Why this blog? It's about trash!

The Problem

The trouble with trash is that we make too much of it and it's not all trash. American's throw away an average of 7 pounds of trash per day or 102 tons in a lifetime (Humes, 2012).

Ironically, we are increasingly concerned with where products come from: Was it made locally? Were the workers properly compensated? Were any baby pangolins harmed in the making of this product?

Pangolin

But we don't often think about the other end of our endless consumption: Where does it go once we're done with it? In the good old USofA, you can answer 'landfill' and you have a 70% chance of being correct. For a grad school project, I recently learned a lot about landfills compared to other methods (such as waste-to-energy incinerators). I might go into this more later but the take away message was that landfills are bad. They are the most polluting waste disposal method out there.

Landfills are the most common method of waste disposal in the U.S.

Hey wait, don't go away yet. I know this is not a pretty subject. But it's our trash and our responsibility - and we have options. Even if we're stuck with landfills for awhile, I'm here to prove that you don't have to contribute 102 tons to one in your lifetime.


One Solution, One Household at a Time

Over the next week, I'm going measure how much waste my household (me, husband, and two litter-box using kitties) produces every day.
 

For this study, I will include cat waste since it goes to the landfill.

I will detail what went to be recycled, what was composted, what was donated to Goodwill, and what made the long haul to the landfill. I will share how I already keep my landfill contributions remarkably lower than the national average - as well as some tips I'm still discovering to reduce my waste.

And I'll throw in some staggering, startling statistics to hopefully inspire you to take action too!

Do you know how long Styrofoam persists in the environment?

Stick around and keep reading as the week goes on - and please contribute any thoughts, comments, or ideas as they come.




References

Humes, E. (2012). Garbology: Our dirty love affair with trash. New York: Avery, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

 
Images are my own unless specified below:

Pangolin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pangolin_borneo.jpg Attribution: Piekfrosch at the German language Wikipedia

Landfill: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Landfill.jpg

Cat in box: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Catfiller.JPG