Sustainable Living Vs Zero Waste

You might be wondering what the difference is between sustainable living vs zero waste living? Sometimes these two terms are grouped together in discussions about sustainability.

However, they are two quite different lifestyles with some parts that overlap.

Table of Contents

Sustainable Living Definition

First of all, let’s look at what is the sustainable living definition.

“Sustainable living describes a lifestyle that attempts to reduce an individual’s or society’s use of the Earth’s natural resources, and one’s personal resources. It is often called as “earth harmony living” or “net zero living”. Its practitioners often attempt to reduce their ecological footprint (including their carbon footprint) by altering their methods of transportation, energy consumption, and/or diet. Its proponents aim to conduct their lives in ways that are consistent with sustainability, naturally balanced, and respectful of humanity’s symbiotic relationship with the Earth’s natural ecology.”
Wikipedia

Sustainable living is a lifestyle where you avoid products and behaviours which have a negative effect on our environment. This could mean you choose sustainable products when you shop or your daily habits reflect your desire to reduce your personal carbon footprint as much as possible.

This doesn’t mean that you need to be perfect, I’m a self-confessed imperfect environmentalist. There’s always areas of my life that I need to work on in terms of sustainability (and everything else 😉).

When you decide to work towards a more sustainable lifestyle, it does usually become such a big part of your life. It becomes a sort of unique way of looking at the world.

You might find that you consider the impact of every single purchase that you make or consider sustainability for all of your daily habits.

That’s very normal! It’s quite a future way of thinking, which can be difficult for some people to understand.

You should be aware that thinking about the future and worrying could mean that you’re more susceptible to eco anxiety. This can be overwhelming.

Eco anxiety is quite a complicated issue, that’s why I’ve written a full guide on how to cope with eco anxiety to help you out.

Zero Waste Definition

Next let’s look at the definition for zero waste.

Zero-Waste adjective

Variations – Zero Waste

Definition: generating little or no waste e.g a zero waste event or zero waste manufacturing

zero waste noun

The creative waste management strategy of “zero waste” is a combination of community and industrial responsibility deconstruction in spite of demolition, composting to keep odorous organic waste out of landfills, recycling and a screening facility to allow more separation and reuse of waste rather than incineration. – Aimee Dolloff

There’s quite a big history behind the term zero waste, it was first used in the 70’s as a business practice for manufacturing goods with zero waste as a result.

Bea Johnson coined the term in the 21st century and made it popular when she created her blog called Zero Waste Home and her book with the same name. When Bea Johnson used this term, it sort of changed the meaning on a more individual level.

Bea Johnson used the term ‘Zero Waste’ to describe a lifestyle that seeks to reduce their waste to as close to ‘Zero’ as possible.

Zero Waste influencers used to save their waste for the month or year, in a mason jar to show how little they had produced. The problem with this is that sometimes this can put people off. If you think that the main aim of zero waste is to reduce your waste to this level – you might not even try because it doesn’t seem that you can achieve it.

On social media these days, I don’t see the mason jar of waste used anymore. I’m very grateful for that!

Now that you know the difference between sustainable living vs zero waste. You might be wondering which one is the best for you or your household?

This is going to depend on what your end goal is. For example, if you want to take a more sustainable approach in general to your lifestyle, you might want to choose sustainable living.

However, if your main goal is to reduce the waste that you or your household creates – then you should consider a zero waste lifestyle.

You definitely don’t need to just choose one if you don’t want to. There are so many habits with both lifestyles that mean you can implement whatever works the best for your family.

A sustainable blogger that I follow always talks about how we should make changes that are sustainable for US! That has stuck with me for a while because I think that’s the key to making changes that work well for us.

Don’t try to change everything all at once, that really won’t be sustainable long-term. Just choose the areas that you can change easily and take it one step at a time.

Sustainable Living Tips

You can follow these sustainable tips to get started:

Assess your households carbon footprint
Be a conscious consumer
Do a plastic audit
Take one step at a time
Buy everything you can secondhand
Consider alternative transport
Go paperless eg digital statements etc
Reduce your meat and dairy consumption
Avoid flying if you can
Switch to a green bank
Switch to a green energy supplier

If you’re interested in making some changes yourself. I’ve written a full guide called Beginner’s guide to sustainable living and zero waste, which goes into more detail.

I hope this has helped you to learn sustainable living vs zero waste living and the main differences. I tend to use sustainable living to refer to my lifestyle but on social media you might see people refer to their lifestyle as low waste or low impact living.

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