Smart investments to begin your journey

Moving towards a more zero-waste way of living is an important shift that more of us could be considering in order to live more in harmony with the Earth’s finite resources. Overconsumption of finite and hard to recycle goods (e.g., plastic) is causing a whole host of environmental disasters.

Deciding you want to reduce your environmental impacts doesn’t need to require an entire overhaul of everything you already own – in fact, that flies in the face of what it means to be sustainable! However, there are a few investments that are worth considering that will help you on your journey. Over time, purchasing these items will save lots of single-use packaging, and could even end up saving you money, too!

Here are my top tips for worthwhile investments in your sustainability journey. And don’t forget, you don’t need to make these switches straight away. Consuming less in the first place will have the biggest impact. 

• Reusable hot drinks cup. Refuse single use cups, and often you’ll save money or earn extra points at coffee shops too, so you’ll end up making money back on your initial outlay. LSE Catering outlet has a 25p tax on single use coffee cups to disincentivise use. You can buy LSE-branded reusable cups in the LSE Shop on campus. 

• Reusable water bottle. LSE has over 70 water refill stations across campus. Build a habit to always have a reusable water bottle in your bag.  

• Reusable food containers. Perfect for storing your leftovers, and if you bring your own prepared food to campus more often, you’ll be using less packaging than grab-and-go convenience food. TIP: you can save the Tupperware from takeaways to reuse for free. 

• Reusable cutlery, chopsticks and straws. 
• A large ice-cube tray. Use this to freeze extra herbs, such as mint, coriander and basil. Mix mint with water and use in a cocktail, or basil with olive oil and add it as a flavour bomb to a future dish. 

• Long-lasting refillable spray bottles for cleaning.  When you have used up your existing cleaning products, purchase a refillable spray bottle, such as this one from neat for £7. You can then purchase plastic-free refill pods, and it could be from any supplier such as this one by Tesco for only 75p. Just by making this initial investment, you can clean your home for years to come with no plastic waste at all. 

Do you have any tips on items that can really help you on your way to sustainable living? Let us know in the comments!  

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