charlotte, vt. a new law aimed at reducing how much waste we create goes into effect this year.by july 1st., all recyclables will be banned from the trash.but is this realistic when we live in a throwaway societythe official definition of &39zero waste&39 is "diverting 90 percent of your waste away from the trash can."recognizing there is 10 percent of waste that is nearly impossible to get rid of, so it&39s a goal like &39zero accidents at a factory.&39this year act 148, the universal recycling law will require all vermonters to recycle starting july 1st.it doesn&39t stop there, each year another provision will be added to the law which is likely to create major lifestyle changes for many of us.but a vermont couple is already walking the walk, and talking the talklouis cox and ruah swennerfelt may be considered extreme by most standards.you can see their passion for living mostly off the grid, just by visiting their charlotte home.the house is powered by photoelectric panels, using sunlight to heat their home and water.they collect rain water to drink and irrigate their garden next to the compost.even going as far as to capturing shower water to flush the toilet."it&39s crazy to be taking good drinking water to flush a toilet and you can take gray water instead, your saying yes. here&39s a way to do something that makes sense," said louis cox.louis and ruah started living this way about 10 years ago.they were inspired by another couple who managed to create one bag of trash a year."it put us all to shame, when we though about what we put in the landfill, and here we were talking about we have a solar house, and we take care of things...we decided that the thing to do was come home, put our trash out on the floor and look at what was creating that trash," said ruah swennerfeltit turned out, most of it was food packaging.so, they started with small changes, like buying in bulk."pastas you can buy in bulk. coffee, we buy in bulk, and here are all the jars of raisins, nuts and seeds," said ruah swennerfelt.for people striving to live zero waste, it can be difficult, especially because a lot of the food we buy comes in packaging that can&39t be recycled.in fact in chittenden county, the only option is to chuck it in the trash.the plastic coating keeps the packaging from being recycled.the chittenden solid waste district collects waste from roughly 160,000 people and 6,500 businesses in chittenden county.cswd&39s job is to reduce, reuse, and recycle by composting, taking hazardous waste, and blue bin recyclables to sell on the worldwide commodity markets."we every year are dumping into the ground around 19,000 tons a year. add 100 to 105 dollars a ton that&39s 1.9 million dollars people are throwing away. those are the commodities we sell day in and day out of our material recovery facility," said tom moreau, cswd&39s general manager.while your intentions may be to recycle, this can of peanuts can be used as an example of what really happens.it&39s got an aluminum bottom, cardboard side and plastic cover.the aluminum and cardboard are recyclable, but the plastic cover isn&39t.so guess what happens to the entire canit all ends up in the landfill."our logic here is to go upstream in the industry, and something called &39product stewardship&39 and say to whoever that peanut company may be and say, you know you have a responsibility to make this more recyclable. and one of things we are looking at is potentially taxing those nonrecyclable things more," said moreau.zero waste isn&39t just for the individual.zero waste outreach coordinator cassandra hemenway said the central vermont management district is moving towards creating 18 &39zero waste&39 towns and cities around the state."by 2020 every business, every organization, every office, every household will be required to keep their food scraps and recyclables out of their trash," said cassandra hemenway, zero waste outreach coordinator at the central vermont solid waste management district.hemenway said they are laying the foundation in places like montpelier.the central vermont management district is doing something no one else is doing, picking up compost from local businesses.food scraps from capstone&39s food shelf, end up being used to feed hungry chickens, living at vermont compost in montpelier.hemenway said in a more urban setting, achieving a zerowaste goal takes baby steps"there is an initial investment. they need to have recycling available beside every trash can and that means on streets, it means in municipal offices, this needs to be a part of what every public entity is doing before residents come on board."back at the home of louis cox and ruah swennerfelt, they are leading by example, and hope others follow."everyday we bring my cloth bags to the store it reminds me of our responsibility to earth and to myself and to my children and my grandchildren, and now i have a great grandson," said swennerfelt.louis and ruah said just like everything you&39re changing a habit, and it&39s easier if you have someone holding you accountable.here&39s a way to turn the zero waste goal into a game.it&39s called vermontivate, a social media game being launched in march to motivate people to make small changes everyday.check it outhttpsvermontivate.comweb extra in coventry, vermont sits this landfill.the only landfill in the state.as it stands today, the landfill has a 20 to 30 year lifespan left.so what happens when it&39s fullthe state will simply need another place for our trash.part of cswd&39s strategic plan is to determine a timeline of when to develop a landfill here in williston.the cswd board has until june to consider whether to pursue a 95million dollar landfill on these 76 acres off redmond road in williston, or invest in technology for disposal.one question is whether there will be enough trash to fill it once act 148, the unversal recycling law takes effect."every july first a new part of the law gets phased in. so this july 1st is a big year because we are phasing in mandated recycling across the state. so recyclables will be banned from the landfill, " said cassandra hemenway.you never know what the future holds. 
