Why do we recycle? You were taught in grade school that in order to “save the planet” we need to recycle. We recycle paper, plastic, cardboard, aluminum, glass, plastic, etc. We recycle to save landfill space, trees, energy, and money. We started recycling out of fear but in reality, everything we are afraid of isn't being helped by recycling. It's being made worse. I hope you come into my essay with an open mind and without biased opinions. First, let’s talk regarding “saving the trees”. According to Jerry Taylor, Director of National Resource studies at Cato Institute, approximately 80% of all material recycled today is paper and 87% of our paper comes from trees that are grown as a crop specifically for paper production. Companies grow trees just for paper, hence saying that we’re wasting trees by making paper is like saying we’re wasting potatoes by making french fries. As long as we use paper, they will always keep growing more trees. “America has 3 ½ times more forest land than it did in 1920. We are growing 22 million new acres of forest annually, while only harvesting 15 million acres. That's a net gain of 7 million acres a year.” (Jerry Taylor, 2015). It's also important to understand that trees are used for more than just paper products. Like Natives used every part of the buffalo, we use every part of the tree, The twigs are used for fuel, the trunk is lumber and the branches (pulpwood) are used for paper. After learning these facts I can’t help but wonder why everyone was taught this. It’s obvious to me now that trees aren’t dying out due to paper, provided that, why even recycle it? Well, another reason is to save landfill space. In 1987, the Mobro 4000 floated back and forth along the east coast from New York to Belize until it could find a place to raze New York’s 3,168 tons of trash. This prodigious barge full of disgusting trash traveled along the coast from March to October. The media and the EPA saw their opportunity to engender fear and panic and ran with it. They had everyone watching the Mobro on the news, telling the American people that we were running out of landfill space and if we didn’t start recycling now we’d be buried in our trash. The Environmental Protection Agency
Imagine you wake up in 20 years and all you see out your window is trash lining the streets and roads. This is what is going to happen if we don’t start recycling now. If we all start recycling now we will have beautiful streets and roads not full of trash. I picked this topic because it is a worldwide problem and I think this topic can be solved. I was very curious about this topic and I wanted to know more about recycling.These are some driving questions I had at the beginning of this project. Why don’t a lot of people recycle? What is the most recycled item? Where is recycling a very big problem in the world? How can more people be involved with recycling? How many people and animals get affected by recycling every year? My driving question was how can we as people create a better recycling society.
It’s a hot summer day and you’re enjoying your nice, cold, refreshing soda from a plastic bottle. You notice a blue bin labeled for plastic recycling and go to chuck it in however you may want to think twice before you do. Everyone has been told time and time again by teachers, peers, and family alike to recycle once in their life. It’s commonly accepted that recycling materials like paper, glass, and plastics will help our environment and our health. However recycling plastics is far more bad than good to both our health and the environment. Recycling plastics is harmful to the environment and human health and we must find a more responsible way to use plastics, recycle them, or do away with them.
Worldwide we are seeing a devastation of our forests due to paper production. Consumption of wood products has risen 64% since 1961. Globally, pulp for paper, has risen from 40% in 1998, to an expected 60% over the next 50 years. The industry expects that demand to double by 2050. The U.S. consumes 200,000,000 tons of wood products annually, increasing by 4% every year. U.S. paper producers consume 1 billion trees each year (735 pounds of paper for every American). U.S. at 5% of world population consumes 30% of world’s paper. Only 5% of virgin forests remain in the U.S.
Americans have yet to face the unnerving reality of the fact that “in 2008 only 7.1% of the 30.05 million tons of plastic waste in America was recycled” (Linn). This low percentage is shocking, outrageous, and should terrify the American public, but this number can change. Recycling is not just a feel good experience; it is a way to help save energy, space, and money. However, with the enormous amount of trash being thrown out each year, landfills are increasing in size creating numerous issues. The staggering amount of waste increases greenhouse gases, contributing to global warming and building up dangerous toxins that sink underground into our soil and water, overflows into wildlife habitats and oceans, and costs a large amount of money to remove. By fining residents who incorrectly dispose of recyclable goods, implementing recycling as a requirement in educational institutions and other business and residential settings, categorizing the
“Recycling Banks have enlisted more then 1 million people in 20 states to help save the planet” (Altmen, A. 2009, para.1). Are you part of this. Whether you are doing your own or part of a group. Are we doing our part to help save our palnet? Are we doing all that we can be doing. We can start out little by doing something locally like we are doing. If you make an impact locally it will get attention and spread farhter as it gets attention. We are proposing that cans and bottle get recycled in resturaunts and bars. We chose these items because these are the most common items that are able to be recylced in the resturaunts and bars and they are produced the most.
Global warming is caused by several things. One of these is the release of carbon dioxide into the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by using energy generated from burning fossil fuels.
When you talk about the worlds polluted oceans and issues with our rain forests, many people think how can I help I am only one person. I believe that curbside recycling can help show individuals that they to can make a difference in making our planet healthier to live on.
These days, our earth has been filled by a lot of waste. There is a lot of garbage, plastic waste, and electronic waste. We always produce it and dump it when we need the new one. Our waste are piling up and continuously accumulating. Plastic waste is one of the biggest problems for us now. And our solution in this problem is recycling. In my opinion, recycling is a way to manage used items into new products. We can reduce, reuse, and recycling (3R) waste management (Peter, 2013). We can reduce our waste clothes with reuse it. There are some reasons why peoples recycle used or unwanted items, which are, prevent wasting unusable materials that still have usage after recycled, reduce the application of raw materials, reduce energy
People Need to Recycle In the United Sates, where the population is inflated every year. The amount of space for landfills decreases every day. The need for recycling should not be asked, it should just be done out of habit. Everyone in America needs to recycle, to help the lamdfill problem, help the environment, and help produce new products from recycled goods. In America there is about two-hundred and eight tons of residential and commercial trash generated a year, 4.3 pounds per person a day (Prichard 1A). This is an overwhelming amount of trashed produced yearly. When people recycle this number can be drastically cut. But many people do not practice and use
We don't have to be a genius to be aware of global environmental mess we created over the
Talking about recycling is easy, actually enforcing the act is a bit harder. As I begin to become more aware of the reasons to recycle, I find myself taking the time to stop and think before I choose the garbage can or recycling bin. In its simplest form recycling is taking used products and instead of discarding them and finding ways to reuse (Strong, 1997).Though the long-term consequences of pollution is unknown, early indicators suggest consequences could devastate many life forms and pose
For example, by recycling paper, “17 trees for every ton of paper” (Martin, 2006) are saved. Thus, recycling is helping to protect the environment because fewer trees are being cut down. Also, by recycling, less waste is put into landfills which they are more harmful to the environment (Martin, 2006). In addition, according to Bill Sheehan, trees absorb carbon dioxide and recycling is reducing the greenhouse gases as a result of protecting trees. He is strongly in favor of recycling because he promotes zero waste by having implemented Zero waste resource management systems which the goal is to educate organizations to take good habits for protecting the environment (Sheehan, 2000).
Humans are drawn towards what is morally good. Whether it is accepting responsibility for a person’s actions or giving generously to those in need, everyone feels compelled to do honorable actions. Many people feel obligated to recycle because recycling makes them feel good about themselves. In fact, some people are pushing for a mandatory recycling policy without realizing the effects it will have. Many are misinformed and do not realize the problems that can arise when they recycle. A mandatory recycling policy should not be enforced because the disadvantages outweigh the advantages.
Valuing nature and the ecosystem is important because it affects us all. When an ecosystem is upset, it can throw a whole town or city out of sync. A ecosystem is like a row of dominoes if one falls they all fall. Which can be disastrous for the nearby populace is can lead to flooding, animals going extinct, water shortage, food shortage and unmanageable pollution will cause health problems. Which is why it is important that we take care of our ecosystem and value nature because if we don’t it can be potentially deadly. Despite this, many people continue to disrespect nature and the ecosystem. Recycling is one way that we can show that we value the environment and nature, because it results in less waste ending up in landfills. Recycling also helps lower the levels of pollution. The problem is that most Americans can’t and won’t effectively recycle. Emphasizing the importance of recycling and how to recycle is another way that portrays how we value the ecosystem. As well as helping better the environment for future
No matter what you do in this life you will always contribute in someway to producing trash. While you may not think so everything you do will produce some type of waste. While recording my trash that I have accumulated these fast three weeks I have noticed a trend. The trend is that every day that I drive to school I end up buying some type of food while I am at school. Most of this trash consisted of paper based products, which can be recycled but in most of the establishments do not have a recycling option because most of the things that can be recycled are covered in food waste so they are viewed as trash. During the weekends I work from sun up to sun down so I can produce a lot of waste in that time frame. Some examples of this are rotors from a truck to shingles from a roof and while each rotor does not take up a lot of space there is a lot of material that will not be broken down. The shingles while they do not weigh that much there is a lot of them and can accumulate quickly. With these shingle you have things such as tarpaper, nails, and staples that will all be thrown away because they cannot be reused. It would be so encumber some to try and collect all of these nails and staples it would increase the length of the job by at least a couple hours. The shingles cannot be reused for any purpose so the only thing to do with them is to take them to the dump. While one roof that’s no problem but if you think about how many people have their roofs redone in a year the