Every ton of paper recycled a year saves 17 trees and 7000 gallons of water. According to the U.S. EPA, methane is the second largest source of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, and landfills account for 37% of methane gas output. By reducing and recycling properly organic materials, including paper, we can divert them from landfill, thereby reducing anaerobic decomposition and the production of methane gas. Yes we can!

::::::::

Permission is granted to freely reprint this article, quote it, excerpt, etc. The only requirement of the author's is that nobody make any money from printing this article. Please pass word along widely, free of charge! Feel free also to pass this on to journalists, asking them to do a report of their own, though they are welcome to use any facts from this report as their own (no need to quote me. This is about public service, not about names). Thank you! 

Dear friends:

I am responding to a comment posted to a diary expressing the generally-felt sense of futility: Anything we do to help the environment will have such a small impact that it can't really help.

True? Yes, most of us feel that way.

Is that feeling founded in fact? Not necessarily.

Below are statistics and facts from the Californians Against Waste website: How much water is conserved as we use less paper, as we recycle it, how much energy is saved just by recycling one single soda can, etc. The statistics are staggering: Check this out!

http://www.cawrecycles.org/living_green/benefits_of_recycling

SOME BASIC RECYCLING FACTS:

Conserving Resources

• Every ton of paper recycled a year saves 17 trees and 7000 gallons of water.
• Every ton of steel recycled saves 2,500 pounds of iron ore, 1,400 pounds of coal, and 120 pounds of limestone.
• Recycling one ton of glass saves the equivalent of 10 gallons of oil.

Reducing Pollution

• According to the U.S. EPA, methane is the second largest source of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, and landfills account for 37% of methane gas output. By reducing and recycling properly organic materials, including paper, we can divert them from landfill, thereby reducing anaerobic decomposition and the production of methane gas.

Energy Savings

• Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a TV for three hours.
• The recycling of one glass container saves enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for 4 hours.
• For every pound of steel recycled, it can save enough energy to light a 60-watt bulb for 24 hours.
• Every ton of paper recycled can save up to 4200 kilowatt hours of energy.

For more information, see the link above or write to:

Californians Against Waste
921 11th Street, Suite 420
Sacramento, CA 95814
916.443.5422 (phone)
916.443.3912 (fax)

According to a 2004 report of the California Integrated Waste Management Board, the following cultural sectors dumped the waste percentages listed below:

http://www.ciwmb.ca.gov/Publications/LocalAsst/Extracts/34004005/ExecSummary.pdf

Commercial  47%

Residential   31.6%

(Single family residences: 23.4%, multi-family residences: 8.2%)

Self-Hauled: 21.3%

(Commercial self-hauled: 17.3%, residential self-hauled 4%)

Here are the contents which comprise the greatest percentages of garbage which is dumped, California-wide, according to the same California report linked above:

30.2% Organic materials (kitchen scraps 14.9%)

 21% Paper

21.5%  Construction demolition                                     

9.5% Plastic

7.7% Metal

5.1% Special materials                                                 

2.1% Glass                                                                  

1.2% Electronics                                                            

1.1% Mixed residue                                                       

0.2% Household hazardous waste                                

Thus, it follows that if we cut back on paper waste by recycling, plastics ditto, and organic scraps (of which 14.9% are kitchen waste), we will be doing a lot to reduce landfill and cut back manufacturing-related pollution.

Note that in addition to paper comprising the large bulk of waste matter that it does, scrap paper is also one of America's largest export items. Thus, as we recycle paper, we not only reduce manufacturing-related air pollution, but we also cut back on fossil fuel use related to transporting the used paper. There's often more than immediately meets the eye, isn't there. 

We also can help a lot by using salvaged materials for home building, such as scrapped metal and wood materials.

The link above contains information about which percentages from the construction industry are wood, which are metal, etc so if you are building a home and want to know about the greenest way you can possibly do it, go to the California Integrated Waste Management's report linked above for further info.

All I can say is that when my husband and I began to recycle, we immediately noticed that our garbage reduced by literally 50%, overnight. So in fact, according to our experience, recycling reduced our contribution to landfill even more than the chart above would indicate. (We had already been reusing our yogurt containers before we began our full-fledged recycling practice at home).

Then we started to compost and once again, we found ourselves dumping literally half as much garbage as before. So once again, in our practical experience we were able to reduce our load by even more than the charts above would have led us to believe. Between composting and recycling, our garbage was reduced literally 75%! We now are down to two small shopping bags of garbage per week, for the two of us put together. Unless, of course, we have a party or Thanksgiving dinner!

For those of us who are lucky enough to have a back yard large enough to accommodate a compost pile, composting can be a rewarding experience in many ways. As soon as we began to compost, I noticed lots more dragon flies in our yard (they're beautiful!), lots more geckos, more ants aerating the soil, more life in general. It confirmed what I intuitively felt since the moment we began to compost: It was doing something very beneficial for the environment, like culturing yogurt does by proliferating friendly bacteria. Similarly, it would seem that composting promotes insect and other life, improving soil conditions not only by nutrients as the compost is spread, but by aeration of the soil from insects, worms et al. It's a really good feeling to be contributing to the environment in this way!

According to a plaque at the local 4th of July County Fair, California will dump enough garbage over a three-year period (or was it ten years?) to fill a gap four stories high, fifteen miles long and half a mile wide. Now, whether the figures reflect a three-year or even a ten-year period, that's a LOT of garbage!

Think how much we all can save in landfill by cutting back our residential garbage 50%. As in, recycling. It's simple to do, and can be done by those living in the cities just as easily as anyone living in the boonies.

Then we can cut back even more by composting, if we are in an area which will support that.

If home composting and recycling reduces residential landfill contributions by even only 50%, is this just a token contribution to the environment? Hardly. I wouldn't think so. Would you?

Consider in addition to saved landfill space, the reduction in greenhouse gases as manufacturing slows down, if the entire nation was to participate in a simple recycling practice.

Above and beyond, let's not forget about the methane gases produced by landfill, and reduced by our own conscious consumerism. Thus, recycling is win-win: Less manufacturing-related pollution, less methane gas causing the greenhouse effect, and an increasingly improved environment.

Thank goodness more and more people are participating nation-wide. And thank goodness people are caring more and more. There still may be some people who think that their "token" contribution to the environment will make no difference, so out of apathy they don't participate in the solution.

How wrong their assumption is!

All we have to do is google at the press of a button, and we have knowledge at our fingertips.

I have always had a motto:
"Big problems? Simple solutions".

Knowledge is power:

"Yes we can". We can help to save the earth.

This is not the only way to help, of course. I will be researching the facts about air pollution and what we can do, and will write another article with more details. My aim will be to provide statistical facts such as those above, and my hope in so doing is to give us a message that whatever we do, really does, can and will make a difference.

Here is a first article in a series devoted to this subject. Please stay tuned. And, thanks for your help!

Authors Bio:
This quote summarizes the nature of my concerns and the content of personal experiences which stir my activism:

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement on human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves". --Paul Revere, House of Commons