Being "zero waste" means that we adopt steps towards reducing personal waste and minimizing our environmental impact.
Our community places a major focus on the 5 R's: refuse, reduce, reuse, recycle, and rot. We practice this by reducing consumption, choosing reusable goods, recycling, composting, and helping each other improve.
We also recognize excess CO₂, other GHG emissions, and general resource usage as waste.
Glass jars with twist off lids can be reused for leftovers and/or fermentation products.
Shop at the local farmer's market.
Do you have a yard big enough to garden? Garden!
Solar panels on the roof.
Catch rainwater to use in the garden. If you have money to spend, that rainwater and house gray water can also be used to flush toilets etc.
Really insulate your home.
Do your shopping by bike whenever possible.
Buy used.
This is a great start so i will add to it.
Seriously start a garden and grow easy stuff so you don't get frustrated; kale, beans, lettuce etc
Get a killawatt meter to start monitoring what is using power to lower your bills and usage
If you live in a cold climate seal all leaky doors and windows, air exchange is a lot worst than poor insulation
Consider heating with a wood stove
In the summer cool your house at night by opening all the windows and using a powerful whole house fan then close it up in the morning to keep it cool
Wood stoves burn very inefficiently and release a lot of carbon into the air. An efficient heat pump will do a better job and be better for the environment (even if the electricity is unfortunately generated by gas or such).
Going to respectfully disagree. Modern catalytic stoves can be over 90% efficient, uses a natural source of energy that captures carbon (though burning it releases it) and is a heck of a lot cheaper to install than heat pumps. And all the power where I live is generated by natural gas which is far from clean. If someone has the money for solar panels and heat pumps then heck yea that's the way to go but most first time home buyers don't have that cash.
edit: I was mistaken, they make stoves over 80% efficient, not 90% efficient. I still think in the total scope of carbon emissions its better than a heat pump powered by fossil fuel electricity but it really depends on where you live, how much woods you have and where you get your power from.
Yeah maybe in a rural area that can make sense. It's just that in an urban/suburban area a heat pump will easily get the equivalent of 300%+ efficiency (over 500% with well designed underground systems). Natural gas isn't clean yes but at the equivalent of 300% efficiency, it's probably better than wood, especially as the electrical grid is slowly shifted over to renewables in most places. Also should consider that while a heat pump is costly to install, they are usually warrantied for at least 10 years and probably last well beyond that with maintenance. It's definitely expensive for now though. (swear I'm not a heat pump salesperson)
Wait, how can something be greater than a 1:1 energy transfer?
Pretty sure electric translates to heat at a 100% efficiency rating, but that's not considering the 30% or w/e origin of that energy. But I digress, how do you get over 100% returns on your energy?
Well it's because it's not generating all that heat, it's simply moving it from outside to the inside, while using up less energy than it moves. That's why it's not 'efficiency' technically (they call it the coefficient of performance), but it still effectively heats up your house or whatnot with more energy than it consumed in the process.
Ah, that makes sense.
But that aside, 300% of what? 300% of electric without the heat pump? It's also my understand that heat pumps aren't that great for heating if they are basic above ground units. Have to be the extra expensive dug in ones.
It's compared to the energy it consumes. For example, a COP of 3 (roughly translated to efficiency of 300%) would mean that for every 100 watts the machine uses to move energy, 300 watts are actually moved. As for the above ground thing, it definitely used to be that above ground ones really struggled to work at all when it was below freezing outside, but that was decades ago. Since then we have discovered tricks such as running it in reverse (like you would for air conditioning) to quickly melt any ice accumulation and thereafter keep working, as well as other tricks. They now work reliably even well below freezing, though with slightly reduced heating capacity. That said, putting them underground or underwater is still better for places where it is perpetually cold.
Most heat pump systems do have resistive electric backups in case of emergencies as well, if it really is so cold outside that the heat pump cannot work sufficiently.
As an addendum, most actual scientists would refrain from calling it '300% efficiency' or whatever since naturally we cannot actually create energy from nothing. A heat pump simply steals the extra energy from the outside air (or ground/water). However, I don't think it's misleading to say that in the context of your own home - you actually do get multiple times more out than you put in.
Ah thanks for the response!
I was actually thinking it as something like: For every 1btu produced by a standard electric heating unit, 3btu of heat would be produced by a heat pump.
Which, is basically what I understand you to claim. Every 100 watts of energy generates the equivalant of 300 watts of energy.
I guess you could say it like that sure
Oye we could go back and forth at this for awhile. 300% efficient at ideal temperatures, not low temperatures, and that efficiency is just at converting the electricity into heat. It doesn't account for the energy it takes to get the fossil fuels out of the ground, processed and brought to a power plant. Or the conversion of the fuel into electricity then losses in the grid getting to your house. Then there is also the fact that fossil fuels are not renewable and the wood you burn can replenish itself and re-capture the carbon you expended making it essentially net zero if you sustainably forest and don't use tons of power tools to harvest the wood. Anyway, I guess what I'm saying is its complicated but for a lot of folks I'm still convinced wood is better for most, for now. Soon as renewables take over I agree, heat pumps FTW but the USA is horrifically behind on renewables.
I believe they go over 80% just not in the traditional style. Rocket stoves, come to mind.
Make a compost pile.
I only have two humans and a dog in my household but we typically only generate one kitchen bag of trash a week by diverting a lot of our cardboard and food scraps into a small compost pile.
Join or start a community plastics recycling effort in the style of Precious Plastics.
If you like 3D-printing, make and use a Trashprinter V3 in combination with a plastics shredder.
Honestly I find the easiest way to start is just to stay engaged in places where you'll see ideas, like this community, or on YouTube, and then try those ideas as you see ones that appeal to you. As you engage more, and try more options, you'll find what works for you, start coming up with your own ideas, and slowly produce less and less waste.
How is it going in your new home since 7 months ?
Here are some ideas for everyday life, if you still need it :
use a bidet and cloth wipes
use solid soap/shampoo (can be the same), solid toothpaste (or learn to do it with baking soda and hydrogen peroxide)
electric toothbrush (more efficient according to my dentist and you throw away only the head, that can be re-used for cleaning works
reusable accessories like cloth wipes for face, ear scraper, tongue scraper
cook from raw materials as much as possible, learn how to use legumes in as much receipts as you can (main dishes but also appetizers and desserts)
create your own cookbook with receipt you like
learn how to do fermentation products and yogurts
buy in bulk stores and farmers markets to avoid packagings
compost
re use bottles and tin cans as flower plants
build a solar oven, a Norwegian Cooking Pot and a Desert Fridge (construction plans can be found on low-tech lab)
and enjoy your life