Interesting Facts About Waste and Recycling
Here are some interesting facts about waste and recycling courtesy of Revive Your Life, an online resource dedicated to providing information and resources to promote positive change.
On average, people use seven trees a year in paper, wood, and other products made from trees. Over a lifetime, this amounts to approximately 525 trees.
It takes approximately 83 trees to produce the junk-mail that you will receive in your lifetime. You will waste 8 full months of your life opening this junk-mail. This fact may change as marketing becomes more centered on digital marketing, if that trend results in a reduction in paper junk mail.
People produce approximately 4.4 pounds of solid waste each day. This adds up to almost 60 tons of trash over the course of your lifetime.
You use paper more than any other material. During your lifetime, you use more than 53,500 pounds (27 tons) of paper. Paper accounts for more than 25 percent of all landfill waste. By recycling only half of your total usage, you would save 221 trees, 91,000 gallons of water, and 1,027 gallons of oil – all used in the production of new paper.
You will throw out approximately two tons of steel or “tin” cans in your lifetime, all of which could be recycled. Recycling two tons of steel conserves 5,000 lbs. of iron ore, 2,800 lbs. of coal, and 240 lbs. of limestone from natural resources.
By recycling all of your waste newsprint, cardboard, glass, and metal, you would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 63,750 pounds during your lifetime. This emissions savings is equivalent to the amount of carbon dioxide produced by your car over a period of 5 years.
For more of these interesting facts you can go to Revive Your Life. You can also click on this link for information on recycling scrap metal.
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