Reducing My Carbon Footprint
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Tag Archives: waste
Waste (in tons) Per Person in Landfills by State in 2019
One major issue in today’s society is waste production and management. In recent years, there have been many concerns about a rise in pollution and global temperatures. Ocean acidification and air pollution are two direct results of improper waste management, and these have negative impacts on all of us, and many can lead to long-lasting health conditions and problems. As can be seen in the graph, Connecticut had the lowest per capita waste presence in landfills, with 8.7 tons of waste products in 2019. The next lowest state is Massachusetts, with 16.2 tons of waste byproduct in landfills. The trend continues increasing, with several states remaining in the 16-18 ton range. With regards to North Dakota, Maryland, South Dakota, and Vermont, and Maine, the per capita presence of waste in landfills in 2019 ranged from 20.3 to 21.9 tons, respectively. This is an alarming statistic, and the total gap between Connecticut and Maine is 13.2 tons.
Sources Cited:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/591862/least-waste-per-capita-in-us-landfills-by-major-state/
2 Charts That Relate to Sustainability
For this Blog assignment, I made 2 charts. The first chart is a scatter plot chart. The second chart is a line chart. I inserted the links to my charts at the bottom because I can’t figure out how to insert the charts on this blog post.
For the first chart, I found that the average family wastes 180 gallons of water per week. I got this from the link below. I took that number and multiplied it by 4 to find out how much they waste in a month. I multiplied the number of gallons wasted in a month and multiplied it by 2 then 3 then 4 all the way up to twelve to see how much water is wasted for each month in a year. My first chart shows how many gallons of water the average family wastes in a year.
https://www.epa.gov/watersense/statistics-and-facts#:~:text=Water%20Stats,gallons%20of%20water%20annually%20nationwide.
For my second chart, I found out how many pounds of food are wasted by the average American in one month. I got this number from the first link below. I multiplied 20 by 1, 2, 3, all the way up to 12 to find the amount of food wasted for each month.
https://www.5280.com/2016/10/how-much-food-are-you-wasting/#:~:text=The%20average%20American%20wastes%20around,wastes%20nine%20pounds%20per%20week.
Chart 1: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-jinw_hxVzHjQrjhTdICHVJsv8g13ahH0ajJmawfEXU/edit?usp=sharing
Chart 2: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qin9nFouNjJ76o2g7SPIu-Onwz_c8ffmmFuWSRN7rSc/edit?usp=sharing
Food Waste: A Major Problem
Often when we throw out leftovers, or walk through a grocery store with many unsold items set to expire the next day, we don’t think anything of it. To many people, food waste is just another part of life; however, it is actually a major problem which is growing every year. Wasted food is defined as food not used for its intended purpose; common examples include uneaten prepared food and plate waste. While some uneaten food is donated to feed people, much of it ends up in landfills. The amount of food wasted each year is great, as according to the EPA, “ about 63 million tons of wasted food were generated in the commercial, institutional, and residential sectors, with about 32 percent being managed by animal feed, bio-based materials/biochemical processing, codigestion/anaerobic digestion, composting, donation, land application, and sewer/wastewater treatment” in 2018. So, just how much food is 63 million tons? According to an estimate from The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in 2011, about ⅓ of all food produced for human consumption is wasted. Food waste is a large global issue and continues to be pervasive to today.
In order to combat the issue of food waste, there are some methods that can be employed in our day-to-day lives. For instance, to help quell food waste at home, you can pay extra attention to what you buy in the grocery store; do not buy in bulk unless you know you can consume all of the items before they go bad. Learn how to store produce correctly, so it lasts longer and less food has to be thrown away. Plan what you are going to eat during the week before you go shopping, so none of your food goes to waste. If we all try to employ these habits in our daily lives and are a little more conscious when it comes to food waste, we can help to minimize a major sustainability issue.
https://www.epa.gov/sustainable-management-food/sustainable-management-food-basics
https://www.epa.gov/recycle/preventing-wasted-food-home
Holy Cow that’s a lot of water
For this blog I decided to pick a cow as my live stock of focus because my home in Western Massachusetts resides in an area where dairy farms are incredibly prominent. When thinking about livestock such as cows and cattle, one may often think about how much they can provide for us but not often do we think about what farmers need to provide for them, ie, water. A healthy, non milking cow drinks somewhere between 9-12 gallons a day, while a healthy lactating cow drinks roughly triple that in 30-40 gallons a day. Holy cow that is a lot of water. The average human with access to clean water drinks about 3.7 liters a day which is about just under one gallon.
When thinking about water waste, my mind tends to travel to some very simple yet day to day things. Such as long showers or leaving the water running while brushing your teeth but something that strikes me is what I found in regards to food waste. Water is needed to produce basically everything that we eat and drink, therefore if we waste less as humanity, we save more water by having to produce less. In the United Kingdom, roughly 7 million tonnes of food and drink are thrown away each year with nearly 3.5 million tonnes of that still being edible. That is almost 50% less production that would need to occur saving billions of gallons of water.
The main reason that bottled water is so popular is due to its convenience. You can take it wherever you go and it is sold often in large packages. People also tend to have a discomfort with tap water being good to drink more-so than they do with bottled water. If you say there are 2,000 students at Union College, I would estimate that there is somewhere around 250 water bottles used each day. I imagine roughly 12.5% of the community drinks and recycles (hopefully) at least one bottle a day. This is based off of nearly 20% of Americans using a plastic bottle each day and Union students are far more environmentally cautious than the average American.
https://friendsoftheearth.uk/sustainable-living/13-best-ways-save-water
https://www.plasticsoupfoundation.org/en/2017/07/the-worlds-population-consumes-1-million-plastic-bottles-every-minute/
Water Waste and How to Combat it
When people consider waste in regards to sustainability, they often consider physical garbage far before they consider water waste. Water waste, however, is a major sustainability issue as, even though it doesn’t take the water out of the water cycle, but instead removes the water from being accessible and usable by humans. It is also wasteful since it overly expends the energy used to deliver the water, such as in the overuse of the dishwasher or washing machine. On the whole, water waste could lead to humans having less usable water readily available and can also take such water away from the environment. As per the DOH, the average person wastes 30 gallons of water every day; some of this waste is due to human tasks, such as overly long showers and leaving faucets on while they are not being used. Other reasons for water waste include issues such as unrepaired household leaks. According to the EPA, the average household can waste 180 gallons of water a week from household leaks alone, which is 9,200 gallons of water wasted every year. While this waste is very common, there are many methods that people can implement in their day to day life to combat this issue. First and foremost would be to check their households for the aforementioned leaks and have them repaired to prevent any further issue. Other simple tasks include turning off the tap when brushing teeth, which would save 8 gallons of water a day, and therefore 2,290 gallons of water a year. One last common occurrence that would save water in the average household is running the dishwasher only when completely full; this alone would save 320 gallons of water per household per year. Water waste is a common, overlooked issue, but by changing the way we implement some household tasks, we can save many gallons of water from being wasted every year.
https://www.epa.gov/watersense/how-we-use-water
