| Each year in the United States we throw away . . . |
- 22 billion plastic bottles (that's 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour). EPA
- Enough office and writing paper to build a 12-foot high wall from Los Angeles, CA to New York City, NY. EPA
- Over 200 million tires (that's almost one for every person in the U.S.) EPA
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Do you see a trend here? In the U.S. we use a lot of stuff and then throw it away. Lucky for us you care (or else you wouldn't be reading this now) and probably recycle and reduce what you use. GOOD JOB! KEEP IT UP! |
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| Recycling . . . |
- 3 feet of paper (about 3 months of the daily newspaper) saves 1 tree.
- 1 aluminum can saves enough energy to keep a 100-watt light bulb burning for almost four hours or run your television for 3 hours. ODNR
- The amount of steel recovered through recycled packaging in 1998 (more than 1.4 million tons ) would yield enough steel to build 60 Ambassador Bridges.* SRI
- *The Ambassador Bridge links Detroit, MI and Windsor, Ont. and was made with almost 27,000 tons of steel. AB
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Recycling is easy and saves natural resources and energy! |
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| Glass has been made roughly the same way for thousands of years. The main ingredient of glass is sand. Other additives include soda ash (helps sand melt at a lower temperature), limestone (makes the glass stronger), cullet (recycled glass). GPI |
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History is way cool! |
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| The residents of Ann Arbor produce enough solid waste (garbage, recyclables, and compost) to fill the University of Michigan Stadium a little over one time each year. A2 SWD & UM
Oh, and by the way Michigan Stadium is HUGE it seats over 107,500 people! |
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While that is a lot of stuff, Ann Arbor recovers over 1/2 of it's residential solid waste, through recycling and composting, making it one of the best recovery rates in the country. |
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| Decomposition is when things break down into their most basic pieces. If these items were thrown by the side of the road this is the order in which they would break down. TRT |
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a banana peel --> 2-5 weeks
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a newspaper --> less than 1 year
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an aluminum can --> 200 - 500 years
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a glass jar --> 1,000,000 years
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a common petroleum (oil) based plastic bottle --> never? |
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In today's modern landfills, many materials do not have enough air, water, or sunlight to decompose properly, if at all. |
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| If we looked inside the municipal solid waste thrown away in the United States we would find the following: EPA |
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| Paper - 39% |
Metal - 8% |
| Yard waste - 13% |
Glass - 6% |
| Food waste - 10% |
Wood - 5% |
| Plastics - 10% |
Other - 10 % |
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Look how much paper is thrown away! We can recycle a lot of that paper and save trees and other natural resources too. |
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| Sources: |
| (A2 SWD) Ann Arbor Solid Waste Department |
| (AB) The Ambassador Bridge |
| (EPA) U.S. Environmental Protection Agency |
| (EWG) Earth Works Group "The Recycler's Handbook" |
| (GPI) Glass Packaging Institute |
| (ODNR) Ohio Department of Natural Resources |
| (SRI) Steel Recycling Institute |
| (TRT) 3-2-1 Contact's video "The Rotten Truth" |
| (UM) University of Michigan Recycling |
| (WISE) Waste Information Series for Education |
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Try these activities!! Quick Quiz, Before and After |