Zero waste has dominated social media in last few years and has motivated many people to reduce the amount of waste they produce in order to live a more environmentally friendly life. The goal of zero waste is to drastically reduce how much waste ends up in landfills every year. Do you want to live a more environmentally friendly and sustainable life?
Keep reading for our tips for creating a zero-waste plan.
What Does Zero Waste Mean?
The overall goal of a zero-waste community is to eliminate or as close as possible eliminate all household waste and put nothing in landfills. It is a lifestyle change that requires changing the way you shop, consume and use everyday goods.
It follows 5 Rs reject, reduce, reuse, recycle, and decompose. Rejecting means rejecting things you do not need like plastic straws, cups, lids, bags and more. Reducing involves reducing how often you do certain things like shopping, doing the laundry, and using disposable items.
Shopping for used or used items like food jars is a crucial component of reuse and recycling. Rot refers to the composting of food scraps, paper, fiber, and other biodegradable materials.
Create a Zero Trash Plan
When you start a zero waste program, you must look at your habits and how you can change to be more environmentally friendly. You cannot get rid of all the waste overnight, but you can begin at any time.
Evaluate Your Lifestyle
How much non-recyclable waste do you generate? Without thinking about it too much, you might think you possibly aren’t creating much waste, but when you think about small items like wrappers, paper towels, plastic packaging, or food scraps, you are likely throwing away so much more than you know what.
Keep an electronic log for at least a week before you make any lifestyle changes and record how much you throw away and what types of non-recyclable waste you generate the most. If you have lots of packaged and disposable items in your kitchen or bathroom, start there.
Start
The mistake people make when embarking on their zero-waste journey is buying lots of new trendy items like metal or bamboo straws, glass jars and reusable bags and then throwing away their current items. You should use any disposable products you currently have before replacing them. This will help you make practical decisions and choose what you need and what you do not.
Create Switches
Once you have used single-use items, you can determine what transitions you can make to approach a zero-waste lifestyle. Here are some changes you can make to different rooms in your home:
Kitchen
If you can, buy as many as you can in bulk. Use reusable containers to buy bulk items like flour, coffee beans, spices, nuts, pasta, rice, cereal and more. Zero-waste stores have gotten more and more popular. You can even get things like milk or butter.
Bathroom
Your bathroom, second only to the kitchen, is like the place where you eliminate the least recyclable waste. Disposable facial wipes can get replaced with washable cotton wipes. There are lots of great ones waste-free beauty products to swap for unsustainable alternatives.
Laundry room
Another aspect of living without waste is reducing the amount of water you use, which means less use of the laundry room. When you do your laundry, skip the store-bought detergent and provide it a try make your own. Try to dry your clothes on the clothesline as often as possible.
Be Zero Trash
Starting your zero waste plan is the first step in changing your habits and behavior to benefit the world. Evaluate your current lifestyle and see what changes you can make to eliminate waste and slowly move away from single-use products. You will not become an expert without trash overnight, but you can begin your journey any time.
Did you enjoy this article? Check out the other posts on this blog for more wonderful lifestyle advice.
