How to stop wasting our future

Sustainable & efficient management of resources

Introduction

That there are no such concepts as 'waste' or 'to throw away' is a message that can be drawn from the book 'Mid-course correction' by Ray Anderson, a former adviser to US President, Bill Clinton, and founder of the Interface Corporation. My former colleagues at the UK Department of Trade & Industry say "Take our advice - stop wasting your money!" Both statements reflect a revolution in thinking about current human economic behaviour that introduces an important step on the road to sustainable development.

The diagram to the right comes from the web site of Precycle, an American organisation whose logo is also reproduced here (left) and by its design indicates the concept of resources flowing round a global system.

The comparable advice from the British Environmental Technology Best Practice Programme is to follow the waste hierarchy:

Eliminate
Minimise
Reuse
Recycle
Dispose

In both cases what is advised is a step-by-step guide to make more efficient use of planetary resources. What has cause this change from 'the throw-away society' is a realisation that there is now a shortage of land-fill sites but also experience of the damage that can result from attempting to bury or burn products that are no longer wanted.

In reality, once mankind had seen the view of the home planet from space (such as the often reproduced 'full earth' photograph taken from Apollo 17, to the right) it should have been obvious that there was no where to 'throw-away' anything.

Back from the brink - practical steps towards sustainability

Perhaps the best way to understand the wisdom built into the 'waste hierarchy' is to start at the bottom! The aim is to eliminate disposal of any human product that cannot be immediately taken-up and used by the biosphere. In the short-term, burning waste to produce electricity does provide a source of energy marginally better than using fossil fuels but it also produces 'greenhouse' gasses and toxic solid residues that are harmful to the biosphere, including humans.

Composting is perhaps the most simple and familiar example of turning our waste into a product that can be taken up by the biosphere and is of obvious use to us because the soil-like mulch that come from the process (which can be seen on the shovel in the picture to the right) improves the fertility of our own gardens. In reality, the work involved in the transformation of kitchen and garden plant residues into compost is undertaken by a community of animals that is encouraged to live and grow in the compost bin or heap.

If we wanted to return the plastic bin, illustrated, to the environment or to reuse its component chemicals it would require reprocessing with energy and catalysts. However, such products are very durable and can be reused as they are, if the current user no longer requires them.

Sometimes all that is required is a system to sort out and reuse valuable resources that would otherwise be expensive to obtain both in monetary value (which tends to be of immediate interest to people) and damage to the planet (which is in our long-term interest). Thus a company such as Celestica has chosen to sort and recycle lead residues. Lead is a toxic metal that would be expensive to dispose of so the bins illustrated below (picture from Celestica's plant near Kidsgrove, Staffordshire) are doubly useful. Companies like this are already reaping the benefit of collecting materials that have a resale value from what was previously a 'waste stream' that cost money and effort to dispose.

The final step in the process of rethinking the concept of waste is reviewing what is purchased in the first place. A significant part of the strategy that Ray Anderson started at Interface involves looking at the design of products and the methods of producing them to see if the materials used can be easily reused or recycled.

Achieving a sustainable future

What we need for our survival and wellbeing is to use recyclable products that have been manufactured from recycled or reused materials with the assistance of renewable energy. The greatest problem in achieving this is that it requires a change of attitude. The strategy and technology to bring the change about already exists. By working within the global system and maintaining the flow we will greatly improve our efficiency at producing what the future demands.

Paul Newman

February 03