They use waste wood and insulation offcuts from a nearby industrial estate, have vegetable beds made from “scrounged” materials and got a greenhouse through Freecycle, an online site where people give away unwanted goods to keep them out of landfill.
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Freecycle: Like Craigslist, Freecycle is a website that can hook you up with free stuff that people in your community would otherwise be throwing away. It’s a matter of signing up for your local group and posting that you’re looking for boxes.
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Angela Barton, a writer and editor in Los Angeles, likes cutting her carbon footprint as well as traveling more using the money she saves. Julia Park Tracey, an author and journalist in Forestville, California, refurbished her home using materials that otherwise might have been discarded. She bought new energy-efficient appliances but gathered most supplies from The Freecycle Network, Craigslist and the nonprofit Habitat for Humanity ReStores, which sell donated paint, flooring, appliances, furniture and building materials.
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A lot of people love to use Craigslist and sites where you can purchase used items from people in the area, but there is a similar website that gets you the items for free. It’s called Freecycle. You just search your area and it will tell you what people are giving away for free and where to pick it up.
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Still working IT equipment can be donated to places such as the Hospice Shop, listed on Freecycle, or for larger quantities, The Waste Exchange.
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It’s the same story in the final London-themed section, where a big interactive map on a screen highlights 25 worthy initiatives across the city, from Open Data Camden – a project to put 300 different datasets online, on everything from parking bays and planning applications to housing stock and road accidents – to Museum Freecycle in Kennington, a hub that allows museums to share unwanted items. The captions and photos that pop up on the screen will thankfully be augmented by real life discussions every Thursday, when each of the 25 groups will host a lunchtime event.
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This month we’ve been lucky enough to interview Deron Beal, founder of the Freecycle Network – a global movement supporting people gifting each other with items rather than sending them to the landfill.
The numbers reflecting the Freecycle Network’s success are astounding: over 9 million members in more than 5,000 local groups in 110 countries with over 732 million pounds of used items being gifted and re-gifted.
This success shows that Freecycle isn’t just one website, it’s a global network of millions of people, all sharing in the mutual value of giving. Talking to Deron it became very apparent that shared values are at the heart of the freecycle network. Deron has injected his passion, light-hearted nature and humour into his work, and it’s reflected in this global and swelling movement.
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Garages, sheds and basements are tricksters. They masquerade as benevolent storage areas, but if you’re not vigilant, they can quickly morph into black holes full of things you don’t want, don’t use or would rather forget about.
Spring is the perfect time to reclaim your turf. Here’s a field guide to common black-hole clutter and how to responsibly rehome or recycle just about all of it:
Nonfunctioning appliances, power tools and outdoor maintenance equipment: If they’re fixable (just not by you), list them with one of our many local online recycling communities (Yahoo Freecycle Newburyport, Nextdoor Newburyport, Newburyport Curb Alert on Facebook) with an honest description of their condition.
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1. Buy used, pay cash
Even if you pay the exact same price for two items, if you buy it on credit, you could end up spending double the price, depending on how long you take to pay it off. On the other hand, if you look online and find someone in your area selling the same item on a site like Craigslist or OfferUP, you can sometimes pay half the price of retail or less. Better yet, you can often find things you might need for free on Freecycle. Check to see if there is a local Freecycle group in your area.
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What about your less-than-perfect or more unusual items that still have plenty of useful life left (just preferably at someone else’s house)? Freecycle Newburyport is a long-established online community where you can list all your unwanted items with an excellent chance that a fellow member will gladly take them off your hands. You can even list items that are partially used or in need of minor repair. (Remember that one person’s trash is another person’s treasure.) For Freecycle signup: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/FreecycleNewburyport/info.
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