Even though “reduce” and “reuse” come first in the expression “reduce, reuse, recycle,” they often seem to get short shrift compared to efforts to promote recycling. Fortunately, there are ways to encourage reuse, at least one of which has become extremely popular recently. Besides, shrift isn’t everything.

Here’s a quick look at some ways in which communities can make reuse easier.

1. Reuse Superstores

There are plenty of small stores, both for-profit and non-profit, that sell used clothing and occasionally a few other used products, but what about a reuse superstore? Urban Ore in Berkeley is one such place, offering what it describes as “3 acres of well-organized used goods.” Its offerings range from building materials to appliances, computers to power tools. Urban Ore also designs reuse facilities for other areas. While people sometimes assume that it is run by a non-profit, it is actually a for-profit business. Its management believes this business model will be replicated widely in the future, noting on its website:

“As the world’s resources are depleted, this type of for-profit eco-retail will likely become more common.”

2. Free Swap Shops

Some towns create swap shops to divert items from entering their waste stream, making them available for reuse. The Earth 911 blog recently highlighted one such effort in upstate New York. The swap shop that opened in the town of Victor, New York this week accepts a wide variety of household items, including toys, sporting goods, and furniture, which town residents can take home at no charge. Victor’s swap shop was created on a budget of just $2,500, the cost of the small storage facilities needed, and is staffed by volunteers. An article in the area’s newspaper notes that such swap shops “are catching on elsewhere.”

3. Free Sharing Websites

Freecycle and similar websites have been around for several years, but I had little sense of how popular they had become until I read an article this past week in the Christian Science Monitor, which was noted in Energy Bulletin. The article notes that Freecycle, which was created five years ago, now has more than 5 million members in 4,500 local groups in 85 countries, and it is not alone. As the article notes, Freecycle was founded by Deron Beal, who used to spend much of his time driving a pickup truck to various non-profit organizations in Arizona, asking them whether they needed furniture or computers that his recycling organization had received. Beal then created an email list, starting with 30 members, which led to the basic Freecycle model: members post items they are offering or items they would like, but do not barter or sell items. From a modest start, Freecycle has grown so large that that Beal estimates its members keep about 500 tons of stuff out of land­­fills every day. With the lagging economy, membership in Freecycle and similar sites is rising quickly. In addition to Freecycle, readers of the Christian Science Monitor article recommended FreeMesa and ReUseIt in their comments.

Of course, this short list has barely scratched the surface. There are many other familiar means to enable reuse, including direct donations to organizations and online sales, such as through Craigslist, which tends to be local, and eBay, which usually is not.

Forms of reuse have probably been around as long as humans have been making things that are durable, but it is good to see new ways in which people are coming together to make reuse easier, especially given the imperatives we face.

Evan

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