8/31/24

Living off-grid means that at some point, Lurko and I had to think about where our waste was going to go. Ever the idealist, I dreamed about living a zero-waste lifestyle. The basic idea of zero waste is to live in such a way as to create as little waste as possible. Sounds great, right? We’d rather not add to landfills, create more greenhouse gases, or contribute to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in our ocean.

A perfectly zero waste lifestyle is a lofty goal in today’s modern world full of non-biodegradable plastics, but it’s still something to aim for in our attempt to live a more sustainable life. We’ll describe some of the options available in Mexico, and then we’ll talk about the options we chose and how they’ve been working for us after living here for 8 months.

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Blackwater

Blackwater is a term you may have heard in camping, RV, or boating circles. Simply put, it is the waste water that comes from toilets. When you live on the grid, you don’t have to think about where your poop water goes. Your municipality pipes it away from your house, treats it in a huge massive system, and makes it safe enough to put back into the water supply. Off the grid, you have to think a lot more about treating and disposing of blackwater properly. There’s harmful bacteria (E. coli, anyone?), and obviously, it can get very stinky. Simply burying your poop in the woods may not be a good long-term solution. But you have options. Some folks opt for composting toilets. Some people dig a septic system. Some go a step beyond that and create an aerated septic system. This article does a great job of explaining all of the options.

Lurko and I paid to have a septic system dug, and it seems to be working well so far. It’s what a lot of folks do here in Mexico. My parents have only had to pump theirs out once in 10 years. To avoid overloading ours, we try to stick to the old hippie adage, “If it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down.” We also try to limit the amount of graywater we flush down the drain, as you’ll see in the next section.

Graywater

Graywater is the less toxic waste water that comes from your showers, dishes, and laundry. If you’d like your septic system to last longer, you might want to consider sending your gray water somewhere else. Used wash water from sinks and showers can be diverted to toilets, or used to water your plants. You can even put it through a filtration system and re-use it. It can be as simple as saving it in buckets, or you can build your whole plumbing system around it. Lurko and I have a standard plumbing system, because we didn’t know any better when we started. But I do re-use water when I do laundry and dishes, and to make it safer I only use non-toxic soap like Dr. Bronners or Whole Naturals Castile Soap.

Since we’re still buying ice every day, we’re also saving the melted ice water from the cooler. It seems like such a waste to dump it out, so I use it to water plants, or I’ll bring a bucket into the house to flush a toilet. It costs 9 liters to flush a toilet, so flushing a toilet 6 times a day means we’d go through the 750-liter tinaco on our roof in less than two weeks. May as well try to save as much of our good water as possible.

Trash

In our little town, we do have a trash truck that comes through three times a week. However, we live outside their pickup zone. When we first moved in, my parents let us bring our trash to their trash bin. I didn’t want to do that to my parents forever, so one day I chased down the trash truck and asked the guys where I could leave my trash. We agreed on a spot by the river crossing, so now on trash day I toss my bin in the car, carry it to the river crossing 5 minutes away, and leave it there. The next time I go into town for an errand, I pick up the empty bin and take it home. It’s worked well so far.

Lurko and I make one bag of trash per week. That’s not bad for a household our size (the average U.S. family produces about two bags of trash per week), but I feel bad about even having one bag. I am constantly looking for ways to reduce our trash output.

Burning

Here in Mexico, a lot of people just burn their trash. But they’ll burn everything, including plastic, so the smell is awful (not to mention toxic) and we hate it. In Guadalajara, this was particularly bad at the edge of the city where my family lived. During the dry season the farmers would burn so much trash, the smoke and smell would carry all the way to our house. Here in Nayarit, we will burn stuff every couple of months but we limit it to paper and cardboard products. It does help us reduce the amount of trash we produce every week. We can’t get too lazy about burning regularly, because if we let the paper pile up the crabs and the scorpions enjoy hiding out in it. We don’t want them to get too comfortable!

Recycling

Recycling: In U.S. urban areas, most of us have been trained to recycle, but they actually do recycle here in Mexico as well. Twenty years ago they had a glass bottle return program, and you would get money for returning bottles. Now they have a program for plastic, but it’s voluntary and only for certain types of plastic. Still, it’s a great way for me to get rid of all my used Topo Chico bottles. I take them to one of the tall collection baskets made of chicken wire that are scattered around town. Someone comes by to empty them once every other week. For metal, you can save it for the scrap metal lady who comes around one a month, and she will weigh the item and pay you by weight.

Reducing

Reducing is basically a mindset: What can we do to make less trash? Buying food locally means less items that need packaging. And instead of using their plastic grocery bags, we bring our re-usable grocery bags from home. Another strategy is buying in bulk. I learned to buy by Topo Chico in liter bottles instead of the single serve. Same with drinking water- we buy the 20 liter (5 gallon) garrafónes instead of the 24-packs of plastic water bottles. It saves money and we throw less trash in our bin. And you can find hand pumps to attach to it like this one.

We also use our reusable water bottles, and refill them from the garrafón. In the future, we would like to install a UV water filter and make our own drinking water straight from the sink. Those garrafónes are heavy! Not to mention, that would be a step closer to self-sufficiency.

Re-using

Remember “Reduce, reuse, recycle”? I re-use a lot of containers, especially the glass ones that pickles and olives come in. They work great for short-term food storage — or for making more pickles. I’ve also used them for storing nails and other knickknacks. I also re-use the colorful plastic grocery bags that I have collected from stores (sometimes I forget to bring my re-usable grocery bags from home). I have bags of bags, separated by size. I use the small ones for dog poop bags, and the big ones for trash can liners. I still have a LOT of bags, though. I’m considering a project like this one because I actually do need some floor mats and these would be waterproof. I’ve also joined a few upcycle groups on Facebook because people there have the best ideas for re-using their trash. Egg cartons have turned into planters for seedlings. Old tires can be re-purposed into flower pots. When our old refrigerator died, we transformed it into a pantry. Find a good upcycle group and get inspired!

The Other Two R’s

I learned that besides “Reduce, reuse, recycle,” there are 2 other “R” options we can consider. One is “Refuse,” or trying to avoid making the trash in the first place by saying no.  This is a good one for me to work on. For example, I should be more automatic about just saying no when they try to give me plastic bags at the grocery store. Yes, even when I forget my reusable bags. The fifth “R” is “Rot.” As in decompose. This can be as simple as throwing food scraps into the Back 40, or burying it and letting nature run its course. I would want to do that far from the house– the raccoons and coatis are cute but they need to stay in the jungle. And of course, compost. I put that one last, because I have tried composting a few times and failed. The maintenance proves to be too much for me and I forget to turn it or do whatever else I’m supposed to do. I did successfully make fertilizer using egg shells, avocado skins, and used teabags, so I feel like I’m not completely hopeless. I do need to try composting again because that would really help to reduce what goes out in the trash.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading, and now you know what Lurko and I do to deal with managing waste off the grid in Mexico. Honestly, most of this will apply to the U.S. or anywhere else in the world. Staying conscious of where we put our waste will inch us closer to becoming good global citizens, and a lot of these tips save money too. Zero waste may not be 100% attainable, but we can all get a little closer. Just remember the FIVE R’s — refuse, reduce, reuse, recycle, and rot. Happy sustainable living!