Reduce Reuse Recycle - Intro

We all want to 'do our bit' to save Planet Earth.
Well I hope you do.
If you don't then you should leave....NOW!

And 'Reduce Reuse Recycle' is sound advice.

Reduce - there's no arguing with that. To maintain the average lifestyle of a person living in one of the 'developed countries' would require the resources of 4 Planet Earths. Oooops!

Reuse - brilliant, I would never have thought of that!

Recycle - but does it sometimes seem to you, if you sit and think about it, that the recycling will use more resources than the recycled item is worth?

For example. You've sorted your waste paper and put it out for the kerbside collection:
A large truck arrives, well that's full of materials that could have been used for something else and some of which are non-renewable and non-recyclable.
The truck is burning diesel as it chugs around it's route, burning non-renewable fossil fuel in other words and creating a carbon footprint.
The waste paper is delivered to a depot where it has to be kept dry, which probably means warm too - the building cost something as does the heating.
The paper is sorted - probably by some sort of machine using fossil fuel and probably kept well lit.
The sorted paper is loaded onto another truck to make another journey.
To a plant full of machinery to turn it into new goods, which then make another journey to the point of sale.
It's an expensive business recycling.

Maybe there's a better way that some of that paper could be reused or recycled closer to home.

1... Shock, horror, burn it! If you have an open fire or wood burning stove why not get the heat out of some of it. Maybe it's only the small proportion used for kindling, most 'window' envelopes use a cellulose for the window, that's plant fibers to you and me. Maybe you have the time and patience to plait some sheets of newspaper into 'twigs', they burn quite slowly. Maybe you have the room to make up paper briquettes, but remember the aim here is not to buy expensive equipment or spend anything on drying them out before you can burn them.
And collect the ashes and put them on the garden.

2...Shred it! Shredded paper makes great bedding for pets or livestock like chickens. And when it's done there, compost it along with all the droppings, it'll mulch down in almost no time at all. But we are now into the realms of buying a shredder but a £19 paper shredder used only occasionally for domestic paper will last almost forever. 1 waste collection truck = how many shredders?

3...A great deal of paper only has printing on one side. Tear A4 sheets into quarters, hole punch in one corner, loop a rubber band through the hole, hang it up and use for shopping lists, etc. (Make sure you bring the list home again to burn, compost or recycle.)

4...Newspaper makes quite a good liner for hanging baskets. It may look a bit odd until it is covered over but at the end of the season into the compost it goes.

The aim here is to get another use, or many uses, out of something without it costing anything.