Why should I Recycle?
How about the following reasons.....Americans generate about 222 million tons of trash annually. On average, each one of us generates 4-5 pounds of trash daily. When we send all of this waste to landfills they fill up quickly. Therefore, recycling has become an important part of our waste management system. By recycling a significant portion of our waste, we save landfill space and get the following benefits in the process:
- Recycling helps conserve natural resources (trees, water, metals, oil, coal) that are used in the production of new products.
- Recycling helps reduce the demand for energy. Less energy is required to produce products from recycled materials than with virgin materials. Consider this: It takes the same amount of energy to make 20 recycled aluminum cans as it take to make one can from virgin materials. That is a 95% energy savings!
- Since less energy is used, less pollution is produced. Many industries burn fossil fuels (coal, oil) for energy. Burning coal produces sulphur dioxide, which is one of our biggest and worst air pollutants.
