As a UK household, we do what we can to keep single-use plastic out of our home. We order a weekly veg box delivery to support local growers and reduce our food miles, we opt for loose produce whenever it’s available, we favour product because of their choice of packaging (when affordable).

As we wrote in our guide on the myth of perfect sustainability, small individual efforts matter but single-use plastic still finds a way onto our kitchen counters.

Whether it’s the film around a block of cheese, a label on a container, or packaging from something we couldn’t source loose, we regularly end up with a pile of plastic waste. Every week, we find ourselves either bagging up soft plastics to return to supermarket collection points or filling up our household recycling bin—hoping that our efforts are making a real difference.

If this sounds familiar, you aren’t alone. And that’s exactly why The Big Plastic Count—the UK’s largest-ever citizen science investigation into household plastic—was such a critical wake-up call.

Organised by Greenpeace UK and Everyday Plastic, hundreds of thousands of households, schools, and community groups tracked every single piece of throwaway plastic for seven days. The goal wasn’t to shame everyday consumers, but to gather hard evidence to show government ministers and major brands that the system itself is broken.

The Shocking Scale of Household Waste

The sheer volume of plastic recorded during the count revealed just how impossible it is for individual action alone to stop the plastic tide. The UK currently generates more plastic waste per person than almost any other country on Earth, second only to the United States.

The numbers speak for themselves:

• 1.7 Billion Pieces a Week: UK households throw away an estimated 1.7 billion pieces of plastic packaging every single week—totalling roughly 90 billion pieces every year.
• 60 Items Per Household: Even conscious households average around 60 pieces of plastic packaging every 7 days.
• Food Packaging is the Biggest Offender: Over 80% of the plastic counted came from food and drink packaging. The most common items were snack wrappers and thin, flexible fruit and vegetable packaging—the exact packaging many of us try so hard to avoid.

Where Does Our Plastic Waste Really Go?

While supporting a circular economy by choosing products made from recycled materials is a fantastic habit, the findings from The Big Plastic Count exposed a harsh truth: the UK cannot recycle its way out of this crisis.

Despite our collective efforts at the curb, domestic recycling infrastructure simply cannot handle the sheer volume of plastic being produced. Here is what actually happens to our household packaging once it leaves our hands:

1. Only ~16–17% is Recycled in the UK: A tiny fraction of what we throw away is actually reprocessed into new products domestically.
2. Over 55% is Incinerated (Burnt): More than half of all UK household plastic packaging ends up in incinerators. Burning plastic releases toxic chemicals and heavy carbon emissions—often producing more CO2 per tonne than burning coal.
3. 14–16% is Exported Overseas: Millions of tonnes of plastic waste are shipped abroad to countries with less developed waste infrastructure, effectively offloading our pollution onto other communities.
4. 10–11% Goes to Landfill: The remaining fraction ends up buried underground, slowly breaking down into persistent microplastics.

Turning Off the Tap at the Source

It’s easy to feel guilty when single-use plastic sneaks into your shopping trolley. But the truth is, consumers are trapped in a high-plastic environment. Fossil fuel and packaging companies continue to flood the market with cheap, unrecyclable soft plastics because it serves their bottom line.

Trying to solve this crisis purely through recycling and return points is like trying to mop up a flooded bathroom while the bath tap is still running at full blast. We have to turn off the tap.

What Systemic Change Should Look Like

To tackle plastic pollution at its root, campaigns like The Big Plastic Count are pushing government officials and corporate leaders to take decisive action:

• Cut Plastic Production: Set legally binding targets to reduce single-use plastic production by at least 50%, forcing a transition toward reusable and refillable systems.
• Mandate Loose Produce: Require supermarkets to sell fresh fruit and vegetables loose, eliminating unnecessary plastic wrap altogether.
• Ban Waste Exports: End the practice of shipping UK plastic waste abroad for other countries to manage.
• Halt New Incinerators: Stop the expansion of waste incineration facilities that pollute local communities and accelerate climate change.

What We Can Do Next

Individual choices—like buying loose, ordering veg boxes, and recycling—matter because they signal demand for a cleaner world. But pairing those choices with collective action is how we drive real change:

1. Keep Audit Pressure On: Pay attention to what enters your household bin each week. When you see unnecessary packaging, let the supermarket or brand know on social media or via customer feedback.
2. Support Local & Refill: Where budget and location allow, keep supporting local veg box schemes, independent green-grocers, and refill stores that prioritize zero-waste supply chains.
3. Demand Legislative Action: Support ongoing campaigns by Everyday Plastic and Greenpeace UK, sign petitions calling for a strong Global Plastics Treaty, and write to your local MP urging them to support targets that reduce plastic production.

Final Thoughts

Taking individual responsibility—whether that’s rinsing out a yogurt pot or bringing soft plastics back to the supermarket—shows how much the public cares about protecting the environment. But The Big Plastic Count proved that holding consumers responsible for a system designed around plastic is unfair and ineffective.

It’s time to stop blaming ourselves for the plastic in our bins and start demanding that manufacturers and policy-makers turn off the tap for good.

Explore our Activism Hub and Recycling Archive to learn more ways we can challenge plastic producers and demand corporate accountability.

Low-tech Magazine turned that model upside down.

Instead of hosting their publication on cloud servers powered by invisible fossil fuels, they built a self-hosted, solar-powered web server running directly off a small solar panel and a battery on a balcony in Barcelona, Spain.

When the sun shines, the site runs smoothly. When extended overcast weather hits and the battery drains? The website goes offline.

Why “Off-Grid” Web Design Matters

The digital world consumes an enormous amount of physical energy. As we explored in The Invisible Waste: How to Shrink Your Digital Carbon Footprint, our photo libraries, cloud backups, and unread emails create a hidden environmental impact. If the internet were a country, its energy consumption and carbon footprint would rival major industrial nations. Most modern web design trends—heavy scripts, uncompressed media, continuous tracking, and complex dynamic database queries—demand continuous high-voltage power.

Low-tech Magazine demonstrates what web design looks like when you treat energy as a finite, precious constraint rather than an unlimited backdrop.

The Ingenious Low-Power Tech Behind the Site

To keep the website accessible with minimal solar power, the publication overhauled its entire digital footprint through a creative use of eco technology:

• Static Site Architecture: Rather than relying on power-hungry content platforms that query a database or call APIs every time a page is loaded, the site is built using static HTML files.
• Dithered Image Processing: Standard high-resolution web photographs require significant bandwidth and processing power. Instead, images are converted into black-and-white or duotone “dithered” graphics, cutting image file sizes by up to 90% while creating a distinctive retro aesthetic.
• System-Native Fonts: The site eliminates custom web fonts (which force the user’s browser to download extra files), opting instead for default fonts already stored natively on the visitor’s device.
• Transparent Live Metrics: Visitors can check live server stats in the footer—including battery percentage, local weather forecasts in Barcelona, power consumption (usually around 2 Watts!), and current uptime.

Embracing “Digital Sobriety”

The most radical aspect of Low-tech Magazine’s solar site isn’t just its technical efficiency; it’s the cultural shift it asks of us as part of living a more sustainable lifestyle. In a world obsessed with 99.999% uptime, accepting that a site might occasionally go dark when nature doesn’t cooperate is a powerful reality check.

Check out the live server metrics at solar.lowtechmagazine.com—just hope it isn’t raining in Barcelona when you click!

Dry cleaning is the process of cleaning garments and textiles using chemical solvents instead of water. Historically, the overwhelming solvent of choice across the industry has been perchloroethylene (commonly known as perc or PCE).

Dry cleaning offers an effective, low-labor method for cleaning delicate fabrics like silk, wool, and structured suits that might shrink or degrade in standard washing machines. However, the environmental and health costs associated with traditional dry cleaning remain a major issue—though global regulations are actively shifting the industry away from its most hazardous practices.

The Waste and Health Hazards of Traditional Dry Cleaning

A traditional dry cleaning facility generates several hazardous waste streams, including spent solvents, contaminated soils, sludge, grease, and saturated filter media. When managed improperly, these chemical by-products pose severe risks to human health and local ecosystems.

• Cancer Classification: The U.S. EPA and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) reclassified perc from a “likely” carcinogen to a known human carcinogen (Group 1), linking occupational and ambient exposure to cancers such as non-Hodgkin lymphoma, multiple myeloma, and kidney cancer.
• Occupational Risks: Workers exposed to persistent solvent fumes face heightened risks of neurological impairment, liver dysfunction, kidney disease, and reproductive harm as outlined by OSHA Safety Guidelines.
• Residual Exposure on Clothing: Research confirms that perc residues remain in garment fibers after cleaning and off-gas into homes, leading to passive chemical exposure through everyday skin contact and inhalation.

How Regulations Have Shifted

When EcoStreet originally asked “Why is perc still being used in dry cleaning franchises?”, regulations were weak and compliance tracking was voluntary in many regions. Since then, legislative bodies have enacted strict bans and phase-outs:

• California’s Total Ban: The California Air Resources Board (CARB) fully phased out and banned the use of perchloroethylene across all dry cleaning operations statewide.
• US EPA Federal Regulations: Under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), the U.S. EPA established nationwide phase-out rules targeting the complete elimination of perc in commercial and residential dry cleaning setups.
• EU & UK Strict Directives: In Europe and the UK, stringent volatile organic compound (VOC) limits under EU REACH Regulations have forced high-street cleaners to replace legacy perc machinery.

Modern, Sustainable Alternatives to Perc

Driven by tighter regulations and consumer demand, the professional textile care industry has pivoted toward safer, cleaner technologies:

1. Professional Wet Cleaning: The gold standard of eco-friendly garment care. It uses computer-controlled washers, specialised biodegradable detergents, and tailored drying cycles. It handles “dry-clean only” items like silk and wool without hazardous chemicals or water damage.
2. Liquid Silicone (GreenEarth): Utilises liquid silicone (D5) through platforms like GreenEarth Cleaning. It is an odourless, non-toxic solvent derived from sand that breaks down harmlessly into silica, water, and carbon dioxide.
3. Liquid Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Cleaning: Captures industrial CO2 by-products and pressurises them into a liquid cleaning agent. It is non-flammable, non-toxic, and recycles CO2 in a closed-loop system.

Key Differences: 2013 vs. Today

Shrinking your digital footprint doesn’t mean deleting your online life or giving up your favorite shows. A few simple tweaks to your everyday screen habits can make a surprisingly real difference.

Do a Quick Inbox Triage

Every promotional email sitting untouched in an inbox stays stored on an active server, drawing a tiny bit of power day after day. Take ten minutes to hit “unsubscribe” on store newsletters you never read, clear out your spam folder, and delete old promotional archives. It’s liberating for your mind and lighter on the planet.

Stick to Wi-Fi for Heavy Data

Cellular networks (4G and 5G) require significantly more energy to transmit data than home Wi-Fi networks. Whenever you are at home or in the office, switch to Wi-Fi before streaming music or videos. If you know you will be commuting, download your playlists or episodes on your home network ahead of time.

Tone Down the Playback Quality

Streaming in 4K or Ultra HD on a small smartphone screen is usually overkill. Your eyes can barely tell the difference, but data servers certainly can. Lowering your default video playback quality to standard HD cuts down massive amounts of unnecessary data transfer without sacrificing your viewing experience.

Keep Your Tech in Service Longer

The greenest gadget is always the one you already own. Around 80% of a smartphone’s lifetime carbon footprint happens during raw material extraction and manufacturing before you even open the box. Slapping on a sturdy protective case, swapping out a tired battery, and pushing off an upgrade from two years to three or four cuts the device’s annual environmental impact almost in half.

Buy Refurbished When It’s Time for an Upgrade

When a replacement becomes unavoidable, bypass brand-new hardware altogether. Choosing certified pre-owned tech keeps functional electronics in circulation and avoids the heavy environmental toll of manufacturing new devices. Verified circular market platforms like Back Market or Swappa, as well as official manufacturer outlets like Apple Certified Refurbished or eBay Refurbished, sell thoroughly tested, warrantied tech for a fraction of both the retail price and the carbon impact.

What’s Your Biggest Digital Clutter Habit?

Is it an inbox with 10,000 unread emails or an endless camera roll? Have you ever bought a refurbished device before? Drop your favourite digital cleanup tips in the comments below!

The reality of low-impact living is that the climate movement doesn’t need a handful of people executing zero-waste flawlessly. It needs millions of people doing it imperfectly, making small, repeatable adjustments that actually stick into everyday routines.

Ditch the All-or-Nothing Mindset

Eco-anxiety thrives on binary thinking: you are either a zero-waste saint or a reckless consumer. In truth, the real meaningful environmental progress lives in the unsexy middle ground. Swapping your daily disposable coffee cup just three days a week keeps over 150 cups out of landfills annually. That isn’t a partial failure; that is genuine progress. When we celebrate sustainable micro-habits rather than demanding immediate lifestyle overhauls, green choices no longer feel like a punishing chore.

Focus on High-Impact Micro-Swaps

Instead of attempting to overhaul your entire home overnight, pick one low-friction habit to tweak this week:

Cold-water laundering:

Shift your routine laundry cycles from warm water to cold settings (30°C or below). Up to 75% of a washing machine’s total energy goes solely toward heating water, yet modern detergents are formulated to clean just as effectively in cold water.

Thermal retention cooking:

Bring soups, grains, or pasta to a boil, cover tightly, and turn off the heat source. Letting residual heat complete the cooking process slashes kitchen energy usage without altering your meal plan.

The 48-hour shopping cart pause:

Before purchasing any non-essential item online, leave it in your digital shopping cart for two full days. More often than not, the novelty fades, saving both your wallet and the supply chain emissions required to ship it.

Living sustainably was never meant to be an elite aesthetic or an all-or-nothing endurance sport. It is simply a continuous series of tiny, deliberate choices stacked over time. Give yourself permission to be imperfect, lean into the small victories, and keep building a greener lifestyle—one practical shift at a time.

Greenpeace and Everyday Plastic have joined forces in the UK to co-ordinate the biggest survey of plastic to date.

Are we recycling household plastic or simply just throwing it away? Let’s gather evidence to show our government what’s really going on. The more we count, the more we’ll have to show the government that it’s time to reduce single plastic use by 50% by 2025 by switching to reusable options. And also to ban sending our waste to other countries.

Every household can join in. And if you are a teacher, you can sign your school up for the count and get access to some great learning resources and classroom-based activities for 9-12 year olds.

Count me in!

You can join Ecologi today and get 100 free trees to add to your forest.

Ecologi has planted nearly 40 million trees on behalf of their members and by supporting worthwhile climate projects around the world, have reduced a massive 1.7million tonnes of CO₂ emissions.

Sign up to Ecologi today to get 100 free trees (offer ends 30/4/2022)

“This year it’s expected that the average family will spend, on average, £800 on presents, food, decorations and travel. After all, it is the time of the year where we visit distant loved ones, reconnect with lost friends, and gorge ourselves silly on party food and alcohol.

“As well as the great financial strains that the festive season puts on us, it also has other, largely unseen consequences that affect the environment around us.

“According to research conducted by Business Waste.trade, the two weeks that make up our favourite time of the year put great strain on resources, and amounts to millions of tonnes of waste and pollution.

“For example, did you know that we as a country throw away 230,000 tonnes of food during the Christmas period, which is the equivalent of 74 million mince pies? Or that it takes 3.5kg of carbon dioxide to produce just 1kg of wrapping paper? ”

Click on the graphic below to find out more:

The true cost of Christmas

After digesting some of those figures, I reckon that if I can make even a small reduction on my impact, it’ll be effort well spent. Here’s some ideas for you to reduce your Christmas Carbon Footprint and have a bit of fun at the same time…

Making, decorating and Christmas day crafts:

Why not try your hand at making some carbon-neutral Christmas lights? Your neighbours will be impressed, and you could work off all those mince pies at the same time on a pedal powered version.

Here’s a fun eco-friendly Christmas day craft activity that will ensure your empty gift boxes get plenty of re-use and enjoyment before you’re ready to recycle them. What other animals or objects could you make?

Eat, drink, be merry and recycle:

For any meat-eaters out there, don’t forget to buy a local Turkey. Make sure you get a big one, so you can invite lots of friends over… cooking one big meal takes up a lot less energy than cooking many. And it’s far more social too!

And finally, when the festivities come to an end, Recycle now has a helpful recycling locator that can make sure anything you haven’t eaten or reused ends up in the right recycling bin.

Wishing you the best for the holiday season from EcoStreet!

Katie Wise and Ashley Moradipour need your help to make a documentary that tells the story of a group of dedicated Icelanders vs. a big road constuction project.

Iceland is a nation well-known for its breathtaking natural landscapes and formations, which Icelanders hold dear to their hearts. This is why a recent road construction project has caused people to fight back. This new road will run from the Alftanes peninsula, where the presidential office is, to the Reykjavik suburb of Gardabaer; the projected plan involves the road cutting directly through the largest lava field in the Reykjavik area. Icelanders of all walks of life, from artists to musicians to elf “seers” are protesting the construction of this road, arguing that the new road is unnecessarily destroying Iceland’s natural beauty. During the fall of 2013, dozens of “friends of lava” (an environmentalist group) gathered around the lava rocks every day, sitting and singing songs to peacefully protest the construction of this road. One day, the friends of lava were confronted with the “biggest bulldozer in Iceland” and over 50 police officers. After not backing down to the officers’ requests to leave the lava field, protesters were physically removed from the area and 9 were arrested and sent to jail. Since that day, the 9 arrested were sent to court for a hearing, but they continue to fight for the preservation of this lava field.

Our documentary will follow the story of this road construction project and the passionate protesters who are fighting to save the land. While the personal stories that will be shared through the film are specific to this cause, the broader issue to be explored is the constant struggle between preserving nature and the expansion of a nation. This documentary will take you into the lives of passionate Icelanders and give a whole new perspective on environment vs. economy.

Vote Bait Damaging Renewable Energy Initiatives

There’s little doubt that the renewable energy market will pay the price for politicians who consider telling people what they want to hear more important than producing a long-term plan for greener and sustainable methods of energy production.

Given the optimistic targets, you would think that the government would be keen to invest heavily in renewables, but the exact opposite seems to be happening with the UK government helping BP fight court battles in the U.S. to win new federal contracts and reduce the number of false claims. This report from the BBC explains how U.S. firms unaffected by the environmental disaster, to which BP admitted responsibility, are now seeking to claim compensation from the UK oil giant.

Jobs and Votes

Obviously, we must protect jobs, but the rise of fracking for shale gas in the U.S. has already reduced the profitability of Oil for use in power stations and I would like to suggest that our government should spend our money on creating jobs here in a renewable energy market. Businesses like B.P. have raked in billions over recent decades, so can’t these industries stand on their own without the need for government assistance?

Surely, more votes would be forthcoming if we had low cost energy generated locally and in a cleaner environment? How about focussing on building an electric charge network for electric cars so petrol prices are no longer an issue and concentrate on using renewables to generate the energy required to charge those cars. A government willing to take the hard route with a long-term plan would win my vote. Electrifying more of the railways is a good start and recent initiatives have been a move in the right direction, but there simply isn’t enough focus on clean energy production infrastructure.

Long Term Development of Energy Efficient Products

When the move to do away with the traditional tungsten filament light bulbs took place, governments around the world made a positive move that benefits the environment because of the lower energy consumption alternatives that replaced them. However, technology exists to further reduce consumption with alternatives and while it’s not a good idea to wipe an industry out overnight, surely, the need to reduce our carbon emissions should be a big enough driving factor to force through further change? At the moment, it seems as though energy efficiency is only driven by the high cost of fuel.

This is a guest post by Shaun Thomas who is working with World of Solar to promote the use of green energy products in the home and businesses in the UK.

Image credit: Simon Howden via FreeDigitalPhotos.net