How ‘Trashy’ is the United States

June 22, 2010 4:40 pm admin Trash Stats

According to the EPA, the US has around 3,091 active landfills and over 10,000 old municipal landfills. What’s worse, 82% of surveyed landfill cells had leaks and 41% had a leak area of more than 1 square foot.  The reality is that Americans generate a LOT of trash and this trash is capable generating a LOT of problems. Here are some stats to give you an idea of where we stand today:

  • The average person creates 4.39 lbs of trash per day and up to 56 tons of trash per year.
  • Only about one-tenth of all solid garbage in the US gets recycled
  • Every year we fill enough garbage trucks to form a line that would stretch from the earth halfway to the moon (63,000 trucks per day)
  • Americans throw away 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour.

So, we make a lot of trash. What do we do with it all? Here are some disturbing landfill stats:

  • Only 2 manmade structures on earth are large enough to be seen from space: the Great Wall of China and the Fresh Kills Landfill (which is now a recreational park)
  • Barges deliver over 14,000 tons of NYC trash to landfills every day

Thankfully, recycling efforts are greatly improving and massive amounts of municipal solid waste are being removed before reaching landfills to be recycled. While there is still a lot of room for improvement, Americans are doing an overall good job recycling from their homes. For more information on US waste and recycling, visit the official site of the US Environmental Protection Agency.

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