love the new site, Jacquie.
June 13, 2012 at 12:05 am
Great idea but how to get people to stop waste “automatically” — the way we brush our teeth?
June 22, 2012 at 11:14 am
There’s an old saying here in New England: “Use it up. Wear it out. Make it do.Do without.” Good advice for our times, though I hear it (and see evidence of people believing in it) a lot less than when I moved here 30+ years ago. Still, I certainly see this healthy attitude among the local farmers, at least.
I will actually make a bit of a pest of myself turning off lights and faucets and unwatched TVs in other people’s houses and in public spaces.
While I don’t see much of a consciousness about “the small stuff,” I do at least see a lot more big-picture thinking (e.g., cradle-to-cradle, zero waste), and a lot of consciousness around eating locally, etc. All steps in the right direction.
Like you, Jacquie, waste drives me nuts. I’ve actually written a consumer e-book, Painless Green: 111 Tips to Help the Environment, Lower Your Carbon Footprint, Cut Your Budget, and Improve Your Quality of Life-With No Negative Impact on Your Lifestyle. And because I really want this information out there, I’ll make it available at no charge to anyone reading this blog–just visit http://painlessgreenbook.com/earthday and use the code, earthday.
August 3, 2012 at 6:25 pm
One of the biggest opportunities in waste is to see it as fresh material. If manufacturers could be encouraged (or forced) to adopt more modular construction & materials, disassembly and recycling would be way more cost-effective. Just one of the many tentacles of this important issue!
September 15, 2012 at 5:34 pm
Food waste is a big pet peeve of mine. The US in particular is horrible at proportioning meal sizes. Every time I go out to eat, I feel that I have to starve myself if I want to be able to finish the entire meal that is put in front of me. Restaurants sometimes have the healthy menu option, but don’t you think they would benefit from a smaller proportions menu option? The customer eats less, pays less and the restaurant saves money. Sounds like a win-win to me!
Recognizing take home left overs as an option, how many times do you forget that you have leftovers in your fridge and end up throwing out the food anyway?
January 21, 2013 at 2:47 pm
“Waste is the perfectly good sofa abandoned on a street corner awaiting an undeserving end in a landfill.” This line impressed me because so many unnecessary garbage items end up in landfills. So when my town went to single-stream recycling, it was a huge victory. As you may know, single-stream recycling is a system by which all recyclable materials are mixed together instead of being sorted into separate commodities. These items are then sorted by state of the art processing equipment. This complete overhaul of the system saves residents time, as they no longer need to separate paper, plastic and cardboard. There is no sorting at curbside; the haulers can speed up the collection process.
Single-stream recycling has significantly simplified the town’s recycling program and, with the help of green marketing, greatly increased recycling proficiency. Since the town converted in August 2011, it was reported that the town residents recycled around 70% more materials than the previous year, saving over $1 million dollars. Most importantly, many of these items avoided an “undeserving end in a landfill” and will likely be reused.
It is important that environmentally sensitive practices such as single-stream recycling are correctly marketed on a national scale. This small change in recycling has proven to create more socially responsible residents and can be a model for other towns and cities. Let’s try to give items a deserving end in a recycling program, rather than an “undeserving end in a landfill.”
January 31, 2013 at 7:55 pm
I think that the biggest problem why people waste is just because they can’t realize how easy it is to avoid wasting. Most of the people just don’t want to change their routine or habits even when that doesn’t mean making any effort at all. It’s just a matter of paying attention to your habits and making little changes. Actually what is the real big effort you have to make just by turning the tab off when you’re brushing your teeth? None at all.