av BRUNO LUTEN för 1 år sedan
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It's obvious that every country wants to be clean and free of garbage. However, while some countries are selling and shipping their materials away, some countries actually go out of their way to buy garbage.
For the longest time, up until 2018, China was known as the worlds dump for importing millions of tonnes of plastic waste from all over the world. Countries such as China would take the waste and recycle it into goods which can later be profited off of from the garbage it once was.
This is a common thing among countries because of it's many benefits. Buying, recycling, and selling garbage is not only profitable, but reduces the need to spend on new materials, which both saves money and preserves the environment.
Plastic waste that doesn't get picked up by any garbage truck will go rogue, riding the earth and wind until it finds it's way into the seas. After a while out at sea, the plastic waste is eventually drawn into one of the Earth's few trash islands. Piles of waste that have been accumulated over countless years and packed together due to the currents of the oceans.
The trash here is like a cancer for the ocean, and for any nearby fish. Birds and fish on opposite sides of the water, will both find themselves entangled within the plastic mess. Some sea creatures may even mistake the plastic for food, not only poisoning them, but their whole food chain from that point on.
When plastic products are discarded into waste bins, trucks will take all the garbage and dump them into landfills. More and more waste gets piled on and compressed, and after rain water works its ways in between the layers of trash, water particles absorbs some of the soluble compounds in the waste. Some of these compounds are very toxic, and the mixture of liquid filth can work its way into the soil, water ways and ponds, poisoning all things living in them.
Plastic bags, and all plastic products in general, began in refineries that chemically bonded oil and gas molecules. The result of this bond becomes polyethylene terephthalate, and when this product bonds enough to where it can be seen to the naked eye, we call it plastic. The plastic is then melted and put into moulds, to be made into bags, straws, bottles, anything you see on a store shelf.
Waste doesn't typically make its way into the environment itself. Garbage ending up all over the globe stems from things as grand as factories dumping excess material into huge landfills, and from things as little as people shooting and missing a garbage can. No matter how big or small, these ways accumulate to one great big cancer that is threatening our planets clean air and water supply, as well as our available material.
Leftover waste that ends up in our forests, fields and seas cause major harm to plants and animals alike. When litter of all kinds of materials such as plastics and metals get into our soil, it can outright poison it, preventing healthy crops to grow.
When this waste ends up in our seas, it upsets the fish and plants; the genetic quality of sea life and simply the safety of drinking the water are all majorly impacted when we allow garbage to build up in our waters.
Old or broken electronics are still made up of valuable materials. Stores that sell electronics often allow you to give them back your old phones, laptops, etc. You can look around in your community for electronic pick up events where you can exchange your "junk" for money even. You can also go the extra mile and take apart your electronics yourself. A lot of phones and computers have bits of silver and gold you can take for yourself to sell.
It's important to remember to properly clean your electronics before sending them away. Be sure to properly erase all personal data for your own safety, then you're free to sell or send them somewhere to be recycled.
Old electronics aren't something everyone considers when throwing away or recycling junk since they're made up of so many materials. Because of this, the majority of electronic materials end up in landfills. Compared to the plastic waste, these kinds of garbage can contain ever more harmful metals like mercury or lead. Allowing these into our soils and waters could lead to devastating consequences on our environment.
Recycling is critical for a healthy globe. When we recycle, we're reducing the need to spend more money, and materials on new products. When we spend so much on new products, we're also emitting tons of waste and pollution to the waters, soil, and sky. Recycling is a way to save all these elements from major damage while saving our own resources.
In Ottawa, we have colour-coded bins for different kinds of waste. These bins include:
Black Bin: paper, cardboard
Blue Bin: plastics, glass
Green Bin: food scraps and other organic materials
In other cities like Vancouver, they have yellow bags for paper and grey bins for glass only; And in places like Montreal, you can even leave out tree branches as long as their a certain size.
A big reason a lot of cardboard or plastics don't get recycled is simply too much contamination, if a pizza box has to much residue on it's surfaces, recycling stations won't be able to salvage the cardboard itself. It's important to remember small things like rinsing out plastic bottles and such before recycling them. That way, they're more likely to be able to be turned into something new.
Recycling is simply taking different kinds of garbage and finding ways to salvage and repurpose those materials into new products. For instance, rather than throwing a plastic bottle into the garbage, you could throw it into a recycling bin. The plastic bottle could then be brought to a facility that can breakdown that bottle, and use it as material for clothing, or even into the roads we drive on.
Composting acts as an amazing way of recycling old organic materials. It helps maintain healthy soil. Left out food waste can actually emit greenhouse gases, and contribute to greater issues such as global warming. Composting acts as a small change that can stem across preventing various hazards while also finding a use for organic materials that wouldn't else have purpose.
Composting can be as simple as throwing a banana peel on a pile of dirt; but to compost more efficiently, you can leave a bin outside filled with soft dirt, to act as a base for everything else. After the dirt is placed, you can add all kinds of common materials. Food scraps are amazing, but things such as dried leaves, twigs, and even paper are great for the decomposers.
It's important to also include holes in the bottom of the bin, and place the bin over nice dirt. Eventually, decomposers like red worms will find their way in and begin to help out. Alternatively, you can just as easily buy and place your own decomposers.
Composting is a way we can turn our organic waste into a home and food source for plants to grow. When food is left outside in the soil, decomposers, like red worms for example, will break down the waste and feed off of it. The waste worms create from feeding off the food acts as a great environment for plants to eat and grow. Essentially, we are taking our old food and organic elements and re-purposing them to house other plants.
