What you can’t see is out of your mind. The debris of our pagan festival has been cleared. The excess was sanitized and the carcasses and packaging materials we consumed were emptied from the house and discarded. Order has been restored at home, but the consequences of what we’ve done behind the scenes remain near. The fuller impact is global, cumulative, and lasting. No waste.
Christmas is a metaphor for a throwaway society. It is a bountiful harvest of oblivion. It’s also a seamless continuity of the way we live now. The disposable cups that host our coffee culture are the flagship of the mismatch between the imagined latte lifestyle and the unspeakable filth in which it is entrenched.
In 2018, we threw out about 200 million cups. Fast fashion, which relies on cheap sweat, globalized supply lines and packaging, can’t stand us sweating in it. From modest kettles to cinema screen-sized TVs, our sophisticated equipment is beyond repair. They are intentionally designed for single use.
There is what is called the linear economy, and then there is the circular economy. We are the linear world leader. It does not lead the world in per capita waste generation. It maximizes your ability to party, minimizes your personal exposure to the consequences, has a great time and at the same time has enough balm of action to make you feel good about yourself. It’s the perfect place psychologically, and it explains how recycling has stalled after years of good progress.
Progress achieved means that an easily achievable achievement has been achieved. Down from over 100 licensed landfills to just 2. Sorting garbage at home is both essential and a panacea. It leads to the feeling that we have done our thing.
In fact, municipal waste recycling has increased by 11% since 2016, but the total amount of waste generated has also increased by 11%, resulting in a stagnant recycling rate of 41%. On a personal level, we’re doing a little better at handling consumer emissions, but we’re also creating more emissions. The circular economy is just getting started.
Recycling is just the beginning. Reuse and reduction are big challenges that we’ve barely addressed. This is where popular culture and individual choice meet global warming. In a linear economy, new raw materials must continue to be developed, manufactured, transported and packaged around the world to meet insatiable needs. Consumption is a precursor to disposal. Between the peak of presentation and packaging, there’s only a fraction of a second before use breaks down the necessities to take home. But there is no escape, because the consequences of the processes our consumption depends on are permanent.
On Sunday, it was reported that England would follow Scotland and Wales in banning single-use items such as plastic cutlery, plates and trays.A simple plastic fork has a lifespan of 200 years. Most of us leave behind massive collectibles for future archaeologists to rival Tutankhamun.
Plumbing has successfully separated us from the sight and smell of our body’s excreta. Our strong commitment to this issue and our commitment to clean water have resulted in amazing progress in a short period of time. But for waste in general, at an extreme cost to the global climate, and yet doing nothing about reducing the increasing mountains we generate, we are free from decaying degeneration. I’ve done enough.
You have a simple option. Malicious brussels sprouts came naturally in their own packaging. So did bananas, apples and oranges. When we go shopping, we become more environmentally conscious. Why do potatoes need plastic packaging?
The bigger issue is design. Most waste is incorporated at the design stage. This is where EU and national legislation comes into play. Discreet swabs are no longer stuck to plastic sticks. I was forced to change the design by law. The Circular Economy Act since last summer and his pending EU legislation will greatly expand powers for design. Governments can and will begin to ban things now. Disposable vape must be a particularly vile example of avoidable waste.
A major design pressure is Extended Consumer Responsibility (ECR). This allows manufacturers to take responsibility for the life of their products, encourage waste reduction, and design things that are unnecessary or non-reusable. 80% of environmental impacts are built into design This is important because There has been a shift in fashion as to where responsibility lies. The importance of personal responsibility has shifted to industry. This was certainly the police of convenience for politicians in a country mad at climate change taxes and fees.
What is driving consumption is our desire to spend more time with our stuff. Our bin contamination rate is horrendous. Only 2% of our items are made from recycled or recovered materials. Everything else comes from developing new primary ingredients worldwide.
happy new year.
