Unpopular opinion: Our repair waste is hurting the planet

Start recycling every part you can, no excuses.

3 comments

3 Comments

My local repair shop saves every screw and plastic clip from old devices. They actually reuse those parts in other repairs all the time. It proves we could keep a lot more out of landfills if everyone tried.

barbara8419h ago

Sure, but how much space do a bag of tiny screws and plastic bits really take up in a landfill? Most of that bulk is the screen and battery. Feels like we're saving crumbs while the whole loaf gets tossed. It's a nice habit, but it probably doesn't move the needle much on the big trash piles.

thomas_gonzalez11h ago

But what if the real issue isn't the space they take up, but the lost chance to use them again? If one shop can reuse those bits, couldn't a bigger system be built to collect and share them? Isn't the bigger waste failing to even try that kind of system because we assume it's just crumbs?