7th grade ODW Benchmark 25-26

from “Benefits of Recycling” 

by the National Institutes of Health

1 How does recycling benefit the environment?

Recycling reduces the use of natural resources by reusing materials:

• 94% of the natural resources used by Americans are non-renewable. Non-renewable, natural resource use has increased from 59% in 1900 and 88% in 1945.

• Recycling saves non-renewable resources. For example, by not recycling paper, 80% more wood will need to be harvested by 2010 to meet growing paper consumption demands. However, through active paper recycling, only 20% more wood will need to be harvested by 2010.

• It takes 95% less energy to recycle aluminum than it does to make it from raw materials.

• Making products from recyclables results in energy savings. Recycled steel saves 60% production energy, recycled newspaper 40%, recycled plastics 70%, and recycled glass 40%.

• Using scrap steel instead of virgin ore to make new steel takes 40% less water and creates 97% less mining waste.

2 How does recycling benefit the economy?

• Incinerating 10,000 tons of waste creates 1 job, while landfilling the same amount creates 6 jobs. Recycling the same 10,000 tons creates 36 jobs!

• The National Recycling Coalition reports that recycling has created 1.1 million jobs, $236 billion in gross annual sales, and $37 billion in annual payroll.

• By meeting the state’s 50% recycling goal, California is expected to create about 45,000 recycling jobs, compared to 20,000 new jobs slated to be created for the manufacturing sector.

• Massachusetts employs more than 9,000 people in more than 200 recycling enterprises. About half of these jobs are in the recycling-based manufacturing sector. These businesses represent more than half a billion dollars in value to the state’s economy.

3 Why is recycling important to future generations?

Natural resources are being depleted and landfills are being filled at an increasing rate. Our current system of production, consumption and disposal has become unsustainable. It is imperative for everyone—from individuals to large organizations—to rethink our ideas and our relationship to trash disposal. By reducing the amount of trash produced and reusing existing materials, we can all make a difference by protecting the environment, conserving natural resources, and sustaining the planet for future generations. . . .

4 Revenue from Recyclable Materials

On average, NIH [National Institutes of Health] receives the following for the value of recyclables on a monthly basis:

(Source 1.2)

This equates to nearly $90,000 per year for the value of these recyclables. This money helps offset the costs of the recycling program.

from “Preventing Waste Is a Better Solution than Recycling It”

by Matt Stern

The author, Matt Stern, is the Seattle area director of recycling for Waste Management.

1. In the early curbside recycling programs of the 1980s and ’90s, our customers sorted their recyclables into three stackable bins. Cans and bottles went into one bin, newspaper into another, mixed paper and cardboard into a third bin. Using this system, the Pacific Northwest became a real leader in recycling.

2. As a society, our recycling evolution was just getting started. We learned that more people recycle more items when we make recycling more convenient, so we replaced the bins with wheeled carts for recyclables. Because the goal was to recycle as much as possible, these “all-in-one” recycling programs became the norm across the county as communities strove to make recycling as easy as possible. . . .

3. Coming full circle, we’ve long known that preventing waste is a much better solution than recycling it. Studies show that some types of new plastic-packaging technology use fewer natural resources and create less greenhouse-gas emissions than the traditional types of packaging—even when the new packaging is non-recyclable. In multiple studies, non-recyclable plastic pouches— such as FedEx pouches and those used for juice and some types of soup—are a much better choice from a greenhouse-gas-emissions perspective because they are lightweight and use less virgin resources than the recyclable materials they replace. The use of these pouches is growing because consumers love their convenience. In addition, they make environmental sense—yes, even though they are not recyclable.

from “Preventing Trash at the Source”

by the United States Environmental Protection Agency

1. Marine debris is often the result of poorly-managed waste on land. Between 1960 and 2013, the average amount of trash generated by each person in the U.S. nearly doubled from 2.68 to 4.40 pounds per day. As litter, this waste can end up in waterways and flow downstream into the oceans, where it becomes marine debris.

2. The most effective way to prevent marine and aquatic debris is to prevent waste in the first place. This is known as source reduction, or pollution prevention. We can reduce waste by considering packaging when buying anything, and we can reuse materials like containers and products. We can also use reusable items. For example, bring your own silverware and cup to work, rather than use disposables that are tossed every day. Lastly, we can recycle almost anything from plastics to electronics, depending on local recycling capabilities.

3. These principles are in EPA’s Waste Management Hierarchy, which ranks waste management strategies from best to least effective.

(Source 1.5)