Saturday 1 August 2009

The Big Green Blog Gathering

Today is day 4 of the Big Green Blog Gathering and I would like to thank our host Emma Cooper of Coopette.com for not just hosting the event but for inviting me to get involved.

I'd also like to thank all of you who have popped by, whether you've just happened on the virtual gathering by accident or have deliberately dropped in with a keen interest in reducing waste and to find out more about The Rubbish Diet Experience.

No matter where you are in the push for consumer zero waste I hope my personal story will help inspire you further, whether it's starting from scratch or going that extra mile to slim your bin.

So without further ado, I will begin my presentation of how I managed to slim my bin last year in our local council's Zero Waste Challenge [just click on the play button to start]

The Rubbish Diet: The 8 Week Zero Waste Challenge

Of course the journey to reducing waste starts now and as we're very lucky at the Big Green Blog Gathering to have excellent recycling facilities, I ask you to help us by putting your plastic bottles, cans and paper into the separate bins provided as well as separating your tea bags, fruit peelings and apple cores for the compost bin.

And don't just stop there. When you leave this virtual festival and step back out into your local town or cities, please keep your eyes peeled for local facilities that help you recycle on the go too. If local facilities aren't available and you want to be really commited, remember you can always take your empty bottles and cans back with you and pop them into your recycling bin at home to ensure they don't go to waste.

Finally if you're organising your own festival, there are a whole host of recycling organisations that can help. A few that I discovered quite recently include the very appropriately named Event Recycling and the Maker Green Team, who will endeavor to make your event as rubbish free as possible, helping your audience divert as many recycling resources from landfill as they can.

And if you want to keep up with what the best eco-festivals are doing to manage their waste, pop over to the Waste Connect site for further inspiration, or stay a while and watch this video of how the Green Festival manages its waste over in the U.S.



Well I hope you've enjoyed your visit today and if you have any questions please feel free to ask. I'll be hanging about for a while and will do my best to answer them before I have to disappear off, otherwise I will be back in touch at the end of August. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy the rest of the Big Green Blog Gathering over at Coopette.com.

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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'll have to look more closely at your blog - great premise!

We are down to a small kitchen bag/week for our family of 4. We are slowly getting there.

What do you do with things that break? Eg. broken CD, toy, etc - something that cannot be repaired.

What about meat scraps that are not that edible? Do you have a dog? That would solve our problem in that area, but we don't have one.

Unknown said...

Love your blog! Just found out in October we can put all food waste in our brown bin!! Fantastic :)

Unknown said...

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The Green Times team is looking for new writers!!

Any green related subject or experience you want to share with the world?!

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Almost Mrs Average said...

Hi Karen - thanks for dropping by and for your kind comments. Sorry it's taken me so long to come back but I've only recently got back from a long holiday.

You sound as though you're doing really well. As for meat scraps, we have two cats, but it can never be guaranteed that they will eat them because they are surprisingly fussy. We used to rely heavily on a Bokashi bin, which uses layers of bokashi impregnated bran to help break down the meat waste into a form that can be put safely into the compost bin. However we use that less frequently now thanks to better measured portions and adapting our diet to eating less meat.

As for broken toys etc. If they can't be fixed easily and as long as they are safe, we've developed a system where broken toys become garden playthings for the children to enjoy imaginary play outside. They are still young (5 & 8) so this system has extended usage of things that would have otherwise end up in landfill by a couple of years. CDs that no longer work are used as coasters or birdscarers. If they snap they end up in the bin.

I hope that helps. Good luck with your continued ventures and please let me know how you get on. :-D

Hi Clareybabble - what fantastic news. That will definitely help your local waste resources. I wish we had similar facilities. Even though we don't have much food waste these days, what with the chickens, cats and Bokashi system, it would still mean one less bin in the kitchen. :-D

Hi Green Times - thanks for letting me know and sharing the link. Looks like a good read. :-D

Proactol said...

If they can't be fixed easily and as long as they are safe, we've developed a system where broken toys become garden playthings for the children to enjoy imaginary play outside. They are still young (5 & 8) so this system has extended usage of things that would have otherwise end up in landfill by a couple of years.

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