Americans throw away enough garbage every day to fill 63,000 garbage trucks, which if lined up end to end for an entire year would stretch half way to the moon.

In a lifetime, the average American will personally throw away 600 times his or her body weight, which for an average adult would leave a legacy of 90,000 pounds of trash at the end of their lifetime.

Of the garbage Americans throw out, half could be recycled, which is enough to fill a football stadium from top to bottom every day.

Of these recyclables, Americans throw away enough aluminum to rebuild the entire commercial air fleet every three months, enough steel to reconstruct Manhattan, and enough wood to heat 5 million homes for 200 years.

U.S. waste disposal costs exceed $100 billion annually.

One ton of recycled Aluminum saves 14,000 kWh of electricity, 1,663 gallons of oil, 237.6 million Btu’s of energy, and 10 cubic yards of landfill space.

Aluminum takes 200-500 years to fully degrade in a landfill.

Recycling aluminum takes 95% less energy than making aluminum from raw materials.

Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a TV for three hours.

There is no limit to the number of times aluminum cans be recycled.

Recycled aluminum can be returned to store shelves in as little as 60 days.

About 120,000 aluminum cans are recycled every minute nationwide.

One ton of recycled glass saves 42 kWh of electricity, 5 gallons of oil, 714.3 Btu’s of energy, 2 cubic yards of landfill space, 7.5 pounds of air pollutants from being released, 1,330 pounds of sand, 433 pounds of soda ash, 433 pounds of limestone, and 151 pounds of feldspar.

Glass takes 1,000,000 years to fully degrade in a landfill.

Recycling glass takes 30% of the energy required to produce glass from raw materials.

The United States throws away enough glass every week to fill a 1,350-foot building.

Recycling one glass bottle saves enough energy to light a 100-watt lightbulb for four hours.

Glass never wears out and can be recycled forever.

One ton of recycled plastic saves 5,774 kWh of electricity, 685 gallons of oil, 98 million Btu’s of energy, and 30 cubic yards of landfill space.

Plastic takes up to 1,000 years to degrade in a landfill.

Recycling plastic takes 88% less energy than making plastic from raw materials.

Enough plastic is thrown away each year to circle the Earth four times.

Americans throw away 35 billion plastic bottles every year.

Only about 25% of the plastic produced in the U.S. is recycled.

If we recycled the other 75% we could save 1 billion gallons of oil and 44 million cubic yards of landfill space annually.

Using aluminum or glass containers is always preferable over plastic.

A plastic bottle of drinking water contains on average 4 cents worth of water.

By using reusable drink containers an average person can eliminate the need for 100 disposable bottles per year.

One ton of recycled paper saves 4,100 kWh of electricity, 380 gallons of oil, 54 million Btu’s of energy, 4.6 cubic yards of landfill space, 7,000 gallons of water, and 17 trees

Recycling paper takes 60% less energy than making paper form raw materials.  It also creates 74% less air pollution and 35% less water pollution.

Americans throw away 4.5 million tons of office paper each year.  That’s enough to build a wall of paper 12 feet high from New York to Los Angeles.

Every Sunday, 500,000 trees are used to produce the 88% of newspapers that are never recycled.

One ton of recycled cardboard saves 390 kWh hours of electricity, 46 gallons of oil, 6.6 million Btu’s of energy, and 9 cubic yards of landfill space.

Cardboard and paper waste make up 41% of the municipal solid waste stream.

Recycling cardboard takes 24% less energy and produces 50% less sulfur dioxide than making cardboard from raw materials.