REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE
Rework your recognition of recycling!

We all understand "reduce, reuse, recycle" but have you heard the latest? Now there's "refuse, repurpose, rebuy," and, just to make things complicated there's "precycling, upcycling, and ecycling". Confused yet? Well, read on.

Ecoboomers, (the new "baby boomers") already know what the rest of us may not. You need to refuse what you don't need, "rebuy" items that have been recycled, and consider repurposing items before you even recycle them! You can also reduce what you do need, reuse what you can't reduce, donate anything that can't be handled by any of the above and then recycle anything that might happen to be left over.


PRECYCLING

In my younger years, precycling used to be called buying in bulk. Nowadays, the concept has expanded far beyond simply bulk buying. Basically, the principle behind precycling is thinking about how much waste a product will create in a landfill (packaging, batteries, throw-away parts, etc.) before you consider purchasing it. Precycling lowers the amount of products that need to be recycled. You might choose products with minimal packaging. If this isn't possible, choose packaging that you could easily reuse, such as a margarine container.


UPCYCLING



Upcycling pertains to the concept of reusing an item before you throw it away. For instance, you can upcycle all those plastic bags used by the grocery stores into what is known as "plarn" bags. These are bags which are crocheted with "plarn", or plastic yarn. Seriously, how ecool is that! Any plastic bags will do and if they're colored, so much the better. Some magazines and newspapers still come in blue plastic bags. Use these to add color to your plarn creations. For more information, please visit THIS SITE.





ECYCLING

This is exactly what it sounds like; recycling your electronics. You can reduce the environmental impact of electronics at the end of their useful life through reuse, donation, and recycling, or by buying greener electronic products. Most communities run programs that accept your old electronics either to train students to fix them or to donate to charities and educational institutions if they are still in working order. In the city of Ottawa alone, diverting computers, electronics, communications equipment and other related wastes in 2007 has kept nearly 50 tonnes of waste from the landfill.

So now you don't have to simply reduce, reuse, recycle. You can do more for the environment you're leaving to your children by choosing to precycle, upcycle and ecycle as well.

Good luck and have fun with it!