Zero-waste home

Today we explain what it means to live in a zero-waste home and, for one day, we set construction and design aside to look at the day-to-day life of an eco-friendly home where we not only reduce energy consumption, but also reduce resource use and optimise waste management.

It seems that we still do not fully understand recycling; in our country, only 30% of the waste we generate is recycled, and in many cases this recycling is not effective or consumes so much energy that it is not even economically viable.

From the recycling of plastic waste, only around 20% of the total is recovered, while other materials, such as glass, which is 100% recyclable, require a great deal of energy to generate the heat needed to turn glass into a reusable liquid material.

We have not been able to implement recycling on a large scale—and even if we were able to in the future, it still does not seem like a sustainable long-term option.

The European Union recently passed the circular economy law which, despite opposition from more conservative groups, managed to lay the first foundations for promoting large-scale resource reuse. This law prevents unnecessary waste from being generated and penalises it; we will have to see whether it is truly effective or falls short, but it is already a first step towards waste reduction.

In the climate emergency we are living through, many voices have been calling for some time now for more common sense to be applied to how our daily lives work and the waste we generate.

In recent months, social media profiles related to zero waste—showing the day-to-day lives of families who manage to live a normal life without generating any waste and with a zero ecological footprint—have been multiplying.

There are already several gurus, such as Bea Johnson in the United States or the Basque couple Patricia Reina and Fernando Gomez, creators of the blog and book Living Without Plastic: Tips, Experiences and Ideas to Give the Planet a Breather, whose lifestyle is being shared through various media and who have millions of followers.

As they say on the Australian network Onemillionwomen—a network of women aiming to reach one million women fighting for the climate worldwide—“we do not need a few weirdos living a perfectly zero-waste lifestyle; we need 1 million normal people living an imperfect zero-waste lifestyle.”

This is exactly what we are applying in our studio, and in our personal lives. Moving from a standardised consumer lifestyle—even when shopping in organic supermarkets—to a zero-waste lifestyle is not easy.

When you start analysing the rubbish generated in your daily environment, there are so many things you consider impossible or very difficult to reduce—food packaging, detergent containers, body soap and shampoo, children’s cream, nappies, drink bottles, tissues, food scraps, receipts, etc.—the list is endless, and it can be overwhelming not knowing where to start.

In our case, we are doing it step by step: every time we identify something that can be replaced with a reusable product or that we can buy in bulk, we try to introduce a new habit.

While this is our humble experience and we still have a long way to go, as I said at the beginning, it is better to have a planet where we all apply zero waste imperfectly than a planet where a few weirdos apply zero waste strictly.

The best part of our experience has not only been confirming that it is simply a mindset shift that leads to a change in habits—and that these new habits do not alter our lifestyle or comfort in any way—but also that this change we are promoting in the studio is creating a chain reaction.

Some of the team are applying the same waste-reduction ideas at home, or even proposing new ideas to reduce waste in the studio. This has been the most rewarding part: seeing how our actions positively influence other people and, by extension, the rest of the planet.

But beyond personal experience, what is a zero-waste home based on? In our studio we design net-zero energy homes, but an eco-friendly home should also be a zero-waste home once the family moves in.

The zero-waste concept is based on the philosophy of the 5 Rs: we add two new ideas to the traditional 3 Rs—Reduce, Recycle and Reuse—starting with Refuse what is unnecessary and adding Composting, whose English term is Rot (hence the 5th R).

Let us look at each concept step by step, based on the recommendations in Bea Johnson’s book Zero Waste Home: The Ultimate Guide to Simplifying Your Life.

1. Zero-waste home: refuse what is unnecessary

As mentioned, this point is added to the classic 3 Rs, aiming to prevent waste before it is created.

This is something we should understand as a mindset shift that goes further, breaking with the dynamics of a globalised, consumerist system that makes us believe we can have any product at any time—even if it comes from the other side of the world, and even if its qualities have had to be altered to withstand transport time, or it is absurdly wrapped in plastic packaging inside a plastic bag.

Such dynamics stem from bad habits and a lack of awareness; we realise that although when we talk about a zero-waste home we refer to the domestic sphere, the change begins with our behaviour outside the home.

In this regard, there is an example of an integrated project that we often mention on this blog: the eco-housing community Hockertonhousing Project, located in England.

What stands out about their zero-waste home philosophy is their strong self-sufficiency. The neighbours in this community avoid much of their consumption by growing their own food and using their own sustainable transport. In addition, they organise group purchases, always ensuring that products are locally sourced and organically produced.

We often think that eliminating processed food purchases requires far more time than we can afford, and that is why we do not take the plunge. In Hockerton, users join forces to reduce this time commitment, so sometimes joint management can help us in this exercise of refusing waste and achieving self-sufficiency.

A practical example: by eliminating plastic bottles at home by installing an osmosis filtration system, we found ourselves needing to carry water outside the home—for example, when driving with the children, we needed to bring water. Instead of buying small plastic bottles, which we categorically refuse, we bought metal bottles that we refill at home from the osmosis tap.

This exercise in refusing bottles made us think of solutions that we have integrated naturally and that do not create any additional logistical problems in our daily lives.

2. Zero-waste home: reduce (what we need and cannot refuse)

Moving down one step in the 5 Rs pyramid, we come to the act of Reducing what we consider non-negotiable.

As this is a process of simplifying our lifestyle, we will realise that our perception of what we need often decreases as our awareness grows and we understand that material reduction promotes personal freedom and less dependence.

Therefore, we must be open to constantly questioning the need for and usefulness of the products we consume.

Following this philosophy, we will prioritise quality over quantity, and experiences over material things.

A surprising example can be found in the experience of the housing cooperative La Borda, a pioneering initiative in Barcelona, where consumption is once again reduced by centralising services that we considered strictly individual.

Against all expectations, the laundry room in this community of 30 homes has only 3 washing machines, managed with a simple system for booking a time slot in advance.

3. Zero-waste home: reuse (what we consume)

The principle of Reuse comes into play when we have not been able to prevent waste from being generated through the previous two Rs: Refuse and Reduce. It is common to confuse reuse with the next point, recycling. However, when we talk about Reuse in a zero-waste home, we mean using the product in its original manufactured form.

By giving products a second life, we maximise their use and extend their lifespan. This way of operating runs counter to the concept of planned obsolescence promoted by certain companies, which predetermine the end of a product’s useful life in advance by the manufacturer during the design phase.

Another common confusion is to consider reuse as synonymous with hoarding, keeping products that are useless to us at a certain point in life under the constant thought, “what if one day…”.

We must understand that a product can be reused by someone other than ourselves, so dynamics such as circulation and exchange of products should be encouraged.

A very widespread example of this practice is the clothing we wear—something that in countries like Spain has changed completely in just one generation. The phenomenon of cheap, low-quality clothing has taken over the streets, accompanied by a consumerist concept of fashion and style that is constantly changing.

4. Zero-waste home: recycle

At this point, we understand that a zero-waste home is not about “recycling everything”, as we might have thought at the beginning. Unfortunately, recycling is the concept that has taken deepest root in our modern society, and it is still a process that requires tremendous logistics and energy for its management and transformation.

Unlike the previous point—reuse—Recycling involves subjecting the original product to a transformation process, in which we may end up using it for another purpose.

We will highlight arguments against recycling to raise awareness of the need to recycle only strictly when we have not been able to refuse, reduce or reuse that waste.

First, we must understand that any recycling system requires energy for processing—energy that we have to produce at a time when we are not even able to produce cleanly the energy we need for basic day-to-day tasks such as electricity supply or heating.

In addition, it is a process we cannot carry out ourselves, so we cannot ensure it is done correctly. In Spain, there is still a major lack of regulations for companies, manufacturers, local councils and consumers—not to mention the lack of awareness: in our country, only around 30% of the waste we produce is recycled.

For our part, we can raise awareness both for ourselves and for those around us, becoming more mindful when buying durable product designs, as well as products that have already been recycled or can be recycled.

5. Zero-waste home: compost what remains

Composting is defined as the management of organic matter through decomposition, so it is limited exclusively to this category of waste, usually from kitchen and gardening scraps. It is estimated to account for 1/3 of household waste in the average Spanish home.

We are talking about the natural process the planet uses to recycle, returning nutrients to the soil so that plants can absorb them.

It is as simple as having a compost container or using public bins intended for this purpose, where organic waste must be placed in compostable bags. With the help of microorganisms and worms, the volume of our waste decreases in a few days, and we can use the final product in our garden/vegetable patch as a natural fertiliser.

Unlike the previous point, here we do have the autonomy to do it ourselves and be aware of where the process ends. However, it must be acknowledged that it is a process that requires some space, which must be outdoors.

Another initiative that pursues this concept is a composting toilet, also called a dry toilet, which also saves water. If you would like more information on this topic, there is an article on this blog where we explain how a dry toilet works.

A final note on the viability of zero waste at scale: the circular economy

We cannot end this post without talking about the concept of the circular economy, an initiative aimed at reducing material consumption and waste production by closing the ecological and economic flows of resources, as the earth naturally does through ecosystems.

The circular economy is based on the premise that all waste can be transformed into raw material, thereby maximising sustainability, and that this zero waste must go hand in hand with a zero-emissions goal.

In April 2019, a European Parliament directive was approved to promote recycling and limit the use of landfills, which are the worst option for waste management due to the methane emissions they generate—a greenhouse gas far more polluting than CO₂.

The directive decreed that this practice should become the exception, even though it is still fully established in most European Union countries.