The 5 Rs of Sustainability

Aug 31, 2018

Reduce, reuse, recycle. As I child of the 80s I remember that phrase being drilled into me over and
over again! But times have changed and in many ways we as a society are in more dire straits than
ever before, and the three Rs are no longer enough. Bea Johnson, the activist who brought zero
waste onto the contemporary world stage, laid out the priorities of the zero waste lifestyle into the
“5 Rs” hierarchy and it seems that they could definitely use more traction in the wider public.
Haven't heard of the 5 Rs? Let's start at the beginning.

Refuse. Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. Rot.

Let’s start at the beginning.

Refuse

This is a straight forward option. Refuse things you don’t need. If you don’t have them in your life
to start with, you’ll never have to worry about how to get rid of them, or what to do when they are
no longer fit for purpose.

Stop using paper towels in the bathroom. Say no to straws at pubs and restaurants, and don’t accept
plastic bags when you can use your hands, or your own reusable bags. Think about what clothes
you really need to buy, what you need to eat. Think about everything and say no to what isn’t
necessary.

Reduce
Consume less of everything. Avoid fast fashion and food waste, and make simple, multipurpose
household cleaners, food staples and skincare products to avoid buying something for every little
thing. Try to buy your food with no plastic packaging where possible (markets and buying in bulk
are great for this). Use less.

Reuse

Don’t use something just once and never again! Choose items that can be used over and over.
Reusable water bottles and coffee cups, reusable cutlery and straws, your own shopper and produce
bags. And it doesn’t stop there - think bigger and frequent your local library, buy secondhand
clothing from local charity shops and host clothing swaps with your friends- really participate in
the sharing economy! Your yogurt pot can hold leftovers, old bed linens can be turned into rags and
hankies, your old toothbrush can give the toilet a good scrub, save the jar your olives came in for
canning next year’s pickles. Use your imagination before deciding a product is at the end of its
life.

Recycle

If you’ve done the other tips, you’ll be recycling less, not more. It’s easy to get stuck into a rut
where you buy things and think “at least it’s recyclable” but the chance of whatever you’ve thrown
in your recycling actually being turned into a new thing is incredibly low. You may have heard that
China, who dealt with much of the western world’s recycling up until recently, has decided to stop
doing so. In fact 106 million metric tonnes — about 45 percent — of the world's plastics set for
recycling have been exported to China since reporting to the United Nations Comtrade Database
began in 1992. That is so much plastic, and that’s JUST the plastic. Not the glass or metal or
anything else.

And that’s not all. Materials matter. Plastic can only be recycled a few times before it is too broken
down and must be sent to landfill. Paper can be recycled up to seven times, but after that the fibres
lose their strength (but then they can be composted). Metal and glass can be broken down and
recycled indefinitely, which is why it’s best to focus on purchasing your goods in these materials
where possible. All recycling is not equal, and we’ve all be riding the recycling train for a little too
long without focussing on the steps that come before it.

Rot
Food, yard debris, and other organic materials can be kept out of landfill via composting. This is
the final cycle of the 5Rs!

So what can you do?

The first three steps of the Rs - refuse, reduce, and reuse - are targeted at the first goal of zero
waste, which is all about limiting consumption in order to stop exploiting the Earth’s resources.

The last two - recycle and rot - target the second goal, which is only consuming goods that can be
fully recycled, either back into the ecosystem itself, or back into the economy.

If you focus on taking smaller steps in your everyday life, and keep this hierarchy in mind, you will
find that you produce drastically less waste. Just being mindful about the things we purchase and
take into our homes and lives can really be a catalyst to recognising how much we DON’T need.
Most importantly, make changes that work for YOU. Don’t look at zero waste as a thing you can
do overnight. You absolutely cannot. No one can! But making even a single change to your life
makes a difference to the world.