FUN FACTS ABOUT RECYCLING
Glass
- Glass containers are 100 percent recyclable, and recovered glass is used as the major ingredient in new glass containers.
- Glass containers produced today are 40 percent lighter than when they were produced 20 years ago, making them much easier to recycle now.
- Every ton of glass that is recycled results in a ton of raw materials saved to process new glass, including 1,300 pounds of sand, 410 pounds of soda ash, 380 pounds of limestone and 160 pounds of feldspar
- Glass containers come in four different colors: clear, blue, brown and green; glass must be separated by color to ensure that new glass is not created from a mix of colors.
Paper
- Every ton of paper recycled saves more than 3.3 cubic yards of landfill space.
- More than 37 percent of the fiber used to make new paper products in the United States comes from recycled sources.
- 86 percent (approximately 254 million) of Americans have access to curbside or drop-off paper recycling programs.
Plastic
- Nearly eight out of every 10 bottles will end up in a landfill.
- The amount of oil used to produce plastic water bottles in America is enough to fuel about 100,000 cars for a year.
- Recycling a single plastic bottle can conserve enough energy to light a 60 watt light bulb for up to six hours.
- About 380 billion plastic bags, sacks and wraps are used each year.
- Plastic litter is estimated to take up to 1,000 years to decompose. This estimate is based on the decomposition rates of plastics buried in landfills for up to 100 years.
METAL (Steel and Aluminum)
- Recycling steel saves 75 percent of the energy that would be used to create steel from raw materials, enough to power 18 million homes
- A steel frame for a 2,000 square-foot two-story house is equivalent to the material of about six recycled cars; a comparable wooden frame would take over 40 trees to produce
- Steel cans contain at least 25 percent recycled steel, with many nearly 100 percent recycled content
- Pretty much all of the steel produced today is in some form recycled-content. So when you buy a steel product (from a soup can to a washing machine), it's manufactured with recycled steel.
- Over 50 percent of the aluminum cans produced are recycled.
- A used aluminum can is recycled and back on the grocery shelf as a new can, in as little as 60 days.
- Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to keep a 100-watt bulb burning for almost four hours or run your television for three hours.
- Tossing away an aluminum can wastes as much energy as pouring out half of that can's volume of gasoline.
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