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Source: http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/muncpl/facts.htm
The Current State of Recycling in the United States:
Recycling has made big strides in recent years, though there is still plenty of room for improvement. Twenty years ago, the United States had only one curbside recycling program; by 1998, that number had increased to 9,000, along with 12,000 drop-off recycling centers and 480 facilities to process all of the recyclables collected. In 1999, the efforts of recycling programs saved 64 million tons of waste from ending up in landfills or incinerators. The recycling options available vary from one community to another, so one must check with the municipality to find out the extent of its recycling program. This may require a little effort, but the benefits that result far outweigh the small amount of time lost. With convenient curbside recycling available in many places, the only obstacles to increased recycling participation are lack of awareness and habitual laziness.
In 2001, the American public generated 229.2 million tons of trash, a decrease of 1.2% from 2000. The recovery rate for recyclables (including composted material) rose to 29.7%. By comparison, the recovery rate in 1990 was 16.2%, and in 1980, only 9.6%, while the United States produced 205.2 and 151.6 million tons of waste in those years, respectively. The 2001 analysis reveals that recycling retrieved 44.9% of the paper and paperboard, 34.5% of the metals, 19.1% of the glass, and 5.5% of the plastics generated nationally (by weight).
Most people recognize the positive impact recycling has on the environment. However, some think that only large-scale action can really make a difference. While it remains true that recycling, like any other effort, becomes more beneficial as it increases in magnitude, the deeds of individual people have significant effects. Here are some interesting facts about recycling to illustrate how much we can save by reducing waste.
Target Items:
Paper and paperboard are also valuable for their reuse potential - they can be reprocessed fairly easily into a range of new paper products. Often a city or town will finance a portion of its recycling program through income from the sale of recyclable items like paper and metal that are valuable since they can be completely recycled into new products. On average, it costs thirty dollars to recycle a ton of trash, fifty dollars to send it to the landfill, and between sixty-five and seventy-five dollars to incinerate it. Many people believe mistakenly that paper products break down in landfills since they are biodegradable. However, the sealed nature of a landfill prevents decomposition from occurring. An analysis of landfill contents in the late 1990s unearthed intact, readable newspapers from the Depression era. The same study also showed that paper products were the leading component of trash in landfills.
Although batteries constitute a small segment of waste by weight and volume, the fact that they contain potentially hazardous chemicals gives them disproportionate significance. Batteries contain acid that can burn human skin if released. The heavy metals in them pollute the environment as they leach out of landfills. Incinerating batteries poses a threat because of their explosive qualities; furthermore, it vaporizes heavy metals and acids that harm the atmosphere and eventually contaminate the water supply. Some batteries contain lead or mercury, which have serious negative effects for the world’s ecosystems. The different kinds of batteries (alkaline, nickel-cadmium, lead-acid, and lithium, to name a few) present different hazards. Recycling batteries allows for reclamation of the metals they contain and protects the natural world from pollution.
* Manufacturing aluminum cans from recycled aluminum requires 95% less energy than using new aluminum ore; the energy saved could power a television for three hours or run a 100-watt incandescent light bulb for almost four hours.
* Throwing an aluminum can in the trash wastes as much energy as pouring out half that can's volume of gasoline.
* More than 20,000,000 Hershey's Kisses are wrapped each day, using 133 square miles of aluminum foil. All that foil is recyclable, but not many people realize it.
* Between 1990-2000, Americans wasted more than 7 million tons of aluminum cans, enough to reproduce the world's entire commercial air fleet 25 times.
* The energy saved from recycling one glass bottle could power a 100-watt incandescent light bulb for fours hours, and causes 20% less air pollution and 50% less water pollution than producing a new bottle from raw materials.
* Americans toss about one-third of all single beverage containers away from home. Nearly 90% of the plastic water bottles we use get tossed out or become litter.
* Recycling a single run of the Sunday New York Times would save 75,000 trees; recycling all our newspaper would save about 250,000,000 trees each year.
* Each ton of paper recycled saves 17 trees, 380 gallons of oil, 3 cubic yards of landfill space, 4000 kilowatt-hours of energy, and 7000 gallons of water. These 17 trees could remove 250 pounds of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
* Making recycled steel requires only 40% of the energy of manufacturing it from virgin ore; similarly, recycled newspaper uses 60% of the energy, and recycled plastics 30% of the energy of making these things from raw materials.
* One year of recycling on just one college campus,
* The EPA estimates that 75% of what Americans throw in the trash could be recycled. Currently, only 25% is.
* Recycling 35% of our trash would reduce greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to taking 36,000,000 cars off the road.
* More than 20,000 communities (63% of the
Since using energy and extracting new raw materials are expensive, recycling makes good economic sense as well. In many places, a recycling program is offered free of charge, and community curbside recycling makes it convenient. The
http://www.earth911.org (an organization dedicated to raising public awareness of environmental issues)
http://www.recycling-revolution.com (a site that compiles data from the other sites I referenced)
http://www.epa.gov (The Environmental Protection Agency)
http://www.plasticsresouce.com (The American Plastics Council)
http://www.nrc-recycle.org (National Recycling Coalition)