Why Recycling Matters
Fast Facts
Recycling is the easiest thing we all can do 365 days a year to
save energy, conserve natural resources and create green jobs.
Why it matters to [Insert school name]
Insert three bullets with facts about the impact of your campus recycling program or your City’s recycling program.
 Bullet #1
 Bullet #2
 Bullet #3
National Snapshot
Aluminum
Recycling is a multibillion-dollar industry
that employs millions of Americans and
helps advance our clean energy economy.
It takes 95% less energy to make a can from recycled
aluminum, than from raw materials. The amount of
energy saved from recycling cans in 2010 equals the
energy equivalent of nearly two days of all U.S. oil
imports.1
Our national recycling rate of 34 percent:
— Saves the energy equivalent of
nearly 229 million barrels of crude oil
or nearly 20 days of all U.S. oil imports.
— Saves Americans the equivalent of
the annual energy consumption of
nearly 14 million US households per
year.
— Avoids greenhouse gas (GHG)
emissions equivalent to removing more
than 36 million cars from the road
each year, or growing nearly 5 billion
tree seedling for ten years.
Glass
A glass container can go from a recycling bin to a
store shelf in as little as 30 days. An estimated 80
percent of recovered glass containers are made into
new glass bottles.2
Paper
In 2010, the amount of paper recovered for
recycling averaged 334 pounds for each man,
woman and child in the United States.3
Plastic
The amount of plastic bottles recycled in 2010
provided the raw material needed to make about 7
million extra large t-shirts. 4
Steel
Recycling steel saves 75 percent of the energy that
would be used to create steel purely from raw
materials. 5
1 Source: Aluminum Association 2 Source: Glass Packaging Institute 3 Source: America Forest & Paper Association 4 Source: NAPCOR and
American Chemistry Council 5 Source: Steel Recycling Institute
Nationwide over 855 million pounds of bags and film were recycled in 2009—up 31 percent from 2005.
A 2011 study found that 6.5% of the used plastics generated in the U.S. are recycled, 7.7% are combusted with
energy recovery, and the remaining 85.8% are landfilled. The non-recycled plastics contain enough energy potential
to power 5.2 million homes each year.
-study sponsored by the American Chemistry Council (ACC), conducted by the Earth Engineering Center (EEC) of
Columbia University,
Recycling 20 PET bottles yields enough fiber to make an extra large t-shirt. (NAPCOR)
The amount of plastic bottles recycled in 2010 provided enough raw material to make
about 7 million extra large t-shirts.
(NAPCOR, American Chemistry Council data, http://www.napcor.com/PET/funfacts.html,
http://plastics.americanchemistry.com/Education-Resources/Publications/2010-United-States-National-Postconsumer-Plastic-BottleRecycling-Report.PDF, and KAB calculations)
2.579 billion pounds recycled/18, 16 oz bottles per pound (ACC)
=138,888,888.89 bottles/20 PET bottles per shirt (NAPCOR,
http://www.napcor.com/PET/funfacts.html)
=7,163,888.88 shirts
Americans recycled nearly twice as many tons of plastic bags and film in 2010 (450,000
tons) than we recycled in 2005 (230,000 tons).
(http://www.epa.gov/osw/nonhaz/municipal/pubs/2010_MSW_Tables_and_Figures_508.pdf)
1 Source: Aluminum Association 2 Source: Glass Packaging Institute 3 Source: America Forest & Paper Association 4 Source: NAPCOR and
American Chemistry Council 5 Source: Steel Recycling Institute