1. What is planned obsolescence?

2. Solid Waste
aka garbage

3. Wasting Resources United States 4.6% of the world's population
OBJ 24.1
Wasting Resources
United States
4.6% of the world's population
33% of the world's solid waste
75% of its hazardous waste

4. OBJ 24.3
Municipal Solid Waste
MSW—more commonly known as trash or garbage—consists of everyday items
Product packaging
Grass clippings
Furniture
Clothing
Bottles & bottle caps
Food scraps
Newspapers
Appliances
Paint
Batteries
Plastic bags
25% is recycled
54% is buried
21% is burned

5. MSW
U.S. approximately 4.5 pounds of waste per person per day (1680 pounds/year)
Up from 2.7 pounds per person per day in 1960
Compare to
Canada (1.79 lbs/person/day)
Norway (2.3 lbs/person/day)
Japan (2.58 lbs/person/day)
Australia (2.70 lbs/person/day)
China (0.7 lbs/person/day)

6. Electronic Waste: A Growing Problem
E-waste consists of toxic and hazardous waste such as PVC, lead, mercury, and cadmium.
The U.S. produces almost half of the world's e-waste but only recycles about 10% of it.
Figure 22-4

7. BURNING AND BURYING SOLID WASTE
Globally, MSW is burned in over 1,000 large waste-to-energy incinerators
These boil water to make steam for heating water, or space, or for production of electricity.
Japan and a few European countries incinerate most of their MSW.

8. Burning Solid Waste
Waste-to-energy incinerator with pollution controls that burns mixed solid waste.
Figure 22-10

9. Burying Solid Waste
Most of the world’s MSW is buried in landfills that eventually are expected to leak toxic liquids into the soil and underlying aquifers.
Open dumps
Sanitary landfills
Open dumps: are fields or holes in the ground where garbage is deposited and sometimes covered with soil. Mostly used in developing countries.
Sanitary landfills: solid wastes are spread out in thin layers, compacted and covered daily with a fresh layer of clay or plastic foam.

10. Pipes collect explosive methane as used as fuel
When landfill is full,
layers of soil and clay
seal in trash
Topsoil
Electricity
generator
building
Sand
Clay
Methane storage
and compressor
building
Leachate
treatment system
Garbage
Probes to
detect
methane
leaks
Pipes collect explosive methane as used as fuel
to generate electricity
Methane gas
recovery well
Leachate
storage
tank
Compacted
solid waste
Figure 22.12
Solutions: state-of-the-art sanitary landfill, which is designed to eliminate or minimize environmental problems that plague older landfills. Even these landfills are expected to leak eventually, passing both the effects of contamination and cleanup costs on to future generations. Since 1997, only modern sanitary landfills are allowed in the United States. As a result, many older and small landfills have been closed and replaced with larger local and regional modern landfills.
Federal requirements:
Location restrictions ensure that landfills are built in suitable geological areas away from faults, wetlands, flood plains, or other restricted areas
Liners are usually plastic sheets reinforced with two feet of clay on the bottom and sides of landfills
Garbage
Groundwater
monitoring
well
Leachate
pipes
Leachate pumped
up to storage tank
for safe disposal
Sand
Synthetic
liner
Leachate
monitoring
well
Sand
Clay and plastic lining
to prevent leaks; pipes
collect leachate from
bottom of landfill
Groundwater
Clay
Subsoil
Fig , p. 532

11. Not everything stays in or makes it to landfills

12. Solutions: Reducing Solid Waste
Refuse: to buy items that we really don’t need or to take a bag when we don’t need one.
Reduce: consume less and live a simpler and less stressful life by practicing simplicity.
Reuse: rely more on items that can be used over and over.
Repurpose: use something for another purpose instead of throwing it away.
Recycle: paper, glass, cans, plastics…and buy items made from recycled materials.

13. OBJ 24.5
Source Reduction
Source reduction (waste prevention) means consuming and throwing away less
Purchasing durable, long-lasting goods
Seeking products and packaging that are as free of toxins as possible

14. Source Reduction Example
Since 1977, the weight of 2-liter plastic soft drink bottles has been reduced from 68 grams each to 51 grams
That means that 250 million pounds of plastic per year has been kept out of the waste stream 14

15. REDUCE & RECYCLE
Reducing resource waste: energy consumption for different types of 350-ml (12-oz) beverage containers.
Figure 22-7

16. RECYCLING
Primary (closed loop) recycling: materials are turned into new products of the same type.
Secondary recycling: materials are converted into different products.
Used tires: shredded and converted into rubberized road surface.
Newspapers: transformed into cellulose insulation.
START HERE

17. RECYCLING
Recycling paper has a number of environmental (reduction in pollution and deforestation, 64% less energy expenditure) and economic benefits and is easy to do.
Recycling many plastics is chemically and economically difficult. Sometimes it is reffered to as down-cycling
Many plastics are hard to isolate from other wastes.
Recovering individual plastic resins does not yield much material.
The cost of virgin plastic resins is lower than recycled resins due to low fossil fuel costs.
There are new technologies that are making plastics biodegradable.

18. Metal & glass recycling
Americans use over 100 million steel cans and over 200 million aluminum beverage cans every day
Recycling aluminum takes 5% of the energy it takes to make new aluminum
Approximately 30% of the aluminum used in the US for consumer products is recycled
Every metric ton of waste glass recycled into new items saves 315 additional kilograms of carbon dioxide from being released into the atmosphere during the creation of new glass

21. 21

22. There are many benefits to recycling
Prevents the emission of many greenhouse gases and water pollutants
Saves energy, supplies valuable raw materials to industry
Creates jobs
Stimulates the development of greener technologies
Conserves resources for our children’s future
Reduces the need for new landfills and combustors
Reduce greenhouse gas emissions that affect global climate
In 1996, prevented the release of 33 million tons of carbon into the air—roughly the amount emitted annually by 25 million cars.

23. Composting Benefits? Keeps organic wastes out of landfills
Provides nutrients to the soil
Increases beneficial soil organisms (e.g., worms and centipedes)
Reduces the need for fertilizers and pesticides
Protects soils from erosion

24. INTEGRATED WASTE MANAGEMENT
We can manage the solid wastes we produce and reduce or prevent their production.
Figure 22-5