Kitchen Renovations to Help Create a Zero Waste Kitchen
This is a writing sample from Scripted writer MEGAN ASHFIELD
Living a green lifestyle can take you down many roads and one of them may be to a zero waste lifestyle. This lifestyle means you are avoiding the use of plastics, reducing the amount of waste you bring into your home, and creating more items in your home from scratch. With that in mind, you may end up rethinking your kitchen design and decide to go with kitchen renovations that are designed to help create the zero waste kitchen you want. Here are a few renovations that can be part of that plan. Compost Station One of the steps that you may take with a zero waste lifestyle is to compost your kitchen scraps. You may find that a small compost bin just isn't enough, especially if you are composting not only food scraps but items like coffee grounds and tea grounds. A kitchen renovation you may want to consider is a compost station rather than just a bin. This station can be put into your existing cabinet or wall and contain a bin with a crank mechanism so you can turn the compost and keep it moving until you can take it to a larger pile in your yard. You can also have it built into a wall with a door on the outside as well. This will allow you to open the station from outside, remove the bin, dump the compost, and put the bin back into the station without carrying the bin through your kitchen. Open Cabinet Designs You may not think of open cabinet designs, or cabinets with no doors, would make a difference in your zero waste plan. The truth is, part of zero waste is reducing what you have and keeping what you need instead. By having open cabinet designs you can see what you have, keep it organized by maintaining a clutter free organizational design, and you can ensure you aren't adding too much to your plans. You basically can see the clutter as it starts and reduce it quickly since you can see into a cabinet that a door would normally hide. Built In Dryer Rack When you start moving towards a zero waste kitchen, you will make swaps like linen napkins or cloth napkins for paper products. You can hand wash these to avoid having a full load of laundry running. Hand washing will save energy and it will save on water consumption as well. However, this does mean you will need to hang them to dry, if saving energy is the top priority. A built in dryer rack that retracts from your wall, allows the cloths to dry naturally, and retracts back into the wall when it isn't being used, may be the ideal renovation. You can also use these to dry reusable bags that you may need to clean after grocery shopping trips. With these three simple kitchen renovations you can begin creating a sustainable zero waste kitchen that works with you and keeps things minimal. Other ideas, such as a hidden recycling station, may also be ideal. Consider the zero waste plan, your shopping, and how you will be using your kitchen and take those ideas to your kitchen contractor.
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