My attempt at a Zero Waste house move
By Rory Broughal – Greyhound Marketing team
I work as marketing and social media specialist at Greyhound Recycling. Every day I am talking to customers and the internet about how to reduce, reuse and recycle.
People often ask me about waste and what the big problems are. I often say that “environmentally speaking, on this planet we are simply running out of infrastructure and materials needed to cope with our ever-growing mountain of stuff.
Where possible we need to stop buying new, start investing in reused and recycle what we can before throwing it away as a last resort.”
Zero Waste House Move
When I started moving house a few weeks ago I wanted to do everything I could to
- Reduce the need for new things
- Reuse existing things
- Recycle as a second last resort
- Put in the general waste (throw away) as little as possible
From a look through my council website it was clear that disposing of large items like a mattress and old couch would actually cost me money to dispose of.
Freecycling towards Zero Waste
Freecycling it was my next option.
I began listing things for free on second hand websites. I soon realised that there was actually competition in the Free section of Adverts.ie and Facebook Marketplace.
This motivated me to up my own marketing descriptions of my “king-size, divan bed frame”, and my “turn-of-the-century-upcycleable-3 piece suite”. Better photos and a friendly upbeat description were key to shifting these bulky older items.
I even managed to freecycle a lot of “empty cardboard boxes” to people in need of packaging. Once advertised most of the items moved along quickly enough. The stuff I put a price on for collection has been slower to move, naturally. Anyone for a “mid-century kitchen dresser“?
Getting rid wasn’t my only problem, I still needed to buy some new bits for my house. I also wanted to make compost in my new garden from my food waste. A compost bin seemed a no brainer. I’ve had compost bins in the past and wanted to try something new for my food waste, something that was easier to manage and quicker.
I searched on Adverts.ie for a “hot compost bin”. Low and behold 2 people in Dublin were selling theirs. Usually these are €250-300 brand new, on Adverts.ie I found one for €200 and one for €50!. Bargain! I contacted DHL and for €20 I had a large hot compost bin couriered to my new garden. Here this bin will be used to heat up and cook food waste turning it into compost much quicker than a standard compost bin.
I also needed a newer mobile phone as my current one has more cracks than an American Patrick’s Day parade. Luckily the person selling the compost bin was co-incidentally selling a mint-second re-used mobile. As I was already paying for delivery for the bin, they threw the phone into the bin and sent both to me for €100. The Circular Economy in action. Delighted!
My last purchase was a washing machine. New ones cost upwards of €350, €500 really to get the 5 year guarantee on an A-Rated reputable model. So on Facebook Marketplace I bought a second hand washing machine that needed a repair. It was €150 and a local repair man came and repaired it for €90. So now I have a working second-hand working washing machine. This saved me the expense and our planet the materials of a new washing machine (€3-500). We’ll see how it goes.
So between “free-cycling my old mattresses & couch, bargain hunting for a hot compost bin and a reused mobile phone – I think my Zero Waste journey with this new house has started on the right foot.
Do you have any tips on how your home can start reusing, reducing and recycling more? Tell us in the comments.
