Lauren Singer studied Environmental Studies at university in New York, USA, and worked as a Sustainability Manager at the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. Motivated by two key moments, she has been living a zero-waste lifestyle, producing little to no waste. The amount of trash that she has produced over the past three years can fit inside of a 453-gram jar.
Screen shot from Seekers Stories: You Can Live Without Producing Trash
The first of these moments was during a presentation by a teacher at her university, Jeffrey Hollander from Seventh Generation, who emphasised the importance of ‘living your values’. This made Lauren think about her personal impact on the environment.
The second moment was when she realised that one of her classmates, who brought her lunch to university each day, used a plastic bag, disposable water bottle, and plastic takeaway container and cutlery every day. This woman would throw all of these items away at the end of her meal. Reflecting on these two moments, Lauren wondered how she could reduce her personal impact on the environment by making changes to her lifestyle, and walk the talk.
Inspired by a family from California, who call themselves the Zero Waste Home because they produce barely any rubbish, Lauren decided to stop buying packaged goods by using her own bags and jars to fill with bulk products at the supermarket. She only shopped in second-hand stores for clothes and reduced her possessions—selling, donating, or giving away unnecessary things in her life. She also tried to minimise potentially wasteful situations, saying ‘no’ to straws in her drinks, to plastic bags at stores and receipts. By minimising, reusing, recycling and composting her waste, Lauren was able to eliminate 80% of her waste
Image from http://www2.hm.com/es_es/life/culture/on-the-rise/zero-waste-for-lauren-singer.html
Lauren says the initial process required a lot of effort and but she was persistent; “If a family of four can live a zero-waste lifestyle, I, as a (then) 21-year-old single girl in NYC, certainly can. So I took the leap”. Lauren decided that if she was going to say that she loved the environment, she needed to actually live like she loved the environment.
Lauren created a blog, Trash is for Tossers, to document Zero Waste journey and show that leading a Zero Waste lifestyle is simple, cost-effective, timely, fun, and entirely possible for everyone and anyone.
Lauren suggests three things for someone looking to produce less waste:
- Evaluate your trash. Understand what goes into your garbage bin. Typically, this might include food packaging and organic waste. Once you identify the sources of your waste, come up with ways to eliminate them.
- Switch to easy, everyday waste-free alternatives,
- DIY. Do It Yourself where possible.
How can you go zero waste in Singapore? What needs to be changed to make this move more feasible?
Sources: http://www.trashisfortossers.com/p/about.html
http://www2.hm.com/en_cn/life/culture/on-the-rise/zero-waste-for-lauren-singer.html
http://tedxteen.com/talks/tedxteen-2015-nyc/295-lauren-singer-why-i-live-a-zero-waste-life
