Why is there so much waste in our local area?

Question

we live close to Redding California. I know a friend who works in the medical filed as a manager a home of mentally disabled individuals. One day I visited her house and saw a huge mound of paper work on just about everything, including tips about how to make certain foods "state approved" creamy consistency. what happened to the paperless society? the paper stacks on the table could be weighed in pounds, and this was only for one week. I am far from an environmentalist , however, even I can see that this is a waste on an incredible scale. what can be done?

Answer 1

I dont know about your area, but our waste aroudn here is worse because we let the government get involved with recycling.  They have made it into such a stupid turf/power war that nobody can afford to bother with it any more.  Example: We used to have these private business guys going around collecting scrap and recyclables like newspaper.  Along comes Big Bother (spelling deliberate) Government and inflicts Curbside Recycling on us.  The scrap guys would accept anything, and get it recycled, old appliances, window glass, pipe fittings, whatever.  The Big Bother Curbside Recycling only collects cans and bottles, depending on the mood of the coddled govermnent paid collectors.  That's it.  Appliances and everything else went into the landfill unless one of the private scrap guys were still around to pick them up.  IN addition, the cans and bottles have to be spotlessly clean and have every atom of label removed from them or the collectors leave them strewn on the lawn or just leave the whole pile in the recycling bin.  The private guys just took everything as-is.  OF course, the Big Bother Government being what it is, they quickly forgot that the whole thing was about recycling, not their personal power.  They felt threatened by the private scrap guys, and passed laws against them, destroying their livelihood.  Now EVERYTHING goes into the landfill.  Hooray for Government Idiocy!

Answer 2

The world is going to a new high with all the information and technology,

Also consumerism and competition has incresased.

companies are trying to parcel the things in a best manner.

But there is no awareness spread about the environment where trees are been cut for paper and the final result of global warming can be seen.

Answer 3

NOTHING can be done until more people become educated on environmental issues. I believe that the government has the most power in making changes take place and with the current administration all environmental issues have been completely ignored, especially since the president's friends are all in the oil business. I truly hope that we can make the current situation turn around because our future seems very bleak right now. We must educate our neighbors and educate ourselves. One person can only make a small difference, but, more importantly, one person can inspire another person to take action as well. And this pattern can continue until great changes take place. I hope our nation does realize that this is a serious issue and that it should not be taken lightly. It is a moral issue. Who are we to destroy this earth? Should we not cherish it instead? Since the start of the Industrial Era, we have only looked at what profits we can make and the luxuries we can attain; however, we must now stop to think were this has gotten us. Although giving up some materialistic aspects of life can be hard, especially since we have been brainwashed by the media to think that these luxuries are necessities, we must do so for our future. The most enjoyable way to live ones life is to use up all of ones savings, until one goes bankrupt. That is the path we are currently on. However, we can now begin saving our money again ( a.k.a. our resources) and plan for our fruitful and bright future.

Answer 4

B'cos u are robot! Sorry.Just kiddin

Answer 5

The example is a great one.  First, the printed matter originated from one of many electronic programs, one which can be viewed within a electronic device.  The problem is;  a) judging by the mass described, the individual is uncomfortable reading from their electronic device and prints it off to read  b) Time constraints to view during normal working hours and taking home to read.   c) this person is disorganized, over-worked or all of he above and, d) they simply don't care to change their preference and contribute to sustainability.

This is also a good indicator of why many things simply do not reach intended goals or objectives; do you believe whatever material in such mass is truly reviewed in its entirety and understood?

Delegate some tasks and live a life, especially if not compensated for time worked outside of employ.

Answer 6

Conservation habits must be established through practice and principle.  Your friend and so many are disconnected from the process, oblivious to the resources being consumed so she can print her to her hearts content.

I suppose the best you could do in this case would be to make a good-natured observation about the volume of paper involved and challenge her to join you and your friends to reduce your ecological footprint for a month.  You probably couldn't keep it up 100% but it may serve as a useful reminder that we all waste resources.

Answer 7

Before the Company I work for tried to go paperless, we used to automatically print every work order once and keep them organized in a common spot with notes made by each worker on the bottom when necessary. The company stopped that, so now when one of us gets a work order on his computer, he prints it. If it hangs around for several days, it gets printed daily. On the plus side, we have quietly rebuilt the old filing system and try to check for paper orders before printing a new one.  But we no longer have the certainty that an order has been printed, so if one of us has it in his personal stack we don't find it. Also, used to be we had large paper maps of our territory that were updated yearly and we took care of them. Now, its on our laptops in our trucks and updated more often, which is nice. But, the puter screens are difficult to read in the sun, so we often look locations up in the office and print maps to get there in various scales as needed, for each order.

Buy Warehauser.

Answer 8

For my own household waste, I sort the recycling into boxes as I go along, then it is an easy matter to get them into the correct skips at the tiphead.  My trash has been reduced to one black bag every four weeks, and it is nearly all packaging.  That is for just one household.  If you multiply this by all the houses around and all the business premises, shops etc., you will have a very good idea of the huge problem with excess packaging.  If we could get rid of the excess, costs would come down too   -   wouldn't they??

Answer 9

the state can generate more unnecessary paper you are so right on this one