Let’s not just ‘create’, let’s ‘upcycle’…

Written by Rashmie Jaaju on 06 August 2009

Tweeet this!

I wanted to post some ideas on how to encourage our kids to reduce waste by reusing, recycling and *upcycling* and then realized ‘upcycling’ is a relatively lesser known and even less understood term and hence we just may confuse it with ‘reusing’. So, here’s a quick post on what ‘upcycling’ actually means, how’s it different from ‘recycling’ and ‘reusing’.

Upcycling is similar to recycling in that we take something (that’s otherwise a waste) and revamp/remodel it into a new form for continued use. However the main difference is that in the case of upcycling we generally do not alter its form back into its components for reuse. Also, in recycing – the quality of the original material may degrade (recycled plastic) but in upcycle, we actually retain the quality of the original product and infact sometimes enhance it.

For example, we have an old glass bottle.

In recycling, the recycling center sorts the glass from other recyclable material and sends them out to be recycled, where the glass would most likely be melted down to make a new bottle/jar along with all the other glass containers that are no longer in use. In upcycling we would clean the glass bottle, beautify it with some glass colours etc and reuse it as a flower vase!

Upcycling is different from simply ‘reusing’ the product for same purpose – for example, reusing the glass bottle to store oil or juice.
Reusing it as a flower vase means upcycling. The glass bottle got a new lease of life when we revamped it to use as flower vase.

This term (‘upcycling’) was originally coined by the authors McDonaugh and Braugart and is being extended to revamping anything for a different use/purpose. Anything that was intended to end up in the landfill.

Upcycling reduces substantial amount of waste and industrial production. Besides being a boon to environment, its wallet friendly as well as we buy less. I find it much more satisfying than just ‘creating’ anything new because in upcycling, we are reinventing and repurposing an old item that may have outlasted its purpose or usability. When we repurpose it, we are giving it a new life and meaning…

Tags: ecofriendly living, gorgeouskarma.com, green living, recycle, remodeling a waste item, repurpose, upcycle
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