Where Does Your Trash Go?: The Hidden Life of Garbage
Posted on Feb 12, 2010 - 01:03 PM
By: Brian Liloia
We all know the three Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. Unfortunately, we’d like to think that recycling goes a long way into decreasing the amount of trash that goes into landfills. However, it’s the reducing and reusing that are exponentially more effective actions in the stride to preserve our delicate environment. Recycling is perhaps a mere drop in the bucket compared to reducing the trash we produce in the first place.
Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage is a book that probes the increasing amounts of garbage, landfills, the politics of recycling and the export of trash to developing countries:
“Eat a take-out meal, buy a pair of shoes, or read a newspaper, and you’re soon faced with a bewildering amount of rubbish. The United States is the planet’s number one producer of trash; each American throws out 4.5 pounds daily. How did we end up with this much waste, and where does it all go? By excavating the history of rubbish handling from the 1800s “an era of garbage-grazing urban hogs and dump-dwelling rag pickers” to the present, with its high- tech “mega-fills” operated by multi-billion-dollar garbage corporations, Rogers answers these questions with a “lively authorial voice” (New York Press), offering a potent argument for change.”
Amazingly, 30% of all landfill space is occupied by packaging, the biggest category of household waste! The history of trash is an enlightening one, and the future is increasingly frightening given what is at hand. Check out Gone Tomorrow for an insightful look into the world of garbage and what it spells for our environment, and just where that soda can goes once it leaves your hands.
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Show/Hide Comments (5)
By Tony on 01/11/2011
I have not read a book in a long time that actually found such relevance in my daily life. Garbage: you see it, live with it and make decisions about it every single day - so it is mandatory to finally have this tool kit to help us understand how it got into our collective lives.
By dermatologist on 01/11/2011
Eventually we will run out of space. Recycling is great but at the same time we need people to use the stuff we recycle. The only way to solve this problem is to reduce and reuse like the article above stated. This needs to get figured out sooner than later.
By realtors on 02/01/2011
I saw an awesome display at Slum Lab in NYC that showed the daily trash output of just manhattan alone. It is enough trash every day to fill almost the entire statue of liberty. I have always wondered what Hawaii does with all their trash??
By Renters Insurance on 02/24/2011
Anybody remember the landfill scene in Toy Story 3? That’s actually a surprisingly accurate picture of where trash goes once it’s picked up from your dumpster. I’d recommend checking it out!
By jamesp frank on 03/25/2011
Absolutely,if your city has a decent water filtration system then by all means use tap! Think of the money saved both personal and city, state if we all bought one of those cute, metal, refillable bottles. Also, think of the plastic we wouldn’t be using.
