source: Daviddge ; CC license
For something as commonplace as rubbish, it’s amazing how little we know about what we throw away. It’s just rubbish, right? Out of sight and out of mind, yeah? Properly disposing of your rubbish is a great place to begin, but sometimes we fail to recognize the impact of what we pitch in the bin. Hopefully these 10 facts will give your perspective on what goes in the dump, and what we can change individually to make a better tomorrow for everyone.
Fact #1: The UK produces over 434 million tons of rubbish every year. Based on this figure, by 2 AM on January first, there would be enough rubbish generated to fill Royal Albert Hall. By January 2nd, there’s enough rubbish to fill Trafalgar Square, and by September there is enough waste generated to fill Lake Windermere.
Fact #2: The average citizen in the UK throws away roughly 7 times their body weight of rubbish every year, and the average British family goes through six trees worth of paper.
Fact #3: 36,000,000 GBP worth of aluminum cans are thrown away every year, aluminum one of the most recyclable consumer materials.
Fact #4: The average plastic carrier bag is in use for 12 minutes. The average plastic carrier bag takes 1000 years to breakdown.
Fact #5: You can make 20 cans out of recycled material with the same amount of energy it takes to make one new one.
Fact #6: Familiar with, “Ten Green Bottles?” The UK uses over 6 billion glass bottles and jars each year. To sing “Six Billion Green Bottles,” would take roughly 3500 years.
Fact #7: Almost half of the waste in the average bin could be composted. Composting is the only form of recycling one can do at home, and the worms in a compost heap eat their own body weight every two days.
Fact #8: Glass in landfills has no timetable for when it will breakdown. In fact, 3000 year old glass from the Middle East is still found today. But glass containers are 100% recyclable and have no limit on the number of times they can be reused. Strive to recycle window glass at all cost.
Fact #9: With 25 two liter plastic bottles, you can make one adult size fleece. 3,000 recycled plastic bottles can make a picnic table.
Fact #10: Per annum, UK homes throw away the same tonnage of rubbish as 3 ½ million double-decker buses, nearly 30 million tons. If these buses were in queue, they would stretch from London to Sydney (Australia) and back.
Rubbish Please isn’t only the name of our business, Rubbish Please is our philosophy. Now that you know the facts, what will you do?
Image source: www.flickr.com
