today's challenge:
see if you can go an entire day without throwing anything away. recycle with abandon, compost yer food scrapes, reuse plastic bags, etc., but don't put things in the garbage can. HARD to do. it's something i've wanted to try for a long time but haven't worked out quite how i can do it. obviously, i would have to have the day off from work, cause even in the liberal food zone there is a heck of a lot of trash produced. at home i have a compost bucket (which is heating up nicely, thank you, and relatively stink free). i also have recycling, (though for some reason they won't pick up clam shell plastic containers, so i have a lot of things planted in salad packaging), so that should provide for some of the things i'm not using anymore. otherwise, i would have to rethink eating many packaged foods and sneezing excessively (or composting my kleenex- ew!).
couple o' facts:
the average american produces about 4.5 lbs of trash per day. coloradans produce about 6.88 lbs. for you average types, that's about 1642.5 lbs. a year. for us above average types, that's 2511.2 lbs. per year. trashy!
landfills are the highest producer of methane gas, at about 34%.
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2 comments:
I love this one! A new group is organzing here in padukee to get recycling started (there is none here) and a lot of us are really excited about it. I will watch everything I aim at the trash can today and see if it can be used differently.
It is really interesting that traditionally eco-friendly coloradans produce more trash than the rest of us slobs! Is it all those neuvo-mountaineers moving in who are skewing the numbers?
reasons for coloradans being more wasteful:
construction boom, i.e. lots o growth
abundant landfill space, a la manifest destiny- thus a low 'tipping fee' for sending trash to landfills
not enough recycling- we're 48th in the country. perhaps KY is 49th?
and, of course, a higher income level, which means a higher 'fuck it' mentality
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