Day 2: You should never waste a good egg!

Blimmin' 'eck. I hope I've not put you off your breakfast or made you splatter your coffee over your keyboard.

But look at me. Not my usual calm self, I admit.

But this is how I used to feel on bin day! When I would drag the wheelie bin, with its huge bags of rubbish and couldn't believe the weight of it all.

Would you believe half of it used to be food waste?

There'd be meat bones and chicken carcasses as well as kids' leftovers. Dig deeper and you'd find gone off food, often still in its packaging, as well as a bunch of banana skins stuffed in too - all because the kitchen compost bin was overloaded.

Like most households across the land I'd be scraping the plates and bunging in dregs of the day's menu into the kitchen bin and a few days later it would stink like a troll's armpits after a bath in a ditch of rotten slime.

I never valued leftovers, or the time I'd spent cooking, or even the cost of the ingredients.

But I did care about the smelly old bin and the stink it caused as well as the flies and maggots in summer.

Consequently when I started the Rubbish Diet, one of the first tasks was to eliminate food waste. I soon realised that this was a serious issue and by reducing what we could we would be reducing the methane that such biodegradable matter could create when buried in landfill. I knew we'd save money too, by buying less and using up more.

After all, according to the LoveFoodHateWaste campaign, the average household throws away one third of food that otherwise could have been used.

It's like a whole load of your shopping falling into a blimmin' black hole.

Hmm....so that'll be a bit like this then!



So we quickly held a family meeting to gather ideas and the kids had a lot to say. And I cooked more of their favourite things. It helped to reduce some waste, but we still had more than a few leftovers to manage because I was hopeless at organisation, terrible at planning and awfully lacking in the ability to deal with my three-year-old's fluctuating appetite.

Then I discovered was one thing that could really truly help.

A Bokashi!

Yes a Bokashi!

Now it might sound like a nasty old sneeze, but it's indeed a landfill saver for those who don't have a local authority food waste collection.



And it's magic. You just bung unusable food in a special bucket, sprinkle over some bran that is impregnated with Effective MicroOrganisms and a few weeks later after leaving it to ferment, you can add it to your compost, wormery or even dig it into your garden and it will break down into nutrient-rich organic matter. Much better than landfill and because the temperature of Bokashi is significantly lower than if buried along with the rubbish, there is no issue with methane.

But how disgusting does that sound in practice?

The idea of lobbing your slops in a bucket and letting it hang around for a few weeks, then a month later you end up putting the fermented matter in a corner of your garden. Eurgh!



It's hardly an attractive proposition is it? And it took me a long time to convince myself that this would be more favourable than a stinky old bin.

I worried about the smell of the Bokashi and quite rightly so. It could have been one step too far. But I was reassured that if I could cope with a pickly scent I'd be fine. A whole year on, the system is still fully operational and it's great. Indeed last year's contents have broken down into fabulous compost that we've now spread on the vegetable patch. And the liquid it creates as a by-product has been used as plant food as well as drain cleaner.

But the interesting thing is when we first started out, we'd easily fill it up in just a couple of weeks. That's how much food waste there was. But thanks to careful food preparation and reducing and then reusing leftovers, it now takes up to six weeks to reach capacity, which I would say is a real result.

However, a year on we still have a problem with some food waste - thanks to the lovely lad with the fluctuating appetite. It's not much but still enough that it continues to need managing.

So with potential rubbish on my hands, I have asked the question could I go back to throwing it in the rubbish bin?

After all, this is my Maximum Waste Week.

So this morning I sat and gave it some deep thought and I then seriously considered the consequences.

I then looked at the bowl of leftover Weetabix - or rather the slops of the Sainsbury's Wholewheat Biscuits, the ones that we bought only the other day.

Then I thought about adding them to my rubbish, actually holding the bowl in position, ready for the dregs to slip into my almost empty bin.

Now that made my stomach turn.

The thought of having food waste languishing in my kitchen bin for a whole week or even two, remaining untreated and gradually decaying all seemed a horrible proposition.

It now seems a step too far.

And just imagine the stench once you add scraps of meat, slops of baked beans and anything else that stinks the house out. Then there's the thought of the flies and the maggots as soon as the weather warms up.

Yuk! I don't think I could go back to that.

I never even got as far as thinking about the methane, in the unlikely event that my small amount of food waste would actually end up in landfill.

So folks, I guess another one bites the dust as far as this Maximum Waste Week is concerned.

Hooray....

Landfill is dead! Long live Bokashi!

Or so you might think.

You see, on the journey along the road of wasting less and enjoying more, we've made another discovery that will help us make even better use of what little food waste we have.

And they come in the form of three special girls, who came clucking our way just this weekend.

So without further ado, let me introduce you to Speckly, Snowflake, and Chickie, three gorgeous little hens who are settling into their urban crash-pad in our garden. Perhaps you can guess which is which. It really shouldn't take long to work it out.



I would never have guessed that the road to reducing food waste would result in such a fantastic experience. And the great thing is, the money we've saved in the process has paid for the hen house!

And our lovely chooky chooks have even got cracking on laying eggs. Just look what we found yesterday.



So on day 2 of my funny old Maximum Waste challenge, I must be the happiest failure alive. I'm most definitely a convert and apart from the old giblets, I don't think we'll be throwing out any food waste to landfill again.

What was that about giblets?

Blimmin' 'eck

What in the heck's name is that squawking?

What was that? You say you now know why the chicken actually crossed the road?

Oh dear, I don't think we'll ever be able to eat a roast chicken again.

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Day 1: Rubbish Shopping

Now what's that old saying?

Ahh, that's it.

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

I love that phrase and when it comes to shopping it seems very appropriate somehow. For instance, have a look at the photo and tell me what you see.

Is it just a week's shopping for a family of four?

Or is it a whole load of treats?

Perhaps it's a whole bunch of healthy ingredients?

Maybe it's not just this week's food, perhaps it's next week's wasted leftovers?

Now look at the packaging.

Do you see recycling opportunities?

Or are you looking at a pile of potential rubbish, like the picture of landfill below?

SETTING THE SCENE

When I look at that photo of my shopping, as well as anticipating the taste of the food and the satisfaction of a good meal, I am also staring at a table full of stuff that could end up in the bin. And that's what it's like when I go shopping these days, trying to avoid creating rubbish while I fill my basket. So, I try and buy loose wherever I can to avoid creating waste in the first place. After all, if it comes loose, that's one less thing to bung in the bin at home regardless of whether it's landfill or recycling. But if something comes in packaging, I always consider the opportunities for recycling as well as a complex combination of other facets including price, quality, shelf life, origins and its versatility as an ingredient.

Now I know focusing on zero waste isn't normal behaviour in many people's eyes and most people would think that it is a huge inconvenience to shop in this way, but the reality is that it doesn't actually take that much time and more and more people are following the simple methods.

Okay, I'll be the first to admit that when you start out with a zero waste challenge you have to look at things carefully and read the labels to find out if you can recycle certain packaging, but after a few more visits to the shops, you gradually become comfortable with the brands that serve you well and indeed the places and routines that help make a zero waste or minimal waste lifestyle a real possibility.

In business terms, it's as simple as "Outcome Thinking". You just look at your goal, which is a slimmer bin and then you make changes accordingly and most importantly you take small steps to incorporate rubbish-free choices into your life.

It just takes a little time and some research and very soon you'll find the ability to focus on products that create so little waste you'll be wondering how you created so much rubbish in the first place.

And a whole year later, you'll find yourself not looking back.

Well that's what happened to me, until I found myself wondering what it would actually be like to go back to my old shopping habits, like journeying through time to explore the kinds of things I would have bought on what would be a normal visit to the supermarket.

Don't get me wrong. My zero waste lifestyle hasn't meant that I've abandoned supermarkets, but where I used to rely on them 100% and NEVER visited the market, I now flirt between the market, supermarkets, farm shops and the farmers' market, depending on my routine.

So what I'm trying to say is, I fit shopping around my routine, instead of creating a routine specifically for shopping, picking things up "en route" on the way to somewhere else and buying little and often in accordance with what we really need. Shopping this way has been very liberating to say the least and has meant it's been easier to cope with my family's eating habits and has contributed to a life of less waste. With a monthly online delivery for basics and picking up fresh ingredients as I go along means it has become less of a chore.

So when considering going back to my "old ways", I was intrigued what it would be like if I did a whole week's shop in a supermarket, just like I used to. And my port of call just had to be our local Sainsbury's store not least because it's on my doorstep, but it's also supporting Red Nose Day too.

NOT SO CAREFUL PLANNING!

So on Sunday morning we pitched up and Little J and I were raring to go shopping in style.

But we'd not even entered the supermarket and we were already breaking away from my zero waste habits. You see, zero waste shopping is all about planning!


No.1: Never go shopping when hungry. It makes sense really. If you don't want to splash out on unecessary treats, always go shopping AFTER you've eaten. But oh dear, by the time we'd got ourselves sorted and got out of the house, our arrival time was 11am. I'd hoped we might make it home by 12pm, but the truth is we were at the supermarket for 2 hours...yes TWO HOURS ... shopping through lunchtime. Now that's a guaranteed way of buying more food than necessary if ever I've seen one!


No.2: Avoid taking the kids. It's a great idea to leave the kids at home, because they have an amazing way of making you buy more than you need. So the top tip is to leave the little people with your partner, family or friends allowing you to avoid anything from gentle persuasion to full blown pester power. I didn't quite manage to go child-free yesterday, but Little J came along to pester me in every aisle and indeed he did!


No.3: Choose the smallest trolley you can. The smaller your trolley, the less you'll fill it up. With my infrequent visits to the supermarket, my weapon of choice is normally a basket or a small trolley. But yesterday was different. We were on a mission to fill it with loads of goodies so we needed a cart that could hack it.


No. 4: Take a list. Now if you don't take a list, you're at risk of buying the whole shop and a whole load of packaging to go with it! I never used to write lists and I really used to bring home half the shop. Yesterday I was on a mission to achieve this ambition, so the list went on vacation to the black hole.


No.5: Take some reusable containers. Now it might be bizarre, but whenever I go to the farmshop, I take a container for the meat cuts and the butcher is happy to use them. They think it's a great idea and are alway happy to oblige. But when I go into a supermarket, I get put off by their health & safety regulations and corporate policies and the fear of feeling a freak. So I didn't bother with the containers yesterday and headed off to the meat aisle for alternative products.


No.6: Take some reusable bags: Oh dear, this was a toughie. I can't believe how long it took to train myself to remember my reusable bags and these days I don't leave home without them when I am off shopping. It's just an automatic action, like picking up my handbag and keys. But the only bags I have are for Waitrose, and I felt embarrassed taking them into a competitor's store. It's like taking in an advertising billboard.

So I thought I'd leave them behind and see if I could use the flimsy ones from the checkout instead. After all the challenge was to create as much rubbish as possible. But despite my bravado, it felt strange going shopping without bags and it was as if I'd forgotten something really important like my credit card or handbag, or indeed the children. It was an uncomfortable feeling indeed and I didn't like it. And as I walked through the store I really couldn't bear the thought of picking up the free flimsy ones at the check-out, even if I could reuse them or indeed recycle them.

But look at my discovery - special bags for Comic Relief. And the best thing was, they were made from 100% recycled plastic. Just look at that grin - what approval!

THE SUPERMARKET SWEEP

So when I went shopping yesterday, I was on a mission to find out two key things.

1. Whether I could shop without considering the packaging and forget the concept of zero waste
2. The role of the supermarket in making waste reduction choices easy.

No wonder it took me so long.


Checking out the packaging!

Before I got into the store I had images of me breezing through the supermarket, popping things into my trolley without considering the consequences of what I bought. That is how I used to shop before I started my zero waste challenge last year. I used to walk right in and I would put stuff into the trolley without looking at the packaging, not interested in the recycling symbols and not even thinking about where the packets end containers would end up.

I can't help wondering if this is how most people shop these days, or if much of society has changed too.

And could I hack it? Did I really manage to go all the way around the supermarket without considering the packaging at all, just like I used to.

Well, I'm afraid the answer to that is NO!

From the fruit and veg section to frozen foods, I still gave thought to whether products were loose or packaged in materials that could be recycled locally.

When I envisaged this task, I bravely thought I could grab a bunch of bananas and pop them in a plastic weigh bag and do exactly the same with other produce such as oranges and broccoli. Well that's what I used to do. That used to be my normal behaviour!

But the reality is, these kinds of products don't need to be put into bags. They can just be placed in the trolley loose and that's what I did. I'm afraid my automatic response of REDUCE was still working, as you'll see in the photo above.

And when it came to smaller produce such as grapes and tomatoes, I couldn't even bear to consider the option of punnets, and pulled out my Onya weigh bags, which I bought a couple of weeks ago and which were conveniently tucked away in my handbag for emergencies. Tomatoes in one bag and grapes in the other...and Bob's your Uncle!



But then came the carrots.

Blimmin' carrots!

At first, I popped just a few large ones in the trolley. Then I spotted that a bag of washed carrots was cheaper than buying loose. I couldn't believe my eyes.

How could that be?

So like a game of hokey-cokey I put my left arm into the trolley and pulled a carrot out, then in-out, in-out, I put them each and every one of them back in the box, replacing the loose produce with a packet of pre-washed carrots.

Sold to the woman with the price-sensitive head on her shoulders!

And the same happened with the Buy One Get One Free bags of apples. With two boys who can eat me out of house and home on the apple front, it was cheaper to buy pre-packaged than loose. Well I thought it was, I found it quite hard to compare with the price labelling.

What a palaver!

I normally get my fruit and veg from the market where I hand over my bag to the stallholder, saying "fill her up". No packaging in sight apart from the odd paper bag that ends up in my compost bin. No decision making needed.

Blimmin' 'eck. No wonder I felt exhausted by the fruit and veg section. Decision, decisions, eh. I really could have done with a cup of tea!

And that's what it was like for the rest of the two hours, with me not being able to forget about the packaging.

And as for purchasing things I don't normally buy, well that's another story!

One thing I have discovered from our zero waste experience is that I now concentrate on buying the things that we really need and avoiding the things we don't. I used to go to the supermarket and regularly spend £120 on a trolley full of treats, but through poor time management a lot of that used to go to waste. These days, our weekly groceries bill just comes to £60-£90, depending on whether we need cat food or toilet paper or other incidentals.

And shopping this way means I have become naturally focused and not distracted by the usual goody-bag top-ups. A good job really, because my willpower is virtually zilch!

And can't you tell.

With a combination of free-rein and pester power my inner shopper was most certainly unleashed!

In went the Sunday Newspaper - which I still haven't opened - along with a box of fresh cream cakes and a few ready meals, including a pizza and quiche. Well I have got a busy week this week, with no time to cook, so a busy mum needed an alternative solution. And thanks to my 7 year old companion there were biscuits, snack bars, crisps, chocolate mousses and a couple of chocolate eggs. And then some mini-cheeses, all individually wrapped up in a little net bag.

And I took advantage of the 3 for 2s in the juice aisle, filling up the trolley with juice cartons, which is something I gave up ages ago, because I don't have the space to store them for recycling. So in they went, six cartons, carefully placed in the trolley.

But there was one thing I just couldn't manage to buy, one particular product that I used to throw in my trolley week-by-week before doing the zero waste challenge.

Strawberry shaped yogurts, in a little net bag.

Lovely looking things and perfect for kids.

But to consume the contents, you have to suck the yoghurt through a teeny tiny opening at the top of the moulded packaging. Convenient for consuming but more cumbersome for recycling.

I was right on the brink of putting them in my trolley and they were just teetering on the edge when I reconsidered the consequences. Could I lazily throw out such packaging to landfill, when an ordinary yoghurt pot could be rinsed and at least have a chance of survival in Suffolk's recycling system?

Oh dear. I decided I couldn't but neither could I be bothered to cut them up to wash them out either.

So they went back on the shelf for someone else to buy.

I'm not very good at creating rubbish am I?

Out of everything, it was the strawberry shaped yoghurt pots, that highlighted I can no longer go shopping without considering the packaging that I put in my trolley.

I was still switching products in accordance with their recyclable credentials.

Oh the relief and cries of "Thank Goodness"!



But how easy was is it to shop waste-free at the supermarket?

The answer to this question is wholly dependent on where you live.

For me, I am confident that having bunged a whole range of goodies in the trolley, there is still hope for a zero-waste result. That is because we have such excellent recycling facilities in Bury St Edmunds that even pasta packaging can be taken to our Household Waste Recycling Centre as well as the plastic used for Cathedral City cheese - our little 4 year old's favourite.

But it's also due to improvements in package labelling, which is vital. And I couldn't help but notice how Sainsbury's packaging has changed and the majority of products I handled, particularly own brand goods had recycling advice for the consumer.

And you can't get bigger or bolder than the instructions on their own brand of Wholewheat Biscuits. The message is loud and clear!

"If every Sainsbury's customer recycled their cereal box, 750 tonnes of cardboard would be reused every year. That's the equivalent to 101 double-decker buses."



It also states that they were the first to make their cereal boxes smaller and are making sure that more of their packaging is environmentally friendly, indicating the box is now made from at least 85% recycled cardboard.

What a great message to pass onto the customers.

But it's not just the the message that's important.

In the words of Frank Carson, it's the way you tell 'em.

And on that packet of Wholewheat Biscuits, Sainsbury's got it just right.

You see, I went to pick up a normal packet of Weetabix, but my 7 year old bag of pester power stopped me in my tracks, clutching Sainsbury's own label alternative. He begged me to buy it because of the lovely picture of the double-decker bus! And he even had the cheek to say "Remember to recycle this carton", happily reading the picture of the post-it note on the back of the box as he held it gleefully in his hands.

Surely that's pester power at its best and if companies like Sainsbury's continue to harness the full potential of this bundle of eco-marketing fun in an ethical manner, then it's an all-round winner, I'm sure.

As I wandered around the store looking at the recycling messages on each item of packaging I picked up, it was encouraging to see the number of references to recycling polythene packaging in-store. And as for using the weigh-in bags, there were even reminders, asking customers whether they really need the bags in the first-place.

However, I couldn't help wondering if there was more that a supermarket could do to help encourage customers to reduce waste. Not just Sainsbury's but other supermarkets too.

Wouldn't it be great if they sold reusable Onya Weigh-in bags, or at least removed plastic bags from sections where they are not needed, such as next to the bananas. Branded containers would be great too, for people to reuse at the deli counters. Just like my local farmshop, it would be fabulous if they could trust customers with the responsiblity of washing them carefully before reuse.

I also think it would be invaluable if they worked more closely with the local authorities and displayed more useful recycling information around the store, promoting details that are relevant to the area. For example in Bury St Edmunds, we can recycle meat trays in our wheelie bins, as well as Tetrapacks at our recycling centre and even rice packaging can be taken there too. I couldn't help think that a few carefully placed signs would help raise awareness of this and add to the council's efforts. After all we're all in this together and it would be a prime example of joined up thinking

But at the end of the day, no matter what role the supermarkets play in waste reduction, it all comes down to individual shopping choices and the personal responsibility for recycling once you pack your boot and take the trolley to the trolley park.

"Your Rubbish Your Choice" is the slogan used by the Norfolk Waste Partnership, just over the border from Suffolk.

And they're quite right.

I couldn't quite leave my Zero Waste head behind yesterday but I still have an issue. When the food is gone I'll have some extra rubbish to deal with this week

But this rubbish is my responsibility. And with our excellent recycling facilities can I really let it all end up in landfill, where it will all go to waste, buried into the ground.

I really don't think so, but let's see at the end of the week shall we.

In the meantime, here's a reminder of what could actually happen to it.


Perhaps it's time to have a look at that picture of my shopping again.

And remember that "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

Then look back at the photo of landfill, with the bin lorry regurgitating all that rubbish onto the ground.

I can safely say, I don't think I've really seen anything so ugly!

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Pondering rubbish

Blimey. Look what happened last week. I did so much thinking, by Friday my brain hurt so much I disappeared into oblivion, not even leaving an "au revoir".

What's been weighing on my mind is this week's challenge. This time last year I was nervous. The prospect of doing a Zero Waste Week and trying to throw nothing away for seven days seemed difficult enough, but the idea of a Maximum Waste Week, which is what I've got planned for next week, seems even harder somehow and is pushing a whole range of awkward buttons that a ZWW never did.

Don't get me wrong. Even though we are good at keeping our rubbish very low, I haven't become so obsessed that I panic if we throw away more than our regular monthly carrier bag's worth. I've learned to accept that some things happen that are just out of my control and it doesn't matter in the great scheme of things.

Indeed take the other week,when the lovely folk at Abel & Cole sent me a free range chicken to try out. Of course I am always grateful for free food, especially if it's of good quality and has been ethically produced, but as I got ready to put it in the oven, I saw something rather scary poking out from between its legs.


Giblets!

Yes, blimmin' giblets.

I'm sorry, I know I'm the squeamish type - and even typing the word is making me feel ill - but confronting such things, particularly in an unexpected manner makes me feel positively sick.

I tried my best. I closed my eyes, stuffed my hand into the crevice and yanked them out to cries of "eurgh, yuk and ick". It was a scene that resembled a challenge from "I'm a celebrity, get me out of here", but in my very own kitchen. Following the momentary madness I put them in the box and popped them in the fridge, thinking that I'd ring Mrs Green over at MyZeroWaste for advice on how to deal with them. But I was in denial. I didn't really want to know how to deal with giblets so in the fridge they stayed until all I could do was throw them away.

But the giblets were only part of the story. The afternoon that I cooked the chicken, Mr A was three hours late from work. By the time he arrived home the chicken was so shrivelled it looked more like a poussin and as for me, my tiredness had left me in a careless disposition, culminating in opening a cupboard door to pull down a couple of plates and knocking over several cups and other assorted crockery. I could only watch helplessly as they tumbled out of the cupboard, all in slow motion, and smashed the vase and glass that stood on the worktop below.

All wrapped up in a couple of bags and placed in a cardboard box for good measure, the broken bits went in the bin along with a couple of dirty nappies left by some little visitors we had entertained that week.

And I never thought about it again, until a lady got in touch to see if I'd had the opportunity to write a blogpost about the Abel & Cole chicken. How she laughed when she heard my tale of woe. I think she understood how the misadventure would not have been the fairest review of what should have been a delicious wholesome meal.

So you can imagine that the amount of rubbish we threw out that week had not just doubled, it had probably quadrupled.

Throwing away the fall-out of an unexpected set up unfortunate circumstances is one thing. However this week's challenge is another.

This week's challenge is going to be difficult indeed, a Maximum Waste Week eh! Trying to throw away as much as I can. At face value, it might seem simple. Throwing away rubbish is so easy isn't it. After all, I never used to give it any thought at all. But having spent a year of reducing, reusing and recycling and changing our shopping habits to suit our local recycling facilities, can I really go against all that, even for just one week.

It would mean changing habits that have been normalised into everyday behaviour, so much so that everything we do is now automatic. And with all I've learned during the 15 months, there is also the issue of responsibility to address. Having visited landfill last year and understanding why we have to reduce our waste, will I really be able to go back to throwing away food waste and the stuff that we used to bin, now knowing that most of it is recyclable?

That's why I feel nervous and it shows that knowledge and awareness are crucial tools that underpin the waste management issues that affect the UK.

And I can add to that the importance of respect.

Respecting the environment at large, and recognising that our actions have a wider implication on the climate, other countries, other species and our future generations.

Oh dear it looks like I'm doing a lot of thinking again! And you all know where that gets me!

And just before I go to the shops too.

Yes, It's time to head to the supermarket for my first challenge and see if I can fill my trolley with a whole load of rubbish for me to deal will.

Sounds easy in principle, but will it be so easy in practice?

I'm already wondering whether I can really leave my reusable bags at home and pick up some flimsy plastic bags at the checkout. You'll have to come back tomorrow and find out. In the meantime, please wish me a whole dose of luck!

Oh to think I'm doing all this to raise money for Comic Relief.

After all my thinking and worrying, I'll be more in need of Pain Relief! So please feel free to donate any cash to cover the cost of a few packets of Paracetamol here. You can be sure it will go a long, long way and you will be supporting a very good cause indeed.

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Recycle, Recycle, Recycle

Oh recycling eh!

Recycle, recycle, recycle.

There are messages everywhere.

They're on your bins, in the supermarkets, and if you go to the big smoke these days you'll even get hit by the "Recycle for London" slogan on a double-decker bus!

The only way you can miss it is if you've got your head buried in a newspaper, but even then you can't get away from the campaign, as you turn the page and see the words "Please recycle this paper".

Before I started The Rubbish Diet, I used to do my bit. It all started in my student days, returning the empties to the bottle banks. Now that's what I call responsible drinking. I might have had a hangover but at least I recycled my bottles.

However, I never really understood the importance of it all.

I just followed instructions. There was a bottle bank, so I used it. Then came the paper bank. I used that too and before I knew it there were recycling facilities on my doorstep. Not just at the community centre or the supermarket, but actually next to my front door in the form of a recycling box, which was eventually followed by a wheelie bin.

It used to be simple with glass, paper and tins.

Then came plastics...so many different plastics...and then Tetrapaks, which contained all sorts of materials in one package.

And with all this array of products came so many new rules...crush this, wash that and remove whatever. Stamp on it, squeeze it but whatever you do, don't use plastic bags or overfill your bin! Then whenever you're passing drop the rest in at the HWRC.

Bimmin' 'eck. It was no longer about following simple instructions, it was like remembering how to operate the VCR.

And I still never considered the big picture.

I just carried on rinsing, lifting, separating and squashing. But with so many things to remember there were lots of times when I simply couldn't be bothered. I was far too busy! What with work, kids, hobbies and other responsibilities. Forget washing up yoghurt pots, it was much easier to bung them in the rubbish bin. And what about the jar of mouldy whatever-it-was, oh yes, just chuck that in too, fully intact with the jar included!

Stuff that could have been recycled, just ending up in landfill.

All because I'd never made the connection and even if I had there might not have been the facilities to lead me to the holy grail.

And because of that I must have despatched so much rubbish to landfill in the last 10 years that if you laid it all out it would be large enough for a game of professional football.

But with the way things are now and if the trend continues over the next 10 years I'd struggle to fill my small garden with all the rubbish we throw out.

Because at last I've looked beyond the bin and have realised why it is so important to recycle whatever I can.

And I can't believe how it took a Zero Waste Week to make me come to terms with my responsibility.

In a modest fashion I class myself as an intelligent old bird. I might be a bit dizzy at times, but my academic credentials are there, with a Masters degree in Information Management and certificates in Marketing, I understand processes and systems and am responsive to communications too. And geez how I've buried my head in so many magazines and newspapers, absorbing information all the time. I've watched the news and read the Internet, but I still didn't really get it until the zero waste challenge came along.

It was only then did I realise that how bad things have got and that there were targets that our councils had to meet to reduce the amount of waste we send to landfill. Meanwhile landfill tax was rising and we as taxpayers had to foot the bill. And God help us if we go over the landfill allowance because somewhere down the line, we'll have to pay for that too.

But why hadn't I connected all this before?

Suddenly my rubbish became my responsibility and throwing any recyclable material into landfill felt like I was paying twice. Once to buy it in the first place - remember packaging doesn't come free - and paying again to dump it in landfill. Again, that service comes at a cost too because the more we dump into landfill, the more we have to pay.

I woke up to the fact that all this stuff I'd been throwing away had value.

The realisation hit home that bunging a yoghurt pot, jar and the odd bottle into the rubbish bin was just the same as throwing money in there too.

And who in their right mind would throw cash in the bin?

But what about the supermarkets and retailers? Surely they play a huge part and should pay to get rid of their packaging? After all it's their responsibility too and not just mine, but the reality is that we'd still end up paying for it somewhere down the line, through product costs and VAT on our purchases. And to get rid of all that packaging would be futile, we'd simply end up with more food waste hitting landfill, which is another issue in itself. We just have to be patient that producers are making changes slowly and changes are coming.

But it didn't stop at money. I learned that landfill was running out and our rubbish still had to go somewhere. Digging another hole was not the answer, not just due to limitations of space, but because of the effect of landfill on the environment, with leachate entering the water table and methane impacting on climate change. Yikes.

But it's got to go somewhere and the alternative is incineration, or Energy from Waste, which is another hot topic amongst environmental campaigners. I'm no environmental scientist, and on this I have no answers. All I know is that we'll end up having to pay for that too and as responsible citizens we should be aware of the arguments for and against, not just the money but our health and the environment. Only then can we make up our minds.

What worries me too is what will happen to the rubbish that is collected which contains materials that could otherwise be recycled? Will that be extracted from the low quality residue or simply burned as fuel? Other European countries with Energy from Waste plants actually have excellent recycling results but they are different cultures, incorporating different methods of collection systems, with greater frequencies of collection and often pay-per-bag incentives to keep residual waste down. Try that here and we could find rebellion on the streets.

We are a society that needs incentives. At face value recycling is a simple fact of life, a process that underpins - or should underpin - our consumer culture, but beneath the surface it can be perceived as a responsibility that goes against our civil liberties, our choices and personal freedom.

Bring in the bin police with their warning cards and fines and the situation gets even stickier, especially due to the confusing nature of recycling itself. If you're doing your bit to the best of your knowledge and your bin gets rejected or you get a fine, it's so easy to get angry and then recycling becomes just one commitment too many. A thankless task for no reward.

But there are rewards. Take the council tax for instance. If we recycle more and landfill less, then we save the landfill tax associated with dumping our rubbish in the ground. But it's not easy to identify those savings because each year the council tax keeps going up with inflation and rising costs from other services elsewhere, which may even be associated with waste management. Perhaps a separate waste tax would help, so we can feel there is financial benefit somewhere along the line.

And what about at the other end. While we're recycling at home, it's easy to forget and not even consider where this stuff is ending up and how it's being reprocessed.

The only time it hits the public consciousness is when the headlines get sensationalised with mentions of landfilling recyclables and stockpiling. They never tell you what's actually working. It's just all doom and gloom. Take this week's Tonight programme for instance, where a researcher roamed the country with a wheelie bin of plastic looking for somewhere to recycle it. If he'd come to my house in Suffolk, I could have popped it into my wheelie bin. The nearest he got was Hertfordshire and with a sense of failure returned the plastic contents back to its owner.

So if you look past the headlines and dig a bit deeper, you'll find that progress is taking place.

And as my own awareness has developed along the way, I've realised that to make it really work it's no good just being committed to recycling. To reap the benefits of your efforts with the old recycling bin, commitment is needed at the other end too by buying the recycled products that are hitting the market.

And it is becoming easier to buy such products, from drinks bottle, stationary and even electronic products. In an interview last night I was even alerted to the new Motorola phone, made from recycled PET (rPET), which is a huge step in the right direction indicating an optimism and confidence in using recycled polymers in the manufacturing of mass market consumer goods.

For a while I have been interested in finding out what actually happens to our recycled plastics and last night I was lucky enough to talk to Keith Freegard, director of Axion, a UK business that produces high-grade plastics made from recycled post-consumer raw materials. The company specialises in taking shredded plastics from all sorts of products including hairdryers, televisions, fridges as well as end-of-life vehicles and converts them into polymer resin or compounded pellets that can be used in injection-moulding machines to make new products.

The polymers have been developed to the same grade as virgin material allowing manufacturers to easily switch between virgin and recycled resources and Keith revealed that customers who buy their recycled polymers pay only 75% of the cost of virgin plastic. What's more, the company highlights that using the recycled materials also offers massive carbon footprint savings, equating to just 200 kilos of CO2 per tonne of recycled plastic compared to 3000 tonnes of CO2 per tonne of virgin material. That's a potential saving of 93%.

So their job is not just to sell the financial benefits but to sell the environmental advantages too.

And for anyone who doubts the value of this as a unique selling point (USP), you've only got to witness the demands currently made by retailers. For example, Keith told me about a dominant supermarket chain who has rejected a manufacturer's product but said they would consider it if it was made from recycled plastic.

As consumers, our hands can often feel tied, so producer and retailer responsibility are a vital process in making sure the recycling loop works efficiently.

But there are some key issues in the manufacturing of consumer goods. For instance, Keith asserts that manufacturers need to be more effective at designing products that are easier to recycle. He quotes lacquered plastics, such as silver televisions and laptops, are harder to convert to a high quality polymer than those made from black plastic. There is also the issue over the number of plastics that are used in products.

"In some products 80% of the plastics used are made from 10 different polymers." he told me. "We also find huge mixes of polymers in smaller electrical goods too. It would be much more efficient to reprocess these products if the mix of polymers was reduced to just one or two".

But Keith Freegard is confident that change will come and with emerging technologies and market demand he hopes that one day this will lead to plastic manufacturing enjoying the same levels of closed loop recycling as other materials such as paper and steel. However this won't happen quickly. It could take as long as two decades.

While interviewing him, I couldn't help but think that his business was part of a new kind of Industrial Revolution.

And when you consider the significance of the first, it's rather exciting to consider the innovation that is driving the current levels of change.

You see despite being committed to Reducing and Reusing, I still love the thrill and the value that certain new items bring.

Some day in the future I would love a new television and no doubt a new hi-fi too or whatever the latest term is by then. And I mustn't forget the new laptop when this current one gets old and crawls along on its last legs. Then in a decade's time a new car may be needed too.

And if these could all be made from recycled plastic components instead of virgin resources, wouldn't that be great. It would mean I could still have my cake and eat it, without any guilt about the planet.

You could call it a state of perfect consumption or even Utopia. Then again, others would call it closed loop recycling.

Recycling eh!

It's not about tree-hugging hippies, or just about saving the planet, it's also about sustaining our consumer driven culture that is so hard to leave behind.

I truly believe that we are in the middle of a new revolution.

And every time you pop something in your recycling bin, you're contributing to the innovation that will drive that change.

And when you look at it that way, responsibility takes a different turn. It's no longer just about avoiding guilt or worrying about the state of the planet. It's also about contributing to technological change and securing the future availability and affordability of consumer goods produced by sustainable manufacturing methods.

How exciting. I love change, I love technology and I can't wait to see the results of the innovation that lies ahead. It might be a while, but it will come.

And something tells me, while I'm waiting, I'll never look at my recycling bin quite the same way again.

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Reuse is the new recycle!

There was a time when disposing of my packaging required a simple decision.

If I could recycle it - I'd throw it in one of the recycling bins.
If I couldn't - then I'd bung it in the rubbish bin.

That was then. Simple eh!

Fast forward to today, and every time I wash up a jar or a plastic pot or indeed anything else, I find myself wondering if it can be reused, not just by me but by somebody else.

Jam jars that I used to take to the recycling bank are now returned for reuse at the farm shop, or saved for when I try my hand at making my own preserves this Summer. And even egg boxes aren't safe. Where they were once added to the compost bin, they are now also returned to the farm shop or stored as an alternative to seed trays. As for envelopes, most are now kept for a second time use, as they always come in handy for sending messages or cash to the school.

And it doesn't stop at packaging, a quick flick onto the latest Freecycle digest or any of the other growing number of free exchange websites (you'll find links in the sidebar) will reveal whether anyone can reuse something that I would otherwise chuck or recycle.

But it's so easy to forget about this option when we live in such a disposable culture. Packaging and unused belongings are still considered by some to be rubbish regardless of which bin they end up in because we are so removed from the processing of it all no matter whether it is landfill waste or recycling.

And yes, I was once the person who would bung yoghurt pots in the recycling bin in the morning, treating them as valueless objects and then go off to the garden centre that afternoon to buy a set of proper pots for my seeds.

I could have used yoghurt pots but they wouldn't have been good enough for my green-fingered experiments. In my perfect little world where everything had to be "just right", they would have been nothing but second best.

Second best - I couldn't have that!

No wonder the credit card bill was as long as my arm.

But who really gives a toss what my seedlings are grown in? It's not as if I'm ready to make it to the Chelsea Flower Show quite yet, or indeed ever!

What a fool I've been.

And just think of all that money I could have saved!

If I'd adopted this philosophy a decade ago I might now be the proud owner of a conservatory or a loft extension.

And what fun I've missed out on during my continuous cycle of buying, disposing and buying and disposing.............It might have taken me a while, but I've come to realise that Reuse is most definitely the most enjoyable element of the 3 Rs. Where recycling is at worst a headache and at best a tricky process, reusing encapsulates creativity, ingenuity and an opportunity to create something individual.

And it's a trend that has been popularised way before I woke up to my senses. For instance, take the latest discussions at ooffoo, the community-based offshoot of Natural Collection. You might have seen the news on Mrs Green's site that readers of ooffoo are currently being encouraged to share thoughts and examples of reuse in action.

So with a chance to win a £250 spending spree at Natural Collection's online shop, I mustn't forget to add my entry, but it's a toss-up between my latest project or the little stocking filler fella that I made for Christmas from some odd felt and fabric scraps, laddered hosiery and old buttons. You can see when I started getting the bug, can't you.

Yes folks, for me Reusing is definitely the new Recycling! But I have to be careful though because there are loads of ideas out there and my problem is we don't have any real storage space to keep hold of things for long.

It's a good job I've come across the Purposeful blog by Cara, which is full of the most wonderful ideas for reusing anything from a plastic fruit punnet to repurposing old socks. It's lucky she left a comment over at MyZeroWaste. When I hopped over to her blog the pitfalls of the Reuse monster hit me straight away and I was pleased to absorb her clever advice on how not to let it take over my life. See her blogpost When is green too much of a good thing.

So whether you're a novice reuser or an old veteran who is used to thinking beyond the recycling bin, be sure not to miss out on a few gems that are full of inspiration to get your creative juices flowing even further.

I'd like to introduce you to Fr. Peter's DIY Environmental ideas, a blog written by regular reader Peter Doodes, which has loads of ideas for making useful things for around the home with the help of plastic bottles and bottle tops.

Another site I like is How can I recycle this?, which despite its name is a blog that focuses on reusing all sorts of random items, including gone-off weetabix and even a wedding dress.

And finally do make sure you visit Junkk.com, founded by Peter Martin, who has a passion for inventing new applications for everyday objects, especially the kind of things you put in your shopping basket.

Junkk.com also offers an online community for folk to share reuse ideas for all sorts of things with a particular emphasis on packaging or its detailed components. What I love about this site is the fact that it even details the brand or the manufacturer of the product and is indexed in such a way that you can look for a solution and then find out how to make it.

And not to be missed is the patented RE:tie application, which Peter is currently taking to manufacturers to incorporate into their packaging to replace the useless tamper-strips that can be found on billions of plastic bottles and jars which just end up in landfill.

It is a simple yet genius innovation incorporating a small modification which would allow the strip to be reused as a tie and could be applied to garden, DIY as well as a whole range of domestic uses.

So from domestic goodies to manufacturing solutions, as I approach the anniversary of my zero waste week I now see the real relevance of reuse as an important process for reducing waste.

And I've been putting some ideas into practice at home. They're not pretty or indeed genius mind you, just quietly practical.

Take a look at my latest project, the polytunnel which I installed in the garden this weekend.




Would you believe it used to be a growhouse cover, like the one shown in the photo below. When we rescued the growhouse from the garage last week, much of the cover had perished and torn. It's no surprise really, it had been left in there for three years.

But while we were replacing the plastic cover, I couldn't help wonder if it could be reused for something else and the polytunnel seemed to be the obvious solution.



A year ago I would have bunged it in landfill, but this year it's been given a new lease of life and I've saved some cash while I'm at it.

I think there may be a revolution coming and if there is, I'm signing up as a member.

I just wonder what I'll make next.

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Reducing much more than waste

A few years ago I was studying the credit card bill and couldn't help wonder how we could carry on enjoying our lifestyle but without spending so much cash and without compromising the good things in life.

Every weekend we'd go shopping or go off for the weekend to visit friends. Then along came the kids and the weekend visits dropped but we'd still end up in the shops, buying stuff to keep ourselves entertained. And there was always an excuse with weddings, funerals, holidays, rainy days or simply doing up the house.

With a rising credit card balance, the obvious thing would have been to stay away from the shops, spend less and simplify our activities.

But if you enjoy surrounding yourself with nice things, tasty food and see shopping as a happiness fix it's hard to shut off the spending reflex, especially when there's always tomorrow to pay it off.

I'd get bored, so I'd shop. I'd get fed up, so I'd shop. I'd get hungry, so I'd shop and if I felt fat I would rush to the shops for a well designed outfit that slimmed my figure.

But I wasn't a shopaholic. Could I admit it if I was? I simply enjoyed improving my lot and splashing the cash. And I could never understand how folk, including my mother, could hate shopping with a passion!

Then I started The Rubbish Diet.

It's funny how focusing on reducing the amount of waste has had an impact on on my approach to shopping. I had expected to simply recycle more and hadn't considered the other consquences that resulted from the challenge. And it really highlight the effect of the power of reduction.

While I was reducing the packaging in everything I bought, I was naturally reducing the amount of things we had to recycle. And even if we could recycle it, I began to question our need for the product in the first place.

Did we just buy the product out of habit? Did it really serve the benefit it promoted? Was there an alternative solution that incurred less consumption as well as less waste? And if we still wanted it after all that, could we simply cope with less of it?

For me, this has been the biggest lesson and most effective outcome of experiencing personal change through the life of The Rubbish Diet. It's not just been about recycling more, it's about reducing and removing the burden of the automatic "must-have" thought pattern.

When I think back to my old shopping list, it's hard to believe how much I've changed. But gone are the kids' bottles of squash, regular magazines, multipacks of crisps, packets of biscuits, keep-'em-busy toys, silly shaped yoghurts, kitchen towel, washing up sponges, clingfilm, regular washing detergent and those awful disposable sanitary pads. The latter never really had me bouncing with joy like the ladies in the adverts.

Then there was food waste. Buying smaller quantities and letting less food go off and using up more leftovers, it meant that I didn't have to rush off to the shops to spend more and bring home even more packaging to recycle.

And as for clothes, I'd always want an up-to-date smart wardrobe, but would never buy in a thrift shop due to peculiar inhibitions about secondhand clothes. Of course I'd always be happy to drop things off for those in need, a rather patronising manner I know and it's for one I now apologise. However these days charity shops are nine times out of ten my first port of call. I now enjoy the benefits of a bargain as much as as the next person.

But it's not just been about saving money. It's always been about waste and the recognition that for each item I buy, there is waste somewhere along the chain of production before I even consider the future options of disposal.

I've still got a Per Una voucher in my purse, which I was given a year ago. Where I would have once rushed out and spent it, as if it were burning a hole in my pocket, I no longer have that driven urge.

And I have also reduced the status of the food cupboard emergency. Instead of running out to the corner shop when we run out of cheese, I now put it into context and give the family something else instead. Previously such occasions would result in a drive to the local shop to buy a top up, get distracted by so many goodies and forget to buy the cheese.

If some "know-it-all" had criticised my shopping habits and told me I was spending too much, over-buying and being wasteful, I probably would not have wanted to have listened and would have dug in my heels in a defensive manner. Even a responsible person like me used to find it hard to accept responsibility for something that we all take for granted i.e. the rubbish we create as a result of our personal decisions.

But to learn for myself has allowed me to tackle behavioural change that was the cause of waste in the first place. It's a journey that I needed to take and I am grateful for the outcomes because we now have more money to spend on the real necessities of life and value more of what we already have.

However, please don't mistake me for Little Miss Perfect, because I don't pretend to be. The odd treats still slip in, including crisps, biscuits, kids' squash and a comic. But these days they are real treats instead of something we take for granted. I also sometimes get caught out without a bag and I don't always use containers because of our excellent recycling facilities. Then there's my new dress that I bought from my favourite shop Phase Eight, but it was the first in a whole year, unlike my previous purchase pattern when I might have got three or four. And finally my real downfall is my love of books and my affection for Waterstone's. That's something I need to work on.

And of course we run out of essentials now and then. Indeed we used the last slice of bread on Sunday night.

So it looks like I'd better rush off to the shop for a top-up. I've just checked the time. I really had better go!

Better not get distracted while I'm there eh...and I must remember my reusable bag!

Ah...Reusing....

Now that's another story. I'll cover that one tomorrow!

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Reflecting the challenge

I'm in a real reflective mood today, thinking about this time last year, when I was on the blower to Kate from the council in a bit of a panic.

I'd got myself all het up over plastic bags. Not just carrier bags, but grape bags, bread bags and frozen peas packaging. I realised these had still been bunging up my black bin and I needed to find a solution, but Kate verbally soothed my brow and reassured me I could recycle them at the local supermarket or even our nearest HWRC (household waste recycling centre).

I can't believe I got myself into such a lather back then, but the pressure was on. There was one more week until Zero Waste Week and I was determined to give it my best shot to really see how low we could go. I'd even swapped my bins around, using my 50l stainless steel Brabantia to guard the recycling while my teeny tiny recycling bin took over its roll as the new dustbin.

I had also started eeking out the toothpaste, for fear that I'd have to chuck out the empty tube during the big week itself, and instead of filling the whole toothbrush head, I reduced the amount to the pea size as recommended by the manufacturers. We'd also started reusing things, stuff like polystyrene, which would normally end up in the bin.

Before doing the zero waste challenge, I felt I did my bit for recycling but I'd always been bugged by the Reduce, Reuse and Recycle mantra. Every time I'd read or indeed heard someone speak about the 3 R's I'd wanted to poke them in the ear with a stick or run off into the distance with my hands over my ears singing la,la,la,la, Boring la,la,la,la,la.

Somehow it all felt like a virtual straightjacket that would spoil my fun. And God help anyone who threw me some extra Rs, such as Refuse, Rethink or indeed Repair.

You can tell I was in denial at the start of the challenge because when I realised what I needed to embrace, I handed the job over to a YouTube video set to the the 3Rs by Jack Johnson. Like whispering the name Voldemort in the Harry Potter tales, I didn't dare say the words myself. My only contribution was a brief statement in the vain of "I don't think I need to spell out the basics, as there are enough organisations out there who already do this".

And I meant it. I didn't want get on the bandwagon.

How I now cringe at my attitude and if my name was Rodney, I'd have Del Boy poking a stick in my ear calling me a right Plonker!

Twelve months on I feel I've now grown up and have recognised the real importance of Reducing and Reusing and even Repairing before you can even embark on the final step of recycling. I've also done my fair share of rethinking and refusing. How far things have come eh!

And I've learned that it's not about spoiling fun or taking away choices. In a way we have more choice and have saved ourselves a right load of cash in the process, for example we've paid for the Eglu with the money we've saved on our shopping each week.

So as I prepare for the anniversary of my Zero Waste Week, I've finally got over myself. I am now ready to blog about the relevance of reducing, reusing and recycling and am getting really excited about uncovering some fine examples this week.

The problem is though, with my new way of thinking....or should I call it rethinking....next week's Maximum Waste Week challenge is getting me more in a tizz than Zero Waste Week ever did.

It's a good job I'm doing it to raise money for Comic Relief or I might just back out.

So while I go and plan my campaign and try to calm myself down, I think it's time to hand over to Jack Johnson again, for him to share his magic words. Now don't put your hands over your ears and sing la,la,la will you? If like me, you too are in denial, you'll find this the perfect introduction.




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