How do we make our hobby more environmentally friendly

[Golgotha]

Something playing on my mind, especially given all the glues, plastics and chemicals our hobby generates is how do we make our hobby more environmentally friendly?

[pixelgeek]

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[Golgotha]

It was just a link to David Attenborough's testament - A Life on Our Planet.

[Hammers]

I doubt that the wargamers total footprint is very large but I supose everything counts. I am hoping for organic substitute for petrochemically produces acrylics. I am not very keen on converting to oil paints based on linseed oil, turpentine and earth pigments.

I hear LEGO is going to be produced in organic plastics by 2020 (?). It would be nice to see plastic kit manufacturers follow suit.

[carlos marighela]

Plant a tree for every miniature you paint.

Buy only from those manufacturers who simply dump all their miniatures into a jiffy bag or box and dispense with bubble wrap, packing peanuts and even zip lock bags.

Alternatively only buy locally and reduce your carbon footprint.

Construct all your terrain from recycled materials. Cereal box card, paper machê, egg boxes and the like.

[Harry Faversham]

Every time I paint a bunch of figures I go for a walk with a pocket full of acorns. I drop one every two hundred yards...
my conscience is clear.

[blacksoilbill]

I suspect a significant part is to simply buy less. Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.

I know I'm guilty of buying lots of stuff that just sits unpainted and unplayed.

[Elbows]

I understand there is the common attitude "everything counts!", but the reality is that wargaming - as a hobby - is absolutely minuscule compared to almost everything else you do.

A plastic milk jug contains about as much plastic as several sprues of models, and people go through several of those a week, etc.  If you're feeling self-conscious about it, recycle your plastic sprues or figures if you really want to.  You can email companies about their packaging methods, etc.  However, there are a multitude of other far more useful things you should concentrate on first.

[syrinx0]

My household has always recycled what we can. Though it is questionable that our local recycling programs are effective at all given what I have read the last few years.  Hobby waste is way down the list of things I would worry about. 

How much garbage some of my neighbors generate with the same size families is surprising.

[Antonio J Carrasco]

I don't think that wargaming or building plastic kits is a problem for the environment. You can put together the environmental foot print of the production of every wargaming company -GW included-, paint, model kits, glues manufacturers, ecc, since the first plastic kit was in the market to the present and would be a fraction of the footprint for a single car company in one week. So I came to the conclusion that any effort to recycle or reduce my wargaming "environmental footprint" would be an irrelevancy and that it is more important that I got rid of my car and use public transport only -or a rental or car sharing, if absolutely necessary-; take care of not using more electricity or water than I really need and try to recycle as much as I possibly can.

[levied troop]

A plastic milk jug contains about as much plastic as several sprues of models, and people go through several of those a week, etc.

Quite a lot of plastic milk jugs appear to be recyclable these days.

[Hammers]

My household has always recycled what we can. Though it is questionable that our local recycling programs are effective at all given what I have read the last few years.  Hobby waste is way down the list of things I would worry about. 

How much garbage some of my neighbors generate with the same size families is surprising.

This is true. For me, it is also a question of staying in a mind se ät and s habit, rather than calculate the impact of every single choice and action. That is why I keep separating waste etc.

[Harry Faversham]

All a load of bollocks anyway, is recycling!
I used to work at an award winning municipal waste incinerator, all your bin rubbish and carefully sorted recycling crap went there, some of it to be magically, turned into electricity! The bin rubbish was the licence to print money going straight in the furnace, the re-cycled stuff was mere cynical lip service to the Environment Agency.
Have a guess wot happened to all the crap you lot so dutifully sorted out for us into various boxes, bins and wotnots when it snowed? No bin rubbish to burn meant no gorging on the golden goose, so we incinerated all yer re-cycled crap under the cover of darkness, and maintained throughput/profit to the grid.
Best carry on assiduously washing and polishing yer baked bean tins though, it kind of makes you feel good all over, dunnit?

[Blackwolf]

Time to lock the thread please.

[Brummie]

Wondered about this ages ago.

Suffice to say the Wargames industry is so immensely small as to have such a negligible impact on environmental issues as to really not be worth going haywire over. It's a relatively small community, and barring organisations like GW most companies are still garage bands with tight profit margins and turnover. It is worth noting though GW now increasingly have limited production runs and have been forced to utilize green energy to supplement their input. This is due to Nottingham Council refusing to increase their energy allotment after they expanded their warehouse/factory and is also one of the reasons why they're rumored to be considering a move.

In this instance I think any steps someone takes to be environmentally friendly with their hobby is just a case of personal choice/satisfaction. Which is fine and honorable etc.

Though same could be said for a lot of personal decisions that are environmentally motivated, as environmental concerns are predominantly driven by macro events and industries. Relatively speaking my lovely Diesel Volkswagen Scirocco is probably doing more damage than any hundred miniature projects on this forum combined!

Don't get me wrong, it'd be nice if here in the U.K we followed the Norwegian model of recycling etc which literally encourages people to clean up on the basis you're 'renting' packaging. But that is a conversation that takes place well outside the realms of the wargaming hobby as it impacts on everything.