Tackling Household Waste: Our Guide to Getting Conscious About What You Throw Out
by W&S Staff
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Learn about what household waste is, why it sucks, and ways you can tackle it in your home.
Contents:
What Do We Mean by “Household Waste”?
What Are the Implications of Current Household Waste Trends in the United States?
What Are the Main Drivers of Exceptional Household Waste in the United States?
Ways to Reduce Household Waste
What Do We Mean by “Household Waste”?
What we refer to colloquially as household waste usually refers to what is scientifically understood as “municipal solid waste”, or MSW for short. The US Environmental Protection Agency defines MSW as any of the “various items consumers throw away after they are used”.
MSW is, therefore, a comprehensive term and encapsulates a range of household items—anything from single-use plastic bottles to refrigerators are included under this umbrella. MSW doesn’t include things found at landfills, such as municipal water sludge, non-hazardous industrial debris, or demolition waste.
What Are the Implications of Current Household Waste Trends in the United States?
The EPA has been measuring MSW for over 30 years to identify the effectiveness of waste management strategies across the country. What they’ve discovered is damning, however, as household waste is on a consistent rise within the US.
In 1960, it was estimated that national household waste was just under 1000,000,000 tons annually. By 2018, that number tripled, reaching almost 300,000,000 tons per year. While a portion of this increase can be attributed to population growth, it still doesn’t make it acceptable that household waste increased by about 200% during a period of an 82% population increase.
This disproportionate rise in annual household waste means waste per capita and per household continues to rise. The US collectively produces three times more than the global average of MSW, with only a mere 35% of said waste being recycled. This makes the US the only developing country that struggles to make its waste output lower than its recycling rate.
What’s more, this trend has many environmental, social and political implications. First, the US is simply running out of landfill space. For instance, in 1991, New York alone closed 200 of its 500 landfills due to reaching maximum capacity. It is now commonplace for the state to (controversially) ship its waste to lower-income states producing less waste.
However, space for household waste is not the only issue—the nature of said waste also poses serious questions about sustainability. Plastics, for example, are notable for their lightweight compared to their volume. This results in plastics, one of the most common forms of MSW, taking up much landfill space. As plastic usage and waste increase in America, this poses a considerable challenge for the future of waste management in the country.
What Are the Main Drivers of Exceptional Household Waste in the United States?
Ineffective Waste Management Policy & Infrastructure
The US has minimal federal and local policies committed to offsetting its high waste footprint. There remains no countrywide standard for what is considered “recyclable”, allowing regional states and cities to make their own rules for what works and what doesn’t.
This creates a wealth of confusion about what people should throw out and where. What’s more, the current recycling infrastructure in the US is increasingly unable to handle the influx of recycled goods. Most recycling plants remain underfunded or understaffed, meaning they aren’t always able to properly take the number of recyclable materials they come in contact with.
Another issue is that Americans have very imbalanced access to composting facilities and the necessary landscape for making compost at home.
Overconsumption
Americans are notorious for overconsumption, especially regarding food, fuel, and consumer goods. Grocery sales, for example, in the US are untaxed, meaning there are no state-induced financial incentives which encourage consumers to be mindful about how much they buy.
Such a norm is tricky as US grocery stores waste around one-third of all food, and those metrics only include food on the shelves. This means that about 16 billion pounds of foodstuff are wasted from grocery stores alone each year.
There is also the underlying culture of trends in which Americans “haul” popular consumer goods that are to be quickly tossed aside when new trends come into fashion. As discussed in our post delving into the issues with shopping haul culture, this can create a vicious cycle of normalizing extreme amounts of waste.
American overconsumption has been an established topic throughout cultural discourse over the past few decades, yet it remains a significant issue in tackling our waste problems.
Lacking Education
Although data from organizations like WWF shows that over 70% of Americans are tuned in to the waste problem, there still seems to be an enormous amount of confusion on what is actually driving the crisis in the first place.
For example, although both consumption and disposal behaviors are equally understood by most environmental scientists as the core of the waste problem, public perception doesn’t seem to align with that. Americans seem to be under the impression that disposal behaviors alone should be the predominant area of focus when addressing our waste crisis.
Also, because the US is such an extensive and diverse country, evidence suggests the country would benefit from place-based interventions and education initiatives. As seen in recent surveys, local and national data regarding waste doesn’t tend to align in terms of consumer willingness to reduce waste and waste disposal access.
Overall, the US suffers from a misinformation issue concerning waste management that must be addressed if we want to make substantial progress.
Ways to Reduce Household Waste
Avoid buying things using single-use or disposable plastic.
Often, people interpret this tip as the typical “stop using straws” or “reduce your amounts of disposable water bottles and coffee cups”. However, this is not the only place we tend to overuse single-use plastics.
We suggest going further by taking stock of all rooms in your house. For instance, we often find people’s kitchen sponges and pot scrubbers tend to be made of non-recyclable materials. Instead, you can opt for organic, compostable washing brushes that do the job without hurting the Earth.
For your next cleaning, why not take inventory of every disposable, single-use item in each room and brainstorm which ones you can find more sustainable alternatives for or simply live without!
Make an e-waste bin.
Electronic waste is an often overlooked culprit in household waste discourse. Electronic waste, including batteries, chords, monitors, computers, and TV screens, is never supposed to be discarded in your everyday trash bin.
Instead, these items should be taken to speciality disposal centers which can break down the potentially toxic chemicals these types of products contain (i.e., lead, cadmium, zinc, lithium and even mercury).
Taking these extra precautions might seem tedious for some, hence our suggestion for a particular waste bin. It’s not often these items need to be thrown out, so you can wait until the bin is near full or make emptying it the first item on your spring cleaning to-do list each year.
Try to bring your own bags when shopping.
The question should have never been “paper or plastic”, but “did you bring your own bag”? Most Americans drive to and from the store each time they go, meaning we have no excuse for not being able to take reusable bags with us when heading to do our shopping.
Stock up on some quality, eco-friendly reusable bags and place them in your trunk so you never need to depend on disposable bags that will just end up in landfills. Also, reusable bags are sturdier and offer more support than disposable bags, making them better equipped to protect your items and health.
Switch to paperless billing.
In this day and age, most of us Americans have safe and reliable access to the internet. Therefore, we don’t need to continue to demand physical bills. Many places offer a choice to have receipts sent via email, for instance.
We suggest changing all your billing and payment settings to happen digitally if you can. Our founder Teyah even loves to create an exclusive email just for bills. This way, you can have one place where all your financial interactions occur, and you never forget anything because you have a reliable archive to check on things!
Make better use of your freezer.
If you have access to a freezer, make use of it! Freezing food is one of the classic ways our grandparents used to make use of every ounce of food that came into the house, and there’s good reason for it.
Freezing food gives you and your household extra time to use stuff without the pressure or annoyance of repeatedly eating the same thing. It also helps you with meal prep or can be a reliable backup for when you’re tempted to order something not as nutritious when you’re busy.
Support organizations and people committed to reducing our waste footprint!
Although there are many things people can do to tackle their personal relationship with waste, this isn’t necessarily a catch-all solution to our waste problem. Like our general climate change problem, individualist solutions will not make the impactful changes we need to see to put the status quo behind us.
That’s why we want to emphasize the importance of supporting organizations, activists, and policymakers committed to tackling our household waste. By doing so, you have an opportunity to encourage the structural and cultural shifts at the heart of this and many other environmental issues.
Research and look out for people and organizations in your local community you can help support that are helping our planet! This might be one of, if not the most, important things you can do to tackle waste!
