gerv 

You'd think that living carfree or car light would mean you output a fairly low level of trash. After all, it's now difficult to drag all that crap back from the mall.

Personally, I am doing about 1/3 of the landfill waste that I see the neighbors putting out. In my case that about 10 gallons a week for 4 people. We compost everything that is compostable and have recycling available. From what I can see, the bulk of the non-recyclable material is plastic wrapping... bags mostly.

Actually, the recycling is probably our biggest output... about 30-35 gallons every two weeks. A lot of this is cardboard from packaging materials. Most of it is needless, excessively packaged good, like cereal boxes.

How do you handle trash? How much waste material do you bring home on your bicycle?

Platy

Shopping on a bike does indeed make one try to reduce excessive packaging. We save about $60 a year in garbage charges by using the smallest size city-issued trash bin instead of the default medium size one. What I hate most is having to dispose of the non-recyclable styrofoam packaging peanuts that come with some online orders.

B. Carfree

As I said in another thread, I haul all my trash and recyclables to the county transfer station. It's about six miles away. Last week I took ten months worth of trash on a large flatbed trailer that I co-own with a neighbor. It was three average-sized garbage cans (I don't know their volume). That's for a family of three adults, one of whom runs an ebay business that is probably responsible for a significant share. Three cans every ten months is a pretty normal rate for us. Since there is no meat in the trash and our climate is fairly cool year-round, there is generally no odor from the cans so I wait until I have three full to take them to the transfer station since three costs the same as one.

Recycling is another issue entirely. Our county has a great recycling program and the few plastics they don't take can be recycled at a Weyerhauser plant next to the county transfer station. They even recycle the cow and soy milk containers. They also take obsolete electronics and truck them away to keep them out of the landfill. I really don't know how much recycling we generate. I would guess for everything except cardboard we generate about fifteen to twenty cans per year.

Since I have to haul everything that comes into the home away (except compostables, those go into the garden), I try to be careful about what I buy. I'll often leave the packaging behind when I make a purchase. If I buy cereal I buy the two pound bags instead of the one pound boxes. Things we use a lot of (rice, beans, olive oil, masa, sweeteners, nuts) we buy in bulk from a local wholesaler. They even give us an extra 5% off for picking up our order by bike. (They make all their deliveries by electric-assist bike.) Fortunately my family is pretty anti-consumer. I don't know which is cause and which is effect, but I suspect our lack of television may play a role in our lack of desire to purchase the next great thing. Heck, it was only last year that I finally put a wheel with a cassette instead of a freewheel and indexed shifters on a bike.

bragi

My garbage output is also very small; I have a very small trash can under my sink that I need to empty maybe once or twice a month. But I live alone, I don't have a yard, and I work 60-70 hours a week.

My recycling is a bit more, but not by much.

I'm not sure how much this low solid waste output has to do with the bike. I suspect that it's not a close correlation. Just because you drive a lot doesn't necessarily mean that you consume more in other areas of life; I'm willing to bet that having kids has a lot more to do with waste volume per household than car ownership.

Sargeist

I have found a way to re purpose a few of my consumables. Old coffee cans I now put things like flour,rice,sugar, & beans into. I have replaced all my plastic tupper ware with glass containers. As far as solid waste is concerned for me I only take out one bag a week. That amount is between two people and if I were to calculate the volume I would estimate it to be roughly 25 lbs by weight.

poormanbiking

I don't recycle as much as I should. My city has the large trash and recycling containers. Once a week trash is picked up and our can is seldom full. Recycling is picked up every two weeks and both of our recycling cans are generally full. Composting may be in my future.

jgedwa

I try to avoid products with too much packaging. When I buy something in a store and the item has much (non-recyclable) packaging, I stop on my way out and throw the packaging away in their trash. Then they throw it away instead of me.

Of course, this act does nothing to reduce the amount of waste in the world. However, why not give them an incentive to reduce the amount of packaging on their items.

jim

Cyclepup

We're maybe a half a can a week, unless we're doing yard work. No matter how little we generate every week we have the neighbors' trash blowing into our yard and we end up adding that to our trash can. Either that or I can walk up the block trying to put it back into the appropriate cans, only to have it blow back. It's frustrating as heck. Right now we have 25mph winds with gusts over 50mph and, since it's trash day, stuff is blowing down the street. As usual, too much of it ends up stuck in the corners of our yard :-(

dcrowell

I found a local grocery store that carries 1/2 gallon glass jugs of milk. It's good milk too! There's a $2.50 deposit on the jug, so you bring it back next time. Although it reduces waste, it increases the weight on grocery trips.

travelmama

I haven't taken trash out of my house in over a year. In fact, what is in the trash can is dust, fruit stickers, lint and two old swimsuits. I recycle most things and dump all that can compost in the bin outside. I too, buy things that do not have a lot of wrappings and like glass over plastic.

crazybikerchick

Dust can go in the compost too And dryer lint if it is mostly natural fibers (ie cotton)
Here's a good list of unusual things for composters:
https://www.care2.com/greenliving/75-...-compost.html#

crazybikerchick

I think there's the less and more trash by bike: less because you don't buy unnecessary things because you have to haul it yourself, and more because you aren't likely to buy too much in heavy but reusable glass when you have to haul the weight.

Roody

I live alone and take out one tall kitchen bag a week, which is probably excessive. My neighbors in the lower duplex fill up the whole dumpster every week, and thay never want to haul it to the curb.

I'm doing more recycling since my city got the single stream system where you don't have to separate stuff. It's pretty convenient to recycle now, but I still don't fill the container every week or even every month. My downstairs neighbors don't recycle at all, or at least they never take a container to the curb. Maybe it's all piled up in their kitchen.

curbtender

I'd like to see a good recycle use for all the styrofoam waste that's produced. Not a big 'per pound ' issue, but it, along with plastic bags, has to be the biggest contributer to our non recyclable trash stream.

travelmama

I know of this list so thank you for posting it as it may help others. I do put such items in the compost bin on in the ground however, at times when lazy, I just put it in the trash bag that once full, will be picked through. As of last year or so, many cities in California are accepting some styrofoams to recycle. This is good but it should be banned altogether and replaced with biodegradable products.

gerv 

I'm actually more concerned with the amount sent to the recycling plants.

I'm very happy that items like cardboard and plastic are being recycled, but the problem with recycling is that it's usually "down-cycled". Your recycled paper doesn't tend to become more reams of paper, but becomes toilet tissue instead. Your plastic throwaways are likely destined for becoming speed bumps. The question is: how many speed bumps can a society support?

The amounts of packing for food products is obscene. Cereal boxes are a good example. Over-priced product and much of the prices is the recyclable packaging. My suggestion: buy oats in bulk.

Like Platy, I see a lot of Internet products shipped with "peanuts" and I also see cardboard boxes which could be easily returned to the seller and reused.

wahoonc

We reuse a lot of our boxes around here for a variety of different things. I try to buy most of my things packaged in steel or glass, both are not normally down cycled as part of the recycling. Unfortunately plastic is a major problem, all food stuffs packaged in plastic are in virgin plastic, so even if you do recycle it isn't doing anything to reduce the stream at the grocery store. Unfortunately things that came in glass a few years ago are now only available in plastic....and the viscous cycle continues.

Aaron

gerv 

I'm really surprised we don't hear more complaints from cities. Everything I "recycle" or trash has to be dealt with by the city and I imagine it can be quite challenging to figure it all out. There are some cities that are struggling to find landfill, but the price of recycled cardboard must make it difficult as well. We recycle bicycles at our co-op but lately get little or nothing for it.

This is a real pity since a lot of packaging that comes with commercial products is absolutely unnecessary.

It's too bad more people aren't complaining about this.

Ekdog

That lint is great for starting fires in your fireplace or when camping. All it takes to get it going is a spark.

Rowan

Or maybe how many polar fleece jackets?

The issue really is the volume, but that is how the consumer society wants it.

The volume of "recycling" is the issue and when there is a glut of anything in a marketplace, the price drops to almost nothing.

One solution is to charge people much more for disposing of their rubbish through the land or local government taxes. It's happening here in Australia, and now rubbish is becoming quite the wealth industry. Hit the hip-pocket nerve, and you get a response... which may result in your desired decrease in packaging.

On which... why has there been this trend to fully sealed stiff plastic packaging that is almost impossible to open without a knife? It mainly applies to hardware, but it can be a major problem actually accessing what is inside. I have no doubt security is an argument for the packaging, but even then it doesn't make that much sense.

Somehow, I expected something like this to be posted -- on a thread bemoaning rubbish, then someone advocating burning a fire to add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere.

Zaneluke

I shop for groceries in a car. I have not been to the mall in ages.

The whole theory that living without a car makes you generate less trash is silly. 29 years ago? I might buy that. If I did not have a car I could buy stuff I needed online.

jgedwa

I suppose there is no necessary connection between transportation choices and waste choices.

However, when one has to carry things home, it has a way of getting one to look with new eyes at everything that goes in the cart. And so, I would not call it silly by a long stretch.

jim

AdamDZ

When I shop by bike I often unpack many of the goods I bought and throw the packaging into the store's dumpster (they have proper dumpsters for recycling, BTW). This way, the groceries take up less space and I have less trash to deal with later at home.

gerv 

I like this idea... I suppose it might have the effect of having some people toss their trash out into the street rather than paying to have it hauled away. Still even that response would make people more aware of the damage their trash causes to the environment (ie, if it were right in their faces).

Ekdog

Why not put pressure on the companies that are using excessive and contaminating packaging to stop? I'm finding that, instead of moving towards more ecological containers, many firms are doing just the opposite. A case in point: more and more eggs are being sold in plastic cartons instead of the good, old-fashioned, easily-recyclable cardboard ones. Another one: almost all of the catsup sold in my area now comes in plastic bottles instead of the glass ones that were used before.