We just moved into our new house a few weeks ago, and there is a trash compactor in the kitchen. I've never had a trash compactor, so I bought trash compactor bags so we could try it out. The bags are more expensive than regular trash bags ($15 for 44 bags) and are much thicker plastic. I was very pleased to see that, with all our recycling and composting efforts, our family of four uses up less than one trash-compactor bag in one week! I've only had to empty it once and we've been using it close to three weeks, and that includes unpacking and moving-in related extra trash.
But now I'm wondering: does the thicker plastic of the trash compactor bag negate any good that it does to compact our trash down to a smaller size? Am I suffering from delusions in thinking that compacting our trash to a much smaller size, yet incasing it in thicker plastic, is somehow beneficial to the environment? Would we be better off generating more bags of trash in thinner plastic bags?
Furthermore (and I realize this is more a frugality and finances question) do you think it is financially advantageous to buy these expensive bags rather than the cheaper bags that we would use a lot more of? I would guess that we used to fill a regular trash bag every other day.
The one good thing I can say is that we make fewer trips to the trash collection place than we would otherwise. (We can take our trash and recycling 3 miles down the road to the county trash collection area for FREE.) But since I make efforts to consolidate my errands, I wouldn't be driving there anyway unless I was already out for some other reason.
I'd love to hear your educated guesses regarding this conundrum.
But now I'm wondering: does the thicker plastic of the trash compactor bag negate any good that it does to compact our trash down to a smaller size? Am I suffering from delusions in thinking that compacting our trash to a much smaller size, yet incasing it in thicker plastic, is somehow beneficial to the environment? Would we be better off generating more bags of trash in thinner plastic bags?
Furthermore (and I realize this is more a frugality and finances question) do you think it is financially advantageous to buy these expensive bags rather than the cheaper bags that we would use a lot more of? I would guess that we used to fill a regular trash bag every other day.
The one good thing I can say is that we make fewer trips to the trash collection place than we would otherwise. (We can take our trash and recycling 3 miles down the road to the county trash collection area for FREE.) But since I make efforts to consolidate my errands, I wouldn't be driving there anyway unless I was already out for some other reason.
I'd love to hear your educated guesses regarding this conundrum.
