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San Francisco, Seattle, Austin and a few other cities have declared zero waste goals. Broadly defined, that means the cities are attempting to eliminate the need to send any waste to landfills, ensuring that all waste is reused, recycled, composted, or, as a last resort, incinerated to generate electricity.

It also means that purchasing professionals are modifying specifications to emphasize recycled-content, recyclable, and compostable requirements.

What is zero waste?

Popular among some well-known companies such as Wal-Mart, Honda, Kimberly-Clark and GM, zero waste seeks to stem the constant flow of waste to landfills by diverting it before it gets there. A handful of cities across the country are attempting to do the same.

The idea of reducing the amount of trash a city sends to landfills to zero sounds crazy to some, but is becoming more important than ever. Diminishing landfill capacity and rising costs are putting many cities in a squeeze. Waste isn't going away any time soon, so new strategies to manage it are a must. Additionally, cities looking to highlight their environmental leadership can leverage their zero waste aspirations to attract like-minded businesses and residents.

Government procurement officials can make a huge difference in the ability of a city to recycle and repurpose its waste. By choosing the right products, zero waste can become not just an ideal, but a reality.

How much is zero?

Historically, zero waste claims have been limited to individual facilities in the private sector. Expanding the definition to municipalities requires a bit of perspective. Defining zero waste seems like a simple task - zero means zero. However, this is not always the case. Oftentimes, zero is an unattainable goal. Despite a community's best intentions, there are some materials that just cannot be recycled. In other cases, a facility may be able to divert 98 percent of its waste fairly easily, but the last 2 percent may be prohibitively expensive or require an unreasonable amount of treatment.

The Zero Waste International Alliance (ZWIA), a non-profit group started in 2003 to increase awareness of the zero waste ideology, has helped shape the landscape of zero waste claims over the past decade by outlining its vision of zero waste. Recognizing that it is not always possible to eliminate all waste, ZWIA recommends that organizations target a diversion rate of more than 90 percent of solid wastes from landfills and incinerators. As a result, when some organizations announce a zero waste goal has been met, they often cite the ZWIA's 90 percent threshold as a basis for the validity of their claim.

In 2004, ZWIA adopted the following definition of Zero Waste: "Zero Waste is a goal that is ethical, economical, efficient and visionary, to guide people in changing their lifestyles and practices to emulate sustainable natural cycles, where all discarded materials are designed to become resources for others to use. Zero Waste means designing and managing products and processes to systematically avoid and eliminate the volume and toxicity of waste and materials, conserve and recover all resources, and not burn or bury them. Implementing Zero Waste will eliminate all discharges to land, water or air that are a threat to planetary, human, animal or plant health."

Although this definition describes the ideology of zero waste, it does not provide any quantitative or normative references by which one can evaluate a company or facility. The lack of standard definition or verifiable criteria makes it more difficult for organizations to pursue zero waste initiatives. It also makes it difficult for public purchasers to know what a supplier means when it claims it is or operates a zero waste facility.

In a recently published white-paper, UL Environment proposed a set of working definitions for zero waste that takes into account the complicated nature of these claims while maintaining strict requirements to avoid deception. "Virtually zero waste to landfill" is defined as a waste diversion rate of 90 percent or greater for a period of one year. "Zero waste to landfill" is defined as a waste diversion rate of 99 percent or greater for a period of one year.

The definitions differentiate between those facilities that are close to zero waste, but not quite there yet, and those that have truly achieved the zero waste designation. With these definitions in mind, it is easier to understand not only the goal of zero waste, but the journey as well.