The three R's

Hello everyone,

Welcome back to my blog, today I am going to be talking a little about the three R's. You may already know about this concept, however I think it is quite an important one to try and put into everything you do. The three R's are simple:

Reduce

Reuse

Recycle

Easy, right? One thing that is really important about these R's is the order in which you say and do them!

Also another honourable mention R, which comes under Reuse, is Repurpose.

What do they mean?

Reduce

Always the thing you should think about first when trying to be more environmentally conscious reducing. A mistake people often make is going out and buying loads of reusable 'green' products. Sometimes this is the right thing to do, however before rushing out and buying new things, think about what you already have. Do you really need those new things? 

Reducing is all about thinking before you buy: Do I really need this?, Am I going to get lots of use out of it?, Could I buy less of this? etc.

Reuse

To reuse something is to, once it has fulfilled its original purpose, use it again for something different. 

For example:

• Using an Ice-cream pot as Tupperware or a lunch box.
• Using used and cleaned out Jam jars to store pasta.
• Sending your old clothes to the charity shop instead of the clothes bin, so that someone else can buy and reuse them.

Reusing before throwing things away is so important. Getting more uses out of product is how you make the energy/resources it took to create them go further, and it keeps them out of landfill for longer. If you cannot utilise the first R, and must buy the item, make it last for as long as possible.

Within Reusing there is another R, Repurposing. Repurposing has become a huge thing in modern times. It has been adopted by many creatives and people who love DIY. Repurposing goes a step further than reusing, by using creative skills to make new products out of old ones. Another word to be aware of here is Upcycling, which is the practice of "dolling up" old items to make them more desirable for resale, or giving them a new purpose.

Some popular upcycles include:

• Using old ladders as shelves
• Using glass bottles as lamps/ lampshades
• Using old Clothing to make new bags or even yarn for knitting
• Using old cans or plastic bottles as plant pots.

The possibilities are endless, a good place to research ideas is Pinterest.co.uk

Recycle

Recycling is the final R, and a final destination for many products. Recycling is when old products that cannot be reused, are sent to recycling plants and turned into new products.

Recycling is last of the three R's for a good reason, it should be the last resort. Recycling is not very efficient with certain materials, as many things that are sent to recycling are not recycled and either go to landfill or are incinerated. Some that do not make it to recycling may have been wrongly recycled, contaminated with other non-recyclable material or not good enough quality to be recycled.

Also there are only certain materials that can be recycled, often due to the cost and efficiency being too high.

The main recyclable products fall into these categories:

1. Paper and Cardboard
2. Plastics
3. Metals
4. Glass
5. Electronic products
6. Textiles and Clothing

Recycling is very specific to your local area, different areas recycle different things. You can find out what your area recycling schemes are online. They will have a list of items you can put in your recycling bin, a list you cannot and their local recycling places you can take other recycling.

I could write a lot about recycling, but I am going to highlight a few things you can recycle that are less known about, and a few mistakes that are often made.

Electrical equipment such as laptops, phones etc. if they cannot be sold on to someone else (CEX are a good shop for selling electronics to) can be recycled at many local recycling centres. This is really important as many electronic products contain rare earth resources that are costly to the environment to product.

Aluminium cans are one of the most efficient out of all the recyclables. Another great material to recycle is glass. Both of these products can be put into you recycling bin and can often have food residue. It is not essential to get rid of every spec of food, however it is good practice to rinse away food residue from any products you recycle. This includes paper and cardboard, anything made from paper/cardboard that is greasy or contaminated with food cannot be recycled.

Any Clothing and textiles that are not suitable for reselling or charity shops can be recycled. However, these cannot go in your recycling bins. Often there are large collection bins in local community places where you can take your clothes to be recycled.

Thank you for reading... If you made it to the end Well Done!

This turned into a long post, but I think it is a really deep subject and I could talk more about it. Research your local recycling, know what to recycle, reduce, reuse, repurpose and most importantly be creative and have fun with it!

A snap I got of a lovely butterfly on my garden flowers, known as Peacock Inachis io.

Again, thank you so much for reading. Hope to see you back next week.