Eco-Friendly Home Storage Keeps You Sane

EcoExpert Tips on Eco-Friendly Ways of Organising the Storage in Your Home

Is clutter in your home / garage / office driving you crazy? Did you know that staying organized not only saves you time and frustration, but it can also help the environment?

Here’s how:

• By knowing what you have and where you have it, you won’t buy the same stuff twice, thus conserving natural resources.
• By tidying your belongings into storage containers, you’ll save space and be less inclined to move to a larger home.
• By keeping your home tidy, you won’t need to use as many chemical cleaners, which are an environmental burden.
• Less clutter means less housework.
• By keeping your things in good condition, you need to replace them less often, which is a win for your wallet as well as the environment.
• By organizing your perishables, you’re more likely to consume them before they go to waste.
• By wasting less, you’ll send less to landfills.

Here’s how to go about organizing your life.

Step 1: Get rid of some stuff

The less you own, the less you need to organize. Look around your home. Do you really need everything you’re storing? Decide what to keep, and what to re-use or recycle.

Step 2: Re-use or buy storage units

Now you need to organise what you are keeping. Organising essentially means keeping like things together in an easy-to-find place. In most cases, this will require storage units of some sort – ideally something with shelves, drawers, or bins that make your belongings easily accessible for daily use.

To be eco-friendly, you want to consider your choices. You could go out and buy new storage accessories, but it’s better for your wallet as well as for the environment if you don’t. Instead, consider these alternatives:

Re-use: are there items already in your home that you could use differently? Look around your home with open eyes – what is taking up space that you could re-purpose? Perhaps you have something which, with a fresh coat of paint or just a clean-up, could work as new storage?

If there’s nothing suitable in your home, then visit a thrift store, or try the ‘free’ section in Craigslist, or Freegle in the UK.

If you’re a DIY-er, build your own storage unit, which you can customise to your needs. Because you make it yourself, you can control what materials you use. If possible, use materials that you (or your neighbour or local junk yard) already own, such as wood scraps. Also consider recycled or reclaimed wood, FSC-certified wood, bamboo and organic cotton. If you want to paint your storage unit, use Low-VOC or VOC-free paints – they are more expensive but you’ll be using a small quantity. (Normal paint contains Volatile Organic Compounds which are not good for you or the environment).

Or upgrade your storage units with eco-friendly high-quality drawer slides for even greater efficiency.

Not every storage unit has to be eye-catching.

Just please don’t buy those big plastic bins – they’re made from petroleum, and they don’t bio-degrade.

The video below shows some more ideas for re-using what’s in your home:

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Related: Small Space Living