Day Two: No Impact Thoughts To Eliminate Your Trash

Photo Credit: Flickr/Justin Ritchie

Day two of No Impact Week challenges us to take a good look at our trash.  If you saw the movie, you saw that the No Impact Family was successful with cutting their trash almost to Zero!  (If you haven’t seen the movie, I recommend that you give it a shot, it is available now for instant viewing on Netflix.) Here are some thoughts for success in trash elimination from the No Impact Experiment:

Before you start the challenge, you will want to pick a day where you monitor your trash.  This might sound yucky, but keep your trash.  I mean all of it.  Start the morning with a fresh bag and use it for all of your garbage.  Don’t let others put their trash in it; you are keeping track of what garbage you generate through your day.

At the end of the day, examine your trash.  How much is there?  Were you able to keep it to one bag?  How much of your trash is recyclable? How much is compostable?  Take a good look at what is in there.  What kinds of things did you use and throw away through the day?  Wrappers?  Containers?  Coffee cups?  Wasted food?  How much was used for less than 10 minutes?  How much for more than 10 minutes?  Really think about what is there and where it is going next.

You should have three categories: recycling, compostable, and landfill.  Let’s think about what those categories mean.  Recycling items will go to a facility where they will be made into other items.  This is great, but remember that it takes more resources to make your containers into something else.  Compostable items will become growing material for your garden, or taken by your municipal waste service to be sold as compost or used in local parks.  So, be sure that you would want what you’re composting to be reincarnated into new food.   And finally, landfill.  We traditionally call this garbage or trash, but calling it landfill will help you to remember that what we throw away doesn’t really go “away”, it goes to the landfill.  Let’s call it landfill.  See the photo above for a visual of where your landfill items go.

Now let’s plan for reducing your refuse for trash elimination day of the challenge.   If you were successful with day one, this should be easy because you won’t be shopping for new things so you will automatically cut down on some of the packaging that you buy. 

Of the items that you recycled, are there ways to eliminate some from your routine?  When you are buying food, are there choices that have less packaging?  If you have plastic containers, can you reuse them a few times for leftovers?  Better yet, can you reuse those containers to buy something else?  How about drinking tap water instead of bottled water?  Buying bulk food instead of packaged food?

Of the items you composted, are there some that could have been used for something else?  Vegetable scraps can make vegetable stock.  Fruit that is on the verge of going bad can be frozen for smoothies later.  Freckled bananas can go in the freezer for banana bread.  Stale bread can be used for breadcrumbs.  Could you have planned to take your leftovers for lunch instead of leaving them in the fridge?  Be creative before you throw food in the bin. 

Of the items you put in your landfill, are there ways you could have eliminated the waste?  Can you eliminate purchases that aren’t packaged in recyclable materials?  Can you cut back on take-out food orders?  Can you use multiple-use items instead of single-use?  Can you find another way to use the item before it goes to the landfill?

There are many ways you can cut down on all of these categories.  But the key is thinking about the garbage well before you decide which bin it goes in, you need to be mindful of where it will go as you are accepting the item into your life.  With everything you bring into your home, keep in mind how long it will be with you and where it will go when you are done with it.  Packaging and all. 

Eco Home Consultations provides green living consultation services to households in the Seattle area.  Learn more at www.ecohomeconsults.com or email questions about this blog or other green living issues to Melissa@ecohomeconsults.com.