Lessons from WWII on sustainability mindset

In World War II, resources were scarce and people were urged to “use it up, wear it out, make it do, or go without”. Post-war, there was the illusion that resources were infinite. Well I say illusion – the resources used to fuel the consumer economy (minerals, oil, etc.) are fairly plentiful and most will be for a long time, but using these resources have unsustainable external impacts on the environment.

The slogan above has since been slimmed down in recent years by sustainability promoters to the “three Rs”: reduce, re-use and recycle. Actually there are several others that we could add to that list: refuse, repair, rot, re-purpose, re-think, remind. These ideas together provide a framework to help one think about reducing one’s environmental impact, and form something of a flowchart to follow, which I go through below.

1. Re-think / Refuse
For anything you are thinking about purchasing, the idea here is to stop and re-think. Do you really need this item? Of course, many times it will be necessary, but there are occasions in most of our lives where we think of buying something, big or small, just because we have a slight whim. If, on re-thinking and re-examining, you find that you can do without, you can stop here in the flowchart.

“Refuse” is about refusing to accept certain things that are offered to you – free and unwanted gifts from businesses, unnecessary packaging, fresh towels at a hotel, advertising flyers etc. Many times you have no use whatsoever for this junk, and so stopping it from being given out can mean less is produced in the future.

2. Reduce
Reducing is as straightforward as it sounds, it’s re-thinking the amount of everything that you consume and seeing if you can consume less of it. For instance: shorter and cooler showers consume less water and energy; eating more vegetarian or vegan meals reduces your consumption of meat and dairy; eating less food overall reduces your waistline; buying fewer new clothes, gadgets and toys speaks for itself.

3. Repair
One important method of reducing your consumption is ensuring that you repair as much as possible rather than simply disposing of it. Most clothes can be repaired until they’re more full of patches than original material – if you can’t do it yourself then it’s still usually cheaper to get a professional involved than buy a new item of clothing. Now in the UK a “right to repair” law has come in stating that spare parts for home appliances must be made available to consumers and third-party repairers. This means that it should be easier and cheaper to fix things – either you can do it yourself if you’re handy, or you can get a professional over to your home to do it, rather than having to send it back to the original manufacturer.

For those of you that want to be handy yourselves but don’t know yet how to work on particular items, there are many guides on the internet, such as iFixit.

4. Re-use / Re-purpose
“Re-use” has a couple of implications. The first is when you have decided that you definitely do need to buy something, and you’ve reduced the amount of it as much as possible, re-use comes in the form of buying second hand: you’re re-using something that someone else has finished with. I find that so much of anything that I feel the need to purchase I can get either from Facebook Marketplace and collect locally, or through eBay and sent to me. Clothes, toys, things around the house, entertainment etc. etc. all findable through these methods. This has several benefits: it’s cheaper for you, it stops something else going to landfill, and it stops you causing a new item to be manufactured.

Linked to this is when an item gets to the end of its time with you, consider whether you can either sell it to someone else in turn as above or give away for free (Gumtree, Freecycle, local Facebook groups).

If that’s not possible, then perhaps you can find a new use for it yourself. This is where the second implication of “re-use” comes in, AKA “re-purpose”. Can you find an alternative use for the item to extend its useful life? For instance, jam jars can directly become drinking glasses, or broken wellington boots can directly become snazzy planters for the garden. The limit is your imagination here for direct uses.

If something can’t be re-purposed directly, then it’s time to start crafting. The plastic nets that fruit comes in can be bundled together and sewn inside rags to make a sponge (sometimes called an “unsponge”); pallets from construction deliveries can be built into a planter or playhouse; rollerball deodorants can be filled with paint and used by your kids. Again, the limit is your imagination.

5. Recycle
Recycling is something that these days everyone will likely be familiar with through local councils’ home collection services. Depending on where you live, these of course include materials such as glass, paper/card, metal tins/cans and hard plastic containers. However, beyond what the council collects, a great deal more can be recycled through other avenues including collection bins in supermarket car parks, your local municipal recycling centre, and private companies, from electronics and plastic film through to biros, toothbrushes, pharmaceutical packaging etc. etc.

The best place to start looking for how/where to recycle things is Recycle Now, which gives you a good overview of what’s available locally. However, there are often many more options by using TerraCycle. This company has schemes with various producers of consumer goods, where that company pays for TerraCycle to run a recycling scheme, such as Colgate paying for toothbrush recycling, or Walker’s paying for crisp packet recycling.

Then there are other things like if you have broken a pair of spectacles, many of the big opticians will collect these for repurposing.

Textiles is one thing that many people are not aware can be recycled. Sure, you know you can donate good clothing to charity shops or bins to be sent to Africa, but ruined clothing, rags etc. can also be re-used. This can be put in some textile bins for turning into insulation and seat cushion stuffing etc. Or you can consider donating to a local dog shelter, if they want some.

Basically there are many many oppurtunities to recycle things if you’re willing to spend a few minutes finding out how best to do it.

6. Rot
At this point, we come to the end of sustainability loop – in an ideal world, this last step would account for anything that you do need to dispose of after going through all of the above steps. The concept here is that anything you need to dispose of should be biologically degradable, rather than sitting in a landfill forever and potentially leaching contaminates into the ground and local water supply.

Rotting can be achieved in several ways: you can compost things at home through a cold garden compost pile, a wormery or bokashi methods, or you can add things to your council-collected bins, either for food or garden waste (or take things to your local municipal recycling centre if you don’t have a home collection service).

Of course, in reality it isn’t currently possible for everything we buy to be rotted, as so much of what’s available is non-biodegradable. However, there are many ways highlight throughout this site of plastic products you can swap out for bio-based equivalents.

Remind: Somewhat out of the flow of the above is “remind”. When you are fully-immersed in the above mindset, gently reminding others about the different steps it’s possible to take to reduce one’s footprint is the next potential course of action.

Image taken from the Eisenhower Foundation