Recycling is sort of like exercising: we all know we should do it, but not all of us do it as often as we shouldand some of us dont do it at all. However, there are lots of reasons why you should make an effort to recycle as much as possible. If you havent been diligent about recycling your garbage, here are seven good reasons why you should start.
It cuts back on global warming. Our planet is starting to feel the effects of global warming alreadyand we need to do whatever we can to lessen the impact. Production of certain materials from scratch can release significant amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. Aluminum production is a prime exampleproducing new aluminum creates 95% more CO2 than recycling old aluminum cans. In addition, recycling paper saves treesfor each ton of paper recycled, 17 trees are saved. Each of these trees can extract around 250 pounds of carbon dioxide from the air in a year.
It makes us more energy-efficient. It often takes a great deal more energy to create something from scratch than to recycle it. For example, it takes twice as much energy to burn plastic as to recycle it; it takes 64% more energy to make paper than to...