- Clement of Alexandria (150-220 A.D.)
Building and remodeling creates waste - no getting around it. How one handles the waste is key. From the Deschutes County Rethink Waste Guide: "The EPA estimates the total building related construction and demolition (C&D) waste to be over 135 million tons per year, and the average new construction project creates 3.9 pounds of waste per square foot."
What can you do? Learn what your local recycling options are, and learn from others who have gone through the process.
Here's what my husband and I did during our own home renovation (we repurposed a 1980 doublewide trailer - talk about recycling!) We gutted the entire inside…We salvaged sinks, faucets, toilets, shower stalls, light fixtures, switch plates, mirrors, cabinets (anything we could) and donated them all to ReStore: The Habitat for Humanity resale shop. We took two pickup loads and a trailer full of wood scraps to our local recycling center. We tore out (and recycled) aluminum slider windows and replaced them with energy efficient ones. We repurposed antique furniture into a vanity sink cabinet, and two linen closets rather than buying new pieces.
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