Why is recycling important? What are your organisation’s procedure for recycling and the disposal of hazardous

Question

Why is recycling important? What are your organisation’s procedure for recycling and the disposal of hazardous

Answer 1

We just dump it all in bushes and skips and stuff.

Answer 2

Hi There,

Recycling is important for several reasons,

1. To Reduce Bio-Hazards:-  Many of the elements in our consumer goods won't biodegrade or don’t break down into harmless substances when they are placed into landfill; landfill is still a principal form of waste disposal. This means that overtime they can release toxic and sometimes carcinogenic (cancer causing) elements into the soil and through leaching into the ground water, our rivers, streams and oceans. Eventually such substances can enter the food chain and cause the death or maiming of all sorts of species including ourselves.

2. To Reduce the CO2 (Carbon Dioxide Emissions) and potential dangers of Incineration:- If such materials are incinerated instead of landfilled upon disposal their burning produces CO2 (the principal or most controllable of the climate change or greenhouse gasses) emissions. Also incineration can only be safe if the plant they are incinerated in has very specialised particulate and noxious substance cleaning filter processes. Even at the end of this some fly ash remains that could contaminate land and water if not disposed of properly.

3. Even if materials will biodegrade ‘safely’ the process of degrading normally releases things like uncontrolled Methane and CO2. Both of which are climate change or ‘Greenhouse gasses which contribute to global warming.  

4.  Open site, landfilled and sea dumped waste are a primary cause of Mammal and Avain (bird) deaths. Plastic shopping bags for example are a primary cause of  wildlife death each year. In sea water they can be mistaken for jellyfish by wildlife and  birds, whales, seals and turtles eat the bags then die from intestinal blockages; essentially they are starved to death painfully.  

5.  To Reduce demand on Scarce Resources:-  Stone, Clays and other mined materials are finite (i.e. there’s only so much we can extract before it runs out recycling building  materials helps reduce pressure on these and also the huge carbon emissions involved in their extraction and transportation. Most plastic products are based on oil, this is again a finite resource as we are using it at a rate exceeding the millions of years it takes for oil to form. Wood takes time to grow, recycling wood products takes pressure off our precious forests. Living Trees not only provide a home to many endangered (particularly in the rainforests)  and beautiful native species world wide, but they also “ground” CO2 during photosynthesis and lock it away safely; in doing so they help reduce climate change by taking some of the gas out of the atmosphere.

In summary, its important to recycle to reduce the impacts or damage done to the natural world and to preserve resources for the future. Its also important to remember that whilst buying solar panels or taking other relatively expensive steps to act on CO2 might not be within everyone’s reach recycling is.

Everyone who recycles is doing that bit more to save the planet from Climate Change Catastrophe. Hope you have fun being a recycling climate change hero ;0)

Oh and finally, on a fun note recycling can also be about choosing to buy second hand goods from charity stores or via Freecycle the online giveaway community. So it can also mean guilt free shopping, being retro chic and potentially picking up an antique for peanuts!

Answer 3

Recycling reduces the amount of waste being disposed of in turn reducing the amount of space needed to dump the waste