It’s Not Trash If It Still Has Value
While most people are familiar with the idea of recycling, what they may not realize is how much easier it has become to recycle today, and how important it is. With advances in technology it is almost as easy to recycle as it is to just throw something away. The limited space in our landfills and the limited resources on earth make this issue one of growing and critical importance. Given these facts, it becomes more and more important to educate consumers on how to incorporate recycling into their everyday life.
Each person in the United States creates about 4.7 lbs of waste everyday (recyclingfacts.org), which makes the U.S. the world leader in most waste per person. Ground water provides about half of the drinking and cleaning water in the U.S.. Landfills may cause future problems with this water source since the trash decomposes and releases chemicals that can go into the ground, and into the ground water (elibrary.bigtalk.com).
Recycling has made a difference already, although we still throw away so much. In 2007, the amount of materials recycled saved 10.7 billion gallons of gasoline that would have been used to make the materials from scratch again; it also prevented the release of carbon dioxide equivalent to the emissions of about 35 million cars. When aluminum cans are recycled they can be made into many different items like: license plates, pie plates, aluminum cans, tin foil, thumbtacks, and many other things. This beats the alternative, so a person can either recycle the aluminum can and make new things with it, or throw it away and let it sit in a landfill for 80-100 years, the amount of time it takes for an aluminum can to decompose (recyclingfacts.org). Recycling just one aluminum can save enough energy to power a TV for two hours, a computer for three hours, or a 100-watt light bulb for 20 hours. Aluminum cans are a large part of Americans everyday life, and an average of 100 million aluminum cans are used every day (oberlin.edu).
Glass is something else that is commonly used, and also thrown away. Glass takes over a million years to decompose when it just gets thrown away. But when it is recycled it can be made into different things: jars, dishes, glass bottles, drinking glasses, jewelry, coffee mugs, and many other things (recyclingfacts.org). On average, every two weeks Americans throw away enough glass bottles and jars to fill the former World Trade Center (oberlin.edu).
The United States generates about 369 million tons of waste every year. Michigan, which rates 30th of the 50 states in recycling, is 20 percent lower than the other eight Great Lake states. Michigan is the only state in which recycling has decreased over the last ten years. Thirty-seven percent of people who live in Michigan have curbside recycling, which leaves 63 percentage of residents who just throw things away since there is no easy access to recycling for them, which makes it more of a chore (michiganrecyclingpartnership.com).
However, in our state it is illegal to throw away certain things in landfills. Michigan Act 34 makes it illegal to throw away: yard clippings, used beverage containers, medical waste, liquid waste, used oil, among other things (bordercenter.org).
One university in Michigan, Grand Valley State University, has made a particularly large commitment to becoming “green,” and to utilizing the latest techniques in reducing energy and material use. The recycling program started in the 2002-2003 school year, and they recycled about 500 tons of different types of resources that year. The recycling program started with the average items such as paper, plastic, cardboard, books, tin, metal, glass, computers, batteries, and light bulbs. Over the years they have started to recycle even more things, such as pallets, and they have started to compost. In the school year 2009-2010, Grand Valley University recycled a total of 787.8 tons, which was 36.7 percent of their total waste (gvsu.edu).
Wanting to get a student’s perspective on this, I interviewed someone whom attends Grand Valley University, Elizabeth Strach, a freshman. She enjoyed telling me about how easy it is to recycle at Grand Valley, and how much more aware she has become of the environment since she has started attending Grand Valley. She really likes how easy it is to recycle there, as there are recycling bins in every room. And in the cafeteria how it is actually harder to throw things away than it is to recycle things or compost them. To make recycling the easiest choice they have two recycling bins, and two compost bins, for every trash can.
I was curious about the recycling habits of my fellow sophomores at St. Joseph High School. I interviewed 44 students and 84 percent said they recycled and 16 percent said they didn’t. I then asked what they recycled and where. The most commonly recycled thing was plastic and bottles/cans, the thing that people recycled the least were batteries, and then light bulbs. The most common places for people to recycle were at school and home, and the reasons most people did it was because their parents do, and the other leading reason was the fact that it is good for the environment.
Progress is being made: we have a heightened awareness of the value of recycling and the cost of not recycling. States such as Michigan are introducing laws to require recycling, and businesses are beginning to embrace recycling as well. These are very positive signs, and while many people are increasing the amount of recycling they do, there is still room to do more. The challenge is educating the public and getting them to change. People are realizing how crucial it is to recycle, and we are all learning about how to use our limited resources and how to reuse them again. It not only saves those materials, but also saves the earth from being further polluted. Continued education is the key to this problem. I hope this paper will encourage discussion and that the power of word-of-mouth will get the information to move even further so more positive actions can be taken.
Each person in the United States creates about 4.7 lbs of waste everyday (recyclingfacts.org), which makes the U.S. the world leader in most waste per person. Ground water provides about half of the drinking and cleaning water in the U.S.. Landfills may cause future problems with this water source since the trash decomposes and releases chemicals that can go into the ground, and into the ground water (elibrary.bigtalk.com).
Recycling has made a difference already, although we still throw away so much. In 2007, the amount of materials recycled saved 10.7 billion gallons of gasoline that would have been used to make the materials from scratch again; it also prevented the release of carbon dioxide equivalent to the emissions of about 35 million cars. When aluminum cans are recycled they can be made into many different items like: license plates, pie plates, aluminum cans, tin foil, thumbtacks, and many other things. This beats the alternative, so a person can either recycle the aluminum can and make new things with it, or throw it away and let it sit in a landfill for 80-100 years, the amount of time it takes for an aluminum can to decompose (recyclingfacts.org). Recycling just one aluminum can save enough energy to power a TV for two hours, a computer for three hours, or a 100-watt light bulb for 20 hours. Aluminum cans are a large part of Americans everyday life, and an average of 100 million aluminum cans are used every day (oberlin.edu).
Glass is something else that is commonly used, and also thrown away. Glass takes over a million years to decompose when it just gets thrown away. But when it is recycled it can be made into different things: jars, dishes, glass bottles, drinking glasses, jewelry, coffee mugs, and many other things (recyclingfacts.org). On average, every two weeks Americans throw away enough glass bottles and jars to fill the former World Trade Center (oberlin.edu).
The United States generates about 369 million tons of waste every year. Michigan, which rates 30th of the 50 states in recycling, is 20 percent lower than the other eight Great Lake states. Michigan is the only state in which recycling has decreased over the last ten years. Thirty-seven percent of people who live in Michigan have curbside recycling, which leaves 63 percentage of residents who just throw things away since there is no easy access to recycling for them, which makes it more of a chore (michiganrecyclingpartnership.com).
However, in our state it is illegal to throw away certain things in landfills. Michigan Act 34 makes it illegal to throw away: yard clippings, used beverage containers, medical waste, liquid waste, used oil, among other things (bordercenter.org).
One university in Michigan, Grand Valley State University, has made a particularly large commitment to becoming “green,” and to utilizing the latest techniques in reducing energy and material use. The recycling program started in the 2002-2003 school year, and they recycled about 500 tons of different types of resources that year. The recycling program started with the average items such as paper, plastic, cardboard, books, tin, metal, glass, computers, batteries, and light bulbs. Over the years they have started to recycle even more things, such as pallets, and they have started to compost. In the school year 2009-2010, Grand Valley University recycled a total of 787.8 tons, which was 36.7 percent of their total waste (gvsu.edu).
Wanting to get a student’s perspective on this, I interviewed someone whom attends Grand Valley University, Elizabeth Strach, a freshman. She enjoyed telling me about how easy it is to recycle at Grand Valley, and how much more aware she has become of the environment since she has started attending Grand Valley. She really likes how easy it is to recycle there, as there are recycling bins in every room. And in the cafeteria how it is actually harder to throw things away than it is to recycle things or compost them. To make recycling the easiest choice they have two recycling bins, and two compost bins, for every trash can.
I was curious about the recycling habits of my fellow sophomores at St. Joseph High School. I interviewed 44 students and 84 percent said they recycled and 16 percent said they didn’t. I then asked what they recycled and where. The most commonly recycled thing was plastic and bottles/cans, the thing that people recycled the least were batteries, and then light bulbs. The most common places for people to recycle were at school and home, and the reasons most people did it was because their parents do, and the other leading reason was the fact that it is good for the environment.
Progress is being made: we have a heightened awareness of the value of recycling and the cost of not recycling. States such as Michigan are introducing laws to require recycling, and businesses are beginning to embrace recycling as well. These are very positive signs, and while many people are increasing the amount of recycling they do, there is still room to do more. The challenge is educating the public and getting them to change. People are realizing how crucial it is to recycle, and we are all learning about how to use our limited resources and how to reuse them again. It not only saves those materials, but also saves the earth from being further polluted. Continued education is the key to this problem. I hope this paper will encourage discussion and that the power of word-of-mouth will get the information to move even further so more positive actions can be taken.