Australia has been identified as one of the largest waste producers in the world. Though we do make an effort to recycle, we also produce an alarming amount of waste. Do you just toss rubbish into the bin and forget about it? You’re not alone, but we can do better than that. There’s a right way and a wrong way to manage rubbish.
10 Facts About Recycling & Rubbish
As a consumer, the best way for you to reduce your waste is to focus on sorting your rubbish carefully to ensure everything is disposed of or recycled properly. In addition to kerbside recycling, you can return certain items to stores, use container deposit schemes, or enlist the services of a professional rubbish removal company. The statistics and studies are clear; we have to take more responsibility for our waste.
- According to an ABC report, Australians send 67 million tonnes of rubbish to the landfill annually. Only 2% of that is converted to energy. That means the average person in Australia produces around 1.5 tonnes of rubbish each year. That’s about twice the rate of the population. To put that into perspective, one Australian family could pack a three-bedroom home with rubbish annually.
- With a ban on single-use plastic bags, Australia has made a massive impact. Only 3% of those were recycled, and eight million tonnes of plastic end up in the ocean annually.
- According to WWF, around a million seabirds die annually due to plastic being dumped in the ocean. That is a shocking statistic made worse by the fact we only recycle around 12% of the 3 million tonnes of plastic we blow through each year.
- Worldwide, around a third of all food is wasted. Australia has a massive food waste problem, with over 7 million tonnes being thrown away. That adds up to around $3,000 per household each year. While many citizens struggle to put food on the table, their peers are tossing it away without a second thought.
- Plastic bottles are one of the most commonly collected items each CleanUp Australia Day. Almost 400,000 million plastic bottles end up in the landfill, with just 36% reaching a recycling centre. Bottled water costs more by the litre than petrol so, there’s a massive and for the environment.
- Landfills are the biggest contributing factor to soil pollution. What’s worse is that around 80% of the rubbish slowly decomposing in our landfills could have been recycled.
- Plastic was built to last, and unfortunately, it does, which is what has led to it being one of the world’s most consistent polluters. 4% of the global oil supply goes to make plastics, and another 4% of oil goes into the refining process. We divert a lot of resources into producing a material that is destroying the earth.
- Waste management is expensive. The government budget for the next four years (from 2020/2021) has earmarked $249.6 million to domestic waste management.
- Things don’t decompose as quickly as a lot of people think they do. For example, something as innocent as orange peels can take six months to fully decompose, whereas an aluminium can take up to 100 years. A styrofoam cup can last forever, and a glass bottle can take a million years to decompose! It’s that type of statistic that you should use as motivation. Let it spur you on to recycle everything you bring into your home.
- Excluding the small amount of plastic annually incinerated, every single scrap of plastic produced still exists today in some shape or form. We keep making more of it, and it never leaves.
We are producing an alarming amount of waste in Australia, and though we are making efforts to reduce it, we can do a better job. Rubbish removal Sydney isn’t just about having a service come and remove rubbish from your home. It’s also about ensuring it’s properly separated and ends up in the correct recycling centre.
How Cheapest Load of Rubbish Can Help
If you want to remove rubbish responsibly, a professional rubbish removal service can help. Not only will a service like Cheapest Load of Rubbish dispose of your rubbish properly, but they will also deal with your recycling. With so many different materials and centres, it can be difficult to identify what items should go where. A rubbish removal company will sort all of that out for you.
Contact Cheapest Load of Rubbish, offering cheap rates and fast service! We will send one of our team to assess your load and provide you with a free onsite quote. If you’re happy with the price, we will remove the rubbish immediately! If you want us to reach you on the day, give us a call, and we can be with you in a matter of hours