This means that when evaluating the sustainability of a product the following attributes will be ranked, with the most sustainable being 1 and least being 6:
1. Elimination of the need of a product in the first place
2. De-materialization - smaller product/packaging and/or longer lifespan of product/packaging
3. Reusable product instead of a disposable product
4. Recyclable or biodegradable product instead of a non-recyclable/non-biodegradable product
5. A product that can be incinerated with energy recovery or some other process for energy recovery
6. Product can only be landfilled
The more attributes a product has at the top of the list, the more sustainable it is thought to be. So the best case scenario would be a product that has a reduced size, is reusable, has a long life span, and can be recycled at end-of-life. Worst case scenario would be a product that is only used once and is then landfilled.
Please note that this is not a perfect rule of thumb. For example, it is possible that a disposable yet biodegradable product/packaging could be more sustainable than a reusable product because the manufacturing impact of the reusable product/package is large and the re-use pattern of the product/packaging is not enough to offset this large manufacturing impact.
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