zerowaste

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/30993218

Copious access points are deployed by naïve admins who are oblivious to the fact that not everyone runs the latest gear. The shitty practice of pushing wi-fi in an arbitrarily exclusive way needs pushback. The first step is exposure. We need to enumerate the various ways demographics of people are being excluded and collect a DB on it.

The wi-fi protocol is the first point of failure. E.g. 802.11b vs 802.11a/g/n.. All new hardware is backwards compatible with older protocols. When an 802.11b device cannot see a signal, it’s because some asshat proactively disabled 802.11b.

Most exclusivity occurs with shitty captive portals. There are countless ways to fuckup a website to make it exclusive. E.g.

• to impose SSL, which inherently imposes recent certs and CAs that exclude old devices. It’s essentially rock stupid when the captive portal is nothing more than a button that says “I accept the ToS”.
• to impose JavaScript, which encapsulates a whole industry of poorly trained people who have no concept of stability of standards and interoperability.
• to impose SMS confirmation, which makes the ignorant assumption that every single user has a mobile phone, that they carry it with them, and that they are willing to share their number willy nilly.

🌱environmental impact🚮

The brain dead practice of deploying public Internet access using needlessly exclusive tech is a form of forced obsolscence. It’s one of the factors that pushes people to throw away working devices in order to overcome these ecocidal Internet access deployments.

🔧the fix💾

An app that records SSIDs, their location, and all the detectable exclusivity characteristics. It should also take human input with notes to record exclusivity that is not auto-detectable. Ideally the local DB would sync with a central DB. It should also be possible to extract a GPX file for a given region which could then be imported into OSMand or Organic Maps.

A family member drink lots of them. I recycle them but it is still wasteful.

What would you do with a soda can or with a lot of them?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/56338342

Folks are dumping laser printers that still have toner in them. Or even if it’s “empty”, not everyone knows the shaking trick. I also find on the 2nd-hand market really dirt cheap toner cartridges, like $/€ 1—5, but they are never for my model of printer.

So is it sensible to try to salvage the toner from incompatible cartridges? A loooong time ago toner came in a bottle (like a big version of the plastic ketchup bottles in small diners). The printer had no cartridge, just a toner tank with a lid. You open the lid and squeeze the bottle.

I think toner is thought to be too hazardous or messy for these days of more persnickety/pampering designs. Everything seems to use a cartridge now. But in terms of recovering toner destined for landfill, what can we do?

Drilling a hole seems like a risk because plastic bits would fall in with the toner. But what if a soldering iron is used to melt a hole? I’m thinking the hole would have to be big enough for vinyl aqarium tubing to connect the salvage cartridge to the target cartridge. Then the salvage cartridge would have to be rattled to move the toner down the tube. I don’t suppose there is any practical way to use a vacuum.

Of course before melting anything, I would look for an existing exit nipple or port and try to plumb the two exits together. Or transfer to a squeeze bottle then try to mate the squeeze bottle to the target cartridge exit opening.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/28520352

An Amazon warehouse insider told me they routinely throw away new unsold products because warehouse space is limited and they have to get rid of the slower moving products. Amazon is very protective of that whole process. They don’t want people to know about it. They also don’t want the products to end up in the hands of someone who would sell the stuff on eBay or some other competitor. They in fact caught employees doing that. So now the area where these products are handled is resticted access w/locked doors; workers closely monitored so Amazon can ensure destruction. Amazon fabricates the reasons for trashing the products. They want to book the waste as “defective” products even though they are in perfect working (new) condition.

I just noticed the EU’s ecodesign framework of 2024 has this new law requiring disclosure:

Article 24 -- Disclosure of information on unsold consumer products

1. Economic operators that discard unsold consumer products directly or have unsold consumer products discarded on their behalf shall disclose:

(a) the number and weight of unsold consumer products discarded per year, differentiated per type or category of products;

(b) the reasons for discarding products, and where applicable, the relevant derogation under Article 25(5);

(c) the proportion of discarded products delivered, whether directly or through a third party, to undergo each of the following activities: preparing for reuse, including refurbishment and remanufacturing, recycling, other recovery including energy recovery, and disposal operations in accordance with the waste hierarchy as defined by Article 4 of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(d) measures taken and measures planned for the purpose of preventing the destruction of unsold consumer products. Economic operators shall disclose the information referred to in the first subparagraph in a clear and visible manner at least on an easily accessible page of their website. Economic operators that are subject to the obligation to publish the sustainability reporting in their management report pursuant to Article 19a or 29a of Directive 2013/34/EU may also include that information in that sustainability reporting. Economic operators shall disclose the information referred to in the first subparagraph on an annual basis and shall include as part of that information the unsold consumer products discarded during the preceding financial year. They shall make the information for each year publicly available. That first disclosure shall cover unsold consumer products discarded during the first full financial year during which this Regulation is in force. This paragraph shall not apply to micro and small enterprises. This paragraph shall apply to medium-sized enterprises from 19 July 2030.

2. With the exception of when the information is available to the competent national authority on the basis of another legal act, the economic operators shall, at the request of the Commission or a competent national authority, provide all the information and documentation necessary to demonstrate the delivery and reception of the discarded products as disclosed pursuant to paragraph 1, point (c), of this Article, and, where relevant, the information necessary to demonstrate the applicability of a derogation under Article 25(5). Such information and documentation shall be provided in paper or electronic form within 30 days of receipt of the request.

and this new prohibition:

Article 25 -- Destruction of unsold consumer products

1. From 19 July 2026, the destruction of unsold consumer products as listed in Annex VII shall be prohibited. This paragraph shall not apply to micro and small enterprises. This paragraph shall apply to medium-sized enterprises from 19 July 2030.

2. Economic operators that are not subject to the prohibition referred to in paragraph 1 shall not destroy unsold consumer products supplied to them with the purpose of circumventing that prohibition.

Seems useful superficially, but then you look at annex 7 and it’s just clothing:

ANNEX VII -- Consumer products of which the destruction by economic operators is prohibited

The commodity codes and descriptions are taken from the combined nomenclature as referred to in Article 1(2) of Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 and as set out in Annex I thereto, in the version in force on 28 June 2024.

Commodity code / Description

1. Apparel and clothing accessories
   Articles of apparel and clothing accessories, of leather or composition leather
   Articles of apparel and clothing accessories, knitted or crocheted
   Articles of apparel and clothing accessories, not knitted or crocheted
   Hats and other headgear, plaited or made by assembling strips of any material, whether or not lined or trimmed
   Hats and other headgear, knitted or crocheted, or made up from lace, felt or other textile fabric, in the piece (but not in strips), whether or not lined or trimmed; hairnets of any material, whether or not lined or trimmed

2. Footwear
   Waterproof footwear with outer soles and uppers of rubber or of plastics, the uppers of which are neither fixed to the sole nor assembled by stitching, riveting, nailing, screwing, plugging or similar processes
   Other footwear with outer soles and uppers of rubber or plastics
   Footwear with outer soles of rubber, plastics, leather or composition leather and uppers of leather
   Footwear with outer soles of rubber, plastics, leather or composition leather and uppers of textile materials
   Other footwear

I think it’s mostly electronics that Amazon wastes, so I guess Amazon won’t be blocked at this stage.. but the reporting still applies.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/53334380

My fridge (Zanussi Z19/4D) quit working. The compressor and relay are both fine. I hotwired the relay and bypassed the thermostat. So I can force the fridge to run on demand using a switch.

Either the thermostat is broken, or some mystery component attached to the thermostat is broken. These parts are no longer sold for my model. Amazon sells “universal” thermostats cheaply, but I boycott Amazon. In fact, I try to boycott banks too so I don’t shop online generally. In the off chance that a 230v universal thermostat were sold locally, I still don’t know if it solves my problem.

So what can I do with this fridge? I could put a timer on it and set it to run 1 hr/day, or something. Is it worth it? I suppose a timer would not be accurate enough to use for food. Temps would probably be unstable. But I wonder if it’d be good for keeping wine or beer slightly chilled. Someone persnickety enough to want a wine cooler might not like the temp fluctuations a timer would bring.

Might it make sense to pull it out for parties and have it continuously run to keep drinks cold? Or would they freeze?

These use-cases don’t really interest me directly. I prefer beer nearly room temp anyway. But I’m just looking for ideas maybe to pawn the thing off onto someone else to prevent waste.

Should I trash it? I would likely harvest the working compressor in that case, but then do what with that? I could look for a trashed fridge that just needs a compressor, but I have never plumbed a compressor and messed with coolant. Can a novice handle that?

The city (Brussels) falls short when it comes to preventing the waste of old but working PCs. Oxfam at Chaussée d’Ixelles 252 will only take PCs as old as 5 years. Generally if it has a Win8 or newer sticker, they take it. Win7 or older they reject.

Any PC can be dumped at C2fd (Quai Fernand Demets 54) regardless of age and they decide whether to trash it, sell it, or (I think) pass it downstream to Oxfam or Les Petits Riens. Looking at the machines on the shelves, there is nothing older than 5 years. It’s apparently getting trashed.

The mentality seems to be: if it can’t drive a version of Windows that is still officially supported, it’s trash. Yet I am working quite comfortably on a 2 core machine of nearly 20 years old, running a recent version of linux (used to write this post).

Neglecting business, there should be machines up to 15 years old on the shelves at C2fd, Oxfam, and Les Petits Riens with linux installed, and a “gratis” price tag (or nearly so). I don’t know what C2fd’s mission is, but Oxfam and LPR is they sell things to bring in money for charity. Is there no chance that the old (hard to sell) PCs could directly be put to use for their charitable causes, whatever that is?

In any case, with no business incentive for them to deal with old machines, the machines are needlessly going to waste. I have several PCs I don’t need, rescued from street curbs and too old for Oxfam.

Every public library with PCs has only Windows PCs. In principle, these 6+ y/o machines could go to libraries at no cost, which would give the public a way to experience linux. And what about schools? Are any schools in Brussels forward-thinking enough to have linux labs for student use?

The tech contractors working for libraries have user support phobia. They have made themselves unavailable and resist deploying any technology that triggers questions. So e.g, if wi-fi does not work with your equipment, there is no support channel (and they were not smart enough to support 802.11b and avoid captive portals). So they simultaneously fail in their mission to avoid creating a need for support.

Researchers have assessed the potential to convert 15 weed species found west of Brisbane into biomass pellets, which were used as a solid biomass fuel.

The findings are published in the journal Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments.

As tons of plastic waste continue to build up in landfills every day, researchers have developed a way to convert this waste into fuels and other valuable products efficiently and cheaply.

The study: Selective electrified polyethylene upcycling by pore-modulated pyrolysis

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/49609301

I’ve found that a crankset that comes with rivet-attached sprockets costs the same as cranksets with no sprockets. So we get ripped off either way. The all-in-one piece wastes a crankset everytime the sprocket wears out and probably overspends on sprockets. And the universal crank fleeces you up front by cheating you out of a set of sprockets.

The rivets on my crankset are 72mm apart. Is there any reason I shouldn’t ragefully take an angle grinder to them?

Will I merely have to find sprockets with aligned holes, or could I run into other compatibility issues like mismatched hole sizes or other mating problems?

The bcd cribsheet shows a standard “Shimano 2003 XTR MX960 4-arm middle” has the bolts 72.1mm apart. So it seems I could get lucky though it’s a bit scary that a specific year (2003) is mentioned.

Not my website! Just a cool thing I encountered. I no longer have periods, but when I did, my flow was incredibly heavy and I spent a lot of money on pads (and of course threw away hundreds of them). I know reusable pads aren't an option for everybody, but they're definitely a great way to reduce waste! Of course, another good option would be buying menstrual underwear etc, but as someone who sews I thought I'd share this for other people who sew <3

(Also you can do cute patterns!)

A few fun facts:

• Cotton cloth pads smell better because they allow moisture to evaporate (rather than it being trapped in by plastic)
• You can wash them by hand or just rinse them to throw in with the rest of your clothes
• Research estimates that people who menstruate use about 11,400 pads in their lifetime

Hope this is helpful for someone!

Proving Zero Waste Works—even in Islands 08 June 2025 - Philippines - Island communities face extra challenges in waste management, but the success of

Lauren Mason decided to take action after witnessing huge amounts of camping gear abandoned at festivals

I have been buying the 20 or 25 pound sacks of Blue Bird flour. But my son's cat scratches the bags and eventually tears them. I currently have the sack in an old pop corn tin. However, when the sack is too full I cannot put on the lid. I am looking for ideas for something larger to use, without having to dump the flour into the tin.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/21937555

A box of really old TomToms (softball sized) appeared at a street market a year ago, two for a dollar. I doubt anyone was interested in any and I doubt the seller would bother to return with them. They were probably be wasted.

In principle, old TomToms could be used to feed a smartphone. If you use a smartphone for navigation, these components compete to suck the battery dry:

• the color LCD
• GPS radio receiver
• WiFi¹
• GSM¹

(1) only applies to Google boot-lickers who enable location tracking in order to avoid the wait to acquire satellites.

The GPS is a significant drain because it’s heavy on non-stop calculations, which generates heat (wasted energy), and the heat itself hits the battery even harder.

We can do better. TomToms with bluetooth tend to suppot NMEA (I think). So the old TomTom w/outdated maps could be used purely to get a fix using its own battery supply, which it then transmits over bluetooth. So you toss TT in your backpack. Disable the GPS on your smartphone and enable bluetooth. Bluetooth is like 1 tenth the energy consumption of GPS. Then you enable mock GPS in advanced settings and run a FOSS bluetooth app that serves as middleware to feed the mock location.

The problem: OSMand and Organic Maps are both incapable of using mock GPS locations. And even if they add the capability, it would only be in their recent version which has already left behind older phones. (edit: well Organic Maps is not that bad… their latest version supports AOS 5)

Refusing to support Google means using airplane mode with location svcs off and being wholly dependent on GPS. And for whatever reason it takes me around 20—30 min to get a fix despite being in a large major city; every time. This must make Google happy. The old TomToms were faster at getting a fix. IIRC, they would take 20—30″ only the first time but quickly got a fix after subsequent power cycles in the same area thereafter.

Smartphones have the sensors to do inertial nav if you calibrate a starting point. But the apps don’t have their shit together yet. I vaguely a recall a FOSS app doing inertial nav, but not too useful if it results in a mock location that OSMand cannot handle.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/21474632

All my local junkyards accept e-waste but they bounce anyone who shows up with a screwdriver. Once a machine is dumped, it becomes the property of the junkyard who sees repairers who remove stuff as a threat to their bottom line, which comes from the melt value of the metals. I cannot even pay for the parts even if I wanted. I have been kicked out of junkyards enough times that the whole staff recognises me now. It’s really fucked up that the shitty melt value of the metals is prioritised above consumers will to repair.

The disposal chain goes like this:

1. consumer dumps appliance waste (sometimes straight to the dump, sometimes to an org in step 2)
2. some org that decides if the thing is broken or not
3. if it works → goes to a charity to resell
4. if reparable → goes to a charity to fix and resell
5. if “non-repairable” → broken down for proper disposal

That last step uses scare quotes because they are piled under such an unsurmountable stock pile of disposed appliances that only trivially repairable things get repaired. Countless things that are either repairable or good for parts get destroyed. I suspect there is a blanket assumption that inkjet printers are never regarded as repairable.

The idea of repurposing is completely absent from this process. E.g. they would never remove a broken LCD panel from a flat screen device and use it to make a lightbox / table for a stained glass artist or photographer who looks at slides.

Step 5 needs a mod. Everything not put through the charity should go to a weather-protected staging area where the general public can walk through and take what they want. Every item should be there for at least a week or two before breakdown.

Freeloaders might use such a mechanism to grab things with a high melt value. But I’m not sure a petition to the city needs to address that -- it’s the city’s problem to solve.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/21474636

If I have a Whirlpool machine model XYZ, broken or not I should be able to add a record to a DB that says notify me if a machine of that model is disposed of so I can pick it up for parts or come and just remove a part that I need.

Yes, this means staff in the e-waste disposal services would need to look up the model of every item disposed to see if a repairer wants to be contacted. Is that too much to ask?

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/21299422

My kitchen scale is powered by a cr2032 lithium button battery. Yes, it was sloppy of me to buy the scale without seeing how it was powered. I only use the scale once or twice per month, yet these shitty button batteries only last a few months. It seems like I only get about ~6—12 measurements before the battery is dead.

WTF? This seems to defy physics. The scale automatically powers off. Of course it must always have some power because there is no ON switch. The scale detects capacitive touch taps or weight before turning on the display.

Digital calipers use a button battery which also only gives a dozen or so measurements before the battery is dead. It seems the calipers power on when the case is snapped shut. Maybe the rattling causes it to power on since it’s very touchy. Turns on with the slightest movement.

My bicycle helmet takes a cr2032, which only lasts a few months. Perhaps because it’s hard to remember to turn off the light. But still, it’s a shitty design because it has no timer or motion sensor. Or would a motion sensor itself use more power than the LEDs?

Questions:

• are button batteries a significant e-waste burden?
• are the batteries themselves really short lived, or are the appliances that use them all just poorly designed?

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/21002819

Two weeks ago I bought a gallon of pickles, because I thought: Oh, that'll last me a while and its only $7 and I can use the jar for something after. It did not last me a while, but I can still use the jar IG. The only remaining decision is what for? My thought is to store beans in it (so that the beans don't have to be stored up high to be away from mice and so I can do a custom blend more easily, and then if I got a second gallon jar (of pickles or otherwise) I could use that as a dedicated bean soaking vessel, which would make it easier to remember to get beans soaking) or use it for making/storing lemonade (tight sealing lid makes the mixing easier, I can just shake it.) But I wasn't just going to commit to something without asking for recommendations.

Before you ask, no, there's no chance I'll use it for making pickles, I would never want to make that many at a time (though I definitely will get a smaller pickle jar for making fridge pickled onions).

I am in the market for a denim jacket or vest. I checked the three thrift stores in town. Only one even had a men's section. Nothing on ebay was used. Found a couple i liked on depop, Butt wanted to see what other market places exist.

In a northern Tunisian olive grove, Yassine Khelifi's small workshop hums as a large machine turns olive waste into a valuable energy source in a country heavily reliant on imported fuel.