Green Daily

"Zero waste" sounds a little like a pipe dream. Recycling every little bit of our waste is the ideal, but it seems far-fetched, especially when some people are just now getting around to recycling the basics, like paper and aluminum, and fully realizing the impact trash has on the Earth.

But Eric Lombardi is trying to change that notion. He runs Eco Cycle, a nonprofit that provides tools and education for people trying to achieve that "zero waste" lifestyle. And he practices what he preaches: in a recent NPR story, he described his community in Boulder, Colorado and its Center for Hard-to-Recycle Materials (ChaRM). The Center is funded by city residents' trash tax dollars, and accepts often impossible-to-recycle items like tennis shoes, old porcelain sinks and toilets, #2 and #4 plastic bags, small electronics, and tons of other stuff.

And Lombardi is adamant that we need to stop waste at its source. "Getting us close to zero waste means that we need to work with industry to start designing their products and packaging for recovery rather than for the dump," Lombardi told NPR. He cites BMW as an example of a company that is incorporating as many recyclable parts in their cars as possible.

Right on - and in the meantime, more big cities' tax dollars should go toward opening and running places like Boulder's CHaRM. The more people on board, the better.