Why is Recycling Important?

Our Website was made to educate people in our society to learn how to recycle

This app is an app that shows you if an item is recyclable or not. Repsychology was developed by Pranava Parasa, Nikhil Pillai, Aayush Bhat, Bill Xiang, and Aditya Sharma. The EPA estimates that 75% of the American waste stream is recyclable, but we only recycle about 30% of it, and we wanted to do something about it, so we made this app.

In today’s electronic age, people are starting to consider going paperless. But there’s still a long way to go before we lose our dependence on this very important human product. From our newspapers to our paper wrappings, paper is still everywhere and most of them are ending up in our landfills creating a staggering amount of paper waste. There was a time when paper was a rare and precious commodity. Now it fills our planet. It was initially invented as a tool for communication, but today, paper is used more for packaging. To produce paper takes twice the energy used to produce a plastic bag. Everything takes energy to produce. In the case of paper, it also involves cutting down trees. Deforestation is one of the main environmental problems we’re facing in these times. 42% of all global wood harvest is used to make paper. Is it really worth it to cut down our life saving trees for this product? Let us share with you these interesting paper waste facts. We are so used to seeing products in their completed form that we seldom think of how they are made and what happens after we dispose of them.

Facts about Paper and Paper Waste

1. More than 199 tons of paper has already been produced.
2. 324 liters of water is used to make 1 kilogram of paper.
3. 10 liters of water is needed to make one piece of A4 paper.
4. 93% of paper comes from trees.
5. 50% of the waste of businesses is composed of paper.
6. To print a Sunday edition of the New York Times requires 75,000 trees!
7. Recycling 1 ton of paper saves around 682.5 gallons of oil, 26,500 liters of water and 17 trees.
8. Packaging makes up 1/3 or more of our trash.
9. U.S offices use 12.1 trillion sheets of paper a year.
10. Paper accounts for 25% of landfill waste and 33% of municipal waste.
11. With all the paper we waste each year, we can build a 12 foot high wall of paper from New York to California!
12. Lessening of paper usage was predicted due to the electronic revolution. It didn’t happen. Demand for paper is expected to double before 2030.
13. Every tree produces enough oxygen for 3 people to breathe.

Expanding on the topic of protecting the environment, recycling is recognized as the third part of the three Rs waste hierarchy, where one takes steps before even disposal, by the processes of reducing and reusing. Reducing means to take action to reduce the amount of waste that a household or factory may produce. Reusing encompasses making the most efficient use of recovered materials. Participating in all three steps is representative of the bigger picture in environmental protection.

Recycling is the process of converting waste materials into new materials and objects. It is an alternative to "conventional" waste disposal that can save material and help lower greenhouse gas emissions (compared to plastic production,[1][2] for example). Recycling can prevent the waste of potentially useful materials and reduce the consumption of fresh raw materials, thereby reducing: energy usage, air pollution (from incineration), and water pollution (from landfilling).

Recycling is a key component of modern waste reduction and is the third component of the "Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle" waste hierarchy.

Recycling is the process of collecting and processing materials that would otherwise be thrown away as trash and turning them into new products. Recycling can benefit your community and the environment.

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