Wasting away: some startling statistics
about our profligate proclivities

Americans throw out 100 billion plastic bags each year, and with them 12 million barrels of oil that went into their manufacture. Paper bags, on the other hand, consume 14 million trees and are less efficient to transport. The answer? As in most things, use common sense: Avoid them both and bring your own.

Source: http://www.popularmechanics.com/home_journal/how_to/4234061.html

According to Starbucks, if 50 customers at each location used reusable mugs, we would save 150,000 cups per day, reducing waste by 1.7 million pounds of paper per year.

Source: http://yalesustainability.wordpress.com/2008/04/11/cut-the-waste-no-more-paper-coffee-cups/

Consumer packaging bellies up 31 percent of the municipal waste stream, far more than any of the products that is contained within its wasteful enclosure. To be more specific, this represents more than 77 million tons of bottles, cartons, cans, bags and wrappers

Source: http://www.triplepundit.com/pages/waste-footprint-ii-by-the-numb-002783.php

Each year, an estimated 500 billion to 1 trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide. That comes out to over one million per minute. Billions end up as litter each year.

According to the EPA, over 380 billion plastic bags, sacks and wraps are consumed in the U.S. each year. According to The Wall Street Journal, the U.S. goes through 100 billion plastic shopping bags annually. (Estimated cost to retailers is $4 billion.)

Plastic bags don’t biodegrade, they photodegrade—breaking down into smaller and smaller toxic bits contaminating soil and waterways and entering the food web when animals accidentally ingest.

Source: http://www.reusablebags.com/

Americans throw away about 200 billion beverage containers, including plastic bottles and aluminum cans, each year.  Beverage containers make up about 15 percent of all packaging waste in the U.S.

Source: http://www.infinitehealthresources.com/Store/Resource/Article/85/1/1477.html

5.6 million tons of catalogs and other direct mail advertisments end up in U.S. landfills annually. The average American household receives unsolicited junk mail equal to 1.5 trees every year—more than 100 million trees for all U.S. households combined.

Source: http://environment.about.com/od/greenlivingdesign/a/junkmail.htm

Typical American school kid generates 67 pounds of discarded school-lunch packaging waste per school year. That’s more than 18,000 pounds yearly for the average-sized elementary school.

Source: http://environment.about.com/od/greenlivingdesign/a/school_lunch.htm

 

On a visit to south Florida, Anthony analyzes what people "trash." Aired on Going Green, WPLG (ABC) in Miami.
(Double click on title below to play).

 

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