Looking for ways of reducing the amount of rubbish you're sending to the landfill? Get inspired by The Clean Bin Project.

From July 2008 to July 2009, the Canadians Grant Baldwin and Jen Rustemeyer attempted to live without producing waste, and managed to reduce their annual garbage from over 200kg per person to just one grocery bag. Amazing !

The golden rules to achieve their Towards Zero Waste goal :

• avoiding bying material goods
• avoiding packaging
• composting, reusing and recycling

The Clean Bin Project has also been turned into an awards wining documentary film now on tour in NZ. Recently screened as part of Reel Earth, Environmental Film Festival in Palmerston North, the movie will next be screened in Waitakere City on Friday, 1st of June.

Sustainable Coastlines are organising a big Beach Clean-Up on Saturday 31st March at locations all up the North Shore. Hop on the ferry to Devonport and lend a helping hand. For times and details click here.

Last April over 900 volunteers removed over 3 tonnes of rubbish from this urban coastline. Sadly, it just keeps coming though so go along and help keep the Hauraki Gulf clean.

If you can't make it along, why not organise your own beach clean-up right here on Waiheke. Gather some friends, take a picnic, enjoy one of our beautiful coastal walks and pick up a bag of rubbish along the way.

Win a camera every week

Care about the Waiheke coastline? Want to help keep it clean? Take a photo of yourself, your friends or your family picking up rubbish on one of our beautiful beaches or coastal walks and go in the New Zealand Herald draw to win a Sony Cyber-shot TX10, valued at $649.95.

There's one camera a week up for grabs every week for the next 10 weeks to the person who takes the best photo, as judged by Herald on Sunday illustrations editor Chris Marriner. Five runners-up will each receive a copy of the book Beached As - New Zealand Beaches Then and Now by Craig Levers.

GRAND PRIZE

At the end of our Beach Busters campaign, the overall winner will receive a grand prize package comprising:

* a Sony Tablet S valued at $749.95

* a dive, snorkel or sightseeing trip for two to the Poor Knights Marine Reserve courtesy of Dive! Tutukaka

* $400 worth of clothing from surf label Sitka.

Entries close each week at Friday noon, and the winning photo will be printed each Sunday. So get snapping, and email your best shot as a JPEG to with 'Beach Busters' in the subject line. Make sure you include your name, address and daytime phone number. Include a caption giving the place and full names of the people in the photo.

Please see terms and conditions at www.nzherald.co.nz/HOScompetitions. APN New Zealand reserves the right to store electronically any pictures entered in the competition and to use the images in any of its publications.

This week's Artist in Residence at Incubator in Artworks is Brett Oakes, the sculptor behind the very over-sized disposable coffee cup seen at last years Headland Sculpture on the Gulf. 

Brett's coffee cup is called Throw Away Fix in reference to the huge number of disposable cups heading to landfill after just a few minutes use and the coffee cup lid can be viewed until Sunday at his temporary Artworks studio.

Disposable cups aren't recyclable because they are generally made of mixed materials. This means they hit landfill after just one use and take many years to break down; a moment on the lips and a life time in the tips. Something to think about next time you grab a takeaway coffee. 

If you're looking for an alternative, grab a reuse-able Keep Cup from Waiheke Fruit & Vege, Lazy Lounge or Island Thyme or take a couple of minutes and sit down for your cuppa at the cafe.

As for Bio Cups & 'compostable' coffee cups, these are only compostable if they make to the compost. So make sure you throw these in your compost pile rather than the bin (just make sure you take the lid off first!).