The act of recycling is actually quite ironic. Trash is thrown into recycling bins then hauled off to factories where it is separated into different categories depending on it’s physical make up. First off, the giant trash truck picking up the materials is setting off carbon dioxide. Second, once the materials have arrived at the factory, even more carbon dioxide pollutes the air from the fumes set off by melting plastics and other materials. Recycling was invented to make the world a better place and save the environment. Instead, it is doing the exact opposite. Recycling is overrated. It’s another excuse to use mass quantities of plastic and paper. Without the world’s will power to effectively recycle, it is impossible to execute successful recycling that actually makes a difference. Recycling was made to save the planet but unfortunately, it is damaging the environment. Multiple buildings in Taiwan made from recycled steel have been giving off gamma radiation for almost twelve years now (10 Ways Recycling Hurts the Environment). Gamma radiation is dangerous to the human body. It can destroy cells and eventually lead to tumors and mutations. Speaking of radioactivity, batteries are also being recycled entirely wrong. When batteries die (specifically car batteries), it is assumed they are no longer of any use. In actuality, the batteries still have a long life ahead of them. In some studies, it is shown that after most car batteries have “died,” they still have seventy percent State of Health, compared to a brand new battery which has 100% (Chandan). In order to make this effective, the timing of recycling batteries should be carefully monitored. In the beginning, recycling was created solely for the purpose of saving the world. It was taking one mans trash and giving it a new purpose. As time has passed, recycling has become an excuse to be wasteful. People think they can use as much as they want because they have a magical blue container that they place at the end of their driveway every Thursday morning. This does nothing but teach people that it’s acceptable to be wasteful. This sets off a chain reaction, people don’t realize plastics are labeled one to seven depending on their melting temperatures.
Recycling and conservation are the solution to climate change and to saving energy. America sends a majority of its trash to landfills when it could be put to much better use by means of recycling or even by burning it to produce energy. Pollution is greatly reduced when recycling because the need to collect new raw materials goes down. Recycling is great because it can help people conserve this Earth for future generations who deserve to have a healthy Earth. Once the United Stated reaches recycling levels of 75%, it would be the equivalent of getting rid of fifty five million cars from the roads in the U.S. each year.
Recycling has been the environmental crusade to reducing the human footprint, with it’s spotlight shining down on in recent years. It was the noblest of causes, recycling being a great idea for the environment and society; but it is being handled poorly. Its modern descendant has turned into a corporate scheme with recycling becoming a business, instead of being about the environment because marketers are using environmentalism as a excuse for overconsumption, recycling products are only being recycled for profit, and cities & big business use inflated numbers to attain media attention. Let’s now take a look at the bread and butter of
Recycling is the process of making new products from a product that has originally served its purpose. The process of recycling starts when used products are disposed in an appropriate, environmentally friendly way. Items made from materials such as paper, tin cans, aluminum cans, plastic water bottles, and glass, which people use in everyday life, can be separated from regular trash and put in an appropriate recycling bin. The United States now realizes the importance of recycling. However, many ignorant people still think separating recyclables requires too much work. Requiring mandatory recycling would prod these individuals into action. Lack of recycling leads to dramatic consequences such as polluting the environment and raising the number of landfills. Delay is critical; time plays a significant role in waste management. The sooner American communities recycle properly the better it will be for the environment and our surroundings. People need to become conscious and take responsibility as a society to protect the earth, keep it clean and beautiful, and preserve the natural resources. The United States can achieve this goal by implementing mandatory recycling.
Many people say that recycling is a waste of time or that they just don't have the time.”Yes it’s popular in affluent neighborhoods like Park Slope in Brooklyn and in cities like San Francisco, but residents of Bryon and Houston don't have the same fervor for sorting garbage in their spare time’(“The Reign of Recycling”). The world needs more people to recycle no matter where they live. It seems that even if more people have started recycling things have not changed much.”While it’s true that the recycling message has reached more people than ever, when it come down to the bottom line,both economically and environmentally, not much has changed at all”(“The Reign of Recycling”). People need to work harder to make a change that will account to something. The goals are being set higher and higher but with little success. ”While politicians set higher and higher goals, the national rate of recycling has stagnated in recent years”(“The Reign of Recycling”). This rate has ceased to flow. If something changes how people feel about recycling then the nation may be able to meet its
One of the biggest reasons recycling should be taken so serious is because of its positive affect on the environment. Without recycling, so many goods that have potential to be repurposed are thrown into landfills. These landfills are piled up and affect the lives of countless wildlife. This quote by Allen Hershkowitz shows the enormity of the helpfulness of recycling. “Because using recycled materials reduces the need to extract, process, refine, and transport the timber, crude petroleum, ores, and so on that are necessary for virgin-based paper, plastics, glass, and metals, recycling lessens the toxic air emissions, effluents, and solid wastes that these manufacturing processes create” (Hershkowitz). Not having to put the weight of everyone’s trash trash on the world’s land and instead, repurposing it into something usable saves so many resources. Recycling not only leaves more room for things where the trash would have gone, but it also means that the people living here will get farther with the resources they have. The more that is taken from the earth the less there will be for those in the future, so saving and taking care of what is here is very important. The ones living in the world today are the people who are get to decide how the people of the generations to come are going to live. People should not want their kids living in a world of filth and pollution where no one cares about the world they are living on. An article by Omid Nodoushani discussed in depth the terrible amounts of pollution that is
Recycling doesn’t affect people that much, but it does affect wildlife and animals. Like the six pack rings, soda comes in, fish get caught in it and they die. Another thing is plastic bags get thrown into the ocean and turtles mistake it for jellyfish, eat it and die. Would you believe me if I told you that glass, aluminum, paper and plastic are not A report from the Federal Highway Administration shows that 80 percent of the asphalt that is removed each year during widening and resurfacing is reused. Recycling has been around for thousands of years, but we still need to recycle even though people thought of this a long time ago. A consequence is the New York City Landfill. The New york city landfill contains 2.9 billion cubic feet of trash. The new york city landfill can be seen from space. The new york landfill is one of the only things that can be seen from space. Another consequence is that farmers in Wisconsin and Minnesota are just now starting to recycle. Minnesota and Wisconsin farms produce 60 million to 80 million pounds of plastic every year, but until now they had no way to get rid of it besides throwing
Recycling is a very essential and crucial process in our world today. The term recycling means that waste can be converted into new products instead of being discarded. As the population continues to grow, humans are using more and more products. In order to reduce the amount of waste on planet Earth, and to preserve its resources, recycling is significant. Not only does recycling allow the environment to thrive, but it also allows living people to thrive as well. There are many materials that can be recycled. Plastics, electronics, aluminum, food and glass are only but a few products that can be recycled. Recycling can benefit our environment in numerous amount of ways. However, without recycling, negative impacts on our environment can occur. Some of these effects include pollution whether it is air, land or sea, depletion of natural resources and even an increase threat to global warming. Therefore, recycling is extremely important to sustain our environment.
The society we live in is disposable we feel more than comfortable throwing away or removing things we use from cans, to shoes, and even plastic bottles because we feel as though it’s easier to throw them out then to fix them then reuse them. This process of renewal then reusing has been given a name; its name is “recycling”. The base word of recycle is cycle which according to Webster’s dictionary means to “a set of events or actions that happen again and again in the same order: a repeating series of events or actions.” While reading Garbology I learned the real reason why so much trash exists on our planet which is affecting our living conditions. Our planet is so “trashed” as a result undereducated people not pondering over where their trash ends up, allowing them to
For example, more than 80% of the oceans surfaces are covered in trash or polluted. Therefore, if we continue to throw trash away, many of our natural resources will be gone before our eyes. We are responsible for this planet so we should start treating it better. Not only would it help the planet but also it would protect our wildlife. One big result of not recycling is the Great Barrier Reef. Recently the Great Barrier Reef has been in its worst condition as possible. There has been tons of trash surfacing the water, the wild life as starting to die out because of it and the list continues. But thankfully, there are people out there that are trying to save it from becoming nothing but a polluted ocean. Another reason why we should recycle is it creates more jobs more people. An estimated 1.56 billion people in the US are currently homeless. Why not help them out and the environment by hiring more people for recycling related jobs. It would not only help the environment but it would help people in need for
Imagine a world cluttered with trash, once beautiful beaches and parks now overflowing with garbage. Roads no longer driveable, air no longer clean. Masks will be worn, and disease is on the rise. Now, imagine if you could have prevented this. I believe recycling is the first step. As of 2006 America is in the lead for producing the most waste, producing 236 million tons annually. Not only are we producing the most waste but by 2100 scientists estimate the amount will triple which will have serious effects on the Earth. Both physical effects and fiscal which means public services and government budgets will be impacted. Our planet is already feeling the effects of pollution at the rate we're going we won't be able to stop the damage nor repair
Recycling is one of the most common ways to keep America clean. The recycling bins are one of the most recognizable logos across the world. People all across the U.S. have recycling bins, inside of their household. The sad thing is most people do not use them, they most of the time just throw stuff in the regular trash that could be recycled. For example, plastic, paper, cans, glass, cardboard, and even computer hardware (www.recycleacrossamerica.org). People don’t realize that they could be doing the world a big favor, just by recycling these everyday items.
Main Point 1: According to Richard Fuller, a system theorist, “Pollution is nothing but the resources we are not harvesting. We allow them to disperse because we've been ignorant of their value.”written on
We have all heard the saying reduce, reuse, and recycle from a very young age. But let’s face it, how many of us recycle? The world we live in is slowly filling up with the trash that we throw out every day. One day who knows, we might be living in our own trash and everywhere we look there will be trash. Is this a world where we all want to live in? If not, we need to take steps to prevent the buildup of trash in our landfills and even our oceans. Therefore, recycling needs to be encouraged because it reduces the amount of waste sent to landfills, prevents pollution, conserves natural resources, and creates jobs.
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.
Yes, recycling is often preferable to sending materials straight to the landfill, but recycling has its own demons. A big concern regarding recycling is the possibility of encouraging over consumption. As award winning environmental journalist Amy Westervelt explains in her essay, “Can Recycling Be Bad for the Environment”, people will ease the guilty they feel for massively over-consuming disposable goods by tossing the used items into their recycling bins (213). But not everything that’s recyclable gets recycled—recycling is