Save the Environment by Recycling your Papers
With paper comprising up to 40% of the municipal solid waste stream, paper recycling is an obvious and easy way to reduce waste in the workplace. Just by doing the simple task of recycling paper and using recycled paper, trees are spared — every ton of paper made from paper recyling saves approximately 17 trees. Cutting down carbon-absorbing trees contributes to global warming, soil erosion, habitat destruction, and other environmental problems. Paper recycling also makes good business sense — company disposal costs can dramatically decrease with the advent of a paper recycling program.
Reprocessing can turn recycled paper into other paper products numerous times before the paper fibers are too weak to use. White office paper retains much of its value and goes into products such as tissue, paperboard, stationery, magazines, new office paper, and various other paper products. Mixed paper, which includes glossy and colored paper, envelopes, and sticky notes, is less valuable than white paper but also can be recycled into various products. Newsprint and corrugated cardboard can find new lives as the same or similar products. White ledger paper, computer paper, corrugated cardboard, newspaper, paper packaging, envelopes, and other mixed papers can be recycled in most areas.
There is no reason not to use recycled papers. They print as well as virgin papers, work well on laser printers, and can divert millions of pounds of printed waste away from the landfills and back into the mainstream.
Recycled papers save our valuable natural resources, save energy, save our trees, create less toxic bi-products, and help our over-crowded landfills.
Using 100% post-consumer recycled papers and less bleaching agents also means less chlorine and that is the next major issue to creating a healthier atmosphere to live in. Chlorine causes Dioxin which, when mixed with other compounds, causes cancer. What is that cost to our medical bills and to ourselves?
Buy recycled paper and print on both sides. When using paper in the office, print on both sides of the sheet and recycle the paper when you are finished. By recycling one ton of paper, you can save 17 trees, almost 7,000 gallons of water and more than three cubic yards of landfill space.
Let us go into some techniques to recycle!
Make recycling bins readily available; make sure your home and office have a recycling bin that is just for papers! Keep them out in the open and label them properly!
Recycle your empty ink and toner cartridges. Almost eight cartridges are thrown out in the United States every second of every day. That’s almost 700,000 cartridges per day.
Look for recycled products for when you buy things Do not take a plastic bag home from the supermarket but take a trolley or a own bag with you.
Recycle your old newspapers!
Reuse your morning coffee cup!
We need to address these issues more actively. Our waters are polluted, our air is contaminated, and our landfills are so clogged that we have to send our waste downstream. Let’s wake up, and do something about the problem, buy recycled paper now, before it’s too late. So do follow some of the recycling techniques that I have suggested to have a better place to live in!
