7 reuse trailblazers you need to know in 2022
Today's guest blog is authored by Suz Okie of GreenBiz Group. The original post can be read here.
When it comes to reusables, I’m a fanatic, an enthusiast, a fan — insert any number of zealous descriptors and you wouldn’t be far off.
That’s in part because my journey to circular economy analyst began with a reusables obsession — following a graduate school commitment to stop buying single-use packaging (a goal I, admittedly, often fell short on), finding innovative reusable solutions became a personal addiction.
Reusables offered a tangible step towards the waste-free world I hankered for. In the food service industry alone, leveraging reuse could avoid 841 billion disposable packages annually, equating to 7.5 million tons of trash diverted. In fact, when comparing serviceware options,
In COVID-era trash surge, waste management ingenuity, circularity, and investments are key
Today's guest blog is courtesy of the World Bank. The original post can be read here.
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and with little warning, municipalities suddenly faced unique waste management challenges: massive upticks in daily waste volumes combined with curtailed garbage collection and cutbacks in recycling. While workplace waste production fell at the pandemic’s height, household waste rose to a degree that offset the decrease in commercial waste. With the exponential increase in the number of ill patients needing treatment, medical waste volumes surged as well.
Regions with poor waste management infrastructure were least able to handle the rapid influx of additional waste, which in many cases overwhelmed existing dump sites or landfills, amplifying negative environmental and social impacts.
Against this backdrop, the waste management industry is responding with ingenuity, creativity, and resilience. Consider…
How Much Can We Recycle?
A friend of mine likes to say the only thing wrong with recycling rates is the numerator and the denominator. I was reminded of this when I read about a study suggesting the 91.4 percent recycling rate for cardboard boxes, also known as old corrugated containers (OCC), is too high.