Reduce and Reuse
A major part of my simple switch to a more sustainable lifestyle is reducing and reusing items in my daily life. The idea of reduce and reuse is not really groundbreaking for you to start, you most likely do it regularly now. You’ve already head of the Three R’s,Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, and today we are going to focus on reducing and reusing. You might have learned early on in school on Earth Day that these would be the key to saving the planet. I previously spoke about reducing your carbon footprint by adopting several sustainable habits.
Another environmental issue, aside from, but in some ways related to excess carbon emissions, is waste. Look outside the window. It’s everywhere. Streets, neighborhoods, parks, waterways. It’s a constantly growing problem and I would love to see a cleaner environment.
The world produces over two billion tonnes of municipal solid waste every year, enough to fill over 800,000 Olympic sized swimming pools.
-McGrath, BBC
Again, discussing environmental issues can quickly spiral into feelings of doom and despair for the future inhabitants of our planet. So, before we get to that point of no return, it is important to remember the simple switch is not about conquering all of the world’s problems in one day. It is going to take time. It is going to take some getting used to. It is going to have to work for you and your lifestyle. So, what can YOU do?
Well, the most logical method to decreasing the amount of waste you create is to start with reducing. After that concept becomes mastered, reusing items is the next step. The goal is to use less or eliminate, then try to find multiple uses for items in your life.
When I first started this journey, my first goal was to use less plastic in my daily life. A very popular and easy solution to get started with this was reusable, cloth shopping bags. By using these, I reduced my plastic grocery bag usage to virtually zero and reuse these bags time and time again. Americans use 100 billion plastic bags a year, which require 12 million barrels of oil to manufacture.
My use of reusable shopping bags led to other plastic reducing behaviors such as a reusable water bottle, keeping a picnic set to utensils for my car for takeout food, and saving glass food containers to fill with soap. I love candles, and now I save these candle jars and use them for plants. Before I throw anything away or even before recycling, I always trying to think twice and check if i can reuse it first. It only takes one small action to get you started in the right path!
References:
McGrath, M. (2019, July 3). US top of the garbage pile in global waste crisis. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48838699.