RECYCLINGGreen Building Solutions |
LEED-Based Principles |
Recycling |
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What is recycling?
Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. Recycling is cost effective, modern waste management. It is returning materials into reusable commodities. The reprocessing of materials into new products allows useful materials from being wasted, reduces the consumption of raw materials and reduces energy. Today, the most commonly used methods for waste disposal (i.e. landfill, prolysis, incineration) are environmentally damaging and are unsustainable.
Benefits of Recycling
- Economic - Recycling saves money by lowering manufacturing costs. Products made from recycled materials, rather than virgin materials, are easier to produce. In addition, recycling conserves natural resources.
- Environmental - Recycling reduces the input of energy and raw materials to a production system. It also reduces the amount of waste produced for disposal. Saving energy, reducing emissions of greenhouse gases and other dangerous air and water pollutants are even more important environmental benefits gained from recycling. Because the materials in the recycling process are purer, less energy is needed to transport them from the place of extraction. Therefore, maximum environmental benefits are gained by waste minimization.
Types of recycling
- electronics (disassembly and reclamation)
- aggregates and concrete
- batteries
- ferrous metals
- non-ferrous metals
- printer cartridges and toners
- glass
- paper
- plastic
- biodegradable waste
- textiles
- household hazardous waste
- electronics (computers, cell phones etc)
- medical waste
- paint products
- used motor oil recycling
- reduce water waste and pollution
- aluminum cans
Facts & Statistics
- Americans throw away enough office and writing paper annually to build a wall 12 feet high from Los Angeles to New York City.
- Americans use 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour, only a small percentage of which are now recycled.
- Recycling saves precious natural resources, energy, time and money.
- In just 60 days, an aluminum can is recycled, turned into a new can and back on store shelves.
- Aluminum is a sustainable metal that can be recycled over and over again.
- While recycling has grown in general, recycling of specific materials has also grown: 50 percent of all paper, 34 percent of all plastic soft drink cans, 63 percent of all steel packaging and 67 percent of all major appliances are now recycled.
- Twenty years ago, only one curbside recycling program existed in the United States, which collected several materials at the curb. By 2005, almost 9,000 programs had sprouted up across the nation. As of 2005, about 500 material recovery facilities had been established to process collected materials.
