What becomes of landfills after their use as a landfill is exhausted?
In terms of land development, greenfields are areas that haven't been
previously developed, like farmland.
Brownfields are usually areas that have been
contaminated to some degree by industrial activity and aren't necessarily
suitable for residential or agricultural use, but can be redeveloped for
commercial or industrial use.
By redeveloping old landfill sites, and any other brownfield site,
greenfields are saved. On a local level this sometimes does not seem to
be an issue, but not using this
space means using greenfields for development of residential and
industrial areas and losing several acres of nature.
Have you found yourself wondering, “If I recycle a plastic bottle...does it go to make new plastic bottles?” or “What could possibly be made from recycled glass?” You are not alone. Recycling is one of those “blind processes” that we know happens, but it happens behind the scenes.
Let me reassure you, however, that the vast majority of your clean recyclables taken or sent to Recycling Works are processed and sent to the world market for reuse...sometimes as other things.
It wouldn’t be as beneficial to talk about recycling if we didn’t add in information and discussion on topics that round out the concept of recycling. Conservation and preservation of our natural resources remains of equal importance. For our purposes today, and along the lines of conservation, I’d like to discuss water conservation.
Even though we are a recycling company, we don’t only recycle. Our main goal is to conserve and preserve all of our natural resources while continuing to reduce the amount of waste in the landfill, reuse the items and materials that we can, and recycle the ones we can’t. Sound familiar? It may be a little cliche, but certainly right on the money.
The term “recycling” conjures up thoughts of aluminum, plastic, glass, and paper. A recyclable commodity that may get overlooked is wood.
Wood recycling, consisting both of raw wood and used wood products, as well as paper, and has become more of a focus in the past decade. We don’t normally think of recycling a natural, renewable resource, but considering the staggering statistics, it is more than necessary.
Management of solid waste in one way or another is one of the major challenges in the world. Inadequate collection, recycling or treatment processes and uncontrolled disposal of waste in dumps lead to hazards such as health risks and environmental pollution.
This situation is especially serious in Developing Countries where inadequate waste disposal can be very dangerous for environment and human health. Sanitary landfills are not popular in third world countries even though more than 80% of the Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) generated is dumped into open dump yards. In some Third World or Developing countries, as much as half of the MSW generated isn't disposed of properly or collected at all. Instead, it is often left in yards or on streets.
Historically, the phrase “The 3 Rs” meant Reading, wRiting, and aRithmetic. The basis on which all other schoolwork, and life for that matter, was going to be based.
In more recent years the 3 Rs became the 4 Rs as awareness and emphasis on recycling, preservation, and conservation grew. Not to say, however that the original basis doesn’t still hold some validity. Reading, writing, and math are still stressed in school systems, as well they should be.
As the 4Rs make their debut in the everyday language of Americans, “they are commonly summarized as... reduction, reuse, recycling and recovery."
Solar energy is a vital part of life. It was the first source of energy in the world; used even before humans knew how to start a fire. It lights the Earth, provides heat, helps to grow crops, influences weather patterns, and is used to produce solar electricity. Without solar energy, life could not be supported on Earth; on land or at sea.
Solar is the first energy source in the world. It was in use much earlier before humans even learn how to light a fire.
Solar electricity differs from solar energy in that solar electricity has to be harnessed and converted into energy by relying on man-made devices, such as solar panels or solar cells in order to provide the clean, harmless, low-cost, renewable energy that is available to us every single day.
Water as a source of power and energy it not a new concept. The use of water current to accomplish such tasks as grinding grain at a mill dates back hundreds of years.
Power from water, called hydro power or hydroelectric power, is yet another renewable source of energy. Since water is about 800 times denser than air, even a slow flowing stream of water can yield considerable amounts of energy.
Container deposit laws, also popularly termed "Bottle Bills", were created by the beverage industry as a means of guaranteeing the return of their containers to be processed, refilled and resold. The deposit-refund system is a proven, sustainable method of capturing beverage bottles and cans for recycling and is a very simple process.
When a retailer buys beverages from a distributor, a deposit is paid for each can or bottle purchased. The consumer then pays the deposit to the retailer when they buy the beverage. When the consumer returns the empty beverage container to the retail store, a redemption center, or to a reverse vending machine, the deposit is refunded. The retailer recoups the deposit from the distributor, plus an additional handling fee generally ranging from $0.01 to $0.03 to cover costs incurred by the retailer.
