At the start of 2011, eight Kimberley families embarked on a month-long mission to create the least amount of household garbage possible.
Within the first weeks, creative participants had made laptop cases with empty dog food bags, contacted owners of chickens who could eat all non-compostable food scraps, and found new homes and uses for packaging and other waste that otherwise would have ended up in a landfill.
The group saved the garbage they produced for the month, and in the end, each family displayed their bins (or bags) at the Sustainable Living and Building conference in Kimberley, and will be doing the same on February 10 at the Spirit of Kimberley Showcase!
Photos and the announcement of the winner will be coming soon!
As the group prepared for the competition, lively discussions helped sort out:
The Purpose and Intent
"If we want to get a sense of what the waste stream is from our place of residence, this is a great opportunity. We are now going to be putting things in the garbage with a different awareness than we usually have."
"It will also be very interesting to see how much garbage will be produced by all of us collectively - i.e. by a group of people who are behaving mindfully and responsibly. It will also really show us where some of the problem areas lie. And we will all really learn from it on an individual basis."
"Even though I have always thought of myself as a clean bin person, I have been looking around my house lately and realizing how much better I could do!"
The Resources
"Anyone fancy keeping a pig to east those non-compostable food scraps? I'll make plastic-bag-free bread for anyone who'll find a useful home for my food waste!"
"Those of us who are omnivores (which in truth the chickens also are) may have bones left over. I'm going to try drying them & then pounding with a sledge hammer in spring to make bone meal or pieces at least for my garden."
"[We've got] a flock of carnivorous chickens that would happy to peck away at my fish bones and your household leftovers. If we all save these for the month, freeze them if you can, we can give them to the chickens at the end of the month."
"You will all be pleased to know that metal beer bottle caps are indeed recyclable at Columbia Recycle in Marysville. Ditto for any metal lids from glass jars etc. The rubber is not a problem."
"[The Kimberley Transfer Station] doesn't want small pieces - like all the bent nails etc I've dropped in their bin - they're into large items like bikes & metal roof sheets."
"But back to those nice people at Columbia Recycle - you can even bring things that are predominately metal - like my bathroom scale I asked them about. Can have some plastic or other bits & pieces attached still."
"And even better still Columbia Recycle takes any kind of aluminum- you heard me right- any kind, including aluminum foil. [So] toss those candle holders into your metals bin with wild abandon. Foil on top of yogurt containers and any other foil seals for example on salsa also fall into this category."
"According to Loree Duzcek, who manages the RDEK recycling program, plastics need to have a number from 1-6 on them to go into our recycling."
"Some kinds of milk in plastic jugs now have lids with a number on it - if you come across this let us all know which brand? - so they can go in your normal recycling."
"You can also bring your plastic milk bottle lids that aren't numbered to the bottle depot and put them in with pop/drink bottle lids."
The Reality
"I'm making yogurt as I type, on the wood stove no less."
"And who just bought a plastic bag of red peppers? Any ideas for reusing those stupid bags with holes in them?"
"Why oh why does my dog eat very expensive, yummy sounding dog food (fresh duck! fresh salmon!) that comes in an enormous foil type bag?"
"Oh, and the "compostable" bags I was going to use for his poo are only compostable "where facilities exist", need industrial composter. Bummer."
"In the interest of waste reduction made a couple loaves of bread, big batch of granola bars and some yogurt today, but in the process created a whole bunch of garbage (foil lid on the starter yogurt - which I can now recycle; plastic packaging from shredded coconut, chocolate chips etc.) Think I still came out ahead."
"But you will all be pleased to know that I brought my own cutlery, plate and thermos of tea to the department meeting tonight because they usually have only styrofoam. Got some weird looks but have to earn those granola crunching credentials somehow!"
"“Having a clean bin is going to be so easy – I always think about my garbage and I think I can produce none over a month without too much trouble”. Yeah right. Not so easy after all!"
Biggest Challenges
"We are both into single use of dental floss. Perhaps used floss can be fashioned into cat toys or tie tall houseplants to their stakes.
"He had a nosebleed that lasted about 6 hours, he used tissues initially and then a towel. The tissues went in the toilet. Cheating you say? Perhaps."
"I was doing great for the first few days, with only a few staples in my bin(from tea bags). Then a chocolate bar somebody gave me over Christmas called to me and was eaten before thought was given to the package....oops.""I've been super frustrated at the plastic wrapping on veggies, especially the organics. I've been asking stores if they have any produce in the back that hasn't been wrapped, and Sprout and Husky have both tried to help me out. Some items I was able to get, others I ended up passing on because of the plastic."
