Zero Waste: Another Green Principle Hits Prime Time

Zero waste is gaining traction in big business, according to a recent Fortune Magazine article, "The End of Garbage," because "...the changing economics of waste disposal, technical advances, and grass-roots activism--along with a feverish desire of big companies to appear green-- are bringing [this utopian vision] closer than you might think."

The list of companies gunning toward this goal is getting convincing (Herman Miller, Nike, Hewlett, Packard, Unilever, Stonyfield Farms, Dell, and, yes, Walmart). Thankfully this is not another article about light bulbs at Walmart. Now they are tackling packaging -- scoring their suppliers on several factors, including "CO2 emissions, the product-to-package ratio, and the use of recycled content."

According to Walmart, "...the initiative is expected to save 667,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere. This is equal to taking 213,000 trucks off the road annually, and saving 323,800 tons of coal and 66.7 million gallons of diesel fuel from being burned."

Zero waste as a green principle is not new. Lots of good thinking has been done on the issue by the likes of Zero Waste Alliance, Grassroots Recycling Network, and ecocycle, to name a few resources.

What is powerful as the zero waste principle enters big business prime time, is the weightiness of the benchmark itself. Zero gravity, zero error measurement, ground zero -- the audaciousness of zero clarifies the priorities immensely. As Fortune reports, "The deeper purpose here is to change the way things are made...waste doesn't need to exist...it's a design flaw."

Carla E. Dearing