About the Project
The mountains of trash we generate each year aren’t inevitable – they’re the product of toxic and climate-damaging systems that allow wasteful practices to flourish. Just Zero tackles this head-on by targeting the most unnecessary forms of waste: Single-use plastics, excessive packaging, and food that never gets eaten. We work to prevent waste before it starts – through smart laws and policies, public education, and direct collaboration with communities and advocates. Our approach drives systemic change that protects the environment, supports local economies, and builds more equitable, sustainable communities from the ground up.
Photo: Just Zero
Photo: Just Zero
The Problem
The U.S. produces over 300 million tons of trash each year – and that number keeps growing. Our economy is designed for convenience and profit – not sustainability. Products are needlessly wrapped in layers and layers of unrecyclable packaging. Food is overproduced, oversold, and under-consumed. And single-use plastics are everywhere – even though most of them are completely unnecessary. Although disposable items – most of which are plastic – may be cheap to make, they come at a steep cost to our planet. All this waste fuels climate change, damages the environment, deteriorates wildlife habitats, burdens municipal budgets, and endangers public health – especially in communities already overburdened by pollution from other harmful industries.
Areas of Impact
Climate & Environment
Extracting fossil fuels for plastic production, burning plastic products in air polluting incinerators, and burying food in landfills where it turns into methane, all damage our climate and the environment.
Economy
Waste is expensive. Reducing waste lowers disposal costs, saves households money, and opens the door to opportunities for innovation in product design and reuse systems that create green jobs.
Equity & Justice
The harm created by the waste we produce isn’t shared equally. All this waste ends up in polluting landfills and incinerators, which are primarily located in communities of color, low-income, and/or limited English proficiency.
Public Health
A significant portion of our preventable waste is single-use plastic, which threatens public health at every stage of its lifecycle – from production to consumption to disposal.
Our Policy and Advocacy Solutions
Millions of people throughout the United States struggle to get enough nourishing food on a regular basis. Yet, as a country, we throw away billions of pounds of perfectly good food every year. When this food is landfilled, it breaks down and releases methane – a powerful and climate-altering greenhouse gas.
By reducing food waste and redirecting good food from being trashed, we not only help those in need, but also protect our climate and environment from harm.
Just Zero works to make food waste a thing of the past. We help design, support, and enact policies that require businesses to reduce their food waste, donate excess edible food, and compost everything that remains.
Progress Highlights
Launch of the Model Food Waste Prevention and Recycling Legislative Toolkit
Just Zero releases an interactive and customizable toolkit to helps communities develop a personalized law that will reduce food waste, strengthen composting, and increase food donations.
Urges Federal Government to Implement Policies to Address Food Waste
Just Zero leads a coalition of environmental organizations in urging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Agriculture, and Food and Drug Administration to implement policies that will reduce food waste.
Release of Report Highlighting How Communities Can Tackle Food Waste
Just Zero publishes a report explaining how states and cities across the country can implement a proven and effective policy that not only reduces food waste, but also helps alleviate hunger and expand and strengthen composting programs
New Hampshire Enacts New Law to Reduce Food Waste and Increase Composting
Just Zero assists advocates in New Hampshire to enact a Food Waste Prevention and Recycling Law. The law bans businesses that generate large amounts of food waste and are located near food waste recycling facilities from landfilling or incinerating their food waste.
Helps Strengthen Vermont’s Food Waste Reduction Program
With the help of our partners in Vermont, Just Zero urges the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources to strengthen and improve Vermont’s Food Waste Reduction and Recycling program by implementing new policies that will help reduce food waste, keep food waste out of landfills and increase food donations.
Practically everything we buy comes in single-use packaging, most of which is completely unnecessary. In fact, about one third of all household waste is packaging. Worse, a significant portion of this waste is unrecyclable plastic that is coated with toxic chemicals.
For decades, consumers have been responsible for paying the cost of managing all this packaging waste. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Just Zero believes the companies producing all this junk should be held accountable for their own trash. And that’s possible with modern packaging waste policies.
Just Zero helps design, support, and enact policies that require companies to redesign their products and packaging to be less wasteful, less toxic, and more recyclable.
Progress Highlights
Maine Develops Rules for Packaging Reduction Program That Will Slash Waste
Just Zero works to ensure the Maine Department of Environmental Protection adopts rules for the Packaging Reduction Program that will force companies to reduce waste and transition from single-use packaging to reusable and refillable alternatives.
Just Zero Addresses National Recycling Congress
Just Zero presents to the National Recycling Congress on the importance of implementing policies, programs, and laws that eliminate needless packaging waste.
Launch of Model Packaging Waste Reduction and Recycling Legislation Toolkit
To help advocates across the country, Just Zero launches a customizable and interactive toolkit for Packaging Waste Reduction and Recycling Laws. The toolkit helps advocates develop a customized policy that will reduce single-use packaging waste in their state.
Minnesota Becomes 5th State with Packaging Reduction and Recycling Law
Just Zero supports efforts in Minnesota to enact a strong new law that will require large companies to eliminate needless packaging waste and redesign their packaging to be recyclable and reusable.
Helps Enact Packaging Waste Reduction and Recycling Needs Assessment Laws
Working with coalitions in Illinois and Maryland, Just Zero helps pass new legislation requiring a comprehensive evaluation of packaging waste in both states. The laws will eventually lead to proposals for more comprehensive laws that reduce single-use packaging waste.
The U.S. generates around 40 million tons of single-use plastic every year. Virtually none of this is recycled. Instead, all this plastic litters our communities, poisons our water and air, and impacts our health.
That’s why Just Zero is working to help communities enact policies that limit or ban single-use plastic products and replace them with less wasteful alternatives. We know we can’t recycle our way out of the plastic problem. So, we’re aiming to reduce single-use plastics instead – by targeting needless items that can easily be replaced with reusable and less environmentally damaging alternatives.
Progress Highlights
Environmental Activists Converge in D.C. to Demand Action on Plastic Pollution
Just Zero and dozens of environmental activists joined together at the Capital to demand strong federal action to eliminate single-use plastics. This included urging elected officials to support a federal ban on foam food packaging, a phase-out of single-use plastics in all National Parks, and better protections against microplastic pollution.
Launch of Single-Use Plastic Reduction Legislative Toolkit
To support efforts across the country to eliminate single-use plastics, Just Zero launches an interactive and customizable Single-Use Plastic Reduction Toolkit. The toolkit helps advocates design a tailored single-use plastic reduction law for their community.
Urges Massachusetts to Enact Laws Eliminating Single-Use Plastic
Along with Plastic Free Mass, Just Zero advocates for the Massachusetts Plastic Reduction Act. The law would ban the sale of single-use plastic bags and polystyrene takeout containers. The law would also prevent plastic utensils and straws from being given to customers unless they request them.
Calls on Federal Trade Commission to Prohibit Greenwashing
Just Zero leads the effort to have the Federal Trade Commission strengthen federal policies that allow companies to lie about the recyclability of plastic products and packaging.
Leads Call for U.N. to Drop Coca-Cola as Sponsor
Just Zero calls on the United Nations to drop Coca-Cola, one of the largest producers of single-use plastics, from sponsoring the annual Climate Change Conference.
June 11, 2024 · PRESS RELEASE
December 12, 2024 · MEDIA COVERAGE
November 17, 2023 · MEDIA COVERAGE
What issue do you want to address in your community?
Legislative Toolkit
FOOD WASTE
Make food waste a thing of the past by banning the disposal of food waste in landfills and incinerators.
Legislative Toolkit
PACKAGING WASTE
Reduce packaging by making companies eliminate needless plastics and invest in recycling and reuse.
Legislative Toolkit
SINGLE-USE PLASTICS
Phase out single-use plastics, strengthen real recycling programs, and end corporate greenwashing.
August 16, 2023 · ISSUE BRIEF
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