The Six R's of Sustainability | Wild Sustainability (2024)

Jaceybonavia/ Climate, Conscious Consumerism, Eco-minimalism, Lifestyle, Zero Waste

We all know the sustainability adage: reduce, reuse, recycle. But do we know what it means? Is reducing, reusing, and recycling enough to live a sustainable lifestyle?

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These six r’s are not merely a list of possible and equal ways to deal with items, but they are also in a hierarchy to help you decide which one to apply to your situation.

1. Refuse | Rethink

Refuse {what we do not need}

Bea Johnson, Zero Waste Home, 2o13

We need to rethink our throw-away culture fundamentally. We should limit the items that we are bringing into our lives to those that genuinely help to sustain our lives or enhance them in meaningful ways. Everything else both contributes to clutter in our home (and arguably our minds), and, even worse, it will eventually have an end to its life and need to be “disposed of.” For most of us who are not already minimalists, this takes a lot of practice.

2. Reduce

Reduce {what we do need and cannot refuse}

Bea Johnson, Zero Waste Home, 2o13

We all have many legitimate needs (e.g., food, clothing) that you should obtain. However, some people often buy so much of these things that a shirt rarely gets worn, or food spoils before they can eat it. Do you need to buy four pairs of sneakers, or could you make do with one?

Reducing can also include selling or giving away things that you have but do not need. This process will help you declutter or tidy and live a more minimalistic life. I will share more on the benefits of minimalism in a future post.

3. Reuse | Repair

Reuse {what we consume and cannot refuse or reduce}

Bea Johnson, Zero Waste Home, 2o13

I think there are several components to reuse, which we will revisit throughout the website.

1. Buy secondhand. It is great to reuse something that somebody else has already used. Buying used allows us to obtain the object we need without supporting the production of new items, which would require the extraction of natural resources and the energy to manufacture it.
2. We can reuse things that we have as many times as possible before recycling (or otherwise disposing of) them. If the items break, repair them, and continue to reuse them.
3. Buy things that are reusable, not “disposable.” In a sustainable society, nothing should be considered disposable.

4. Repurpose

We can find new purposes or uses for things we have that no longer fulfill their intended functions. Perhaps we can sew a purse out of torn, patched jeans or use an old, ratty boot as a planter. We can repurpose cans or jars as containers for other items.

5. Recycle

Recycle {what we cannot refuse, reduce, or reuse}

Bea Johnson, Zero Waste Home, 2o13

As nearly a last resort, we can send our items to a recycling facility. There are a few significant problems with this, though: 1) recycling processes take energy and other resources, 2) items are often “down-cycled,” and 3) many things sent to be recycled still go to a landfill. I will discuss these problems in more detail in another post.

Still, trying to recycle is far better than sending recyclable items to end their lifecycle in a landfill. Recycling provides resources for manufactures, reducing the materials that need to be extracted from our natural environment.

6. Rot

Compost organic materials that cannot be refused, reduced, reused, or recycled — typically food scraps and yard waste.

Occasionally, despite all of our best efforts to refuse groceries that we do not need and reduce the number of groceries we buy to what we can eat before it spoils, we still have some food and yard “waste.” For example, we have apple cores and banana peels (although I know that eating bananas up in Wisconsin, where they cannot grow, is controversial). When this happens, we compost them.

When we throw food items into the trash to be buried in landfills, they do not decompose into soil! The conditions are not right. Instead, the food releases methane gas — a major, problematic greenhouse gas — into the atmosphere and contributes to climate change.

In contrast, when you compost food “waste,” it forms a nutrient-dense addition to soils that helps plants thrive. I will go through types of composting in a future blog post.

If you can follow all of the r’s, you are well on your way to living a zero-waste lifestyle!

What questions do you have about the six r’s? Do you have any creative examples of items you have repurposed? Leave a comment!