ABSTRACT
Every day around 5 million tonnes of waste is generated globally. Designing out waste can, in the process, eliminate greedy consumption patterns, prevent untold pollution, lower carbon emissions and enable greater equality locally and globally. Waste is a result of misappropriated scientific and business ingenuity that’s focused on product creation and has not been held responsible for long-term impacts of all those products, of six-plus decades of instant gratification, of an advertising industry heralding the ownership of more stuff as a barometer of status and pride. The UK’s Wood Recycling Network diverted 8,500 tonnes of wood from the waste stream in 2012. The UK generated 200 million tonnes of waste in 2012. Shockingly, 3.5 billion people have no or very poor waste management infrastructure, which leads to further poisoning of their soil, air and water, especially because increasingly discards are petroleum-based products – plastics.
