So, you’ve already made a few simple changes to your lifestyle to become more sustainable – that’s great, go you! Whether that’s by swapping to a bamboo toothbrush or investing in a couple of strong and sturdy reusable bags for your grocery shopping, every little counts. We’d love to help you take your next steps, here are our top 5 tips.
Turn your recycling up a notch
Reduce, reuse, recycle, the golden rule of eco-friendly living! But could you go the extra mile? Those Terracycle items you purchased liked Pringles and pet food sachets, actually post them back. Your old carrier bags and batteries can often be recycled at larger supermarkets. Before you throw it away, take a minute to find out if you could recycle it instead. All these small steps will all add up.
Go one step further: Consider starting your own home compost or wormery to recycle all your fruit and veggie scraps.
Buy better
Every product we buy (eco or otherwise!) has an impact on the environment. But it’s not all doom and gloom, every day there’s new products coming out that will help you reduce your impact on the planet. From low wattage lighting to choosing Fairtrade or organic items, you don’t necessarily need to make huge changes.
Go one step further: Choose to buy second-hand if you can as it means fewer resources and energy is being wasted.
Consider offsetting your carbon emission
Our everyday actions, at home and at work, consume energy and produce carbon emissions, such as driving, flying and heating buildings. Carbon offsetting is used to balance out these emissions by helping to pay for emission savings in other parts of the world. Depending on the company you go for, you could choose to plant trees or sponsor fuel-efficient stoves in LEDCs.
Go one step further: Put pressure on the companies you work for and brands you shop with to consider offsetting their carbon emissions too.
Start #MeatFreeMondays
Making the simple swap from red meat to plant-based just once a week would cut the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions by a staggering 50 million tonnes. That’s the equivalent of taking 16 million cars off the road or a reduction of up to 8.4% in the UK’s total greenhouse gas emissions.
There’s plenty of amazing vegetarian and vegan foods that you didn’t even notice were meat-free. Pasta, Guinness & Oreos are all 100% (accidentally!) vegan. And if you are craving some meaty textures, jackfruit is a great alternative or companies like the Meatless Farm Co. and Quorn offer great meat alternatives.
Go one step further: Increase the days you go meat and dairy-free.
Have your food shops delivered
Home delivery is like the public transport of groceries. Instead of having 20 odd cars make their way to the supermarket – one van drives around delivering to everyone in the area. As well, it means you’re less likely to impulse buy which can help to reduce your food waste. In fact, research by the University of Washington found that delivering groceries is indeed a more efficient model that produces 25–75% fewer emissions than individual trips to the grocery store – great news!
Go one step further: Ask for your groceries to be delivered without bags. After all, how far do you need to carry your shopping when it’s delivered to your home anyway?
We hope this helps! Got any of your own tips and tricks for how to take the next step in your eco-journey? Comment below, we'd love to hear from you!