Why do we create so much trash for the landfills?

[gtaus]

We produce a lot of trash. Mostly from bulky food packaging, since we do all our own cooking.

That's the bulk of my garbage as well. I am able to shred light cardboard boxes, like cereal boxes, and use those paper shreds out in the chicken coop as litter, which later gets composted. But the styrofoam trays and plastic wrapping I have no use for. Best I can do at present is burn that stuff in a burn barrel over a stump I need removed.

Eating out is a rare treat.

Dear Wife is an excellent cook. Although she enjoys going out every once in a while for a meal, I really don't care so much about it. She cooks better food at home.

But it's the companies that decide what a product gets packaged in. We shouldn't have to force them; it should be an easy decision to switch.

I bet they only are concerned with the cheapest cost of packaging and probably never really consider alternatives if they cost more, but are more friendly for the environment.

 

[gtaus]

And a lot of people buy way more than what they need, sadly.

For years I would encourage Dear Wife to stock up on non-perishable items when they go on sale. Her philosophy was just to buy it when you need it. When COVID-19 hit, and our shelves were empty of toilet paper, paper towels, etc... she panicked and ended up buying all that stuff at a premium price - like so many other people. By the end of the pandemic, we had a COVID closet full of overpriced products, mostly toilet paper by bulk. However, Dear Wife is now on board with buying those non-perishable items when on sale and stocking them in our pantry. Although we no longer have to pay COVID prices on those goods, we still save lots of money by buying those items when they go on sale and stocking up our pantry.

Of course, I look at a 6-pack of toilet paper and think I"m good for a couple of months. She looks at a 6-pack of toilet paper and wonders if we can make it through the week. Vive la différence!

 

[arizona_chicken_noob]

Great points about electronics! Here are a few changes I have made in the last few years in that regard: (may or may not appeal to others )

• I tend to chose corded tools over cordless. Yes I do have to run an extension cord over to the coop and other locations, but I always get 100% power and never have to replace a lithium battery / worry about recycling it nor do I need to replace the tool in a few years.
• I stopped printing at home. I print so rarely... maybe 3x per year, that I just take a USB stick to the office store and do it for 10c per page there. Previously I bought printers and they would clog up from non use! (More stuff to recycle/toss)
• Vintage tools and hand-me-downs are a-okay. I don't need every new feature
• Keeping things like phones and even cars as long as possible
• Make use of things my neighbors put out for bulk trash, if I can (and I put out things early so others can take them)
• Try to maintain my things so they last as long as possible

I have it on very good authority that our regional recycling plant in AZ is actually quite advanced and can separate the different types of plastics and DOES actually recycle many things. Now as to who buys the materials, I'm not sure.

Recently I fixed a hairdryer by buying a new GCFI plug and installing it, felt great!

 

[Smokerbill]

But the styrofoam trays and plastic wrapping I have no use for. Best I can do at present is burn that stuff in a burn barrel over a stump I need removed.

I save several of the styrofoam trays that meat is sold on. I've washed them in the dishwasher (without using the heated dry cycle) and they hold up well to that. They make great waterproof trays for seed starting pots.

 

[gtaus]

I tend to chose corded tools over cordless. Yes I do have to run an extension cord over to the coop and other locations, but I always get 100% power and never have to replace a lithium battery / worry about recycling it nor do I need to replace the tool in a few years.

I have both corded and cordless tools. For what I do, I prefer cordless in most cases because I am out in the yard far from an electrical outlet.

Many years ago I bought cordless tools only to find out a year or two later that I could no longer get new batteries for the tools. Complete waste of an otherwise good tool. But, about 15+ years ago, I switched over to Ryobi 18v One+ tools because they promised to keep their battery format into the future. So far, all my 15+ year old Ryobi Ni-Cad 18v tools work great with my new Ryobi Li-Ion batteries. Ryobi kept their promise. The new batteries are cheaper and better than the old Ni-Cad batteries and all my Ryobi tools share the same batteries. As a DIYer, that's great value to me.

I stopped printing at home. I print so rarely... maybe 3x per year, that I just take a USB stick to the office store and do it for 10c per page there. Previously I bought printers and they would clog up from non use! (More stuff to recycle/toss)

I don't print out much stuff anymore. My last 2 ink-jet printers died with clogged heads from non-use. My oldest printer, a Samsung black and white laser printer, still works as good as new. Laser printers don't have print heads to clog up.

Although a colored laser printer is initially more expensive than an ink jet printer, I know it would last longer because the print heads would not clog up on me. Additionally, some of the new inkjet printers use a sponge to collect waste ink from routine cleaning. When the sponge is full, the machine shuts down and is effectively dead. They are designed to die in that manner, unless you are a tech and can tear apart the printer and bypass the waste ink stream. Rip off!

Keeping things like phones and even cars as long as possible

I don't use a phone very much, so I only have a Tracfone from QVC. I get a new phone every year from QVC because it comes with 1500 minutes of talk, 1500 texts, and 1.5 GB of data and one year of service. That's more than I will use. My old phones still work, but it would cost me more than double just to buy an additional year of service with the 1500 minutes of talk. I don't know how QVC does it, but it's much cheaper for me to buy a new phone every year from them than to just purchase an extra year of service. Go figure.

Bonus deal, the unused Tracfone talk, text and data balances are carried over to the new phone.

But my life does not revolve around my smartphone. I only use maybe 800 minutes of talk per year, and maybe a couple hundred text messages (mostly junk notices that I don't care about).

Make use of things my neighbors put out for bulk trash, if I can (and I put out things early so others can take them)

That is starting to become a thing around where I live as well. A couple of days ago I picked up a perfectly good plastic lawn chair that someone no longer wanted. Works great in the backyard by my fire ring.

Try to maintain my things so they last as long as possible

That's the way I was raised.

 

[gtaus]

I save several of the styrofoam trays that meat is sold on. I've washed them in the dishwasher (without using the heated dry cycle) and they hold up well to that. They make great waterproof trays for seed starting pots.

That's a good use for them. I have done that in the past.

Recently, I have been picking up extra tote lids from Menards for little or nothing. They sell lots of totes and not everyone takes a lid. Last week I went to Menards to buy some more totes that were on sale, but they were all sold out. However, they still had a small stack of lids leftover that nobody took. I talked to a manager and she sold them to me for 50 cents for a pack of 4 lids. Sometimes, if you get the right manager, you can get them for free.

Anyways, this spring I used some of those tote lids to hold my 3 inch net cups for seed starting. They are much stronger than the standard 10X20 trays I used in the past.

 

[Shadrach]

This past Labor Day weekend we had my brother, a couple of his girls, and 6 of his grandchildren visit us for a couple of days. Basically, an overnighter leaving after supper on day 2. I have a split level house with full accommodations on both levels. So, my brother and his family stayed downstairs on the walk out level. My Dear Wife and I live on the upper level. Anyways, 10 of them downstairs for a day and a half, more or less.

Now, they did a very good job in cleaning up after themselves, so this is not a complaint. But in just 2 days, they had 3 kitchen bags full of garbage which is more bagged garbage than Dear Wife and I create in a full month! We are down to about 1 garbage per month now, which I will explain in a short while.

It got me to thinking how much garbage must be sent to the landfills that really could be taken care of in other ways. For example, all their leftover and uneaten table food was just tossed into the garbage bag, whereas Dear Wife and I would have put all that stuff into a chicken bucket. All their pop cans and empty plastic containers got junked, whereas we would have rinsed them out and put them into a recycle bin. Lots of food packaging, the light cardboard kind, filled up the garbage bags whereas I would have shred them up to use as coop litter for the chickens. A very small amount of their trash is what would be considered garbage for us, such as plastic wrapping, used napkins and paper towels, and they also had a baby with them, so diapers, of course. All in all, I estimate they could have gotten by with maybe only 1/4 of a trash bag for the weekend if they reused, recycled, or feed the kitchen scraps to the chickens.

Of course, it was much easier for me to just let them toss everything into the garbage for the 2 days they spent with us and then take out the trash when they left. But thinking about it now, I wonder how much stuff gets sent to the landfills that could be otherwise taken care of in other ways? Kind of wish everyone had chickens, shredded their paper products for animal litter, had livestock to feed the kitchen scraps and leftovers, etc... Recycle the metal, glass, and plastics if you can. Leaving only a few things left for the landfill.

My personal journey: Years ago, Dear Wife and used to have 3 to 4 bags full of garbage every week. Recycling cut that down to half, easily, or maybe even more. But the real savings is now that I shred almost all our paper products and use the paper shreds as chicken coop litter, which later gets dumped out into the chicken run composting system, and the compost gets used in my raised garden beds. Almost all our kitchen scraps and leftovers get put into a chicken bucket to feed the girls. In the end, we are down to about 1 bag of garbage per month, for the 2 of us.

I would love to hear any thoughts on garbage disposal methods to reduce the amount of stuff that gets sent to the landfill. We are doing our part, but I am sure we might be able to do even more.

The solution is easy, don't buy stuff.
I'm completely gobsmacked by the amount of stuff we don't realy need that we buy. I'm fairly restrained compared to my peers. It's not just the little stuff. Every now and then a picture of the contents of someones shed or kitchen or workshop gets posted. I've seen less stuff in the relevant shops.
Can people be persuaded to buy less stuff? I doubt it in Western society where get more rather than use less is the norm.

 

[Sally PB]

such as plastic wrapping, used napkins and paper towels,

The other thing I hate are the plastic bags at the store,

I bought some mesh bags for produce. Now I only get the store plastic bags for meat, because if it drips, it can contaminate anything that touches it, and I might not notice.

a plastic grocery bag recycling bin. Dear Wife drops off our plastic bags when she shops there.

My usual grocery store has plastic film recycling. Chip bags, the plastic wrap on the frozen pizza, and the bags, of course.

I started using chicken feed bags as trash bags too

They make great shopping bags. No, I don't as many shopping bags as I have feed bags, but I think I'll make some for Christmas gifts this year. Into which will go other gifts: no wrapping paper will be used!

We have a 40 year old refrigerator and clothes dryer. I will sure miss them when they finally give it up. Yeah, the fridge probably is an electricity hog. But it sounds like in the time I've had them (29 years -- we bought them used), we would have had 4 or 5 new ones.

 

[Smokerbill]

Chip bags, the plastic wrap on the frozen pizza, and the bags, of course.

I rarely buy chips, but when I do I save the empty bags and use them for stuff like coffee grounds, bones, any messy garbage that I don't feel like carrying down to the woods or compost pile. Empty salmon and sardine cans go into those bags, then into the freezer until trash day.

I save empty beer boxes and rip off sections to use as disposable cutting boards for meat, or to drain fried foods on. And I've cut off the ends of beer boxes and used them to grow my garden seedlings in.

 

[gtaus]

Yeah, the fridge probably is an electricity hog. But it sounds like in the time I've had them (29 years -- we bought them used), we would have had 4 or 5 new ones.

Well, it's pretty easy to find out how much electricity your appliances use. I bought a Kill-A-Watt meter years ago that shows you how much electricity your appliances use. I'd probably buy the less expensive one from Amazon if I got one today.

I only use my Kill-A-Watt maybe a couple times per year. But it sure is nice to take out the guessing of the electricity used on a device.

For example, I thought it might cost me about 25 cents, or more, to recharge my 18v 4Ah Li-ion battery. I plugged my charger into the Kill-A-Watt, recharged a dead battery, and discovered that the real cost was actually less than 2 cents per full charge.

A meter like the Kill-A-Watt would let you know how much your old refrigerator uses in electricity and if it's worth it to retire and replace it with a new energy efficient fridge. I usually hold on to stuff until it breaks. But sometimes it makes sense to retire on old electric hog appliance and save money with a newer energy efficient model.

If you do retire the old fridge, maybe you could paint it green and repurpose it as a raised garden bed!? That would keep it out of the landfill for a while. Additionally, if you can make the fridge watertight, you could probably convert it into a sub-irrigated raised bed which would make it more valuable than the fridge itself. If/when I have a dead refrigerator, I am going to try to convert it into a sub-irrigated raised bed. If you had to buy one, that would cost you lots of money.