How to Reduce Your Trash Output To ZERO
In today’s world, is it really possible for a family of four to completely eliminate waste and still enjoy a normal healthy lifestyle?
The Strauss family are about to find out as they undertake a Zero Waste Challenge during the first week of September, in an attempt to cut their household waste altogether. The idea first came about following concerns over the impact of plastic bags on marine life, said Rachelle Strauss in an interview with EcoWorldly;
“..In May of this year I read an article about the effects of plastic on marine life. When I showed this to my husband he was clearly shocked and moved by what was happening. From that moment he declared ‘no more plastic bags’ and here we are 4 months later carrying out the idea of reducing our waste to the ultimate.”
Eliminating waste completely is clearly a difficult undertaking, particularly in a world where the average family throw away approximately one third of all the food that they buy. Not surprisingly the Strauss family also had some misgivings about the feasibility of their challenge. “I wasn’t even sure we were in with a good chance when we decided to go ahead with the idea! We’d had a couple of blips the weeks before and I was losing confidence“, said Rachelle, although by slowly reducing their waste output each week they managed to throw out a mere 55 grams in the week preceding the challenge. “That gave me a boost of confidence and I’ve chosen to tackle this week one step at at a time. “
So what are the top tips to reduce your household waste to zero?
- Adopt the right mindset: Says Rachelle: “We have a mantra now that goes something like ‘there is no such place as away.’ We’ve all grown up with the idea that we throw things away, but where is away? It’s a hole in the ground, an incinerator or a huge ship sailing to China. It’s actually ’someone else’s problem’ and we’ve decided to take responsibility for the waste we create.”
- Plan where you can, but be wary of the unexpected: “You can plan things like meals, but then something might arrive in the post, a friend might turn up with something for our daughter, some kind of minor ‘crisis’ might happen; you just don’t know…”
- Consider following a rubbish diet. The Strauss family started off small, and then built up. They suggest that people “focus on what they can do, rather than feel defeated about the things they can’t deal with”
- Get support and reduce your waste together with others: “This is why we set up a pledge and win competition to go alongside our zero waste week. The aim of this is to encourage people to try just one thing; they don’t have to go zero waste, we just want them to give something a go.”
Find about more about zero waste week at the Strauss familiy’s myZeroWaste website.
More from GreenOptions
- How Much Food Do We Waste?
- Tough Times = Less Trash
- The Environmentalist’s Old Clothes: Reduce, Reuse, Do Not Replace the Things We Own
Image credit: Bethany King at Flickr under a Creative Commons license
Now this is something I can get my teeth into. I have been doing this for years. I am a graduate of the 1930’s, therefore consider myself rather an expert.
Right from the days when we used salt and soda for brushing our teeth and before plastic was invented.
Our groceries were called in and delivered, usually by bicycle. Ask some of us. Then write the book.
Thank you, Mark for covering our zero waste week challenge. We did indeed rise to the occasion and succeed with nothing for landfill, despite a couple of near misses! But as I wrote on my blog, a radical challenge, calls for radical creative thinking, so we managed to get around all those ‘unforseen’ crises!
E.A.Morgan, I have great respect for your comment and indeed, there is a lot to learn from, is it PC to say ‘people of your generation’? I would welcome the opportunity to amass some of your wisdom any time. I quite agree that rather than moving forwards with clever ideas, we simply need to stop and ask ‘what would we have done before plastic?’
Please, if you feel inclined, come over to our site and join in with some of the discussions and share you ideas
mrs Green