Routledge Zero-Waste: Reconsidering Waste Management for the Future (Routledge Studies in Waste Management and Policy)

This book analyses ‘zero-waste’ (ZW) as an emerging waste management strategy for the future, which considers waste prevention through innovative design and sustainable consumption practices. Drawing on a diverse range of case studies from Australia, Bangladesh, Japan, New Zealand, Sweden, and the USA, this book explores why urban waste management systems still remain a major challenge for almost all cities around the world. Rejecting waste as an ‘end-of-life’ problem, Atiq Zaman and Tahmina Ahsan instead consider waste prevention through the ZW model, in which resources are utilized and consumed with minimum environmental degradation. In addition, the authors give extended discussion on why embracing the ZW concept will be beneficial for the circular economy (CE). Providing a strategic zero-waste framework and an evaluation tool to measure waste management performance aimed towards ZW goals, this book will be of great relevance to students, scholars, and policymakers with an interest in waste management, sustainable consumption, urban planning, and sustainable development. Review 'This book is very timely, given the fact that the world is currently experiencing the third wave of environmentalism: the environment and climate emergency. Zaman and Ahsan propose an alternative zero-waste approach to tackle the critical waste problems we have in our society. We cannot continue to deplete our global natural resource in the name of consumerism. The book argues an alternative circular design and systems thinking where zero-waste practice is a central approach to solving the core challenge of global waste.' -- Greg Morrison, Professor of Sustainable Cities, Director of Curtin University Sustainability Policy (CUSP) Institute, Curtin University, Australia 'The opportunity presented by striving for zero waste and building a circular economy shouldn’t be underestimated by businesses wanting to improve their triple bottom line or governments seeking jobs growth and a better environment. This book documents examples and gives hope that we can achieve these goals.' -- Vaughan Levitzke, PSM, Chief Executive, Green Industries SA, Adelaide, Australia 'The global waste crisis has made the issues addressed in this book ever more urgent: we need a clear waste reduction and elimination goal to aim for, a mix of "hard and soft" strategies to reshape systems towards this goal, and ways of measuring progress towards its achievement. This valuable book addresses all three essentials together, showing how they depend upon each other, and does so in an accessible yet scholarly and balanced way. This is a substantial achievement.' -- Robert Crocker, DPhil (oxon), Deputy Director, China Australia Centre for Sustainable Development, University of South Australia, Australia 'This book is in response to the enormous waste problem plaguing the planet’s ecosystems from urban settlements to landfills and contaminated sites, and severely impacting the once pristine marine environments. We need a drastic change in the way "waste" is perceived. Zaman and Ahsan offer the zero-waste approach as an alternative to the current practices and management systems. They tackle the challenges of plastics use, e-waste, consumerism and planned obsolescence through zero-waste strategies and solutions. The readers will find insights and examples which help understand better the essence and solutions of the problem created by industrial society and human behaviour.' -- Dora Marinova, Professor of Sustainability, Curtin University Sustainability Policy (CUSP) Institute, Curtin University, Australia About the Author Atiq Zaman is a Lecturer at the School of Design and the Built Environment and an early carrier researcher at the Curtin University Sustainability Policy Institute, Curtin University, Australia. He has more than eight years of research experiences in the area of sustainable waste management and environmental assessment. He is an a