All about reuse and what the CRNS and its members are doing about it

Washing machines, fridge freezers, cookers, beds, mattresses, sideboards, duvets, bikes, toys, games, books, prams, art materials, carpets, paint, wood, medical equipment, office furniture – almost anything that’s still in working order can be passed on for someone else to use.

Scotland has 80 community based reuse organisations (most of them members of the CRNS) that help around 100,000 people every year by uplifting unwanted household items and passing them onto those in need. The reuse sector also provides 12,000 volunteering and 1,000 training placements each year.

Reusing prevents valuable resources from going to landfill and saves the raw materials and energy that would have gone into making a new item. This includes the energy and water used to extract materials like metal or timber, transporting them and turning them into a new product.

For example, making one kilo of new cotton uses on average 11,000 litres of water. This means that producing a new 250g shirt uses around 2,700 litres of water, and this isn’t factoring the energy and emissions associated with its production. The London Community Recycling Network estimates that for every tonne of textiles reused, at least 19 tonnes of CO2 is saved and for every tonne of furniture reused, four tonnes of CO2 is saved.