The 4 R's and the Waste Hierarchy

The Waste Services Unit is committed to the Waste Hierarchy. It is important to recycle but it is vital to reduce, reuse and repair.  Each of us can take these simple steps to do our bit to protect our environment and reduce the waste mountain.

Reduce

You, the consumer, can reduce the amount of waste you generate by buying products which contain less packaging, and which can be easily recycled. For example, buying loose fruit as opposed to a pre-packaged fruit bag. Or even buying refill items i.e. fabric softener.

Manufacturers, especially, can prevent the generation of waste by simply not using countless, useless and unsustainable packaging for their products. There is pressure from the Packaging Directive for manufacturers to start thinking about and using recycled materials or less packaging to coat there selling product.

Re-use

Most of the product packaging that you buy can quite easily be re-used for another purpose. For example, glass jars (jam!) can be used to store pickle or used as a pen holder or even a vase, especially if you’re feeling imaginative! Shopping bags are an item, which easily get accumulated and thrown away. So to prevent this waste, next time take your already used shopping bags to the supermarket to be re-used again. Or even better, buy a cloth bag which you can use every time you go shopping.

Repair

So often when something is broken the first reaction is to throw it away and buy a new one.  However if the item, whether electrical goods, electronic items, toys, clothes etc, was perfectly good before, seek to repair the item before buying new, thereby saving money and avoiding wasting resources.

Recycle

Recycling makes and creates used materials into new useful products, therefore saving cost and energy on extracting raw materials. For example it takes the same amount of energy to make one new aluminium can from raw materials as it does to make 20 recycled ones.  That's a 95% energy saving! Recycling or composting our waste also reduces the amount of waste being sent to our already burgeoning landfill sites. Not only is landfill responsible for producing around 21% of the UK's Co2 and methane emissions (dangerous gasses responsible for climate change), due to the fact that biodegradable waste is not able to discompose properly in a landfill site, but landfill space is due to run out in in Hertfordshire by 2008. The aim of the Herts Waste Strategy is to be recycling /composting around 50% of our waste by 2012.  In Dacorum we are currently recycling/composting around 45% of our waste.

Disposal

This is the final and least preferred option after recycling. Disposal will often mean landfill or incineration, however, there are present technologies under consideration which can extract energy from breaking down waste.