Scott Chase

Right now it's mostly leading by example, carrying my own reusables to public events where disposables are used.
The need for reusables seems obvious (saving the planet), but it can be a hard sell. An argument for reusables would be reduced cost, i.e. no regular purchases required. The downside is that reusables need to be washed, an issue for some organisations in my community (insufficient washing facilities or staff).

I now carry a collapsible coffee cup (given to me by my energy provider Pure Planet last Christmas) with me much of the time. This is starting to have an effect, as the monthly popup coffee house I attend has noticed that two of us carry our own cups, and may be suggesting to others that they could bring their own, instead of using the paper cups provided.
I also now carry a reusable plastic spork and a metal knife in my bag. Two weeks ago at a community breakfast I brought my old plasticware container that was bought over 20 years ago to use as a bowl/plate for a community lunch. Now resurrected. I'll try to bring these to other events where I'm sure they'll be providing disposable utensils and plates. Hopefully folk will notice and consider doing the same.

My visit on 26 July to the Glasgow Recycling and Renewable Energy Centre (GRREC), run by Viridor, was a relatively short one, as I couldn't get a proper tour of the centre at that time, but the person who spoke with me did give me some time and showed me their Visitor Education room (for pre-arranged group tours). I learned about their rather impressive facility with 3 different sections for processing materials, and saw some items manufactured from recycled plastic, e.g. a school blazer. Their website will now require a more detailed study when I have the time.

Sadly, too much of our weekly bulk uplifts (goods too big for the bin, and put out on the footpath) ends up being crushed before it even gets here. Glasgow City Council used to pick up a lot of this stuff (e.g. furniture) and haul it away. Now they stick it into the back of their bin lorry, where it is immediately crushed. It's mostly large electrical items (fridges and TVs) that don't get crushed and now require a special request to the Council for uplift.

Afterward GRREC I went next door to the Polmadie Recycling Centre, which I had never been to, as I don't own a car. I essentially went there for a wee walk around and to dispose of a light bulb and fluorescent starter, which can't go into any of the home rubbish/recycling bins. During my walk I nipped into the electronic goods trailer (TVs and the like) and ended up coming away from the depot with more than I had disposed of: three HDMI cables, two of which had never been used! This is a symptom of our throw-away society: people don't have the knowledge, time, or energy to arrange for the reuse of unwanted items (i.e. sold or given away). Whether these cables would have been saved by the staff or simply crushed, I don't know.

I include a photo of a pile of electrical goods on the ground. I'll bet that had their owners taken these items to the Glasgow Repair Café, a good number could have been spared this sorry end to their useful lives.

Quite challenging:

1) I'm limited to doing all of my grocery shopping at the local Coop, which doesn't have a lot of loose fruit+veg; that which it does have is usually much more expensive than the packaged (an issue for those of us on tight budgets). On Tuesday's shop I managed to buy loose broccoli at roughly the same price as packaged--and it's a real pain with no scales anywhere for customers. The hoops I had to jump through to do a price comparison between loose and packaged tomatoes--the staff is probably still talking about it!

2) The challenge is now to source reusable bags (home made or purchased) or other suitable containers. I didn't have any of these on Tuesday, so just put the loose broccoli in my 23 y.o. shopping bag with everything else! The broccoli ended up in a bowl in the veg compartment of my fridge :-)

It seems that the majority of what I purchase has plastic in some way--either as part of the item, or in its packaging. When I looked at my food consumption, I realised that most of I buy on a weekly basis has some plastic packaging--almost all of it non-recyclable (at least judging by what I'm allowed to put in the recycling bin).

Perhaps not in the intended spirit:

I occasionally pick up litter in front of our building, dropped by the multitude of guests to the (illegal) short term accommodation flat on the ground floor of our close--but deposit it (neatly) by their front door. Gives me (and hopefully the neighbours) some satisfaction in keeping the area tidy--and I would hope that it sends a message to the non-resident owners/maintenance of the flat that they need to be more proactive in maintaining the flat and policing their guests. Actually talking to them hasn't had much of an effect...