Waste: Trash, Compost and Recycling

One of the ways to reduce your environmental impact is to decrease the amount you put into a landfill. In 2012, Americans generated 251 million tons of trash, and recycled or composted about 87 million tons of material (source). The more we can tip that balance, the less likely we are to be using single use products, and more likely that we're buying for longevity.

As I mentioned before, ideally, we would all compost our plant matter, but that may not be an option for apartment or condo dwellers. However, there are options that can be used to compost indoors (which I will offer with the caveat that the friends who tried this seemed to have a semi-regular fruit-fly issue), and some cities are starting to offer curbside compost services (NYC, St. Paul, Cambridge, Salt Lake City, and San Francisco, among others).

Recycling is an option for almost everyone- most cities have curbside recycling, if you look up in the information. Increasingly, recycling is an option in businesses and public places. It can be kind of a pain to keep a designated spot if you live with minimal kitchen space, but I've found that lack of a designated spot doesn't need to stop me. Bring them to work with you one at a time, or do what we do, and keep them in the sink (washed out) until there are a few that justify a trip to the recycling bin. Feel like the only time the extra effort is worth it is when you have lots of people over? Put out a bag for cans and bottles- in my experience, people are almost always willing to set aside their recyclables.

The last way to reduce consumption, and it's a weird trick, is to reduce the size of your trash can. We use an office sized container, and it's the only trash recepticle in the house. Taking the trash out can be a pain, especially if it involves a trip outside. You might reconsider buying the toy that comes with 3 layers of plastic, or the food that's individually wrapped, if it's going to cause an extra trip. By saving yourself that inconvenience, you're also saving yourself from creating that much more trash.

What do you do to reduce your waste?