Did You Know?
- Reusing a bag meant for just one use has a big impact. Just one sturdy, reusable bag has the potential to eliminate hundreds, if not thousands, of plastic bags over its lifetime.
- In New York City alone, one less grocery bag per person per year would reduce waste by 5 million pounds and save $250,000 in disposal costs.
- Plastic bags now carry 80% of the nation's groceries, up from only 5% in 1982. They also create litter, clog landfills, and endanger wildlife.
- Hundreds of thousands of sea turtles, whales and other marine mammals die every year from eating discarded plastic bags mistaken for food.
- The average plastic grocery bag may take 450-1000 years to decompose in a landfill.
- 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 them.
- When 1 ton of paper bags is reused or recycled, 3 cubic meters of landfill space is saved and 13 to 17 trees are spared! (In 1997, 955,000 tons of paper bags were used in the United States.)
- When 1 ton of plastic bags are reused or recycled, it saves the energy equivalent of 11 barrels of oil.
- Each year Americans throw away enough recyclable beverage containers to circle the Earth 10 times.
- We each use approximately 500 lbs (140 bottles) of glass a year! Recycling a single glass bottle saves enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for 4 hours.
- One person who does not recycle uses and discards two pine trees in paper products each year.
- The average office worker participating in an office paper recycling program can save more than one tree each year. That may not seem like much, but just think about how many office workers there are in this country and imagine that each one is a tree. That's a heck of a lot of trees!
- If Californians recycled the aluminum cans they buy in one day, we would have enough aluminum to make 17 Boeing 747 jets.
- Recycling a single aluminum can saves enough electricity to operate a TV or computer for 3 hours.
- A ton of paper made from 100% recycled paper saves the equivalent of 4100 kwh energy, 7000 gallons of water, 380 gallons of oil, 60 pounds of air emissions, 17 trees and 3 cubic yards of landfill space.
- Approximately 65,000 to 75,000 trees are needed to produce paper for the Sunday edition of the New York Times.
- Currently, less than 5% of magazine paper has any recycled content, a practice that consumes an astounding 35 million trees each year or about 100,000 trees a day!
- There is no limit to the number of times that an aluminum can can be recycled.
Save the Planet and Help Stop Global Warming:
10 Simple Things You CAN Do Right Now to Reduce CO2 Emissions
1
Change a Light
Replacing one regular light bulb with a compact fluorescent light bulb will save
150 pounds of carbon dioxide each year.
2
Drive Less
Walk, bike, carpool, or take mass transit more often.
You'll save one pound of carbon dioxide for every mile you don't drive!
3
Recycle More
You can save 2,400 pounds of CO2 per year by recycling just half of your household waste.
4
Check Your Tires
Keeping your tires inflated properly can improve gas mileage by more than 3%. Every gallon of gasoline saved keeps 20 pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere!
5
Use Less Hot Water
It takes a lot of energy to heat water. Use less hot water by installing a low flow showerhead (350 pounds of CO2 saved per year) and washing your clothes in cold or warm water (500 pounds saved per year).
6
Avoid Products with Excess Packaging
You can save 1,200 pounds of carbon dioxide if you cut down your garbage by 10%. Reuse packaging when possible, and start using reusable shopping bags instead of paper or plastic.
7
Adjust Your Thermostat
By moving your thermostat down just two degrees in winter and up two degrees in summer,
you could save about 2,000 pounds of CO2 a year.
8
Plant a Tree
A single tree will absorb one ton of carbon dioxide over its lifetime.
9
Turn Off Electronic Devices
Simply turning off your television, DVD player, stereo, and computer when you're not using them will save thousands of pounds of carbon dioxide each year.
10
Spread the Word!
Learn as much as you can about environmental issues and share the message with others.
Lead by example--Reduce, Reuse, Recycle--and encourage others to do the same.
Buy eco-friendly products and support businesses (like mine!) that use green practices.